Fair Weather Vegan

Embarcadero!

I knew I'd forgotten a neighborhood in that Food Tour 2011 post. Of course we stopped at the Ferry Building, where the San Francisco Fish Company made an unusual misstep with its fish tacos.  Or at least I found them difficult to eat because of the overlapping taco presentation and somewhat dry in the fish department. Those who have puzzle-solving skills involving spacial manipulation would probably find these tacos a fun challenge to eat.  Then there was another dilemma at Ciao Bella, where my usual habit of getting two flavors so I can try as many as possible was thrown into disarray by the most appetizing flavor of the day being cookie dough.  Nothing goes with cookie dough!  In the end I had it by itself.  It was delicious, but I still had the feeling I was missing out. 

The main piece of advice I can give you from that day, other than you can't go wrong with the SFFC's fried offerings, is not to be in SOMA during rush hour.  Especially when there's been an accident on one of the approaches to 280. I spent a long time convincing my folks that we don't have a traditional rush hour in the city, but this happens to be one of the two neighborhoods where that spectre does exist.  It's no joke. 

Neighborhood Eating Tour 2011

I was briefly convinced that I should tell you about the giant octopus that might block your way or pick up your car during this tour: he seems fierce but it's really only because he's shy.  Then I realized I must have been dreaming about writing this post.  That was followed by a dream about finding Little Debbie snack cakes at my local Safeway.  I leave it to you to decide which is more improbable. 

Cole Valley- We chose to come to Zazie straight from the airport, on the off change that at lunchtime on a weekday there wouldn't be a line.  Unfortunately nowadays its reputation has gone so far that there's always a line at Zazie.  When we told the fellow in charge that my parents had been up since 4 a.m., however, he gave us a free bowl of fresh fruit to 'keep our blood sugar up' while we waited to be served.  The food was high quality as usual.

Sunnyside- You'd think K's Kitchen would hold no surprises, being my favorite restaurant and all, but I've discovered a new second-place roll here: the Super Dynamite.  It's a bit like a tuna-based version of the Volcano Roll, with tuna and jalapeno in a crispy tempura.  Plus for the first time ever we had a brief wait to get in. This historic moment hopefully means K's will be in business for a long time. Neighborhood standard Gialina has rolled out a superb chard and ricotta salata pizza; try calling for pick-up, it's much quicker. 

Bernal Heights- We went for brunch at Liberty Cafe, having also previously gone for dinner and its famous pot pies, and everything was perfectly fine (once we convinced my father that if he ate everything together he wouldn't even taste that the eggs in his huevos rancheros were over-easy).  But the lunch menu is much more diverse and interesting.  It was at this juncture that I experienced something I hadn't known existed: Benedict satiation point. 

Mission- Specchio's spinach pasta with salmon is still, I'd argue, the best pasta dish in the city.  It may be simple but it never disappoints.  Is it wrong that since we have three people we always grab a table while we're in line at Tartine? I'd been looking forward to Grub's mac and cheese bar, but it turns out that by planning the mac as a base for more interesting ingredients, the dish itself gets neglected.  It's serviceable but lacking in creamy decadence, even if you add truffle oil as I did.  Almost tastes like it's made with two-percent milk, and certainly with very toned-down cheeses.  Grub does serve sweet potato fries of such tastiness that even avowed haters will scarf them down, and the burger bar, with several vegetarian/pescatarian options, is a solid if less interesting alternative to The Counter.  Mission Beach Cafe is getting its own post. 

Noe Valley-Any day you can hit Chloe's and not stand there for an hour is a good day.  It's hard to be blown away a second time, especially given the number of brunches we'd been eating (see: Benedict satiation point), but everything was still tasty, especially my croissant french toast.  The trout sandwich is still the standout item here.  

