Izumi

Not that long ago, conventional wisdom would have envisioned the future of a revived East Passyunk Avenue entwined in a cocoon of spaghetti and red gravy. Even when Lynn Rinaldi first made a stylish comeback to her old neighborhood just four years ago with Paradiso, she simply added an elegant new sheen to a tried-and-true notion: that South Philly's heart and soul would always beat Italian.

But a funny thing happened on the way to Izumi, Rinaldi's latest - and most unexpectedly Japanese - venture with fiance-chef Corey Baver. This corner of deep South Philly has blossomed at last into a neighborhood with its own organically evolving character.

It's not that the pasta purveyors of Passyunk are in any peril of being pushed aside. But they've since been joined by a sudden influx of Mexicans and their taquerias, by the bike-messenger hipsters and their craft-beer gastropubs, by Wi-Fi coffee shops and a steady infusion of young, upwardly mobile home buyers.

"Gentrification," Baver says with Rinaldi lingering in the background. "Lynn hates that word."

After all, touting "gentrification" in your own neighborhood sounds like dissing the family roots. But there's no mistaking the fact that tiny Izumi, with its trendy Old City looks, Asian fusion menu, and sushi bar, is something novel for the neighborhood.

Raw fish, hallelujah, has finally broken the South Street border! (Conversely, I'm still waiting for a genuine Italian hoagie to finally make the upstream journey north.)

In terms of pure culinary adventurism, it's not like we're talking about molecular lettuce foam and acrobatics with meat glue. Sushi has simply become mainstream enough for South Philly. And South Philly's diners, meanwhile, are finally ready to enter the 21st century.