Wood Tavern - Rockridge - 4 stars

Visited on:

June 15, 2007


Comments:

Great new restaurant, very delicious, excellent addition to the Oakland Rockridge community.


Experience:

That night we just decided to go to a new restaurant to try something new. The new Wooden Tavern seems to be the perfect choice. Replacing the vegetarian Grasshopper, it is located next to one of the best chocolateries in the Bay Area. We called ahead to inquire about availability and was informed that we might just make the last walk-in table. True to the hostess's word, when we arrived, we had the perfect cozy table ready for us. Lots of great ambiance too, with the wooden beams and beautiful abstract landscape paintings. And onto the dinner.


We started with a wonderful salad with shaved parmiggiano and caramelized sweet bell peppers. Now, I don't know what those seed-like...seeds are, not sesame, but they have a really good texture! Kind of like tomato seeds, actually. Very delicately flavored, nice citrusy contrast with the sweet caramelized bell peppers.




But what blew my mind was the lamb carpaccio. I knew it was a risk when I ordered it, but I went ahead with it anyway. The worst scenario was that it could be inedible, no big deal, but this time, I scored big. Move out of the way, beef carpaccio. Lamb carpaccio is the only way to go! Soft, tender, snowflake meltiness, so much better than beef with same amount of fat, because lamb is by nature more silky. Then there's that hint of lamb taste. It was not gamey. It was very elegant, if I were to describe it in colors, I would say that it is a rich and earthy orange with a vein of dark red running through, strong, exciting, yet sophisticated. Shaved parmesan cheese, watercress, and whole black pepper + EVOO just enhanced the entire dish. Seriously yummy.



For the main dish, we debated between pork chop and duck, but picked pork chop because it looked so good going to other people's table. We were not disappointed either. Pork chop was beautifully pinkish in the middle, soft and juicy all the way, extremely tender. Fresh corn and peas bring a summer sweetness to the overall dish. Mouthwateringly good...




I had the Wicked Fish Stew, I have to admit that I was very attracted by the name "wicked". It was right! I especially loved the monk fish in it: soft but spongy at the same time, the ideal characteristics of the fish. Really sweet shrimps, really fresh clams and mussels, but my, the soup is sooooooooooo spicy!! The reason is because of the spicy sausages in there, but the sausages were among the most memorable ingredients of the evening. After a few mouthfuls, strangely, the spiciness would grow on you and you would just keep drinking even though it burned in your mouth. Huh...like opium?? Just can't give it up!





Unfortunately, the desserts did not look very inspiring, so we skipped it.

More duck breasts made its way past us...must try it next time.

Basic information:

6317 College Avenue, Oakland, CA 94620

(510) 654-6607

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Grand Cafe - San Francisco - 3 stars

Visited on:

June 8, 2007

Comments:

Very impressive looking restaurant, why so few people for breakfast?

Experience:

That day was a day of accidents. Canteen isn't open on weekdays, Slow Club isn't open on Monday, but I wanted breakfast in the city, so we went to Grand Cafe. Very beautiful interior with two floor high sculptures and Muscha posters, stain glass windows everywhere. Very art deco in style. I only wanted a light breakfast, so ordered two items with my friend.


This is a tarte tartine with egg salad and caviar. Now, anyone who has had a regular tarte tartine knows that this should only be a piece of baguette smeared with butter and maybe jam. (Which reminds me of my first experience of tarte tartine: I just arrived in Paris and went to this cafe for breakfast. Being new there and to the French language, I totally confused tarte tartine with tarte tatin - reveresed apple pie. So imagine my surprise when I saw this! *Huh...this looked nothing like the tarte tatin that I had last night....*) Grand Cafe indeed serves up a grand tarte tartine. Tastes very good too. Egg salad is not too sour with just the right amount of mayonnaise and the baby spinach leaves were nicely mixed with the salad so you don't get a raw leaf stained with mayo taste. Shredded raw beets is a nice touch that compliments the mustard undertone in French mayo very well. There was more caviar than I expected, I think it is farmed Oestra - all the better. Wild caviar should be left the way it is: wild. The sharp saltiness of the caviar mixed with egg salad and spinach made it all the better.



My friend had an egg benedict. Which is good, but of course cannot compare to Canteen's, but what could? Lots of meaty mushrooms and ham underneath that contrasted nicely with tomatoes. Good enough on a regular day.




One thing that is worth mentioning: the orange juice is very good, but they just pour for you before you could see that it was 4.25 a wineglass glass. So, just be mindful of this. Apart from that, nice decor, great ambiance, totally friendly personnel. Nice breakfast experience in all.


