San Francisco Eats

My friend and business partner, Caroline, and I drove up to San Francisco for a quick visit to San Francisco. Having both lived there at different points in our lives, the city holds many memories for each of us. The weather was full of sunshine thanks to a cool wind that blew through the city keeping the fog at bay. We walked everywhere, up and down those SF hills so as to really feel like we were in the city. This will be a rather large entry because we spent our time eating.

The day we arrived, we did a food tour through GourmetWalks, in the Hayes Valley district. The photos and details from this experience can be found through the link on the right (or here) with the entire photo album from our quick visit. The last item on the GourmetWalk was the cocktail at Smuggler's Cove.

On Sunday night we arrived at A16, in the Marina, at 9:00 for our reservation. Having walked 15 blocks in heels, we were ready to sit and enjoy our evening. As we walked through the bustling restaurant, we marveled that it was so packed on a Sunday and everyone was enjoying bottles of wine. The waitress, about to seat us at a table, asked if we would prefer the bar seating area where one watches the chefs at work. Obviously we chose to watch the show. Our female Sommelier opened and poured our wine moments before the Burrata and crostini plate arrived before us.

 I enjoyed Northern halibut and monterey squid with fennel, spring garlic and breakfast radish. Most tender calamari I have ever eaten. The fennel was fresh and delicate and all those ingredients together created the perfect bite. Wow.

 You gotta love those marble counters...

 Caroline enjoyed braised pheasant, bitter greens, spring onions, and fava beans.

Chocolate mousse/pudding dessert with salt on it...would not necessarily order this dish again. Not up to the caliber of the rest of our dishes.

 Delicious espresso.

 The definition of macchiato...

Now I take you to our Monday night restaurant experience at Incanto - 1550 Church Street, at the southwest corner of the intersection of Church and Duncan Streets in San Francisco’s Noe Valley neighborhood. The Chef there is Chris Cosentino, which some of you may have seen on a few shows on Food Network. He was there, cooking up a storm, his passion reaching his team and his dishes.
We enjoyed flutes of Prosecco and a salumi plate for aperitif. The clear white looking one is skin, cartilage and something else interesting broken down and compacted and then sliced. A bit on the odd consistency side for us. The cotto ham was our favorite.

Our waiter was calm and knowledgeable. I stated my price range and what we were eating and he came up with this wine to enjoy with our meal. He was spot on. Thanks Mark!

First course for moi, Trotters (meat from pig's feet), foie gras, strawberries & horseradish. There was also some tarragon in there. This has got to be one of the oddest flavor combos I have ever eaten...and in some strange way, it worked. Who knew?!

 Asparagus, soft boiled egg salad.

And here is the kicker I enjoyed for my entree - Spaghettini, Sardinian cured tuna heart, egg yolk & parsley. Yes, tuna heart. It's the shaved stuff on top. Talk about a flavor I do not know! It tasted minerally and was salty and, the oddest part for me to handle, tasted like iron and blood, obviously, but in a way that was just so interesting and still palatable. Add the raw egg yolk in there and this was one heck of a rich dish. Though I am not sure I would order this again, I recommend you do, just to have this unique experience of flavors.

 Caroline went for something more straight forward - Handkerchief pasta & rustic pork ragù. Delicious.

 Ginger ice cream and rhubarb-strawberry tartlette.

 We did a mystery dessert wine tasting as well. It was fun to try and guess, but my palate was feeling nutso at this point.

 A little coffee to wash it all down and voila, one heck of a meal!!

On our final day we went to Swan Oyster Depot. The experience of sitting at the bar is fun and watching the men at work is also enjoyable. However, I was disappointed by the oysters. They all were quite sweet and lacked that wonderful ocean flavor I crave. My tummy was rumbly our entire ride home, so this left a bad taste in my mouth about this historic spot in the city. The chowder was a bit watery and the crab cocktail was great however had way too much cocktail sauce on top.

And on a last note, you must eat at The Grove in the Marina just to enjoy the simplicity of Sol's Bagel and their huge glasses of fresh squeezed orange juice. The coffee is delicious as well and if you feel like a sweet, eat a giant cookie! Plus, the dog watching on that street is amazing.

Holy Moly!

A few weeks ago my friend/business partner and I got to meet Anthony Bourdain and Eric Ripert after their presentation at the Arlington, which was very enjoyable to watch. It's all a blur to me now, but I am pretty sure I mumbled my entire question and turned beet red. I am a huge admirer of Bourdain's writing and am very inspired by his unique style. Thanks Chefs for smiling politely at us and for being real people, not big headed famous people.

