Food Adventure Team

SO MUCH MEAT.

Ahem.

Recommendations: Don’t eat all day in anticipation of the meal. Skip the salad bar (except to grab a plate and maybe a little rice). Wait for the infinite meat to arrive. It won’t take long. Get a caipirinha, or maybe even a strawberry caipirinha if you’re feeling saucy. Order dessert, even though you don’t have room. Expect to feel as though you have a brick in your stomach for the next three days. At least your wallet will be a little lighter!

Seriously though, next time I will go a bit easier on the meat. I didn’t need that much, and I didn’t even like all of it. The pork tended to be dry and uninteresting. The bacon-wrapped chicken was amazing, but the other chicken wasn’t particularly special. I tried a chicken heart and did not enjoy it; too chewy. The sausage was good but nothing amazing. No, save yourself for the filet mignon. Oh sweet tender filet mignon, I will eat you all night! The sirloin is also fantastic. There were ultra-fatty beef ribs; so rich. And there was some sort of something that I’m pretty sure was still mooing. The red meat is by far and away the best of the meats that they bring to the table. But I had to try them all!

The little appetizers they brought as part of the meal were not to be forgotten! I couldn’t stop eating those cheesy popover things. The fried polenta and the deep fried banana were also wonderful. Especially the banana.

The desserts were to die for. You must order the peanut butter thing. It has a silly name, and it is fantastic. The cheesecake: also delicious. The chocolate mousse was light and fluffy and oh so chocolatey. Too bad we were so full that it took 10 of us to devour only 3 desserts; there were loads of other things on the menu that looked divine.

Expect to spend $50/head, plus $10/drink, plus dessert (most were in the $7 range and could easily be shared by 3 people), plus tip+tax. Our entire bill for 10 people came out to $850, including tip. Ouch.

Photo by Ed

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Leah, Jared and I went to Slow Food Nation the prior weekend and managed to acquire a large quantity of cured meat from the Heritage Foods stand. We got “Surry-ano” ham (lovingly dubbed “buttermeat” by us), a large chunk of some amazing garlic sausage, and a slab of unsliced coppa. We also got a huge half-wheel of mystery cheese for $10. All of it was amazing. Laurie brought 3 cheeses from Bi-Rite: something with a ground coffee rind (what! amazing), something incredibly stinky (grayson), and a third cheese that I can’t remember at the moment. Brendan and Mo brought some prosciutto, some smoked gouda, and a slab of brie which they warmed and topped with strawberry (?) jam. Josh brought some Klinker-Brick shiraz. Jared brought some Cakebread Cellars white wine and bread pudding. Lee made some wonderfully spicy chili. Divine, absolutely divine, all of it. A wonderful evening with friends.

20080903 – Meat & Cheese Party from Ed Hunsinger on Vimeo.

Warning: White girl reviewing! I love Chinese food and consider myself fairly adventurous, but I definitely was not raised eating the more unamericanized fare served here. So some of the stuff I didn’t like may have been because I’m just a white girl and I don’t like things that seem “weird” to a westerner (like, for example, tripe).

The service was fine for such a restaurant. Nothing special. The servers pretty much spoke no English, but it wasn’t really needed. It was a little dirty (for example, they left a water jug for us, but it was an old tupperware container with food crusted in its cracks — kinda unappetizing), but on the whole the ambiance was totally acceptable. And everyone was super nice!

We ordered the meal for 7-8, plus a few extra things. I’m glad we did it this way because we got to try things we never would’ve thought to otherwise. However, I probably wouldn’t do it that way next time, because there was some kinda “meh” stuff that got wasted because we didn’t eat it.

