Hair of the Dog: Diner Pancakes by Way of Vietnam at Out the Door Bush
Most of us have our preferred poison, be it PBR, Pinot, or mixology's latest love child. For mornings after one or 10 too many, SFoodie offers Hair of the Dog, our weekly recommendation on where to run when a hangover calls. Hey, it happens to the best of us.
C. Alburger The buttermilk pancakes at Out the Door Bush: Mayberry by way of Asia.
We know full well we're supposed to get the porridge, or the spring rolls, or the steamed bbq pork buns at the newest breakfast-centric iteration of Charles Phan's Out the Door. But a hangover drives one to do ridiculous things ― like ordering buttermilk pancakes at a Vietnamese restaurant.
Though chef Grace Nguyen, who served as executive sous chef at The Slanted Door for two years, wanted breakfast at Bush Street to be a strictly Asian affair, Phan asked her to add a few American dishes ― in case someone wasn't in the mood for phở. A stack of five airy, coaster-sized breakfast cakes splashed with maple syrup mixed with julienned bacon was Nguyen's answer. "I've always loved bacon with pancakes," she told us. 
watz/Flickr What goes better with pancakes than Japanese beer?
It's breakfast with a cultivated touch. The hotcakes are crowned with a hefty dollop of butter, enhanced by house-made applesauce and sea salt, finished with the snap of tart, diced Pink Lady apples. Remarkably, it's all right in step with Vietnamese flavor theory, tickling the taste buds with salty, sweet, tart, and smoky flavors. This translates to your hangover roughly as follows: Check these ridiculous pancakes! Can't. Stop. Eating.
Wash down Nguyen's butter-bacon-maple-slathered cakes with a spirits-lifting Hitachino Nest beer from Japan. And then call it a day ― a day, that is, in which your hangover is precisely that: OVER.
Out the Door Bush 2232 Bush (at Fillmore), 923-9575
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