Castro- It is a rare thing when you have a jones for a particular food item, can go and get it right then, and it's exactly as you imagined it.  I figured my parents wouldn't understand my need for Indian food for breakfast, but after our meal at Chloe's we headed over to the Castro Philz to pick up a few pounds of Tesora for the journey back to Indiana.  That Philz is, quelle surprise, right next to Kasa.  One karahi paneer kati roll later, I was a happy woman. 

Hayes Valley- The stories to be told about my parents' first foray into this neighborhood don't really concern food, but we did happen upon Christopher Elbow and buy some chocolates.  Despite having waited a year+ to try its wares, I was disappointed with my tupelo honey truffle.  Once I accepted it as savory rather than sweet it was interesting, but when I order a honey truffle I want a sweetness explosion, not an academic paper.  My parents really liked theirs, and they also purchased some bars which they selfishly saved until they got home to eat ;)  Apparently these were fantastic, and as specialty bars go they weren't insanely expensive.  I don't know how $7 got to be reasonable, but there you are. 

Russian Hill- The clash between my dietary restrictions and my mother's came to a head on our final evening.  Ethnic food is easiest and most satisfying for me.  She only eats it on sufferance, and loves classy New Americans, especially serving seafood which is hard to come by in the Midwest., If I have to face one more fillet of salmon or trout in some kind of sauce I shall scream.  A brief trip onto the tiny internets reveals Pesce, a relaxed but sophisticated small plate seafood joint where my father can get a dish with duck, my mother can eat scallops or sole to her heart's content, and they have something called tuna bolognese which creatively mimics one of the dishes I miss most in the meat pantheon. 

As my mother was pointing out that we'd visited almost all the neighborhoods in the city, we also noted we'd been to SOMA but not to eat (Asian Art Museum: go even if you think you wouldn't be interested), and even briefly to the Marina, although having been to Hayes Valley already that day our allotment of snotty was already filled.  On the other side of the socio-economic spectrum, my parents also drove through Ingleside one day to get to me.  It's rare we actually get to experience working-class San Francisco these days. 

This morning, I had a dream that I was on the Upper West Side at a sandwich shop that resembled a very frou-four Ike's (and in a gourmet ghetto in which many things from that neighborhood had moved onto the same street).  And I was walking the length of the counter back and forth, back and forth because I couldn't decide what kind of sandwich to get, veggie chicken?  What kind of veggie chicken?  How did I order since I could never find a counter person to pay attention to me?  Maybe I should get a cheesesteak instead, but did they have veggie cheesesteaks?  And then one by one the lights went off and they pulled down the shades and the place was closed around me.  I think this is a sign, but of what I don't know.  

20 Under 10

7x7 recently published an item called The 20 Best Dishes Under $10 in the Mission.  Too many of these dishes contain meat, although I suspose that's part of the selling point.  Meat at these prices really is a steal.  What is not a steal for people with actual budgetary constraints is one dish that approaches ten dollars, even if it is a sandwich from Pal's.  But 7x7 does do a good job selling many of the dishes as money-savers. 

To their credit, they include four vegan dishes: Idli vada sambar from Udupdi Palace (whose Peninsula location I wasn't thrilled with; I hear this one is better), cold sesame noodles from Mission Chinese Food (which seems expensive at $8 but the magazine assures us they are special and the ingredients are unique), Senroppen Salad at Cha-ya (if I had ten bucks for lunch I wouldn't spend it on radishes), and Gracias Madre's famous vegan pozole.  There are several other vegetarian and pescatrian options as well, none of which I have tried yet.  The one I'm intrigued by and wary of is the salmon Benedict at Valencia Pizza and Pasta, because who ever heard of a pizza place that serves brunch, let alone something that has hollandaise sauce, and it only costs $6.95.  I've had salmon Benedicts all over this fine city and the South Bay, and they're never less than ten bucks.  Lox is expensive.  Oh and 7 squared...cheese quesadillas?  Like ATM machine?  I know you want to tell us to get the vegetarian versions are the cheapest, but....

