Rotisseur - 21st Between Chestnut and Sansom St

Thanks to a heads up from foobooz I learned that Rotisseur on 21st started serving lunch.  I actually had no idea this place was open for business because the last time I walked by there was just a menu taped to the window with no signs of life.  But even then, the idea of a rotisserie chicken place peaked my curiosity so when I read that they were open for lunch I got pretty excited.

Inside, everything looks very clean and modern.  When you enter you'll see a few window seats immediately to your right, then a thin island with some reading material and then the kitchen/food counter pictured above.  On the left there's bench seating that extends the length of the wall and maybe 6 or 7 individual tables spaced equally apart. This is about the same size space as the other restaurants here, like Tampopo, so a large party would have a hard time being seated here.  Overall, I really liked the look of the place.

1) 1/4 breast & wing meal(includes 2 sides) - $8

Their website states that their "chickens are cage-free, hormone-free, antibiotic-free and halal. our food is made fresh daily from locally-sourced ingredients, so our menu changes with the seasons."  Now I won't get into the semantics of cage-free vs free-range vs organic, you can research that for yourself but there's no denying that we should support the use of locally sourced ingredients(in the case of the chicken, Lancaster County)  So how did these locally sourced ingredient translate on the plate? 

The chicken was moist and flavorful. Comparing it to another rotisserie style chicken market we're all probably familiar with, it was smaller but higher in quality(a trade off I'll gladly take).
My sides were pickled veggies and mac and cheese.  The pickled veggies included radish, green bean pods, tomatoes, okra, and a clove of garlic.  Besides okra, which I'm not a fan of anyways, they were all excellent. Even the clove of garlic, which becomes much milder during the pickling process.   

The mac and cheese, that I was told had just come out of the oven, was the real deal.  Creamy and delicious with a few bread crumbs sprinkled about. [8/10]

 2) Chicken bánh mì  - $6 + small side(mac and cheese) - $2.50
I think calling this a bánh mì is a bit of a stretch.  It is a sandwich with pickled veggies and meat but the flavors are not what you would get from a Vietnamese restaurant.  Of course, this isn't a Vietnamese restaruant, so I don't fault them too much for it but for those who are more anal about it might question why it's being called a banh mi.  Overall, I thought it was a decent sandwich. The ingredients were there, especially the pickled veggies but the bread was crustier than I prefer and it could have used more chicken. [6/10]

Overall LTE score [8/10]  I left impressed by what was served at Rotisseur.  A place like this, nearby, that's made by 2 guys who want to do it right will get my business any day and when that quality can come through in the food, sign me up for the frequent eaters card(they don't really have one of those that I'm aware of).  Now, the one thing that would keep me from eating here more often would be the narrow menu choices.  I can only eat so much chicken.  But they say their menu changes with whats in season so I expect to see a wider range of local foods to come soon.

http://rotisseur.net/