Ridge's Profile
State bird provisions-5/12/12
We tried State bird provisions last weekend for the first time. It was a celebration dinner for a friend’s birthday. I have been curious to try this place because it seemed like a unique and smart concept for a restaurant: nnovative internationally influenced small plates brought around Dim-sum style.
The past few years we have burnt out on fancy California cuisine restaurants. The food is often good but sometimes overly heavy, overly refined, unmemorable and expensive. Most of the time we dine out we eat ethnic food. So I was curious to see how we would like this place. We didn’t like it. We LOVED it. The food was excellent. This place is a welcome shift in paradigm. The flavors jumped off the plate and almost everything was excellent.
Here is what we ate:
oysters on the halfshell- perhaps the weakest dish of the night but still good. The oysters were kind of bland compared to recent oysters we have eaten and the accompaniments did not add much.
duck liver mousse with almond biscuit -good
beet, tofu & miso ‘ranch’ –very unique flavors
tuna tartare & quinoa with bonito-rosemary –one of my favorites of the evening. The texture of the quinoa combined with the tartare was a revelation. And the seasoning was perfect.
smoked duck fingerling potato salad -excellent
‘green garlic bread’ with burrata –this was one the favorite dishes of my dining partners
hass avocado with seafood ‘salsa’-another favorite
pork fried farro, ramps & soft egg -excellent
kimchi-pork belly with tofu and clams- very good
guanciale & ramp shortstack with candy cap powder- overall my favorite dish of the evening. Just perfect
mendocino sea urchin, ginger & scallion with soy-lime excellent
CA state bird with provisions- I can't remember the last time I ate quail I enjoyed as much. The lemony onion relish underneath was the perfect counterpoint to the tasty fried quail.
double chocolate pudding, sesame crunch, long pepper-excellent
chocolate-walnut ‘ice cream” sandwich, dulce de leche-excellent
The bill was extremely reasonable given the amount of food we ate and the service was warm and unpretentious. Seems like this could be an influential place on the food scene. I hope so.
Visitor -- Coffee? Chinatown? Good Bar for a Single Lady?
I think Chinatown in SF is worth a stroll if you have never been. My recommendation is to eat at Z and Y and beforehand go for reflexology in the place across the street from Z and Y (I forget the exact name of the reflexology place, something like “Foot reflexology”. It’s good but I would not say it’s cheap). Z and Y has great spicy Sichuan. But you need to be sure to tell them to translate the special menu that is written in Chinese, and let them know you like spicy food.
1st time in Sonoma for wine novices
I haven’t been to Sonoma in ages but one of my favorite wines is Rafanelli zinfandel. The winery is located in Dry creek valley. You need to call to schedule an appointment and they only take cash.
http://arafanelliwinery.com/
Looking for a fun Italian dinner spot in Wine Country
I think Bistro Don Giovanni is overrated but some people love it. Oenotri is excellent, especially if you focus on the pizza, apps, salads and pastas. But it’s in downtown Napa. If you search this board you will find lots of reviews on Oenotri.
Staying atop Nob Hill; Recommendations for Dinner?
We enjoyed Keiko a Nob Hill. It's more of an upscale special occasion place but quite good. You can read my review here:
http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/839593
Need East Bay Izakaya recommendation?
I think Ippuku is overrated but many people love it.
I love Kiraku. We have been going on a regular basis since they opened and every time we have gone it’s been spectacular. We went there the weekend before last. It was such an amazing meal. Everything was a revelation, from the simple but delicious Kiraku salad to the impeccable fresh sashimi to the creative tapas plates. I was going to post a review here but time got away from me and it seems kind of dead around here these days anyways. Another thing about Kiraku is that the service is incredibly warm and welcoming. I was glad to see the restaurant was bustling. It deserves to be.
Anyone ever tried Stinky Tofu?
There is likely variation in the funkiness of this stuff. I suspect the stuff we had in Taiwan was probably much more potent than the stuff at Spices3. I was expecting it might be like epoisse, but it just tasted rotten in my mouth and was difficult to swallow. I am curious to try a milder version.
From talking to people in Taiwan my impression was that stinky tofu is less of a Taiwanese comfort food, which is was what I had always thought, and more of an obscure street food that has only recently become very popular. And even though lots of people in Taiwan obviously like it, every Taiwanese person I talked to about it (not a very large sampling) hated stinky tofu.