When Calorie Counts Attack

This story, like so many others that I tell, takes place in the line at Subway.  I was at Subway because I had come to campus to teach, and because I hadn't eaten any breakfast, I was planning to get a footlong tuna sub.  Then I looked up at the sandwich board, and noticed for the first time that there were numbers after the sandwiches.  They weren't prices.  The gougey prices charged by our campus Subway are at the top.  No, these were the calories in each half and full sub.  Now, if you've eaten a tuna sub at Subway you know that it tastes like junk food.  What's actually in it doesn't bear much thinking about. But it's tuna, so it beats any number of other things, like steak or buffalo chicken, right?  I'm not going to repeat my experience in you the reader by telling you the actual count, but suffice it to say that in fact the tuna sub is one of the most caloric things on the Subway menu.  For a person of my size using a certain well-known overall count, that sub could account for more than half of my daily calorie intake.  And that's before adding toppings like cheese and chipotle sauce which add extra fat, which in turn make some types of eating enjoyable. 

I believe that human beings, once they free themselves from the tyranny of the boom and bust cycle that today's culture forces upon them, should eat when they're hungry and stop when they're full.  I believe counting calories is harmful behavior, and I believe menu calorie counts are eating disorder triggers waiting to happen.  But I hadn't experienced the impact for myself.  I don't have an eating disorder.  I've simply absorbed years and years of cultural conditioning about good and bad eating.  My reaction to the knowledge that something I wanted to eat was 'bad,' when I hadn't known that previously, was surprisingly emotional.  An added problem was that I couldn't just switch to something 'better,' because tuna is one of only two things at Subway I can eat.  I would love to just eat a turkey sandwich, I argued in my head, but I can't, because I have this other commitment which is more meaningful to me.  It's not fair that other people get lots of choices, which can affect other aspects of eating than simly 'I'll have this bacon' or not.  Of course the other sandwich I can eat, the veggie delight, is one of the least caloric on the menu.  And I eat it often, because it's both tasty and cheap.  But who wants to eat a salad as her first meal of the day? 

At the same time as my cultural conditioning, however, I've taken on a certain amount of intuitive eating counterprogramming.  This liberation-type theology was saying to me: this is the sandwich you want and you are really hungry.  The best solution would probably have been to get half a tuna and half a veggie delight, but at any Subway and especially at our gougey one, that is way less cost effective than a footlong.  Watching my wallet is a constraint that is actually important right now.   In the end I got the sandwich, and it was junkily delicious, but I felt guilty about it.  And I can't unlearn the calorie thing, which means I am less likely to order it in future despite ostensibly not caring about such things.  Some policy-makers would call that a success.  They say it promotes knowledge and more thoughtful choice-making.  But many people (especially women) in our culture who have access to Subway are people who think about things like this all the time, and not in a healthy way.  I don't call making people uncomfortable and guilty about their natural functions any kind of a success.  It also makes it about twenty times more likely that a person who felt like she's cheated herself at lunch stops for a cupcake on the way home, either because she ate the fatty sandwich so she might as well 'give up' totally, or because she had something that didn't contain enough fat and is now craving what she lacks.  So the policy backfires anyhow.  Having a personal calorie-count moment has solidified my objections to this practice, and I hope my readers can stay free of this kind of experience. 

Mr. Pickle's Will Serve You Vegetarian Sandwiches

I had not even heard of this Mission institution before She Who Is My Alter Ego* mentioned the little-known fact that they will create many of their signature sandwiches using tofu or other meat substitutes if you ask.  The squeaky wheel gets the buffalo-sauce tofu, apparently.  Yet another entry for my aspirational list. 

