Asian SF (part 2)

One of the key things I wanted to try in SF was the sushi, and I can even call it research for work! SF is overrun with sushi places, reminded me of Hong Kong where there is almost one at every street corner, many of questionable quality. The one we went to, however, turned out had a Michelin star a few years back, and I took it as a good sign that they could only offer us seats at the sushi bar when we walked in without a reservation.

Sushi Ran in Sausalito is in quite a sleepy neighbourhood, Sausalito being the one stop north of the Golden Gate bridge that tourists manage to get to. There is an adjoining sake and wine bar next door, and the layout of the restaurant itself is pretty tiny, dominated by the large sushi bar. Having spent quite a lot of time examining sushi bars recently, I was really quite impressed with this one. The display was pretty standard for Japanese restaurants, but the chefs behind the bar all showed very good knowledge of their product, and just chatty enough (thankfully none of the American false over-friendliness). Our chef was hilariously named Garth, but with an appropriately Japanese sounding surname:

Their sake list was also pretty impressive, didn't count exactly but probably about 30 different sakes, many available by the carafe. It is still interesting to see how restaurants present their sake lists, many I've seen, including this one, actually put a little picture of the label on the menu, which strikes me as both a little useless and a little tacky. Never mind, at least the tasting notes were pretty good, and we opted for a sake I recognised: dewazakura oka, which was fragrant and light. The way their served it meant that getting the table all wet was a bit inevitable:

Sushi Ran boasts that they ship a lot of their fish directly from Tsukiji Market in Tokyo, but Garth explained that because it was Golden Week in Japan, their shipment had been delayed, so the selection was quite limited on the day we visited. This was a shame, because we were comparing the sushi in SF vs. London (he came to do an extensive visit last year), and one of the things he complained was the lack of variety in London, but the selection that day in SF didn't really show me what I was missing.

The uni was so good and fresh and creamy that we ordered another round. It was a good sign of their freshness that they ran out really soon into the evening:

Monkfish liver (ankimo) you don't really see on the menu in London (although Chisou has it as an appetiser), and it was very good. I'm all into my creamy nigiris as you can see:

Their hot food impressed me less, with some quite steep prices and variable food. Their tofu tasting was an interesting concept, with tofu 3 ways, but only the usual agedashi tofu was any good. The top one was disturbingly cold and made me squirt juice across the table, and the one with chilli at the bottom was disappointingly bland. And this is a tofu fan telling you that tofu is bland!:

Fil had never had black cod miso before, so we went for that. Pretty good version it was too, fish was meltingly soft, but at a very steep price, one of the most expensive 'mains' they had on the menu, tiny portion size:

We also sampled some of the crazy maki that Californians are known for. They didn't actually have California roll itself, but all sorts of maki with a similar idea. Their spicy tuna roll was so so, with the spice coming from the sprinkles on top rather than within, but we really liked their miso scallop roll, again, creaminess always wins me over:

We had also asked for a crispy salmon skin roll, but after being told that it would take 30 minutes and it was towards the end of our meal, we asked for their recommendation instead. Garth mentioned that they sell around 10,000 of their crunch maki every year (we worked out that it was just about believable at around 30 of these rolls a day), which includes eel, avocado, spicy crab, and shrimp, and as you can see, lashings of sauce on top:

For me, there was far far too much going on in this roll, with so much stuff inside that it collapses as soon as you put it on your sharing plate, so you end up eating it in pieces anyway. I guess it is this style of sushi which is popular in California though, if they sell so many of it, which I think is a shame, particularly as I've just looked up their sushi menu online and looked at how many types of fish they normally are able to serve. We never did get a chance to try any more sushi whilst I was in SF, but pretty impressed if this is the standard they set.

Asian SF (part 1)

I kept wandering around San Francisco thinking that it reminded me of Sydney; the bay is arguably even nicer, and the bridge even more impressive, but even better, there appears to be things to do in SF other than go jogging. But from a foodie point of view, Asian food was another point of comparison between the two cities. It is the Thai and Vietnamese food that I miss most about Sydney, and SF certainly was able to compete on that front.