Anyone ever tried Stinky Tofu?
We were in Taipei this past winter and tried it. We went to the Shinlin night market, which was one of the places where Andrew Zimmer tried it on his bizarre foods show. Let me preface this by saying that we like funky and pungent foods. We LOVE super stinky cheeses and are huge fans of epoisses. We really didn’t like stinky tofu at all. Here is the reason: With something like epoisses the aroma can be very stinky but once you put it in your mouth it tastes good. Epoisse and other smelly cheeses don’t taste the way the smell. Stinky tofu on the other hand tastes exactly the way it smells. The taste is just as strong as the smell. And it’s just not pleasant tasting (at least to me).
Keiko à Nob Hill
Last weekend we went to Keiko à Nob Hill for my partner’s birthday. The setting is nice, more intimate, less trendy and less sterile feeling than a lot of upscale places these days. The food was very good and I would recommend this place for special occasions.
Here is what we ate:
Carrot ‘Trio” This included a carrot chiffon cake and a carrot custard. The custard was excellent. The carrot chiffon cake was good for what it was but to me it really seemed out of place as an appetizer.
Trois ensemble of Dungeness crab. The crab was layered between thin crunchy sesame tuiles. The crab tasted very fresh, and paired well with both the livelier “red” garnishes and more vegetal “green” garnishes.. I am usually a big fan of simply presented crab dishes, but I think this dish might have been elevated to the next level with a hit of lemon or yuzu juice and a tiny drizzle of good quality olive oil. While enjoyable as is, a bit of acid would have really brought out the flavors of the crab more and brought the dish together.
The next course on the menu was foie gras, the signature dish here. We are not big foie gras eaters and they made us a vegetable course with roasted bamboo shoots and bomito and miso instead which was very good.
Duo of black angus rib eye ‘Deux. Braised and grilled rib eye. The rib eye was probably the standout dish of the evening. It was offered with shaved black truffle for $40 extra. Since it was a special occasion we got the black truffles on top. From past experience, getting shaved truffle has been a mixed experience ranging from transcendent to mediocre. The quality of truffles varies greatly and sometimes servers can be very stingy with the amount of truffle. Thankfully this experience erred on the transcendent side. First, the truffles were very high quality, plump, dark are bursting with umami earthiness and aroma. Second, the owner was generous with the amount he shaved on our food. The rib eye was outstanding, very meaty and full of flavor. The braise was good but fell short because it was not braised long enough and the meat was too dry.
Fourme d'ambert cheese-kind of like a blue cheese fillo pie. What a great idea. It was excellent.
The Cannelé Bordelais was the best version I can remember having.
Wine selection suggested by the sommelier was a 1990 Maison Leroy Maranges – a perfect match for all courses.
China Village [Albany]
A few other dishes I recommend:
Spicy numbing beef tendon (mentioned above)
House special shrimp
Tea tree mushrooms
The Almost Finalized 5 night SF and Monterey/Carmel Itinerary - Researched and re-researched!
If you are eating dinner in the Mission another place to consider is Mission Chinese. MC is an adventure for sure. It's experimetal Sichuan. If you like bold and spicy I think you will like it. Given the experimental nature of the place some dishes don't soar as much as others. But the dishes that soar are amazing. The Kung Pao pastrami is one of my favorite dishes in SF.
Please critique my itinerary for 5 night trip to San Francisco (DID LOTS OF RESEARCH)
Z and Y in Chinatown is outstanding. It’s our goto place for dinner is SF. And we are picky foodies.
Please critique my itinerary for 5 night trip to San Francisco (DID LOTS OF RESEARCH)
If the weather is nice one of my favorite things to do in San Francisco is take a long walk on Ocean beach near the Cliff House. The sound of the roaring pacific is very soothing. And the Sutro bath ruins are very unique and interesting to see (for more info see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sutro_Baths). After the walk have a drink downstairs at the bar at the Cliff House restaurant. It’s a marvelous view of the ocean while you are enjoying a cocktail. The Cliff house restaurant is supposed to be just ok (we have never eaten there), so don’t plan on eating dinner there. My advice to you would be to skip Fisherman’s Warf. I dread when I have visitors who ask to go there. It’s touristy, filled with tacky shops, crowded and boring. Go have a nice walk on Ocean beach and visit the Sutro bath ruins instead.