*Don't worry, we're actually two distinct people

Lunch In The Inner Sunset

People, I am not made for eating at home as much as I have been.  The Very Nice People are in town for the weekend, and it's been quite exciting to be able to seek out new restaraunts again.  We're attending the exhibition on the Olmec at the DeYoung today because the weather is supposed to finally break, and I just hope that the queue won't be around the block the way it is for other major shows, but I'm not holding my breath.  That also means we get to eat in the Inner Sunset, and I had almost made my decision when I happened upon reviews of a very new coffee shop called The Wiggly Wooly Pig Cafe.*  I'm getting the (for me) conflicting messages that the food is excellent, and that much of it involves pork.  They even put bacon in their French toast.  Pancakes, I would get.  French toast, not so much.  So I think that's one where I have to stick my head in ane peruse the menu for swine-free options before I commit. 

*Obviously I was thinking Piggly-Wiggly

Around The Bay

Grubstreet has found a video guide to re-creating Bakesale Betty's famous chicken sandwich.  That almost seems unsporting, as well as taking away one of the true pleasures of the experience, which is making the pilgrimage to Oakland along with other devotees. 

Mission Local reports that the Amber India owner is set to open a new locale near Luna Park. This is fabulous news for an area of the Mission bereft of North Indian cuisine.  It also adds that Philz is set to raise coffee prices by $.25, which reminds me that I need to pick up a pound of Tesora to ship to my parents. 

Finally, in a combination of two of my favorite things, SignpostSF says that Tuesdays are trivia and $2 taco nights at The Boardoom (as well as $2 beers and $5 tequila shots if you're into such things, although the tequila doesn't seem like much of a bargain?). 

Win A Patxi's Giftcard

This is a very stupid thing I'm doing, telling more people about this contest, because it lowers my own chances of winning.  Nevertheless: FunCheapSF is giving away two $25 gift cards to Patxi's, which has just opened a new branch in Noe Valley.  Enter here.  I was kind of irritated he pretended to make liking the post a condition of entering (I'm pretty sure that's a bluff), but I did it anyway.  What the hell. 

Oh, and in case you didn't know, you can call ahead at Patxi's to coordinate your arrival with your pizza.  Since their deep dish pizzas can take 45 minutes to cook, I recommend this method.  One of my fondest Bay Area food memories is calling the Palo Alto pizzeria as I was on the air tram to pick up my father from SFO, and waltzing into the place past a line of people to a waiting pie. 

Coffee Shops of the Mission: The Blue Fig

First, a big thank you to this new Mission coffee shop for letting us sit for almost three hours, as the place went from so full we couldn't hear each other speak across the tiny table to nearly empty as lunchtime ended.   It is indeed true that they haven't worked out the kinks yet.  My waffle came out quickly but someone flat-out forgot to make my iced coffee.  Word to the wise: coffee is not a joke here, add milk.  And it is also true that the space is warm, loud, and you will share elbow room with your fellows.  But the staff is genuinely nice, which is sometimes a rarity in Hipsterville.  The menu is small but interesting, with lots of amazing-looking savory vegetarian options including two sandwiches made with fresh mozzarella.  I do wish the sweet options were more plentiful.  I ordered the signature cornmeal waffle with whipped cream and fig reduction.  It also comes with bananas, which of course I shunned but which would have balanced the fig's tartness better than just syrup, as it was a tad overwhelming.  They must be hiding a traditional Belgian waffle iron in the back, because the waffle was nice and thin.  Non-veggies should also take a look at the croque monsieur, which passed our table smothered in real bechamel sauce.  In short, if you hit the place on off hours, a nice addition to the Valencia Street pantheon. 

Today In Vegetarian Sandwiches

Pal's: Happy Boy broccolini, swiss cheese, cucumber, early girl tomatoes, greens on Acme wheat bread. Salad of the day is ginger-tumeric roasted Swanton Farms cauliflower salad w/sugar snap peas, radish, fresh herbs, rice wine vinaigrette. 

Kitchenette: heirloom tomato and hand-stretched mozarella, grilled zucchini, basil pistou, wild arugula

They also have a pescatarian sandwich: yucatecan-style fried local cod with slaw, cilantro, and remoulade. 

DAMN IT why did I already blow today's artisanal food budget?