Phil Manganaro is a paradox.
His Park Place Café and Restaurant in Merchantville is open three nights a week, with 20 seats, no assistant chefs, no reservation system and an unanswered phone. Yet this elusive entrepreneur is an underground foodie phenom who was a James Beard Award semifinalist for Best Chef Mid-Atlantic in 2023.
Chef Phil, you’re like a great musician who’d rather gig in small clubs than arenas.
If you mean that I fill my seats with devoted diners, that’s true. In fact, I was a rock guitarist in LA for a while, when I wasn’t surfing. I’m also a poet with two published volumes. I look way beyond the surface of things in everything I do. I live a purposeful, meaningful and balanced life. I live in the town where I grew up, Medford. For me, contentment means having enough. My work, nature, and my 13-year-old son, Dean, bring me joy.
What’s the genesis of Park Place?
I was ready to be an executive chef, but I was turned down by the place I wanted because I’m a single dad, and the owner didn’t think I’d put in enough hours. That was a wake-up call. I found a restaurant space in Merchantville, renovated it myself, and opened Park Place in 2016.
How has Park Place evolved?
My original concept was to use high-quality, global ingredients. But in buying items like ramps, chanterelles, morels and black trumpet mushrooms, I realized that, hey, they grow around here. So I learned about wild ingredients and started foraging in my Pine Barrens surroundings. After a while, I put a 20-mile-radius limit on the vegetables, greens and fruit I found, including 10 varieties of wild blueberries. In 2020, I transitioned to local origins for everything, including fish, meat, and heritage grains that supplement the acorn flour I make by hand. There are very few exceptions, like lobster, squab and Italian olive oil.
Your menu is beyond seasonal; it changes daily. How do you manage this?
I have a protein in mind, and Mother Nature leads me to the rest. I do my foraging in early morning. I don’t just wander around; I follow my treasure map, a spreadsheet of what, where and when stuff comes up. Even in winter, there’s so much out there. My food is actually very simple: a meat, seafood or poultry main with sides. But at Park Place, the protein enhances the vegetables. I’ll use every part of the plant—leaves, flowers, stalk, seeds, roots—to prepare in a number of techniques. You name it: raw, grilled, sautéed, baked, pickled, dried, or used as a marinade, purée, sauce or garnish.
Can you give me an example of an entrée that spotlights the woods?
My velvety hamachi-loin crudo is raw, and soaks up flavors from tender fiddleheads, purple mulberry granita, Atlantic sea salt and my “magic oil.” That’s what someone called it, and it stuck: olive oil infused with something ever-changing, like hickory bark, pine needles or herbaceous mugwort.
Who are your diners?
Ninety-five per cent are repeat patrons. New diners are introduced to Park Place as guests of regulars. They come from Philly metro, all over NJ and beyond. Some call their visit a pilgrimage and plan a weekend around their dinner. Since Park Place is BYO, serious oenophiles come with a stash of bottles to pair with my daily menu. My sole offering is a $110 prix-fixe tasting meal with six courses.
You’ve followed your bliss, but will you do this forever?
Park Place’s cuisine is the terroir of my life, and for now my work is to share nature’s beauty. Gratitude is the air I breathe, and I feel zero anxiety, worry or anger. I’ll always be a cook, but maybe I’ll reassess in a few years, because life is fluid. And I’m branching out. The 34-minute documentary I co-produced with Palmyra-based Forde Films, Found: The King of Matsutake Ridge, is making the rounds of film festivals for eventual distribution and, hopefully, sequels. By the way, matsutake is a mushroom.
Are we the Garden State once again?
As New Jersey farms become more sustainable, we’re getting back there. But my mission is about more than farms. We must preserve our woods, meadows and waterways, because honoring our wild places is the only way civilization can survive. I’m hopeful about this.
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