Things you must get:

• DUMPLINGS! We got the Shanghai dumplings, which I had never had and were completely delicious. Soup in a dumpling — what a novel concept! I have no idea how they do it. We also got the crab and pork dumplings, which were similarly delicious.
• Rice with some sort of Chinese bacon (?) on top. Should’ve grabbed a menu so I could know what this was actually called. The rice was perfect and fluffy but still quite moist — not gluey. It had scallions in it, and on top was some sort of extremely salty cured (?) pork. The pork, while delicious, was a bit intense for me so I didn’t eat a huge amount; the rice was amazing.
• Soy braised “lion’s head” meatball. This was quite tasty in unexpected ways. Not “weird” at all, these huge (as in, softball-sized) meatballs were spiced of cinnamon and ginger, and served in a soy sauce based sauce on a bed of spinach. One of my favorite entrees.
• Red Bean Buns – holy crap, BEST EVER. So light and fluffy and fresh. Not overly sweet. Perfect. Do not miss these. (But be careful, they come out HOT and the filling will burn the roof of your mouth.)
• Sugar puffs – very simple dessert. Extremely fluffy, eggy dough with lots of air pockets, like a popover, fried up tall and served with sugar on top. I could eat 12 of them if I let myself.

Things that weren’t bad but weren’t amazing either:

• Green onion pancakes. Nice and crispy without being overly greasy. Weren’t something I’d write home about though.
• Cucumber salad. This was the only appetizer I liked, really. It was a really simple salad of sliced cucumbers with a strongly garlicky dressing. It wasn’t terribly exciting, but others devoured it.
• Some sort of spicy beef dish (kung pao?) with onions and bell peppers. It was pretty tasty, but was more along the lines of “generic Chinese food”, the kind you can get at every mom & pop Chinese restaurant you walk into.
• Fish soup. It had a lot of greens (spinach? bok choy?) in it — perhaps too many — but it wasn’t fishy-tasting or smelling at all (which is a good thing). It wasn’t my favorite thing, but others seemed to enjoy it a great deal.
• Shanghai style salted pancakes. I think that’s what these were called. They were kinda weird and gluey, but not in a way that I enjoyed. The outsides were crispy, which I liked. They had something else in the filling besides the gluey stuff, but I never did find out what it was.
• Some sort of shrimp dish. It was shrimp and some leafy green veggies and probably green onions (I don’t remember) in a gooey, clear, bland sauce. The shrimp themselves were great — not fishy, not tough — but the sauce didn’t impress me.

Things I definitely would not order again:

• Vegetable stir fry of some sort. It had tofu skin noodles, pieces of… tofu? Seitan? bok choy, and some other unidentifiable veggies & stuff. It kind of tasted like nothing, and looked like nothing also.
• The appetizers. I think they were just too “weird” for me. They were all cold appetizers, which wasn’t helping for some reason.
  • The cucumber salad (mentioned above) was pretty good, but the other things left something to be desired.
  • There was a duck dish that tasted pretty good (marinated in sesame oil) but was sliced in a way that the bones were embedded and impossible to remove from the meat. I know bone marrow is a Chinese delicacy so I guessed that maybe it was supposed to be eaten bone and all, but honestly I’m not there yet.
  • There was a chicken dish. The chicken had its skin on, but it was just floppy white skin– I’m guessing the chicken was boiled? The meat tasted strongly of sherry; very one-dimensional.
  • There was a tripe dish. This was the only thing I didn’t try all night. I know, I know, I’m a big wimp. But it didn’t look terribly appetizing and others who tried it weren’t big fans, so I didn’t bother.

Summary: It was an overwhelmingly positive experience. The good stuff was REALLY good (as in, I’d happily trek across town again just for their red bean buns or Shanghai dumplings). For the stuff we weren’t such fans of, hey, at least we had a new culinary experience! And, amazingly, we walked away paying only $17 apiece, including a generous tip! Highly recommended.

East German food! I’d never had it before. Started off with the potato pancakes with chive sour cream and applesauce. Delightful! Nice and crispy. Unfortunately, I am writing this review a month too late and have forgotten what I ordered; I believe it was the Jger Schnitzel (Porkloin) with Spatzle and Creamy Mushrooom Sauce, but it may have been something off the specials menu. It had pork and mushrooms and spatzle, but also red cabbage. I’m not a big cabbage fan in general, but it was actually pretty good. Surprisingly sweet. The spatzle was delicious (I’m a sucker for starchy sides) and the pork was incredibly juicy and tender. The mushrooms were mushroomy. There wasn’t a whole lot in the way of seasonings but I think that’s just the way German food is (I’m more accustomed to the highly seasoned ethnic food that is ubiquitous in San Francisco). I enjoyed it! Everyone else seemed to enjoy their meals well enough too (it wasn’t as much of a sharing meal as the other FATs have been). Delicious beer (go for the Weltenburg Amber, or the Franziskaner Hefeweizen). We got the Cold Dog and the Apple Sturdel for dessert. Strudel was awesome, Cold Dog was good but kind of boring.