Basic information:
501 Geary Street (between Shannon St & Taylor St), SF

(415) 292-0101

www.grandcafe-sf.com

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Canteen - San Francisco - 5 stars

Visited on:
Many times, latest on July 1, 2007.

Comments:
Five stars, best breakfast restaurant in SF, best egg Benedict anywhere. Best pancake ever tasted, though it is not exactly an American pancake.

Experience:
The restaurant itself is very small, adjacent to the now Academy of Arts student houses. It is kind of hard to tell from the outside, but if you see lots of people crammed inside a small space, that is Canteen. However, I've been there around 12, 12:30 a couple of times and I never had to wait. Brunch hours are the busiest for sure.

So today we started with their brioche. It is sometimes off the menu, so need to ask. Each small fluffy lump is about 3 inches high, about 1/3 of the size of a regular loaf of brioche. Golden top, soft powder sugar, melting bread warm from the oven. Hmm...who needs those extra 2/3 of a loaf?

Brioche




The next dish to come up is a tomato and prawn cold soup. Imagine our surprise when it was "white"! The first taste made us all gasp in surprise - it does taste like nothing but tomatoes, but such clarity in the texture! Refreshingly crisp with shredded basil, just like waking up on a sea cliff and draw in your first deep breathe of the morning with a hint of seafood on the sea breeze. If that air could be had for breakfast, it would taste something like this soup. Prawns are very juicy and sweet. There are 5 of them, quite generous!

Tomato and prawn soup




Next is fish hash, which is truffles compared to your regular button mushroom of a hash. Nice chunky pieces of soft fish with even creamier potatoes in a light but savory saffrony sauce. Then add in that poached egg...so incredibly yummy.



Then of course la piece de resistance - Egg Benedicte. There was an unfortunate accident today: one of the eggs was broken when served. Quel horreur! When I showed it to the chef, he immediately tossed that egg into the trash and offered me another plate on him. How could I turn him down? When the second plate arrived, I could tell that the first plate was done by sous-chef, because this time it was as my memory: the white splits open at the lightest pressure of the knife, warm yolk runneth down along the grilled ham and muffin...a mouthful is a moment of bliss in culinary paradise. And did I mention the sauce? Amazing, amazing hollandaise...so light in texture that it was like the foam of regular hollandaise but with the full flavor and body of a much thicker sauce. We had no trouble finishing plus moping up the second plate, no sir!
Egg Benedict - first plate: see egg on upper corner broken?



Egg Benedict - second plate: must be done by the chef himself



The night before, I was watching Iron Chef "pork chop", so I was seized with an unreasonable longing for pork chop, as many fans of the shows would have experienced frequently. And guess what? Pork chop showed up in Canteen's daily changing menu that day! What can I say...must be dharma. Of course I had to order it, and this beautiful piece of pork arrived. Where there was fat, there was the perfect melding of fat and lean meat, soft as a ripe peach. Where there was only lean meat, it was perfectly pinkish in the middle with a nice firm but yielding texture, dripping with juice. The white beans added the un-needed but much appreciated extra protein. Honey mustard sauce gave an extra kick that saves the dish from being to heavy for a breakfast item. Now, this is what I call a breakfast steak!

Pork chop



Finally, the dessert. Think of a thick slice of really great crepe with fresh strawberry compote hidden underneath, then you have an idea of what the pancake is like. It has a strong taste of egg, and high quality eggs too, no mistake about that. It is like the homemade crepes that my mom used to make me for breakfast, so I feel nostalgic about the dish. My friend who went there for the first time was totally stunned by her first bite that she couldn't speak for a long time. Later, she told us that she could feel tears welling to her eyes. Now she's been called one of the most stoic, expressionless people you could ever meet, so this is high compliments indeed from her. Warm, actually hot pancake, thin in the middle to accommodate the compote, thick on the edges to add extra chewiness to a slice so you can taste the dough as well as the compote. Sour cream sauce again light as a dream, brown sugar syrup is only a dark shadow of sweetness that highlighted the slight tang of fresh strawberries. I cannot think of a more perfect pancake dish than this.

Strawberry pancake with sour cream and brown sugar syrup




Four people, absolutely full, about $65 for all dishes (I added in the price of the egg benedict) and one orange juice, one latte, tip not included. Very satisfactory as usual, love Canteen, can't wait to come back, say...next week.:p

Basic information:
http://www.sfcanteen.com/

817 Sutter Street, SF

415 928 8870

They also serve lunch and dinner, brunch on weekends only. They recently changed their business hours, so call ahead to ask and reserve for dinner.

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