Valentine’s Day dinner at Morimoto [Napa]
My partner really enjoyed his previous visit. It’s worth trying. Not a place we will be visiting too often because it’s pricy but we will definitely go back.
Valentine’s Day dinner at Morimoto [Napa]
Last night we ate at Morimoto in Napa for Valentine’s Day. It was my first time here but I am a big fan of his from Iron Chef. My partner had been here once before and actually met Morimoto at a food and wine event once.
I thought the space had kind of a cavernous and cold sterile feel. I did not like the layout and design of the place. But I am picky. The valentine’s omakase dinner was $80 per person which was less than we were expecting to pay. Here is what we ate:
An oyster amuse bouche with Asian pear and wasabi pop rocks. Mediocre and gimmicky. If you are going to add something to oysters it should improve their flavor. The pop rocks and oysters combo just did not work at all for me. I started to get concerned about the rest of the dinner.
Mochi with bacon marmalade and hazlenuts. Somewhat difficult to eat but it was really tasty.
Beef severed on a hot stone with bone marrow kimchee. Two small cubes of beef served on a very hot stone. Very good. The kimchee topping was delicious and paired well with the tasty beef.
Grilled prawn in Thai flavored soup. Just ok. The prawn had a strong iodine quality that I never like in prawns. The soup was good but not as good as you would get at a decent Thai restaurant.
Sushi- a small cube of toro tartare in a spicy sauce, sockeye salmon nigiri, hamachi belly nigiri and a roll with prawn tempura. All were excellent. The sockeye was the standout and was the best piece of salmon sushi in my recent memory. The hamachi was also pretty great.
Abalone and veal sweetbread pot pie. Very good. It could have used a bit more abalone but it was very comforting.
Braised pork ribs in miso with king oyster mushrooms and bok choi. I thought this dish was stellar. I have had so many mediocre braised dishes at restaurants the past couple of years that I forgot how good braised meats can be. This dish was so amazing! The meat was falling of the bone and the miso sauce added a delicious umami flavor. The bok choi were also delicious. Perfectly done and the miso sauce paired as well with the bok choi as it did with the pork. An unforgettable dish.
Matcha green tea cake with rhubarb and white chocolate mousse. This was very interesting. Not my favorite dessert of all time but it was good.
I ordered the sake sampler $30. It was ok, I really enjoyed one of the 4 sakes. My partner ordered the Morimoto Daiginjo which was good.
All in all a very good experience.
In Search of South Bay equivalent of "West Style fish fillet soup with 1000 Chilis"
I love the China Village version. It’s so comforting.
This is what I do to spice it up:
While they are removing the chilies ask them to leave a few in the soup.
Put a chili pepper in your soup bowl when you take some soup. Cut open the chili pepper. The inside is filled with spicy liquid. Let the spicy juice inside the chili leak into your soup. I find that doing this adds just the perfect amount of heat to the soup and really increases the enjoyment for me. Try it!
Cowgirl Creamery Drake cheese sighting
We got a wheel the previous weekend at the cheeseboard in Berkeley. We ate it on Sunday. First with a toasted baguette. Then we tried it on its own. WOW! This is definitely a cheese that is better to eat by itself. No bread, no crackers. It was so amazing! It has an intense concentrated cheese flavor that makes my taste buds smile.
Kiraku - New Izakaya in Berkeley
We spent $80 (including tip) which included food and sake for two people. I had the sake sampler $15 and my partner had a glass of sake (served with ice, which I had never seen before. To me it seemed to water down the sake so next time we will ask them to leave the ice out). We could have eaten more but left feeling satiated.
Kiraku - New Izakaya in Berkeley
What a find!
We went last night and really enjoyed it. The food was really delicious and the menu has lots of interesting sounding dishes. Our server could not have been more welcoming and gracious. We had a very difficult time deciding what to get because everything on the menu sounds so interesting.
Here is what we ate:
Maitaki mushroom tempura-this was one of the specials. I love maitaki mushrooms. This dish was excellent. The mushroom were crisp outside but moist and flavorful inside. The batter was crispy and not greasy.