Our first weekend started well with a visit to the Farmers' Market in the Ferry Building. Someone very clever decided to re-purpose this large cavernous space as a mecca for fresh produce, and the place was heaving with yummy mummies on the Saturday morning we went, just imagine if they scrubbed up Borough Market a bit and put it in Primrose Hill! It was almost too clean for me, but I loved to see how people revelled in the produce.

It was interesting to see that the emphasis of this market vs. Borough at home, which I think is a reflection of Californian vs. British strengths in food. In Borough Market, arguably the best things are the meat and the cheese, and whilst there seemed to be a healthy industry for these farmed goods in SF, it was definitely not quite to British standards. Most alarmingly, meat and fish is sold in zip-lock bags, all filleted and neat and clinical, no way you could have figured they came from animals. Interestingly, we read that Fergus Henderson was going to be guest-cheffing at a few restaurants after I left, not sure his cuisine would go down that well in SF to be honest.

On the other hand, the vegetables and fruit is the real star of the show in SF, and these are the things I'm craving now I'm settled back into cold, cold London. The oranges in particular were like eating sunshine, and strawberries so sweet it feels they must have injected them with sugar. No wonder they can have raw movement in California, one of the only places where raw food is glorious enough to shine by themselves.

But getting back to Asian food, Eugene sent me a list of his SF favourites, and bang on top of the list was Slanted Door in the Ferry Building. Fil tried his hardest to get me to try other stuff instead for lunch, but it looked too enticing! It is apparently one of the Top 10 grossing restaurants in the US (or California, I forget which), and you can immediately see why. The place was rammed on a Saturday lunchtime, and we were lucky enough to get seats at the bar after being told it would be a 90 minute wait for a table. The restaurant makes the most of its location with huge windows all along the harbour, and minimalist design, but ultimately I think the success of this place is down to the consistently good, fresh food.

We decided to test the place with some Vietnamese classics as well as some of the more funky things on the menu. I'd only been in SF for a few days at this point, and putting uni on the menu just made me want to try it. This uni was served with avocado, cucumber, and black tobiko, and was wild Californian uni:

The combination was really quite fabulous, loved the contrast between the crunchy cucumber and the creaminess of the avocado and uni together. The uni by itself wasn't anything to rival its Japanese cousins for creaminess on its own though, hence I guess the inclusion of the avocado to help it along. Sometimes these slightly Americanised 'sushi' dishes have too much stuff in them, but this really worked.

More traditionally, we also had their Slanted Door spring rolls and a Vietnamese crepe:

Both these dishes you see in almost every Western Vietnamese place going, but this was probably the best two examples I have ever tasted. Both dishes were incredibly light; the spring rolls laced with very thin slices of pork to give another dimension of flavour, and the crepe not only had the freshest ingredients, but floated in my mouth. The curse of Western Asian cuisine is to use substandard ingredients and cover it is cloying sauce as a disguise, but this was the absolute antithesis.

Our decision on Slanted Door was mainly because of our equal obsession with Asian soups, so we tried both their wonton soup and their beef pho:

To be honest, the pho is nothing to write home about. Indeed, Eugene told me off later for ordering pho in somewhere that wasn't a 'proper dirty Vietnamese place', and he is so right. The wonton noodle soup was pretty decent though from the one bite of noodles that I got out of Fil. The noodles had exactly the right texture, and also the prerequisite 'fairy liquid' taste you get from Hong Kong noodle eateries. However, we went to the sister Out The Door on my last day in SF and tried the same dish, and disappointingly there the noodles were all stuck together and the whole dish was swimming with MSG. Stick to the pork buns if you're going to OTD.

The other Asian place that Eugene recommended was The House on the corner of Grant Ave and Vallejo. This was a much smaller, family feel affair, and I loved the little homey touches they had. Their place mats I thought had the perfect combination of being cost effective and cute:

We were meeting two old friends for dinner here, so I couldn't really focus on the food, but their special starter of seared scallops with a miso ponzu sauce was by far the most successful thing we ate that night. I love that combination of saltiness and sourness:

The grilled seabass with soy dressing that everyone raves about, however, was only just ok. The seabass must be a completely different breed to what we have in England to warrant such a huge steak, but ultimately I found the flavour to be meaty but a bit bland.