Introduced to me by my friends Tinny and Jarek, Cafe Colucci has quickly become my favorite Ethiopian place in the Bay Area. There isn’t anywhere in San Francisco that compares. This food is FLAVORFUL. It’s pretty greasy and has loads of onions but you know, live a little!

We started with the the meat sambussa and some fried potato things. They kind of resembled floppy potato chips, but they were very flavorful, especially when topped with salt and that spicy red powder they have on the table instead of pepper. Sambussa were delicious of course.

For the main course, we ordered a massive plate of food to share. They split it into two plates, actually. We got two orders of the veggie combo, which I always get when I go to Colucci. My favorite is the buticha, which is kind of like hummus. We got the sega tibs (beef with onions, jalapenos, rosemary, fresh tomato), doro tibs (chicken with onions, jalapenos, etc.), mushroom tibs, lamb tibs, and shrimp tibs. The food came out steaming hot, served on a bed of injera — the vinegar-y bubbly bread that is traditional of Ethiopian food. Infinite injera was served in baskets; you use the bread as a sort of utensil to scoop the food from the plate. Everything was rich and flavorful. Onions are perfectly caramelized, meat was tender and permeated with flavor.

I can’t really describe this place well enough. Just go.

I never got around to writing a detailed review of Bissap Baobab, unfortunately. Here’s the short review: Delicious food. Everything that was ordered was wonderful, especially the fish. Was a little disappointed about the meat to veggie ratio (too much meat, very little veggie), but I was told it’s not usually like that. Loved the hot ginger juice after dinner. Cocktails looked wonderful, though I did not partake. Service during the meal was a little slow, but that’s probably because they were very busy. Service before the meal was upsetting: I had made a reservation for 8, but then a couple of people bailed last-minute. I called about an hour ahead to let them know. Then one more person bailed, which I didn’t find out till I got to the restaurant. The owner was very rude and made us wait 45 minutes for our table because of the changes; apparently changing your reservation nullifies it? The host was extremely nice, though of course he didn’t have any power over the owner. The experience set the tone for the night, so even though the food and drink was delicious, I felt kind of “eh” about the place. I’d go back though, with a smaller party.

Yemenese cuisine — new to me! It was more in the realm of “creative” Yemenese food rather than “traditional”, but no complaints here. We were seated right away and the service was excellent. We ordered several small plates and a few appetizers too. And then some desserts to top it all off.

Small plates:

• Stuffed Avocado — Technically a salad rather than a small plate, it was described as, “Knaffe coated & lightly fried avocado stuffed with Couscous tabouleh and served with semi-soy marinated tofu and raspberry reduction”. I’d never had cooked avocado before, and was highly impressed with what they presented us with. The half-avocado was warm and perfectly ripe, with a light crispy crust of shredded phyllo. I normally do not like tabouleh but the tabouleh that they put in the avocado’s seed-hole was to die for. One of my favorite dishes. I could eat the whole thing by myself!
• Hummus & pita — gone in about 1 minute. Very earthy and irresistable.
• Ahi Knaffe — “Ahi tuna crusted with shredded phyllo then lightly fried and served with carrot & roasted red pepper salad and prune reduction.” Pretty much just that! Perfection! Though I have concluded that I prefer my tuna raw, rather than seared.
• Kofta — “Yemeni meatballs of ground lamb & beef marinated with allspice, cumin, mint, cilantro, onion, and olive oil. Served with zahaweg.” Probably the most traditional small plate we got. Great flavors, but I found it not to be the most exciting thing in the world.
• Saha’s Signature Ravioli — Wow, so good! “Shiitake mushroom ravioli in sauce of fresh mango,
  red pepper flakes, fresh mint, and touch of cream.” Couldn’t get enough of these.
• Bastilla — savory-sweet chicken phyllo dish. A bit too sweet for me, but extremely delicate and tasty nonetheless.