Grilled fava beans-another special. Large fava bean pods are grilled till the outside is charred. Served with salt for dipping. Simple and delicious. A must order.
Fried ginko nuts- very interesting. I really liked this dish but probably not something I would order every time.
Fried garlic- literally was fried garlic cloves. The cloves were surprisingly mild and soft and surrounded by a crisp tempura shell. Served with what I think was a zesty fruity miso-plum sauce. Very good.
Buta-Kim- (Sautéed Pork and Kimchi w/ Poached Egg). Maybe the favorite of the evening. A perfectly balanced dish bursting with flavor. The spicy slightly acidic kimchi was a perfect match for the impeccably sautéed tender pork. Not at all heavy. A must order.
Spicy Scallop- Tender scallops seasoned with spicy pepper. Simple, satisfying and delicious.
I really loved this place and am anxious to go back. It’s so rare to find a good non-Sushi Japanese place in the states. It reminded my of restaurants I went to in Japan last summer. The food at Kiraku was creative without being gimmicky, tasty and was not overly greasy or overly saturated with MSG.
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Kiraku
2566B Telegraph Ave, Berkeley, CA 94704
Dinner at Quince--Below average food, above average prices
I’ve had good experiences at Quince but have not been since last year. I don’t know if it’s a trend but it seems like I have noticed increasing variability in restaurant experiences the last few years. You will go to a restaurant and have an amazing meal and go back and it’s just ok or the meal will be marred by lousy service. Has happened to me at several restaurants the last few months most recently last Monday. While some variability is to be expected it seems like lots of restaurants are lacking in QC these days. It will hurt them in the end.
Kiraku - New Izakaya in Berkeley
I love Japanese food and am excited to try it. I will report back on my experience. Curious to compare it Ippuku which in my opinion is way overrated.
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Ippuku
2130 Center St, Berkeley, CA 94704
Mission Chinese Food 8-5-11
I did like the potatoes. They lent contrasting texture to the dish. They were especially tasty if you ate them with one or two of the peanuts and a small piece of meat.
We were saying on the way home that the tiger salad was the most satisfying spring rolls we had ever had.
Mission Chinese Food 8-5-11
We ate at MCF last night for the first time. Sichuan has been my favorite cuisine the last few years and I really liked the experimental take on Sichuan at MCF. We thought it was excellent and will be going back. Here is what we ate:
Tiger salad: lettuce and herbs wrapped in rice paper with a chili oil and turnip vinegar dressing. At first we were shocked by the presentation, which was unexpected. It looked somewhat similar to spring rolls except fatter. It was really delicious. I loved this dish so much. It was simple but the combination of flavors was innovative and satisfying.
Ma Po tofu: Ma Po Tofu is one of my favorite dishes and I often make it at home. The version here is non-traditional and pretty good. There were some added seasonings that I could not put my finger on. Allspice perhaps? I would say I prefer the traditional version of Ma Po Tofu, but I enjoyed this version and I applaud MCF for experimenting.
Cumin Lamb: Made with fatty lamb belly. Spicy, cuminy, lamby. Delicious.
Kung Pao Pastrami: It is going to be difficult to not order this dish the next time we go back. Bold, smokey, spicy meaty. Immensely satisfying.
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Mission Chinese Food
2234 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA 94110
Z & Y - what to order?
I really love this place. I suspect that they use healthier oils than other Sichuan restaurants because I don’t get the saturated fat overload feeling after eating here that I experience at other Sichuan places. The tea tree mushrooms on the special menu are one of my favorite dishes here. Super umami richness. The crab with house spicy sauce is very good also. The last time we got this spicy silky tofu jelly dish from the dim sum menu. It was like a rich spicy soup somewhat reminiscent of Ma Po Tofu. Really amazing.There has only been one dish I haven’t liked here. The corn, shrimp and egg dish on the special menu, which I found cloyingly sweet.
