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The Northeast gets another auto-parts store and loses Sabor Centro Americano.
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CHARLES FERRUZZA
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es, Sabor Centro Americano is still open. The question is, how much longer? The restaurant, at 2661 Independence Avenue in the Historic Northeast, has been serving the cuisine of Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador and Costa Rica in a former Captain D’s for the past seven years. But the clock appears to be running out. Texas-based developer Cabinrock Investments LLC, which owns the property as well as several surrounding buildings, plans to tear down Sabor Centro Americano. The idea is to use the parcel (and the weed-choked vacant lot behind it) as the footprint for a new building that would house an Advance Auto Parts store. “That’s phase one of the plan,” says Mike Bushnell, publisher of Northeast News and an outspoken advocate of the proposed development. E R MO The second phase would be to tear down an old florist shop and empty T A INE ONL .COM post-office building and PITCH take over another weedfilled lot and construct a new retail development, which this stretch of Independence Avenue hasn’t had in decades.” Not everyone is so upbeat about Cabinrock’s plan. Just go to the Real Northeast Facebook page to meet the neighborhood residents who oppose the project (and a few who support it, and at least one who would like to see a new Captain D’s in the area). Many of them are angry about the perceived exclusion of neighborhood residents from the decision-making process. “The developers say that they talked to all the neighbors who own homes surrounding the property,” says actor Ron Megee, who lives around the corner from Sabor Centro Americano. “But they lied. No one told us anything. I found out by accident.” Some of the other arguments on the Real Northeast page: “I actually don’t have a problem with it, it’s just that Independence Avenue already has a Napa, O’Reilly, and Advanced Auto Parts [sic] …”; “More specifically, an auto parts store does not seem to be congruent with the plans for the Avenue’s resurrection …”; and “I also do not think it is a bad thing. … A business that will close at night, with a secure lot. Finally, no place for drug dealers to hide, hookers to service men, and killings in the Honduran restaurant parking lot.” The last comment was from Megee who admits, somewhat sheepishly, that he wants to see the auto-parts store built. “I’ll get hell from my neighbors for saying this, but I like the plan,” he says. “It will be harder for johns from Johnson County to come here
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and have sex with Independence Avenue hookers in my neighborhood. People are really passionate about this, though. Someone keeps calling the lots behind the restaurant ‘green space.’ It’s really just old lots filled with weeds.” Bushnell adds: “[The] developer has bent over backward to appease the neighborhood. The opposition needs to sit down and take a good long look at exactly what they’re fighting.” Bushnell believes that the properties at Independence Avenue and Chestnut will be developed, furor or not, and that Sabor Centro Americano, which is beloved in this ethnically diverse community, will live on in another location. “There’s an empty restaurant property just up the street,” Bushnell says. “It just needs a tenant.”
REID OPTION Tasting Arrowhead’s new, Philly-homage Chiefsteak.
W
hat. Is. That?” asked the first man I walked by on the concourse Sunday at Arrowhead Stadium. He pointed at the comically large cardboard box I was balancing. Inside the box was a footlong bun loaded down with smoked brisket, primary-colored swatches of cheese and bell peppers, and a burping river of barbecue sauce: the Kansas City Chiefsteak. The stadium has introduced its newest sandwich in homage to Andy Reid, the mustachioed head coach whose most recent previous
The Chiefsteak tastes like a punt. job was in the city of angioplasty. (Philadelphia has not officially adopted this slogan. Yet.) I’ll say this for the $15 sub: It’s certainly an attention-getter. I was briefly as popular as the nearby cheerleader talking about her swimsuit calendar. But, as with any showpiece purchase, the Chiefsteak began to depreciate as soon as money changed hands. This novelty sandwich was more novelty than sandwich. That big bun was just a hotdog roll on HGH — a sad misstep in a city with great bread. The smoked brisket was tender but hidden under a cheddar sauce as thick and characterless as elementary-school paste. It’s fundamentally wrong that the sweet peppers turned out to be the part of the sandwich I enjoyed most. You need a fork and a knife to battle through the Chiefsteak, which slays a forest of napkins. The moat of crispy, peppery barbecue chips, packed in with this meat volcano, was the real star of the box I bought. The other side item, a jalapeño slaw, didn’t deliver on the promised kick. So add the Chiefsteak to the list of Phillyhopeful sandwiches that fall short. But some things — like football fans who use Cheez Whiz to dull their battery-throwing, expletivespewing pain in the wake of the great Chip Kelly experiment — are best left to that city anyway. What the Chiefsteak has going for it is basic KC value: It’s filling (working well split between two people) and, as stadium food goes, cheap. — JONATHAN BENDER
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