Entrees:

• Orange chicken — “Free range Chicken breast marinated with orange juice, cinnamon, sage, honey and lime then pan seared and roasted. Served with couscous cake and orange-cinnamon sauce.” This was one of my favorite entrees. Usually orange chicken type dishes are too sweet for my liking, but this one was just right. And the chicken wasn’t dry, which can be difficult to accomplish.
• Zahara — “Wild mushrooms, heirloom carrots, and fennel with ginger-orange sauce and farina cake” Not my cup of tea, but others liked it.
• Sage duck — “Duck breast marinated with honey, sage and mustard then grilled and served with roasted pears, mashed sweet potatoes , and cinnamonorange reduction. Cooked Med Rare.” This was my favorite dish, hands down! I normally don’t like duck because it tastes “ducky”, but this, wow, this was amazing!! Comparisons were made to filet mignon. When I return, I will be ordering this as my entree.
• Mansaf — “Classic Middle Eastern Dish of Tender Cubed lamb stewed with Arabic yogurt, allspice, cauliflower and mint then served with Arabic rice.” Very flavorful and tender; I loved the hot sauce it was served with!
• Lamb Tagine — “A tender lamb cube stew with saffron, ginger, cinnamon, prunes, carrots, and pearl onions. Served with Maftoul.” Also flavorful and tender, this seemed like a more traditional dish.

Desserts:

• Chocopear — “Chocolate & Pear mousse with poached pear” Yum, just yum. Gone within a few seconds.
• Slap ya mama — “Roasted fruit, date & almond marzipan, and chocolate wrapped in phyllo and baked” Wow! This was crazy! It was kind of too rich and sweet for me, but one bite was delicious.
• Bisbusa — “Yemeni cake with syrup and gelato (we got cardamom)” – Tasty but kind of boring. I wasn’t a huge fan of how crumbly the cake was, but I certainly wouldn’t turn it away were it offered to me! The gelato was fantastic.
• Something that’s not on their online menu. It was a white/milk chocolate pyramid shell filled with a kind of pastry, dulce de leche, and other good stuff. By far my favorite dessert!

Neo-sortof-Italian place in the Mission. Incredibly tasty & worth the wait (though the 45 minute wait was frustrating, given that we had a reservation and it was freezing out).

Top-notch artisan cocktails (which caused me to break my “no drinking” rule). I got the agricole mule, and enjoyed it most out of all the drinks I tried (dolores park swizzle – delicious but SO STRONG; gaby de lys – DO NOT WANT; nuestra paloma – really fresh and yummy but also somewhat odd-tasting)

We ordered a bunch of appetizers for the table:

• cauliflower with pangratatto, capers & sage — loved the pangratatto, capers, & sage, but found the cauliflower just too much like something mom would cook (as an ingredient)
• bruschette of robiola & broccoli rabe (ok, that one was on the house for how long they kept us waiting even with the reservation) — not bad but not exciting either
• chicken liver crostini alla toscana — I’m not much of a liver person, but those who are were delighted by this one.
• gnocchi, fresh porcini mushrooms & guanciale — Holy crap delicious. Just delicious.
• herb bread with extra virgin olive oil — so soft and fresh and cheesy and herby and yuuuuuum.

My favorites were definitely the gnocchi and the herb bread.

Among the entrees that were ordered that I tried were:

• prosciutto di parma, tomato, arugala & mozzarella pizza — My entree. Quite tasty but not actually as exciting as I’d hoped)
• potato, rosemary, raddichio & gorgonzola piccante pizza — Very, very interesting, sharp flavors. Extremely rich. Wouldn’t be able to eat more than one piece.
• mozzarella, fontina & pecorino with garlic oil pizza — Had it for leftovers the next day. Was tasty but not amazing, but then again, it’d been refrigerated and reheated at that point.
• pork saltimbocca alla romana — Quite tasty! But only had a single small bite
• squid ink risotto with calamari Amazing! Being black from the squid ink, I expected it to be heavy, but it was very light and lemony — such an unexpected and awesome flavor/appearance clash)
• saffron risotto with osso buco — also extremely yummy!

Conclusion: TASTY! Would definitely go back, again, and again, and again.

A crack team of San Francisco foodies is taking on a challenge: eat at a new delicious restaurant every Wednesday! This blog documents their adventures.