The Resy Guide to Incredible Desserts in Philadelphia

Cicala’s pastry chef and co-owner, Angela Cicala, spends half of her time traveling in Italy. And when it comes to Italian sweets, the Philly-born, Jersey-raised chef knows her stuff. Whereas some restaurants offer simple gelato to close out a meal, Cicala serves L’oro Verde. This “green gold” dessert combines housemade pistachio gelato (the faintly green kind made with real pistachios) in a chilled metal ice cream dish with a sprinkle of Trapanese sea salt crystals and a drizzle of Sicilian extra virgin olive oil. Seasonality rules on the restaurant’s dessert menu, which takes its cues from Italy’s many holiday traditions – like pizza dolce for Easter and lemon sorbetto served inside lemon rinds, Amalfi-style, for summer.

Part of a menu of James Beard Award-winning showstoppers, the desserts at Kalaya elicit an equal number of head turns and gasps as do the savory dishes. When chef-owner Nok Suntaranon’s volleyball-sized nam kaeng sai hits the table, everyone – even the fullest among us – grabs their spoon. There are two options for this shaved ice treat: sweet coffee caramel with banana panna cotta or refreshing coconut pineapple with strawberry compote and pandan tapioca pudding. Share one and also try the durian sticky rice. It’s Suntaranon’s personal favorite after a spicy meal because, she says, “It’s sweet, savory, and creamy.”

Balance is the name of the game for chef-owner Michael Ferreri at Irwin’s. At his Sicilian restaurant, Ferreri likes to add salinity and savory notes to the sweets, such as pistachios with milk and honey gelato, black sesame with sweet fried dough, and torta all’arancia, an orange cake with almond and bay leaf that’s one of Ferreri’s personal favorites. If you’re lucky, pastry chef Andrew Bugno will be making proper Sicilian-style cannoli with sheep milk ricotta, Sicilian pistachios, and candied orange in homemade shells. The cannoli come on and off the menu, so cross your fingers when you go.

It’s often said that canelé – the chewy, caramelized, and custardy pastry from France’s Bordeaux region – are best in the morning while the outside is still crispy. Good thing that time stands still at Friday Saturday Sunday, because your luxurious tasting menu always ends with a fresh, crackling, mahogany-hued canelé baked by pastry chef Amanda Rafalski. Dessert here is a parade of Rafalski’s ever-changing creations. She’s also known for her creative ice cream flavors, sometimes served in mini cones or between thick cookies infused with something hyper seasonal like sweet corn or ginger molasses.

At Longwood Gardens, one of Pennsylvania’s top attractions, the long-running fine-dining restaurant recently got a few major upgrades – a swanky redesign, a fountain-facing location, and a brand-new menu. Executive pastry chef Cecilia Gaudioso’s Caramelia dessert is perhaps the cutest treat in the mid-Atlantic. The menu simply reads “chocolate mousse, espresso caramel, cocoa soil,” but order it and you’ll get a mushroom that looks like it came from Alice in Wonderland, complete with shiny red cap and candies shaped like rocks, fungus, dirt, and leaves. It’s an homage to the crop that Kennett Square, the “Mushroom Capital of the World,” is known for. We also recommend trying the beignets with strawberry and peanut butter.

We’ve been shouting from the rooftops about Lacroix’s indulgent and elegant brunch for a while now. A big part of the draw is the dessert room – yes, an entire room – where you collect your sweet treats. Head to the back of the kitchen to find pastry chef Laura Chalupa’s weekly lineup. Recently, it included a dozen mini desserts, like strawberry Oreo fudge, tres leches cake, orange creamsicle cake, Tastykake-style butterscotch krimpets, espresso dark chocolate mousse, a coconut and guava tart, oatmeal cream cookies, and pineapple upside down cake, plus an interactive cannoli station. We recommend visiting for dinner, too, when Lacroix’s head chef, Eric Leveillee, really shines. For dessert, you’ll get to try Chalupa’s crème brûlée with marzipan, smoked maple, and caviar.

Relative newcomer Meetinghouse feels like the sort of place that’s always been there – and that sense is present on the dessert menu, too. Consider the baked pineapple, or pineapple stuffing that Andrew DiTomo’s grandmother serves as an Easter side. At the restaurant, DiTomo makes it bread pudding–style with creamy and crunchy spots. All the desserts here are nostalgia-inducing, from the chocolate pot de crème inspired by now-closed Dmitri’s to the cheesecake with glowing red cherries, and from the vanilla ice cream with a shot of crème de menthe to the slice of toast slathered in warm salted caramel sauce.

Southern-style food is so satisfying, and we wish Philly had more of it. Until that day, get your fix at South, a restaurant that specializes in live jazz and hearty food. For dessert, we gravitate toward anything warm and topped with ice cream, like the pineapple brown sugar bread pudding in Jamaican rum sauce or the apple and cherry cobbler with a sweet biscuit on top. The rum sauce also tops South’s warm, powdered sugar–dusted, sweet potato doughnuts.

Classic Italian American food is easy to come by in this town, but how many places do it right? And how many have been doing it for 125 years? Ralph’s can lay claim to that. Next time you visit this Italian Market staple, go with a group (the restaurant is used to large parties) and order all the desserts to share. You’ll get cannoli, but also three-layer cannoli cake, tiramisu, and cheesecake. And then there are the ice cream desserts: strawberry, pistachio, and chocolate spumoni, chocolate-domed tartufo, and gelato sandwiched between two pizzelles.

Here are a few of our favorite [sweet] things: A bonus list of signature desserts at some of Philly’s best restaurants.

• Basque-style cheesecake at Ember & Ash
• Soft serve (banana with chocolate magic shell or brown sugar vanilla) at Laser Wolf
• Pineapple upside-down Alaska, flambéed tableside, at Alpen Rose
• Cannoli at Giuseppe & Sons
• Tehina-date ice cream sandwich at Dizengoff
• Dulce de leche filled alfajores at Jezabel’s
• Kunefe with shredded phyllo dough, sweet goat cheese, and pistachios at Kanella
• Chocolate cake with caramel and peanuts at Illata
• Kanafeh, a crispy Lebanese dessert with melted fresh cheese curd and rose blossom syrup, for two at Suraya
• Key lime pie with Ritz cracker crust at Middle Child Clubhouse
• Baklava at Stina Pizzeria