Winter Break (iii): San Francisco Eats

Some of my friends consider me a foodie because I like to find new/hip places to eat. This isn't exactly true, since I don't actually know anything about food or its preparation. I just know when something tastes good and is cheap. With some food blogs a part of my daily internet reading, naturally I've cultivated an affinity for non-chain restaurants. That said, most of my trips are planned around seeing and eating things. I already covered the seeing of San Francisco. Here's the eating:



1. The first place I ate was at Katana-Ya, a ramen place near Union Square. Unfortunately the lighting inside was really dim and purple-y so nothing came out that well. I ordered the chasu ramen, which seemed to be the thing. It was good, certainly better than anything in DC or Boston, but paled in comparison to any of the excellent bowls you can find in NY.

2. Lunch the next day was at Farmer Brown's Little Skillet. I'll go ahead and say that this was my favorite meal of the trip. Nothing super complex or fancy, just sublimely satisfying soul food. As you can see, it's just a window shop without any seating. I took my chicken and waffles and walked the couple blocks to the benches by the bay behind Giant's stadium. Sitting by the water with the sun in my face, warm breeze on my skin, and a giant piece of fried chicken in one hand and a waffle in the other just made me smile.

3. I had dinner that night at Una Pizza Napoletana. Having been to Anthony Mangieri's NY shop before he fled to the west, I knew what to expect in terms of the food (which was excellent neapolitan pies), but I really liked the space there. While his NY operation was tiny and cramped, the SF space was very open. Vaulted ceilings and a large cordoned off area for the brick oven and preparation table. It was clearly designed with the intention of exhibiting the art of Mangieri's pie making.

4. Dinnered the following night at The Monk's Kettle in the Mission. The wait for this place was excessive, but the abundance of bars in the immediate vicinity make it easier. Admittedly, the food here wasn't spectacular. Passable, but the main draw was their drink list which totaled to approximately a bazillion different kinds of beer.

5. On my last day there I met a friend from high school for dim sum at CityView Restaurant. Probably the best dim sum I've ever had. Which isn't saying too much, since I haven't had dim sum an extraordinary amount of times. The soup dumplings, however, were comparable to what I've had at Joe's Shanghai/Shanghai Cafe in NY. Needless to say, I ate a lot of them. The catch though, which I should have picked up on judging by the cleanliness of the place, was that it was not as shockingly cheap as I usually am surprised to find dim sum to be upon receiving the check. Still, it was good and I don't regret it.

A good variety. San Francisco is not a bad food town.