Cheap & Hearty Southwestern at Green Chile Kitchen in NoPa
I first heard about Green Chile Kitchen on a web comment section arguing about who serves the best burrito in every single SF neighborhood. Numerous commenters were insistent that Green…
Beer & Empanadas – That’s What Woods Polk Station Does!
I’d argue that beer is almost always better when consumed along with food. It just pairs so well with anything and everything… but especially toasty, crispy things. One late evening while I was drinking with a few friends on Polk Street, we stopped in to a nearly unmarked bar called Woods Polk Station that I had heard good things about so that we could fill our bellies full of bubbly beer goodness and some tasty late-night munchies.
The place was quite small and had a ski resort mountain lodge vibe with its fake flickering fireplace displayed on the TV overhead, quiet, laid-back vibe, and simple wooden bar slanging gorgeous goblets of craft draft beer. It’s cozy and quiet and I think it’s quite a nice option when you’re looking to escape the general craziness of Polk Street with a few glasses of beer.
Date Night with Fancy, Open-Faced Sandwiches at Tartinery in Nolita
I’d never thought to go to Tartinery in Nolita before, but I’ll be damned if that place wasn’t an absolutely perfect spot for an impressive first date. You wouldn’t know it from the street, but inside the understated exterior of this restaurant there’s an incredibly sexy, well-thought-out, subterranean dining room with large vaulted ceilings with exposed brick walls accented by lots of black iron and flickering candle lights. It’s a really incredible space and if you’re looking to put the vibe in the air, this place is perfect for that.
The menu is also great for two people getting to know each other. It features a vast array of French-inspired open-faced sandwiches known as tartines. And there’s a wide selection of very accessible toppings offered – so you know that picky eater Tinder first date is going to be able to find something they can eat – yes, even vegetarians.
Super-Fresh Chinese Pastries at Golden Gate Bakery in Chinatown
After heading over to San Francisco’s Chinatown to check out the Fortune Cookie Factory and Cable Car Museum, we figured it was probably worth exploring a bit more to find some fun and delicious snacks in the area. A quick search on Foursquare brought one place in particular to our attention – it was rated much much higher than anything else in the neighborhood – a little pastry shop called Golden Gate Bakery. Literally every tip at this place was ecstatic about their Egg Custard Tarts so we sort of had to try it while we were in the area.
Off-Menu Offal Loaded Soup at Zen Yai in the Tenderloin
Offal-lovers, are you listening? Boy, have I got a dish for you.
If you’re like me, you probably really enjoy eating freaking unusual dishes. This dish I’ve got is definitely going to interest you. In the The Tenderloin, only a block or two from the other outstanding Thai restaurants I’ve already written about like Lers Ros Thai and Sai Jai Thai, I’ve found another place worth venturing through this crackhead-infested neighborhood to. This place is called Zen Yai and they have an off-menu dish I had been meaning to try that drew me in for a visit one morning.
You’d probably never even know to order this dish unless you had the ability read Thai or enjoy scraping the internet for food finds as much as I do. I can’t read Thai, but I did get word of this crazy dish somewhere and knew I had to see what all the fuss was about. I can’t even remember where I first heard about the dish, but one hungover day I was in the mood for soup and wanted to try something particularly funky and interesting. To be honest, I didn’t really even know anything about what I was ordering myself except that it involved plenty of offal. I was ready for the gastronomic adventure.
Fresh Out Of The Fryer at Bob’s Donuts in Lower Nob Hill
By reputation, Bob’s Donuts is known for making the very best doughnuts in San Francisco. That’s a huge reputation to live up to and I’m lucky enough (or unlucky enough depending on how you look at it) to live only one block from the place to be able to put it to the test. I already knew that late-night was the time to go because between 11 PM and 2 AM is when they make all of the doughnuts fresh for the next day’s batch. That’s also when all of us Polk Street drunkards are craving deep-fried doughnut sweetness.
Unexpectedly Excellent Mom & Pop Sushi at Wayo in Lower Pac Heights
So, there I was. Back on my quest for great and reasonably priced sushi. This time, I didn’t want to go further than a five minute walk from my apartment, so I did a quick search of the radius and landed on a little spot tucked away on Van Ness called Wayo Sushi.
Sampling the Much-Hyped Black Seed Bagels at Mile End Delicatessen in NoHo
Like I’ve said before, one of the dishes I find myself missing the most living out in San Francisco is the simple New York staple of a bagel with lox. I haven’t quite found myself a viable replacement yet, so when I find myself back in New York I know 100% of the time I’m going to venture out to get my fix.
In the time since I’ve left the city, there seems to have been a resurgence and revitalization of Jewish comfort food in NYC with placed like Baz Bagels and Black Seed popping up and Russ & Daughters expanding into a full sit-down cafe. After reading much about the now famed Montreal-style bagels being baked at Nolita’s Black Seed Bagels, I knew I had to give them a shot. The write-ups often fall at polarized ends of the spectrum with those in the negative camp often harping on the lines, cost, portion, and quality so I was excited to check them out for myself to make my own judgements. Instead of wandering down to Nolita where Black Seed’s main shop lives, I decided to head to Chef Noah Bernamoff’s closer-to-home Canadian sister restaurant Mile End in NoHo – where I had heard Black Seed bagels were also being served.
A Meticulous, Experimental Tasting Menu at Barley Swine
*Editor’s Note 3/29/16: Barley Swine has relocated its entire operation to a larger space at 6555 Burnet Road since my visit.
Many of my previous visits to Austin had been during Austin City Limits where my schedule was jam-packed full of concert-going and nearly every moment of my usual 3-day stay was booked up. But, this Christmas-time trip was a little different. We were in town for a full week with plenty of time to relax and do bit of gastronomic exploration.
I’ve experienced a variety of Austin’s lower-key options including mini-trips to the outlying barbecue towns of Lockhart and Elgin, but I had never before really experienced Austin’s more elevated dining scene. First on my list of places to try was a little, Southern, tasting menu-only restaurant called Barley Swine and sister to another amazing Austin hot spot called Odd Duck – both which recently received 2015 James Beard Award nods.
An Authentically Laid Back, Under-the-Radar Italian Cafe in SoHo
Bar Ciccio is the kind of place you could walk by a million times and never notice. It’s located on a strip of 6th Avenue that gets ridiculously minimal intentional foot traffic and the shop front is so understated that you probably wouldn’t even realize it’s open for business. In fact, the place is completely subterranean and is located down a flight of stairs frequently obscured by scaffolding, but to miss this truly authentic Italian joint would be a big mistake.
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