To dine, or not to dine?
New York Times puzzlemaster brings fine dining to Mt. Airy

by LEN LEAR

To dine or not to dine; that is the question.
Whether to suffer the heartburn and heartache
of outrageously overpriced restaurants,
Or to take arms against a sea of undercooked
fish and, by refusing to eat them,
end the pretentious ripoffs.
(With apologies to William Shakespeare)

*****

Shrimp and scallop dumplings, pan-seared and served with a soy and fig sauce. (Photo by Jimmy J. Pack Jr.)

Like me, you may be mystified and frustrated by the New York Times crossword puzzles, but it is no puzzle at all to figure out why Hamlet Bistro, which opened May 21 at 7105 Emlen St. in West Mt. Airy, is already being received by diners in Mt. Airy and Chestnut Hill as warmly as a puppy in an elementary school class.

The charming storefront BYOB, which formerly housed the Rinker Rock Cafe, is serving up the kind of aesthetically presented, upscale cuisine you’d expect to find at the Walnut Street/Rittenhouse Row temples of gastronomy, but at about half the price and minus the $50 to $100 bottles of wine.

And this is not just press release fluff. Chef Raul Schmalzbach, 37, who graduated from the Restaurant School of Philadelphia in 1990, has cooked in some of the area’s most celebrated kitchens, such as the Four Seasons, Striped Bass, Rittenhouse Hotel and Deux Cheminees. He is used to making no mis-steaks.

(The earlier reference to the New York Times crossword puzzles relates to Raul’s brother, Jonathan Schmalzbach, 44, co-owner of Hamlet Bistro, who has also been a freelance crossword puzzle writer for the New York Times for the past 10 years. About 75 percent of the puzzles he has submitted have been accepted by the Times puzzle editor Will Shortz, more than 40 in all. Each one takes Jonathan about eight to 10 hours to create, for which he is paid the princely sum of $75.)

“It was part of our plan,” explained Jonathan, who’s a sparkplug, not a blasting cap, “to have a little neighborhood place where everybody knows each other and to surprise people with the quality of the food. We wanted a place close to our home (in Mt. Airy) with great food, but affordable. At first we looked at locations on Germantown Avenue, but the rents were too high. Here we just have 30 seats, but we will also have tables on the sidewalk, and we expect to do ‘two turns’ on weekend nights (two parties dining at each table in the course of the evening).”

Bibb and warm goat cheese salad, dressed in a citrus vinaigrette. (Photo by Jimmy J. Pack Jr.)

The name Hamlet Bistro was conceived by Raul and Jon for two reasons: first, because “Mt. Airy feels like a hamlet, a small town, in the city,” and secondly, because Jon is a member of the Philadelphia Shakespeare Society, the oldest Shakespeare Society in the country. It even pre-dates any in England, having been started in the 19th century.

Since 1995 Jon has also run a non-profit organization called the Independence Hall Association, which is dedicated to telling the story of Philadelphia colonial history. You might say their web site, USHistory.org, is high on saturated facts. It gets millions of hits every month and offers a wealth of information about the Revolutionary War, Valley Forge National Historic Park, Betsy Ross House, Philadelphia historical oddities, etc., much of which was written by Jonathan.

“I came to this part of the city to write information about Germantown history,” explained Jon, a New Jersey native, “and I just fell in love with the area.”

Jonathan’s wife, Janis, 50, editor-in-chief for Kappa Publishing in Blue Bell, the world’s largest publisher of crossword puzzle magazines (20 per week), also helps out in the restaurant. The two puzzle-philes had an eight-letter word for marriage ceremony (“nuptials”) last October. Janis has two children from a former marriage, and she and Jon are currently in the process of adopting a child from China, which is expected to be finalized next January when the child is 14 months old.

Crab and asparagus pasta dressed in bow ties and finished with a roasted
garlic-wine sauce. (Photo by Jimmy J. Pack Jr.)

“I had a house in Wyndmoor, and Jon had a house in Northern Liberties,” explained Janis, who grew up in New Haven, Connecticut, “but we wanted a real community we could embrace, and Mt. Airy is the nicest community. We’d go to yard sales here and get in great conversations with people. We live on Quincy Street, and it’s a very welcoming neighborhood, exactly what we wanted. We love going to ‘flamingo parties.’ If you stick a flamingo on your lawn, it means you are hosting the party in the next month.”

When we had dinner at Hamlet Bistro last Thursday night, every table was occupied by 7:30, and pedestrians were stopping in all evening to take out paper menus and ask questions of the owners. As is typical of Mt. Airy, the customers represented a mix of ages, races and sexual orientations. “People have been fantastic,” exclaimed Janis. “We’ve already had repeat customers.”

‘We loved the food here,” said customer, Leslie Daniels, of Chestnut Hill. “It’s great to have a casual, fine dining place just five minutes from our home. We will definitely be coming back and bringing friends.”

Chef Raul should be able to turn out the dinners at Hamlet Bistro as easily as falling out of bed since his specialty at the Rittenhouse Hotel, where he worked for seven years, was preparing food for events of more than 500 people. “We did a lot of events,” said Raul, “but then I burned out and had disagreements with (executive chef) Jim Coleman.

“Then I worked at a small place in South Philly named August. The two women who ran it were wonderful. I definitely learned how to operate in a small kitchen and always keep my eye on the bottom line. That has come in handy here ... My dogs (a 5-year-old beagle and a 4-year-old daschund/shepherd) also love this area because there are so many green spaces, which we did not have in center city.”

The amazing appetizer of spinach and mushroom pancakes — light chickpea pancakes stuffed with spinach, shiitake mushrooms and creamy goat cheese — is both yummy and a great bargain at $7. (Photo by Jimmy J. Pack Jr.)

Some of the items currently on the menu, which elicited oohs and aahs from our table and others, are the shrimp and scallop dumplings, pan-seared and served with a sublime soy and fig sauce ($8); spinach and mushroom pancakes with shiitake mushrooms and creamy goat cheese ($7); and entrees such as the pecan-crusted tilapia served over roasted corn, tomato and cauliflower and bathed in a fennel and orange vinaigrette ($16); and crab and asparagus pasta with herbs and shiitake mushrooms, finished with a roasted garlic-wine sauce ($17). Desserts, made by a woman in Schwenksville named Kim Shellenberger, are divine, especially the cheesecake with fresh cinnamon and the hazelnut apricot torte ($6 each).

Hamlet Bistro has track lighting, bare hardwood floors, linen cloths on the tables, pottery from the Schmalzbachs’ home and paintings on the wall by Ed Adler, who has taught at the Sorbonne in Paris, lectured at universities and exhibited at galleries and museums around the country.

Hamlet Bistro is now open for dinner every evening but Sunday and Monday, as well as for Sunday brunch. They expect to begin lunch service in the fall. They take reservations, but they will not hold them for long because of limited space. For more information, call 215-247-5800 or visit www.hamletbistro.com.