Sexy Portuguese Date Night Off The Beaten Path at Pão! in West SoHo

Just because I moved away from NYC doesn’t mean I still don’t have a few more gems tucked away to tell you all about. One of my more frequented go-to date night spots from my New York days is a tiny Portuguese restaurant located on the western edge of SoHo serving homey, upscale, and unusual food in a cozy, window-lined space that faces out onto the quiet, infrequently trafficked streets. I think Pao! still remains off-the-radar for most people and prior to Union Bar & Kitchen opening, it really was the only viable date night option in the area.

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A Perfect Balance of Quality, Price, and Value at Live Sushi Bar in Potrero Hill

It’s not always easy finding a great sushi place in San Francisco. Often times the quality at inexpensive spots is unacceptable and the high-quality places are just way too expensive. And if you can manage to find an excellent and reasonably priced spot like Domo Sushi, it’ll constantly be plagued by long lines and waits due to its extremely popular Hayes Valley location. That’s why I was so happy to find Live Sushi Bar in the less trafficked Potrero Hill neighborhood. It has consistently proven its ability to hit that sweet spot of freshness, price, value, and ease of access. And I know you’ll love it too.

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A Perfect Day of Eating & Wine Tasting Across Paso Robles

To celebrate my lovely girlfriend Amy’s redacted birthday, we planned a glorious weekend getaway to the Paso Robles wine country. We had heard excellent things about the remote region’s beauty and density of high-quality wineries so it seemed like a great way to spend a couple of days and the perfect way to mark the occasion.

On the Friday of her birthday weekend, Amy drove down from San Francisco to pick me up from work in Sunnyvale before we headed off into the beautiful, winding, south-of-SF countryside only to stop quickly in Moss Landing for dinner before reaching Paso Robles at around 11 PM.

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Simple, Satisfying Date Night Fare at Salt House in the Financial District

I feel like it’s a good idea to always have at least one great date night spot in every neighborhood. San Francisco’s Financial District is pretty quiet at night compared to the rest of the city, so it isn’t always too easy to find a great place to serve this purpose. One night I was in the area looking for a nice place to take Amy to and I stumbled upon Salt House which I seemed like it might very well fit the evening’s bill.

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Outstanding Sustainable Seafood on the Sausalito Waterfront at Fish.

It may be October, but Summer is still in full swing in the Bay Area. When I get a particularly warm and sunny day, nearly every time I just want to be outside to enjoy some fresh seafood with a cold beer. Since we have a car, taking a short drive north over the Golden Gate bridge to Sausalito is not a big deal and Fish. is the perfect solution for this sunny weather scenario.

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Simply Spectacular Fresh Seafood at Swan Oyster Depot in Lower Nob Hill

Ah yes, the world famous Swan Oyster Depot. This 100-year-old Lower Nob Hill institution is certainly one of the more famous San Francisco eateries and I’m lucky enough to live on the same block as this revered bastion of seafood. With a place so good, so close by you’d probably expect to find me there on a weekly basis, but there’s two things that constantly hold me back – open for lunch and there’s constantly tourists lined up out the door.

Literally every single time I’ve walked by this lunch-only hot spot – between their opening at 10:30 AM and their closing at 5:30 PM – there has been a substantial line to contend with. This is a very discouraging sight for someone like myself who absolutely refuses to wait in lines for anything, no matter how amazing the results may be.

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Rincon Taqueria in Norwalk, CT Has a Thing or Two to Teach You Northeasterners About Mexican Food

WOAH YEAH. Who’d a thought you could find super-legit Mexican food in Eastern Connecticut? I certainly didn’t. But there I was, sitting on the SoNo waterfront (South Norwalk for all you out-of-towners) searching for a solid lunch spot and when I stumbled across a little taqueria on Yelp with only a few reviews, but every single one of them was utterly ecstatic about the place. It was settled, Amy and I were going to drive across town to Rincon Taqueria in Norwalk to see what all the people were buzzing about.

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Fast, Casual, Waterfront Seafood at Phil’s Fish Market in Moss Landing

For Amy’s birthday weekend we had booked a cabin in the Paso Robles Wine Region. From San Francisco, it would have been a four hour drive so we knew we needed a Friday night pit stop for dinner half way there. A bit of web research illuminated the fact that there were very few viable options between Los Gatos at the south edge of Silicon Valley and our ultimate destination without heading into Santa Cruz or Monterey, which we wanted to avoid for traffic purposes. But there was one single place that did seem to be well regarded and worthy of a pit stop — a fish shack on the waterfront in the tiny town of Moss Landing called Phil’s Fish Market.

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Tataki Gives Sustainable Sushi a Good Name in Lower Pac Heights

In the past, I’ve never really bothered much to concern myself with social consciousness with regards to food and waste. I don’t think you could blame me too much though, because I had never before lived in a place where it was such a high concern or integrated part of the cultural fabric. As it turns out, just being in San Francisco pretty much forces you to become very aware of the impact your consumption has on the environment simply through the requisite use of separate trash, recycling, and compostable bins everywhere you go.

Beyond waste management though, I’ve learned you can further be accountable for your actions by the types of meat, seafood, and produce you buy. By choosing responsibly sourced, environmentally friendly meat, seafood, and produce at your grocery store you can be sure the stuff you love so much stays around for a long, long time. And even beyond home shopping, there are ways to make good choices when you’re dining out. For instance, when the desire for awesome sushi strikes, you can choose to go to a place like Tataki in Lower Pac Heights that refuses to serve any sushi made with anything but sustainably sourced fish.

I know, I know. I can hear you groaning already. Sustainability? Social consciousness? What happened to Winston when he moved out to Cali?? Don’t worry, it’s the same old bacon-loving me, I’m just embracing living in San Francisco and trying to learn as much as I can. Trust me, this sushi tastes just as good as the unsustainable alternative and doesn’t even cost more than the quality stuff you’re used to.

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Authentic, Hidden Peruvian Cuisine at La Fina Estampa in the Polk Gulch

Now that I’ve moved to San Francisco, I’ve got a whole host of restaurants to explore in my new neighborhood. There are plenty of obvious eye-catching eateries on the main Polk Street drag, but there was just something about that unremarkable and completely illegible awning that caught both of our eyes while walking down one the side streets. It was getting close to dinner time and we weren’t sure what we felt like having for dinner, so we decided to venture inside and try out this mysterious Latin American spot we knew absolutely nothing about.

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