The boys both had the special of grilled cod, the most interesting thing about it was the presentation:

Served with what was essentially a Californian roll that had been sliced lengthways, apparently this was really quite good as well as being creative.

With the higher proportion of Asian population, it is not surprising that the Asian food is of a good standard. We also went to the much heralded Yank Sing for dim sum, again, very high standards even though they don't seem to be able to make char siu buns properly. Still, we still managed to get tourist-trapped in Chinatown - we had decided to go there on an empty stomach lacking any decent recommendations, and relied on yelp.com to find somewhere to go. We apparently went to one of the best Chinese in America at Chef Jia's, according to some of the reviews, and I really should have known better when reviews praise a restaurant for its use of chicken breast meat. I should just trust my instincts and never eat in a Chinatown ever again.

Unhealthy stuff in San Francisco (yes, it's possible)

My first few days in San Francisco felt like a whirlwind tour of what you can take out of food and still manage to eat it: gluten-free, meat-free, soy-free, lactose-free, and of course, fat-free. More on that in my next post, but I wanted to celebrate all the unhealthiness of the city first.

I have never understood why American students always come to London and moan about the lack of Mexican food. Even with the advent of Wahaca, I still don't really get the appeal of what I see is essentially a cuisine made of mixing some kind of tortilla with some tomatoes with some meat, and then smothering it with cheese.

La Taqueria in the Mission is such a favourite amongst my friends, that Fil has come straight here when he gets off the plane, and apparently we are going to all live in a communal squat with Eugene and Aisha just so that we can be near. This humble Mexican joint has been in the Top 100 San Francisco restaurants for many many years now, and was suitably crowded with an eclectic crowd when we went, a mixture of local Mexican families to what looked like a well-fed white Texans on tour.

Inside, the menu is small, you can basically get either various kinds of tacos, or various kinds of burritos, served with a small selection of drinks. The walls are adorned with the numerous awards the place has earned over the years:

I went with the expert, who recommended the carne asada burrito with a strawberry agua fresca. At this point, it remained somewhat unpromising:

But unwrap the tinfoil, and I finally, finally understand what this was all about. This was unlike any burrito I have had, in London, US, or Mexico. There was no rice, no avocado, just a perfect mixture of beef, tomato salsa, and beans in a tortilla wrap, nothing more. And I am thinking that this might only work in California where the tomatoes are just amazing. It was so juicy that I think I used up half a carton of napkins, and hence why the photos suddenly stop. It took a long walk around Mission to digest it, but that only helped me to think it was the best neighbourhood in San Francisco (living in East London helps).

Oh, and the agua fresca was amazing too, probably because the strawberries in California are in season and amazing right now. Sorry, British strawberries will never again cut it for me.

Somehow, we managed to top this food coma with brunch at Dipsea Cafe in Mill Valley, a local favourite serving 'homestyle breakfast' in Marin. It is like one of those cute little American diners that you always see in films, complete with the booths and the unlimited jug of coffee and the overly friendly waitress. I was almost expecting Pumpkin and Honey Bunny to come and rob everyone.

Their breakfast menu is a little ridiculous for choice, including some interesting things like huevos rancheros, gravlax scramble, but I thought you should just go with the locals, and ordered the Dipsea Special of two buttermilk pancakes, one egg, link sausage, bacon, and home fries.

Now, I'm used to a good old big English breakfast, and was getting my stomach prepared for the onslaught. But I still wasn't quite expecting the enormity of the pancakes that were presented to me. I was expecting little drop-scone sized things, but they turned out to be bigger than my face (and ever since my teens I have been teased for having a huge face):

And that huge nob of butter on top was just unnecessary. I somehow managed to plough through about one of those pancakes before admitting defeat. I have a Nigella recipe for American style pancakes, the proportions of which are so huge that I have to halve the recipe each time, but now I understand where she's coming from. We actually spotted another table on the way out which had ordered an extra full stack (3 pancakes) and side of bacon on top of their normal breakfast.