Mon Cher Petit Valentien

 

Oh Petit Valentien, how happy you make me. Jeff and I dined here last week and were reminded where we should be spending money on eating out. We shared the Norwegian smoked salmon plate and the homemade pate de campagne plate. The salmon is melt-in-your-mouth delicious. The pate was wonderful as well, accompanied by cornichons, saucisson, confit figs, and spicy mustard. These starters are only 9 dollars! Seen above is a very drinkable white grenache from Spain. Light yet still with enough going on to stand up to duck.

For my main course I enjoyed the duck breast with a blood plum sauce (and one on top!) served over a bed of mashed potatoes and baby spinach. The mashed potatoes were rich and creamy, which means they must have put a good amount of that wonderful, addictive butter that accompanies the little bread rolls in it. The blood plum was sweet and tart and the duck was very flavorful and ducky. Only $18.50! Unbelievable.

And just because we were enjoying ourselves so much we decided to indulge and order dessert. This is the flourless chocolate almond cake, which, as server Chris recommends, should be warmed up. Not too sweet at all (just as I like my desserts) and still satisfies that need for a bit of chocolate at the end of a meal.

Petit Valentien, you rock. We will be back.

Patience is a Virtue

6 years ago I moved into my cozy condo. At that same time, I had gone to visit an Iris garden up North with my mom, my boyfriend at the time, and his mom. Irises, irises, irises everywhere! The place was a rainbow of beautiful, crazy shaped flowers. As a fun gift, we were given 3 bulbs to plant. They did not tell us what color they were so that it would be a surprise when they bloomed.
Every Spring I would wait, hoping to see my Irises bloom. Mine never bloomed. Till this year andIamsoexcited! Two of the three bloomed, which I think is just fabulous. Here they are!

Easter Brunch

Seen above is my very first eggs Benedict. I learned how to truly poach an egg a few days prior without its yolk breaking or over cooking it and so have been eating eggs like crazy! The sauce is a light lemon Hollandaise my mother taught me how to make using a small amount of butter and lots of lemon juice. All over smoked salmon and French baguette and insert a "yum" here!

Seen below is one of my very first successfully poached eggs on a bed of asparagus in a light vinaigrette, bacon, and shallots. This dish was inspired by dishes Caroline and I have eaten in restaurants and really loved. You can swap out the asparagus for spinach and it still works out fantastically.

Une Tomate Surprise

Tomate surprise is a dish I associate with my childhood and recreated it a few days ago for dinner. The "surprise" is tuna inside a tomato...not that astonishing, but fun nonetheless. I mixed the tuna with mayonnaise, lemon juice, and some salad herb blend herbs. Carve out your tomato and put the guts into the tuna mixture. Stuff la tomate, et voila! Play with your food and never grow up...

Mediterranean Meal

Cadiz hit Santa Barbara's restaurant scene a few weeks ago and all I have heard is positive. So I went to check out the situation myself. One walks into a breezy, high ceilinged dining room with reflecting lanterns projecting beautiful images onto the walls and giant palms in the corners adding a bit of movement (though I am usually not for giant indoor plants). We arrived a bit early and the managers, waiters, and designer were chatting up a storm with each other and looked like they were doing some business as well amongst themselves. 

Promptly after being seated, our vivacious waitress flowed over to us wondering if we would like something to drink. We told her the usual, that we needed to choose what to eat before knowing which bottle we would like. She came back about 2 times wondering the same thing and we finally had something to tell her the fourth time she came over. 

First course - Grilled baby octopus, shelling beans, kale, blood orange, meyer lemon oil. This was a lovely dish with fresh, tender octopus. Lovely combo of flavors. I am not quite sure why they put that romaine lettuce on top. The color contrast is awesome, but the lettuce was not dressed and old looking.

My friend enjoyed the - Flash-cooked Mount Cook Alpine Salmon, celery, horseradish, lemon vinaigrette. This dish was super delicate and delicious.

I enjoyed the seabass for my main course which was accompanied by carrots and lemon brown butter and olive paste dots. The fish was cooked to perfection, which is not surprising with Chef John Pettitt in the kitchen.

Marinated asparagus with a poached egg and bacon.

The wine. Mediterranean white - isn't that funny?? I wonder how many varietals this means...

One of the best dessert ideas ever - housemade yogurt, fresh guava, sangria reduction. I adored this dish. The yogurt was fresh, fresh, fresh and with the guava and reduction just was my idea of a perfect dessert!

Ricotta panna-cota, pistachio wafers, blueberry marmalade. Also quite good, but did not top the yogurt!

All in all, this was a very pleasant experience. The quality of the food was lovely and the choices were interesting and unique. The atmosphere was just like being in some Mediterranean villa, though I have a feeling that when the place fills up the tile floors are going to create quite a loud space. Aside from our overly attentive waitress and managers wondering how everything was, we enjoyed ourselves and so did our stomachs.

Cadiz is located at 509 State Street in Santa Barbara. Phone: 805.770.2760