This Exclusive Philadelphia Italian Restaurant Requires A Membership To Get In

Philadelphia's noteworthy dining experiences include restaurants such as Pho 75, home of Anthony Bourdain's favorite hangover-curing soup, and Le Virtù, offering an Italian feast with 40 courses. Alas, City Tavern, where the founding fathers celebrated the first Fourth of July, is now only open for special occasions. Even so, it may be easier to get in there than to book a table at Palizzi Social Club, a restaurant that's drawn rave reviews from critics and currently enjoys a 4.4-star Yelp rating. The reason is, it really is a club; you'll need a membership to get in.

The term "supper club" is usually applied to a type of restaurant popular in the Midwest that doesn't require you to do anything other than make a reservation (if that). Social clubs in Philadelphia, however, are another thing altogether. These establishments have Class C liquor licenses allowing them to remain open until 3 a.m. as opposed to the 2 a.m. closing hour observed by bars open to the public. This tends to make them popular with people who work in the industry and who want to unwind with a drink after their shift ends.

The membership fee at Palizzi Social Club is a modest $20, but the problem is memberships are hard to come by. The website at present says that membership is closed for the time being, although a Reddit post indicates there was a brief window last spring where memberships were available. To get them, you had to be at the door at 3 p.m. with cash in hand. If you snoozed, you lost, since people were already lining up at 6 a.m.

One interesting thing about Palizzi Social Club is that it has a rule prohibiting members from leaving reviews, which is why you won't find it on TripAdvisor. In fact, a Philadelphia Magazine staffer even had their membership revoked after a glowing writeup of the restaurant. Luckily, the restaurant was unable to have it unpublished. We also have the reviews of 27 rule-flouting — and possibly now banned – Yelpers to guide us. (To give them their due, some were admittedly guests of members, and thus not bound by the rules.) For the most part, everyone appreciates the old-school vibe, complete with Dean Martin soundtrack, while the food and drinks are also highly regarded.

The menu starts off with Italian-American classics like Caesar salad and stromboli, but the main courses branch out to include such lesser-known dishes as spaghetti with blue crab and tripe cooked with tomatoes, eggplants, cinnamon, and Caciocavallo cheese. The entrees also include braciole (or brasciole, as the restaurant calls it), a dish of rolled beef flank stuffed with breadcrumbs and boiled eggs and cooked in tomato sauce. One Yelp review described the dish as "exceptional," while another said it was "like mother made." The second reviewer also urged, "You must try the homemade spumoni to end the evening," which is never bad advice. Other dessert options include a cherry and almond-flavored ricotta cheese pie as well as anise-sugared Sicilian doughnuts known as sfingi.