Fil started getting worried about me during the trip because I kept refusing food, saying I wasn't hungry. If you've ever met me, you would know that this is not normal. I didn't want any dinner that day, and I'm sure I am still digesting some of that pancake right now.

One last naughty outing was to go to In and Out Burger, mainly to placate my foul mood after I found out about the inconclusive election results and was missing the Guardian last Thursday. There is only one branch in San Francisco (and another in Marin), so unsurprisingly it was packed that lunch time. I had forgotten what all the secret codes were, so we went for a straightforward cheeseburger & fries. It was much better than the one I ate in LA this time last year, it is certainly a superior fast food burger, and I think it's strategy of keeping the number of branches small probably ensures the quality.

Don't worry, a full report on salads, fresh fruit, and ridiculous healthiness in the next post :)

Birthday at Hibiscus

Hot off the press from Monday, the San Pellegrino World's 50 Best Restaurants have just been announced. Only 3 restaurants from the UK made it onto the list this year, old favourites Fat Duck, St John, and a new entry at number 49 for Hibiscus.

Either Fil is psychic (unlikely), or just very well trained (even more unlikely), but it ended up being the venue of my surprise birthday dinner a few weeks ago! For their Friday and Saturday nights, you don't get a menu, you just get to choose the number of courses you want: 4, 6, or 8. We decided to be averagely fat and went for 6 courses. Here they are without any commentary from me:

Amuse bouche

Apple and Carrot Soda

Devon brown crab

Salad of Devonshire Crab, Tokyo White Turnip, Kentish Sea Leaves, Cream & Smoked Olive Oil Dressing

Black bream

Cornish Black Bream Stuffed with Morels & Kaffir Lime, New Season Broad Beans & Coffee

Snails

Fricassee of Herefordshire Snails, Turkish Morels, “Vin Jaune” Sauce & Wild Chervil

Squab Pigeon

Roast Squab Pigeon, Tamarillo Confit in Muscovado, New Season Carrot & Passion Fruit Puree, Cheltenham Beetroot

Selection of British & French Cheeses

From Neal’s Yard and Bernard Antony

Pre dessert

Strawberries and Celeriac with Sichuan Pepper Foam

Winter Garden

Iced Nougat Parfait of Candied Roots, Physalis Coulis

I'm a bit dubious about the World's 50 Best list anyway. I've only been to 6 on the list, and only one of them (lovely Martin of San Sebastian) is the only meal I would say has absolutely blown my mind.

I loved loved the surprise element at Hibiscus, especially as I wouldn't have ordered the best dish of the lot. The stuffed sea bream was a creation of wonder, I could have happily eaten about 5 portions of it. And the other thing I absolutely adored was the so right cheese selection (you can tell I was excited as I didn't even take a picture) - fourme d'ambert, comte, a goatey one and a soft stinky one. I couldn't really have asked for a better place for my birthday.

But obviously, now I have to overanalyse every aspect of my dining experience, there were a few niggly things I have. First, the dining room is really odd, the tables a bit too spaced out almost, and I'm not sure about the minimalist blonde panelling, the room needed more character. I also thought it was weird to have two dishes with morels (the sea bream and the snails) back to back; unfortunately the sea bream dish was so so good, the snails felt like a let down. And finally, I really disliked the dessert. I know I'm not a dessert person, but this was just an odd choice to try and display your dessert talents. Simply not very nice at all!

Berlin

So yes, it was an awfully long time ago that we had our little visit to Berlin, but work has been incredibly busy, and I am now catching up on all my blogs! Even with my ridiculous OCD memory for food though, I am struggling to remembr the exact ingredients of the food we ate there.

I have a real fondness for German food, even when it is so unfashionable to like it. I like a bit of stodge, and am a big fan of sauerkraut. Unfortunately though during our little weekend away, we never found the opportunity to go and eat any wurst, it does somehow feel wrong, especially as I'd even researched where the best curry wurst supposedly is. But the food we did eat was consistently good.

