September 9-15, 2004

food

Raising the Roof

PARK PLACE: Moh Azizi says his Rittenhouse-area supper club, The Mansion, will allow him to "stake a new claim." Photo By: Michael T. Regan

After 28 years in local kitchens large and small, Moh Azizi thinks he's finally found his house style.

by A.D. Amorosi

Discuss the decade-long restaurant renaissance of Philadelphia with chef Moh Azizi and he laughs. Mention Rittenhouse Row's sudden luster and he sighs. The reason behind the giggles is that Azizi has made it all and had it all since the '70s, whether cooking for Steve Poses' legendary Frog or his own Saffron House, opened in 1993. Without a hint of the jadedness that comes with having seen it all and done it all, he's currently turning the grand brownstone of Saffron into The Mansion, a private supper club whose luxury will be a perfect match for Azizi's rich sauces, quirky, homey vegetarian fare and lustrous arrays of meats and fishes.

"I think you have to put a new face on some things," says the Persian-born Azizi of the changes made to suit the post-deco decadence of The Mansion, set to open in late September. "Saffron, though good, had grown slack. I wanted a new look to go with a new food; something younger and fresh."

Rather than be initiated into culinary life through school, Azizi, 54, started his chef's life at Frog in 1976 as a dishwasher. "If you have the talent, it becomes you," says Azizi of never having gone to school for cooking. "If you're an artist, you could paint. I've seen many a culinary student who can't cook."

While a textile engineering student at Philadelphia University, Azizi cooked a Frog staff meal based on what he had picked up as a child under his mother's watchful gaze. "From that point on, if one of their chefs — whether it was the appetizer man, the brunch chef — was missing, I filled in." After making his way through a few years of food preparation (and Frog's move from 16th and Spruce to 15th and Locust), Azizi became executive chef, happily preparing meals for the likes of Henry Kissinger and Elizabeth Taylor during his tenure at Frog. "I remember one particular engaged couple who based their wedding date and plans around my schedule so I could cook for them. That makes me very proud to this day." With the command of an Iron Chef, Azizi worked in all styles and nationalities of food, creating personalized takes on genre. "I love Mediterranean and Persian cooking. But I've done Japanese, Greek; as long as the ingredients are fresh." By 1989, Azizi had opened his own restaurants, big (Chameleon, next to Le Bec-Fin) and small (Brickworks on 19th Street) before settling into the brownstone at 19th and Sansom, Saffron House. Like a cagey magician, he refuses to give away the deepest darkest secrets of his arsenal, except to say he's a big fan of cilantro, parsley and lime: "Everything from the rind to the whole lime, from frying it to sun-drying it, it's exquisite."

Though successful as a restaurant specializing in Persian-American fare, Saffron became renowned for its daily catering of pricey business affairs and conferences. "As a restaurant, I'll be honest, I stopped paying so much attention to it. I wasn't around during nights. I didn't hire each and every person."

Not The Mansion. With the same hands-on fashion as his career's start, Azizi is hoping to affect RitRow's younger professional the way he's already catered to their Brooks Brothers-wearing company elder. His silent partners are embellishing the brownstone's most elegant old-world elements — thick copper radiators, mahogany room dividers that match the grand winding staircase, mantled fireplaces in every room — with sassy accouterments worthy of its membership-only status and $150 yearly price tag. That means the VIP room's walnut window ledges on floor three (each with window boxes and stained-glass transoms) will get white linen swags from the ceiling to match the room's gorgeous linen couches and zebra-print rugs. Its massive second-floor bar will be lined with thick studded leather club seats to go with the mod masculinity of its cobalt painted walls with gold-leaf trim. While its gaming/billiard room will be painted dark, roasted-pepper red and filled with plasma TV screens, its first floor is The Mansion's most dynamic space, a mix of smoking area, main dining room and entry lounge. Filled with more walnut than a Jewish apple cake, the club's every ledge, brass-railinged bar, mahogany relief, burnished long-table, wine cuvet and fireplace will be subtly surrounded by faux antique plastering of a gentle lime color so that its peak capacity of 150 can stay green-tinted without envy.

"I'm staking a new claim," says Azizi of his Mansion's menu and its surprisingly hearty, filling fare. Dishes will include filet mignons surrounded with tiny dishes of everything from plantains or gorgonzola-based sauces to Persian salads; roasted chicken and shrimp over caramelized onion mashed potato and whole-grain mustard sauce; Atlantic salmon glazed with chipotle honey sauce over smoked gouda, tomato, broccoli and bacon ragout; and oven-roasted pork tenderloin with dried cranberry port sauce. "I want to see people play with their food, literally and figuratively, to have fun and get good value for their money," says Azizi with pride.

The Mansion, 121 S. 19th St., 215-665-0865.