Metro Caffe (Veggie Cheesesteaks)

The gentle whooshing scrape scrape is the sound of a metal spatula moving steak shavings around on a griddle.  The sound of cheesesteaks being made! 

I was looking for a place that served good classic onion rings on Yelp, and stumbled across a burger shack in the Lower Haight that had not only onion rings but also vegetarian cheesesteaks.  In fact, they serve two kinds, using different brands of faux meat.  It was one of those truly nasty San Francisco days, cold and threatening from the start, and visions of hot, crispy tater tots danced in my head on the bus ride over.  The place is right near the corner of Fillmore and Haight and so quite accessible.  The Yelpers had cautioned to order the Garden rather than Boca cheesesteak, but I still am not entirely sure which one I got, because the order was relayed in Spanish and I distinctly heard the word 'Boca.'  My Spanish is fine but rusty, and in moments of stress I can't be sure I'm hearing my order versus, say, the guy telling the cook to take some more Boca out of the freezer.  I was also momentarily floored by the absence of tator tots on the menu, despite their being on the online version.  Fortunately a woman who came in just after me ordered them, so I knew they were a secret item, like the grilled cheese at In 'N Out. 

Metro Caffe is an odd name for this little hole-in-the-wall, which is mostly taken up by the kitchen, with a few tables thrown in as an afterthought.  There's a pretty, folksy mural on the wall, though, and the stools are comfortable.  The Caffe is also famous among carnivores for being one of the first locations in the city use Niman Ranch organic beef.  But I was there to check out the veggie alts.  On first bite of the steaming cheesesteak the nostalgia poured in: crunchy peppers, melty cheese, and grilled onions.   The tots had clearly just come out of the deep fryer. As the sandwich cools, it becomes  clear that you're eating a soy version, and one not necessarily made from fake steak.  The texture isn't that chewy and there is a more distinct TVP flavor, which is why I became somewhat certain I had the actual Garden version.  But the smooth cheese, which I judged to be white American, and the meld of hot and sweet peppers still make for a satisfying finish.  The foot-ish long sandwich plus a heaping mound of tator tots cost a little under eight dollars.  Cash only, as are many places in SF, but with an ATM in the store.    

I had made the trek under threatening skies, but by the time I emerged they had broken open, releasing steady rain driven horizontal by gusts of wind.   Then I missed the 6 and had to wait in the freezing drizzle for the next one, plus the connection to the 43.  A good tip for bus travellers in the city is that when the 'next muni' sign in the bus shelter says the bus is coming in some inordinate amount of time, like 27 minutes and 48 minutes, something has gone wrong with the tracking system and there's usually one within ten.  Thank god that principal often holds and I got home to huddle over my radiator, thinking black thoughts about crossing the city for a greasy soy sandwich.  But as I warmed up, I thought more warmly about Metro Caffe and the service it does cheesesteak deprived vegetarian Westerners.