I arrived in Berlin very late on a Friday night, and as much as we loved our hotel, their concierge was rather rubbish at recommending something that was still open at 10pm, especially as I'd insisted on eating German food. We also insisted that we wanted to walk there, so she pointed us to somewhere near Hackescher Markt.

We loved the walk there, taking in most of Berlin's sights in Mitte, but it was only when we were quite near the restaurant that we realised we were walking right through the red light district. It didn't make us feel particularly uncomfortable, but knowing us, we started to overanalyse their business model and started thinking of ways to improve their sales. For some reason, all the girls had almost exactly the same outfits, with the exception that some boots (all equally patented and shiny) were black, whereas some were pink. Maybe men are just not that fussy.

Anyway, we ended up at a place called Lutter & Wegner, which turned out to be a sort of chain restaurant serving extremely traditional German food. Definitely a lot of stodge and soured cream to be had here! I had a goulash with spatzle, and spatzle has become one of my new favourite foods:

I think we had also ordered some kind of wurst and they got our order wrong, which meant some black pudding with apple arrived instead. I really ought not to try my bad German on actual German people:

All in all, it was good, but not particularly exciting.

More exciting was Moses' recommendation of Monsieur Vuong, also in the Hackescher Markt area, which he had described as being like a Vietnamese Busaba in Berlin. We'd also read it in the New York Times, which meant we knew it would be rammed, and even when we arrived at 4pm for a very late lunch, the place was packed!

And to be honest, I'm not really sure what the fuss is about. I did love the decor, quite utilitarian yet chic at the same time, but the short menu was almost too short (probably 6 main dishes in all with 2 or 3 specials), especially as the things on the menu didn't really excite me exactly. There was no beef pho (not sure whether that is a good or bad sign), so we both went for the chicken pho:

It was fine for what it was, but the soup base was a bit weak, maybe I'm just a bit spoilt for Asian food in London. What I was more impressed with was their setup; they didn't appear to have a kitchen at the back, and did everything in a tiny area by the entrance (boiling the noodles, spooning on the broth etc.), which probably explains the tight menu.

Undoubtedly our most exciting dinner was at Schneeweiss in Friedrichshain, also mentioned in the NYT. It wasn't quite as chic as we had expected it to be, it was definitely very white, but also quite down to earth, including some quite amateurish snowflakes on the windows which quite endeared me to the place. The whole idea of the menu is modern Alpine food, and whilst it won't set the world on fire, it did feel right to eat it in what is supposedly the equivalent of the East End of Berlin.

Starters were a goats' cheese tart and a potato and carrot soup - both humble yet very well done:


My memory is failing me slightly on the mains. One of them was definitely red mullet, very light and fresh:

But the other one was another goulash (maybe?) with some pink stuff on the top.

We really liked the Friedrichshain area actually, with some quite interesting bars including one called the Big Lebowski that served (not particularly good) White Russians, and also a very self-consciously grubby place that played good 60's British music!

Berlin is one of those places I can go back to again and again. The first time I went was with a group of 20 raucous consultants and ended in Berghain, this time, it was a much calmer experience. If only I can go there once when it's not freezing cold! Anyway, here is probably the best memory of the weekend :)

The Glasshouse/ Chez Bruce

I recently (re)discovered the joys of taking a day off during the week recently: I had a few days' holiday left over before the holiday year ended, and London is such a lovely place before the weather is good enough that it is flooded with tourists, and there is no-one around!

One of the nicest things we did was to go to Kew on a Friday and eat at The Glasshouse. Unfortunately, I now fear for the survival of the place, along with its brother Chez Bruce in Wandsworth. We went to Chez Bruce on a Saturday night, completely on a whim, and managed to get a booking by calling about 4 hours ahead. Worrying. And when we got there, it was definitely not fully booked. I know it is in the middle of nowhere, but I always thought that reputation would sustain a place like that.

