Philadelphia Weekly

There's a girl sitting next to me at the bar at Dock Street Brewery. She's dirty blond and pasty-faced, an American Apparel ad come to life. She says she's just moved here, fresh from Boston, and the fiercely proud Philadelphian inside me whoops with glee. I almost choke on Dock Street's spicy Winter Warmer ale, fragrant drops of vanilla and cinnamon invading my windpipe.

This is only Miss Boston's second night. Renting around the corner, she stumbled across Dock Street Brewery last night, and instantly this cavernous converted 1903 firehouse became her corner bar, something familiar in an unfamiliar city. Even though they don't serve Sam Adams.

Dock Street has become a local haunt for many, an impressive feat for a spot way outside the University City safety net. Here, Wharton MBAs and USP pharmacists-in-training rub elbows with West Philadelphians born and raised. Differences dissipate over flowery IPA and pizzas that bubble like marinara tarpits. Unfortunately, this neighborhoody aura is the best thing Dock Street is serving. It ain't the food, which is occasionally delicious but often disappointing.

Dock Street co-founder Rosemarie Certo--who also used to own nearby Pizza Rustica--has wisely made pizza the focus, featuring 18 pies (plus five calzones) hand-thrown to 10 or 16 inches. For beer, there's no better mate. Human relationships might let you down, but pies and suds are there to remind you true love does exist.

Made with stone-ground flour, pizzas are fired in a gape-mouthed monster of an oven. It hungrily gobbles up firewood stacked on the eroded concrete floor. Stoked by spacey student kitchen workers in flannel and gunmetal denim, the oven is a fickle beast, turning out pies more flaccid than a Shady Acres canasta tournament alongside the crisp and snappy.

The barbecue chicken pizza is sweet and tangy, but the promiscuous pie sheds its top faster than a Tri-Delt after some white zin, as does the margherita, which is more like a standard cheese than a fresh caprese trio. It doesn't help that the pizzas at Dock Street take so looong, the oven's bready aroma evilly amplifying your hunger and making the sorry pies that much more disappointing.

But when they're good--oh man, they're good. Crisp as a saltine cracker, toppings that defy gravity, crust that leaves sooty black smudges on the fingers. The sausage calzone, oozing tomatoey magma bolstered with stewed peppers and onions, is rich and robust. The veneto pizza is a creamy dream of fontina, ricotta, creme fraiche, spinach and sun-dried tomatoes.

Miss Boston speaks highly of the flammenkuche. It's a breakfasty blue-veined canvas of gorgonzola mined with applewood bacon.

The burger, a charbroiled beef stud on a sesame-seed pillow, is totally respectable. Fries or salad accompany. I ask for the latter but receive the former--cool, undercooked and screaming for salt. The same sorry spuds make up half the fish and chips, the other half being two bland fried Pollock fillets. On a different visit, though, the fries are crisp and salty, but the added flash-fried leeks taste like burnt tissue paper. The classic fruit, cheese and nut salad--a foolproof formula--misses everywhere possible with unripe pears, dry walnuts and watery vinaigrette.

Desserts include not-horrible tiramisu and cannoli, and a selection of vegan cakes. If the cinnamony apple chai cake falls into that category, my morose server fails to mention it. Of course she can barely manage a smile either. Perhaps she had the pear and Gorgonzola salad for dinner.

The big draw at Dock Street isn't the food, and I feel lucky to be able to enjoy great beer crafted a few feet from where I'm sitting next to Miss Boston. Visible through a plate-glass window, the 10-barrel brewing network resembles a shoal of slumbering octopi. Here, brewer Scott Morrison fuels Dock Street's six taps with drinkable mainstays--hoppy Gold Stock Ale, pajama-comfy Imperial Oatmeal Stout--and sociable seasonals like Cranberry Kolsch. At first I'm a little embarrassed by the Kolsch's pink blush, but after a few mouthfuls of its tart effervescence, I'm ready to throw on The Nanny Diaries and call it a day. Boston, you coming?

Dock Street Brewery
701 S. 50th St. 215.726.2337. www.dockstreet beer.com
Cuisine: Brewpub with pizza.
Hours: Mon.-Thurs., 11am-11pm; Fri.-Sat., noon-midnight.
Prices: $7-$18.
Sound advice: Four-alarm noisy.
Atmosphere: Come as you are.
Service: Too cool for school.
Food: Not amore.