Poco Dolce Chocolates and Toffees
I’m a huge fan of Poco Dolce. The thing I like about them is that somehow they manage to make their chocolate really rich and dark but without even a hint of bitterness. And I really like the fact that the chocolate is not too sweet (Poco dolce is Italian for “a little sweet”). The tiles are the perfect size. One tile is intensely satisfying and you don’t feel guilty (if you just eat one!) because it’s relatively small and not overly sweet. My favorite tile is the chili and I agree that they do it just right. The chili tiles remind me of a solid version of rich hot chocolate except the heat is from chili and not temperature. The chocolate bars are fairly recent and they are delicious. I haven’t tried all of the flavors yet but as someone mentioned the olive oil bar is wonderful and if you are into peanut butter like I am the peanut butter bar is nirvana.
Review: Atelier Crenn [San Francisco]
We went on Friday night. We liked it overall. Here is a mini review:
On the night we went the service was not great. I would say there was a general lack of warmth in the service. Our server in particular looked very unhappy to be there. The menu is somewhat complex and we practically had to force him to give descriptions of the courses. It was kind of amazing. The biggest flaw in the service was that that night they were serving the potato appetizer with shaved truffle. Something our server failed to mention (even though we asked him to describe this dish!). We would not have known had we not seen the next table over get this dish. Had we know we would have gotten this dish as an appetizer. The chef came over to the able to talk to us. In contrast to the servers she was delightful and very warm and it detracted a bit from the bad service.
The chefs tasting menu was more Foie gras rich than we like so we ordered and shared the four course price fix menu. We asked if we could substitute an appetizer for one of dessert courses (something other restaurants have done in the past) but our waiter looked at us as if we were crazy. Whatever.
We ate:
Le Jardin: Very good but the portion was pretty small for what it was.
“Broken” Avocado: Very enjoyable but I was not as blown away by this as some people here.
"Walk in the Forest’: Really delicious. Maitake are my favorite mushrooms and I always have wondered why more places don’t use them more.
The Sea: Delicious. The least successful element was the abalone but the other elements were excellent. The uni and char were particularly tasty.
Pork: Another winning dish. Really amazing
For dessert we shard the cheese plate which came witha choice of two cheses from the cheese plate. The cheese selections were good fairly common cheeses like the old standby St. Agur. Our waiter put us remarkably tiny thin slices of cheese. I sighed when I looked at the plate. Felt ripped off.
The chocolate dessert was delicious.
One thing I liked about this place is that the portions were reasonable so you don’t leave dinner feeling overly heavy and bloated. I can see that some might complain that the potions are small and this was certainly the case with our cheese course. We will definitely go back although next time I will be sure to ask for a different waiter if we get the same one.
michael bauer's negative review of fonda (albany)
I can’t stand that I agree with him on something!!!
michael bauer's negative review of fonda (albany)
Well…….I have to bite my tongue. We went back to Fonda on Tuesday night. We hadn’t been in a while. I was hoping it would be as good as previous visits, but overall the food has slipped. We started with chips and guacamole. The chips were slightly overly greasy. The guacamole was good but not as vibrant as previous versions I remember. The salsa that came with it was completely unspicy and bland. It was taco night. We got duck and lamb tacos. The duck tacos were definitely a big step down from previous versions we have had there. The lamb was kind of bland. We got grilled squid with siquil-P'ak. This was a dish they used to have at Sea Salt. At Sea Salt this dish was always amazing. The version at Fonda was mediocre. The grilled squid was tasty enough, but the giant mound of siquil-P'ak underneath was weird and bland and not at all like the spicy Sea Salt version. We also got an old favorite the Tostaditas de carnitas. This was good but then again this is a difficult dish to mess up. The one thing I noticed different from previous visits is a lack of seasoning, no heat from chilies and no acidity from lime that I always liked. Our last visit to Sea Salt was also somewhat of a letdown but not as much as this visit to Fonda was.
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Sea Salt
2512 San Pablo Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94702
michael bauer's negative review of fonda (albany)
I have liked it. I like the atmosphere on the upstairs level, it’s comfortable to sit in the comfy couches and eat small plates and drink wine. I’ve liked the food and never have had a bad experience there. I think maybe the food is not for everyone. It’s pretty rustic food and the seasoning is heavy on lime which I love but others might find one dimensional. I have particularly liked their crudo appetizers, the chips with guacamole and pork and the duck tacos. Once in a while I have gotten a less than stellar dish but more often than not I have enjoyed the new things I’ve tried.
michael bauer's negative review of fonda (albany)
I haven't been in a couple of months but will try to go back soon and will report back