Even more worrying was when they gave us a discount voucher for The Glasshouse with our bill. It was for a half price weekday lunch, 3 courses at £11.75. Yes, a Michelin starred, 3 course meal for less than £12. Even at full price it is ridiculously cheap. Thankfully, the place was quite full on the Friday lunchtime that we went, but we were definitely the youngest people in the place by a good few generations.

The worrying goes on too, as the food was such generous proportions, and the wine by the glass list far too reasonable. I had a gorgeous Slovenian white (must look up what it was) for a fiver a glass! This accompanied some great dishes, but enough food to feed a small family.

I started with a chicken raviolo with a garlic veloute. Whenever I read 'raviolo' on a menu, I start thinking it's going to be tiny and would never satiate my never ending desire for pasta. NOT THIS TIME! Look at how big it was!!!:

As big as a Cornish pasty, just this would have been enough for lunch, especially as the veloute is so thick it's the sort you can stand a spoon in. Fil unsurprisingly went for a salad, this time a wood pigeon one topped with a truffled egg. Again, so big you wondered why they thought following this with 2 more courses was a good idea:

And here is a gratuitous shot of the egg, very truffley it was too:

I am guessing they are making some money out of this by using lesser meats and worser cuts, but that logic goes out the window when they serve you nearly a whole rabbit for your main, which also came with a huge potato gratin thing, Bayonne ham, vegetables drenched in butter:

How we managed dessert is a small mystery, but probably helped by how good they were. Everyone knows I'm not a dessert person, but both Chez Bruce and The Glasshouse had me licking the plate. I had a fig roll with almond ice cream and a poached pear. Another good thing about having lunch at The Glasshouse is being able to take colourful pictures:

Fil found out how amazing trifles were with his black forest version:

We went to Kew Gardens afterwards (very nice by the way, even with its very ugly Asian pagoda), the admission for which was about the same price as the meal! I really ought to stop over-analysing restaurant business models and relax and just enjoy the damn food. I've just remembered the main course at Chez Bruce was this veal and spatzle concoction featuring veal tongue which was probably one of the best mains I've had in a long time. But do I mention that first in the blog post? No. Bad Connie!

Just about worth the hassle

I have wanted to go to Franco Manca, apparently home to the most authentic Napoli pizza in London, for the longest time, but given that it is in the deepest depths of South London (well, ok, Brixton), I knew it would be a trek. But oh what a trek it turned out to be. Obviously Fil and I decide to go when the Victoria line is down, and didn't manage to get our arses ready until about 2pm anyway. Then we had all sorts of fun with the buses, including getting one going the wrong way, so we arrived finally at about 3:30pm. And this place closes at 5pm.

After getting a bit lost around Brixton market, we got there to find this humungous queue, like 30+ people in the queue. Yes, look at it! Fil hilariously went to try and find some sustenance to keep him going, and then bought a plantain without realising you can't eat it raw, hahaha!


We were in the queue for about an hour, I don't really want to think about how much time we spent travelling/queuing for a freaking pizza. And we probably sat down for about 15 minutes whilst we wolfed it all down. F went for the more classic margarita. It was as good as the ones I had in Naples, slightly sweet, slightly sour, a shame that I left it to get a little too cold:

And I should have known better than to order something a little funky. When I first read about the place a few years ago, it only had 3 or 4 very basic pizzas on the menu, and whilst the choice is still pretty tight compared to more commercial outlets, they now have a fixed menu of about 6 with another 4 or so specials each day. The one I went for was probably the most different to the margarita, a non-tomato one with crumbled sausage and some kind of pickled vegetable that I didn't write down:

I must say I struggled with this a little bit, the pickled veg was quite bitter, and I guess I was craving a simple margarita. Trust me to try and get too creative! But even more wondrous was the homemade lemonade:

Yes, looks really dark and oxidised and a bit dodgy, doesn't it, but oh it was soooooooooooooo good.

I hear Franco Manca now have a second branch in an equally inconvenient location of Chiswick. It does hearten me that little places like this get crazily popular, yet they still maintain that 'we don't care that our opening hours are really inconvenient, and yes we do insist on making everything fresh and in our own way' charm.