Blue Plate Redux
Blue Plate Entrance
One of my favourite restaurants in town, I’ve been going to Blue Plate since it opened in 1999 and began serving its wonderful, hearty neo-American fare with plays on old classics like Meatloaf and Fried Chicken. Today, it can still pack in a crowd, so that last-minute reservations on a Friday night yielded only a 9:15 opening, but we were able to get seated around 9 or so by arriving around 8:45 and waiting for a couple of the counter seats.
Scallop, Uni and Mentaiko Pasta
Uni, Scallops, Mentaiko and Tobiko
This is a crazy luxurious dish, containing some of my most favourite seafood in the world, and cream and butter. I've had uni sauce for pasta before, mostly in fancy restaurants and the like, but not to this degree at home. Well, ok, we did attempt an uni cream sauce once, with actual fresh uni, but this dish, this dish nails it just so. Just the right amounts of cream and uni and other goodness (mentaiko was definitely the key) to turn something fantastic into something orgasmic.
Wakuriya
DD pointing at some Monterey Pines
Ok, I’ll admit it, Wakuriya only hit our radar after it received its first Michelin star. I have a horrible fault of usually turning a blind eye (with a few exceptions) to anything south of San Francisco, preferring to focus on wine country or Oakland/ Berkeley instead. DD had tried to get reservations before, but had called too late for a birthday dinner.
We wish we had gotten to Wakuriya sooner. I’d go every month if we could.
Momofuku’s Spicy Sausage and Rice Cakes
Spicy Stew for Two
Whenever I open a cookbook for the first time, I’ll usually skim the recipes with photos first. Are they appealing? Do they make me want to read the recipe? Do they make my mouth water and immediately start plotting out how I might make the dish, and soon?
Restaurant menus can be different. They often don’t have illustrations or photos accompanying the text, and the way a dish is described or written may have to work twice as hard to entice and lure and seduce.
flour+water Tomato Dinner
Plating in the Dough Room
flour+water had been popular right out of the gate, spurred by a buzz going even before it opened - with Chef Thomas McNaughton boasting a resume listing La Folie, Quince and Gary Danko; a number of stages at Michelin-starred establishments in Europe, including an artisinal pasta apprenticeship: "...basically Tom and a bunch of old ladies with rolling pins..." according to David White, one of the partners at f+w.
DD and I have been jonesing to go back to flour+water but trying to get a decent online reservation in advance lately has been quite difficult. On 98% of my attempts, I've usually encountered nothing earlier before 10pm. Once in a while, if I looked out far enough, I’d spot a listing for 9:15 or 9:30pm. For a Tuesday or Wednesday. Sheesh! They opened in May of 2009, and 2 months thereafter garnered 3 stars from The Chronicle’s Michael Bauer. Accolades followed from the other local food press, and soon there was even a blurb in the New York Times. The restaurant purportedly holds back 1/2 of their seats for walk-ins, but we've been hesitant to try this tactic, not being from the immediate neighbourhood.
Momofuku’s Cured Hamachi
Momofuku at Home: Cured Hamachi
NYC in late 2009 was a great trip. I'm jonesing to go again, perhaps sometime next year when I hope to also make it to another favourite eating-town, Chicago. As I've mentioned before, our trip to New York had turned into a bacchanalia of eating and drinking - would that our bellies were bigger, or that I had a higher tolerance for alcohol. 5 days and 4 nights just wasn't enough to make a dent. Momofuku Ssam Bar was indeed a highlight, and one of the dishes that struck me the most for its beauty and delicacy was the cured Hamachi crudo dish.
Saison
Saison
Saison’s website proclaims that there is no dress code, and urges folks to “come as you are.” While the food is elevated, there’s a nice dichotomy between the white-tablecloth cuisine and the service and warmth of the staff. We had finally made it - after a couple of years and one pop-up when Chef Skenes was away.
How to describe Saison with words of praise that have already been said in a style far better than mine? DD and I had a wonderful meal here, full of beautiful and delicious moments. Sometimes, it might be better to just let the food speak for itself.
Making Momofuku Ramen at home
My weekend project: Momofuku Ramen
DD and I visited New York in December of 2009. He was there for work, I was there to tag along, partially working remotely as well. We also turned the trip into a bar-hopping and salacious dining extravaganza. During our 5 days there, we managed to sample 3 of David Chang’s eateries: Momofuku Ssam Bar, Noodle Bar, and Milk Bar, though I have to admit that the visit to Milk Bar was just a cursory walk-through - we had been lunching at the Ssam Bar next door, and could not pass up a visit to peek at sweets. I don’t much recall what we had at Milk Bar if anything as I was too full from our decadent lunch.
Masala Dosa
Masala Dosa Interior
Along with a plethora Japanese restaurants, we also have a good number of Indian/ Pakistani eateries in my neighborhood. Curry Village’s arrival last year was the latest entry to the Inner Sunset, with stalwarts Naan ‘n Curry and Masala Indian Cuisine holding down in their location for many years. Masala Dosa replaced the Pakistani Tasty Curry on 9th that we never managed to visit; we had tried Curry Village once and found their dishes too sweet; Naan n’ Curry fell out of our favour in recent years.
But Masala Dosa seems like a great addition to our neighborhood, and our lunch there indicated that we’d be returning to it as our Indian place of choice in the future.
Summer Vegetable Gratin
Veggies are good for you!
It's that time of year. The time when farmer's markets abound with a profusion of summer produce: eggplants and pattypan squash and green zucchini with their bright yellow cousins. Ears of corn call to be shucked and eaten raw, right off the cobb. An abundance of tomatoes and basil sends one rushing for the good olive oil and oozy burrata. Beautiful golden squash blossoms call out to be stuffed and fried... Even at work, one of my coworkers with a prolific garden brings in trayfuls of her extra produce, to be snatched up by the garden-slackers (i.e., me).
| M | T | W | T | F | S | S |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| « Mar | ||||||
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | |
| 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 |
| 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 |
| 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 |
| 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | |||
Subscribe to Tabemasu
Recent Posts
- New Running Shoes
- Training/ Workout Summary Week of 20-26 February
- Brazen Bay Breeze Half 2012
- Beachside Coffee Bar and Kitchen
- Kaiser Half Marathon 2012
- A Trip to Napa
- Excuses
- Hainanese Chicken Rice
Running
Daily Mile
Food Porn
View my posts on: Tastespotting and Tasteologie.
Categories
Tags
Archives
Foodblogs All Over
- A Life Worth Eating
- Amateur Gourmet
- Blue Lotus
- Chocolate and Zucchini
- ChuckEats
- Cooking with the Single Guy
- David Lebovitz
- Eat a Duck I Must
- i nom things
- JustHungry
- No Recipes
- Ono Kine Grindz
- Rasa Malaysia
- Simply Recipes
- The Amateur Gourmet
- The Ulterior Epicure
- Third and Fairfax
- Third and Fairfax
- White on Rice Couple
Friends
- Annamarie Panlilio Photography
- Athena
- Cygnoir
- Justinsomnia
- La Vie Soleil
- Ono Kine Grindz
- Quasistoic
- Secondhand City
- Shikamoo
- The Ulterior Epicure
Group Blogs
SF Bay Area
- Athena
- Beer and Nosh
- Bunrabs
- ChuckEats
- Cooking with the Single Guy
- Cygnoir
- Focus: Snap: Eat
- Married with Dinner
- No Salad as a Meal
- Quasistoic
- SFoodie
- Shikamoo
Translate
Foodista
Foodblogs
