My Loup? Mish Mish? How some of your favorite Philly restaurants got their names

You’re opening a restaurant. You have the concept, the menu, and perhaps the location.

Before Day One, you will also have to come up with a name — maybe your mom or dad, or your nickname, or your ancestral hometown, or a favorite flower, or a food or beverage, or something from your imagination. The idea is to brand your business, and perhaps define it.

Over the years, Philadelphia has seen some original name gems — pronounceable, memorable, unique enough for search engine optimization.

» READ MORE: What's in a restaurant's name? Sometimes, a funny story

Here are the backstories for the names of some popular Philadelphia bars and restaurants:

Amina (104 Chestnut St.): Partner Felicia Wilson named the Old City bistro after her daughter, whom she named in honor of Amina, an ancient warrior goddess of Nigeria.

Ants Pants Cafe (2212 South St.): The Graduate Hospital-area cafe carries Australian slang for “really good” — an expression like “the bee’s knees.”

The Bishop’s Collar (2349 Fairmount Ave.): This Fairmount mainstay’s name is taken from a slang term for the head on a pint of beer or ale.

Bolo (2025 Sansom St.): Chef Yun Fuentes honors his Puerto Rican grandfather Juan “Don Johnny” Fuente by applying a family nickname. He and his cousins mispronounced “abuelo.”

Buddakan (325 Chestnut St.): Stephen Starr conceived the Old City restaurant as Cuban with the name Babalu, but changed to an Asian theme. The name grew out of Starr’s past as a music promoter. The first act he booked was Cheap Trick at the War Memorial in Trenton. The group’s seminal album was Live at the Budokan. Starr tweaked the spelling as he installed an outsize Buddha in the dining room for its 1998 opening.

Butcher & Singer (1500 Walnut St.): The steakhouse occupies the former Butcher & Singer brokerage house.

Charlie was a sinner. (131 S. 13th St.): “It’s the first sentence of a great novel,” owner Nicole Marquis said of her vegan bar-restaurant in Midtown. “It tells the whole story yet begs you to read on. In many ways, Charlie was a sinner. has deeply personal elements that I never share but I love how guests make up their own story about it. Many people think it’s about a sordid love affair that I must have had. Ha! It fits the entire vibe I’m going for — mysterious, sexy, and a little bad.”

Cry Baby Pasta (627 S. Third St.): It’s after the Garnet Mimms song (1963) popularized by Janis Joplin in 1970.

FoodChasers Kitchen (7852 Montgomery Ave., Elkins Park): Sisters-owners Maya and Kala Johnstone are longtime foodies who enjoy chasing great experiences.

Friday Saturday Sunday (261 S. 21st St.): It was called Friday Saturday Sunday & Thursday Too, reflecting the days of operation, when seven friends each kicked in $2,000 to open it in 1973 in a long-closed hippie coffeehouse called the Gilded Cage. Weaver Lilley bought out his partners and soldiered on for four decades before selling in 2015 to chef Chad and Hanna Williams. The couple poshed it up and opened in 2017.

The Good King Tavern (614 S. Seventh St.): Chloe Grigri and her French-born father, Bernard, honored René of Anjou, who was known as “the Good King” in 15th-century Provence. History books gave him the nickname “for being sort of enlightened pre-enlightenment, very social and open,” said Chloe Grigri, now in business with her husband, Vincent Stipo. “We liked that it was kinda cheeky in that it sounds sort of British — definitely not a French bistro.”

Hop Sing Laundromat (1029 Race St.): Lê, the cocktail bar’s mononymic owner, said Hop Sing, the cook for the Cartwright family on the classic TV series Bonanza, had made it a habit of threatening to quit and open a laundromat back east. Why he chose this is anyone’s guess.

Kiddo (1138 Pine St.): Chef Wyatt Piazza and Elizabeth Drake wanted to honor “that childlike excitement that people can get around food,” Piazza said.

Laser Wolf (1301 N. Howard St.): Mike Solomonov and Steve Cook adjusted the spelling of the butcher Lazar Wolf from Fiddler on the Roof for their skewer house.

Mawn (764 S. Ninth St.): Phila and Rachel Lorn’s noodle house reflects a Cambodian word for “chicken” and happens to rhyme with “jawn.” (Phila’s parents named him in honor of the family’s adopted city.)

Middle Child (248 S. 11th St. and 1232 N. Front St.): Owner Matthew Cahn is a middle child (between David and Elizabeth), and “MC” are his initials. “We’re also a lunch spot, which is between breakfast and dinner,” he said of the original location in Washington Square West.

MilkBoy (401 South St. and 1100 Chestnut St.): This music-friendly bar started as a recording studio founded by Tommy Joyner over Zapf’s, an iconic music store in North Philadelphia. On the second floor was a music repair shop before it was converted to a recording studio. A cutout of a boy was on the face of a kick drum. “Somebody saw it and suggested calling the studio MilkBoy,” business partner Jamie Lokoff said.

“The more interesting story is what drew Tommy and me together,” he said. “When I was a kid, my friends referred to me as MilkBoy because I was allergic to milk. My friends would joke, ‘We can’t get pizza because MilkBoy over here can’t have cheese.’ I was hired to write a song for someone and needed a studio to record.. I already had a relationship with Sigma Sound because I had recorded spots for my dad’s business, Bryn Mawr Stereo, but I was handed Tommy’s business card that said, ‘MilkBoy Recording.’ It was so random and so really bizarre to me that I had to pursue it. My first day working together with him, he was so kind, talented and hard working that I knew we should work together. Seven businesses and 25 years later, we’re still at it.” They also own Bolo with Fuentes.

Mish Mish (1046 Tasker St.): This is owner Alex Tewfik’s nod to the Arabic proverb “bukra fil mish mish,” which translates to “you can have apricots tomorrow” — basically, a reference to one’s pipe dreams.

My Loup (2005 Walnut St.): It’s a play on chef Amanda Shulman’s pet name for co-chef (and fiancé) Alex Kemp and a “wolf” reference to her pet dachshund, Tootsie. Say it “my-loo.”

Paffuto (1009 S. Eighth St.): Owners Jake Loeffler, Daniel Griffiths, and Sam Kalkut opted for Italian slang for “chubby.”

» READ MORE: From 2018: The stories behind some now-closed restaurants

Palizzi Social Club (1408 S. 12th St.): It’s the actual name of an old-time South Philadelphia social club named after Filippo Palizzi, a 19th-century painter from Vasto, Italy. Chef Joey Baldino revived it.

Poison Heart (931 Spring Garden St.): The Ramones single inspired the name of this cocktail bar in SpringArts.

SIN (1102 Germantown Ave.): Steaks, Italian food, and nightlife (SIN, get it?) combine as “vibe dining” at this Northern Liberties newcomer.

Tabachoy (932 S. 10th St.): Chef Chance Anies named his Filipino BYOB after the word for “chubby” in Tagalog. (Seems to be a theme.)

12 Steps Down (831 Christian St.): A name found in the suggestion box before this subterranean Italian Market bar’s 2002 opening does double duty. It’s the number of steps from Christian Street down to the front door and describes a recovery regimen.