San Francisco Food Blog

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Stuffing saver: A porcino growing wild.

​If you're dreaming of experiencing wild edibles 'round the table this Thanksgiving (a little extra oomph for your stuffing or risotto, per chance?), then ForageSF has an enticing bounty for sale. The wild and foraged foods gatherer is selling local mushroom boxes for the holiday, but you have to order by 1 p.m. today. Boxes cost $50 or $100 and include porcini and chanterelles that have been picked locally and identified by experts (for safety). Pick them up yourself tomorrow -- home delivery is also possible within a certain radius of San Francisco. To check out Andrew Simmons's writeup of other CSF treats ForageSF offers, read this. To place an order for wild mushrooms, click here.

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There's no excuse for rawists to spend the holiday alone in front of the dehydrator.

​Can you say, "I feel grateful?" or perhaps "I feel bountiful?" Café Gratitude sooo wants you to. Keeping with a well established annual tradition, four out of five Café Gratitude locations will serve free food this Thanksgiving. The alive and vegan food mini-chain will have volunteer-served meals at its San Francisco, Berkeley, San Rafael, and Healdsburg locations. Addresses here.

This'll be the fifth year Café Gratitude hosts the Thanksgiving appreciation meals, meant as an expression of gratitude to customers and other fans. Meals will be served on a first come, first served basis, 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Ingredients donated by Veritable Vegetable, Bariani Olive Oil, and other local purveyors. Interested in donating products yourself? E-mail info@cafegratitude.com with 'Thanksgiving' as the subject.

Really? The same old turkey stuffing you always bust out, with frankly mixed results? Consider going multiculti this year, with turkey and mole from street-food vendor El Huarache Loco. Huarache owner Veronica Salazar told SFoodie she'll start taking orders for holiday birds this weekend at the Alemany farmers' market. You can get your turkey raw or roasted, with organic, chocolate-spiked mole on the side.

Lady Jake/Flickr

Please -- not the gummy cornbread stuffing again.

​The sauce is a family recipe (Salazar is from Mexico City). Or you can get your bird adobado: stuffed with ground beef, potato, and almonds, roasted with wine, and topped with pineapple. Salazar plans to offer other holiday items as well (Thanksgiving as well as Christmas) with dishes like an elaborate Mexican salad of beets, carrots, fruits, and a dressing sweetened with sugarcane juice. Check her Twitter page for news about a holiday menu item tasting at Alemany.

As for how big a turkey you'll be able to order, Salazar said it depends. She can get a 40 pound beast, or a svelte 20-pounder that serves eight to 10. "The big one is for Mexicans," Salazar said, "because we always have so much family over."

Customers will be able to pick up holiday orders Wednesday, Nov. 25, or Thanksgiving morning (Thursday, Nov. 26), in the Mission at La Cocina (2948 Folsom at 25th St.).

4505Meats.com

Turducken from 4505 Meats: Why settle for one bird when you can have three?

​Mission dwellers have a grazing option today. Starting at 5 p.m., Bi-Rite Market (3639 18th St. at Guerrero) is setting up a Thanksgiving tasting station set up in front of the store -- samples of Bill Niman's BN Ranch heritage turkey, cranberry relish made with honey from the Bi-Rite Sonoma farm, pumpkin and pecan pies, and related Thanksgiving dishes. Bi-Rite is the only San Francisco retailer to carry BN's heritage turkeys, which are heirloom breeds pasture-raised in Sonoma (Bi-Rite also carries birds from Good Shepard and Diestel). The sample party runs till 7 p.m. today, a repeat tasting happens Saturday, Nov. 14, 11 a.m.-2 p.m.

If you're looking for something less traditional for Thanksgiving than a heritage gobbler, consider turducken from 4505 Meats. Rock star butcher Ryan Farr is taking orders for the turkey-duck-chicken mashups (stuffed with cornbread-chicken sausage stuffing) through Nov. 20. The birds are organic and free range, and the turducken comes in two sizes: 15 pounds ($200) and 20 pounds ($250). You'll have to pick it up in Potrero Hill, or opt for overnight shipping (which is extra). Place an order by e-mailing Meats@4505Meats.com. Cash or check only.

[Full disclosure: Mary Ladd does occasional work for Bi-Rite's catering department.]

AC:MP/Flickr

This is what you won't be getting -- a menu.

​Searching for a mystery thriller for your Halloween dinner? Maverick (3316 17th St. at Mission) is organizing another Mystery Night this Saturday, a dining adventure designed to seriously test your food and wine game. You won't get a menu. Instead, you'll receive a three-course prix-fixe for $40; mystery wine pairings cost an extra $15. You'll get a treat and scorecard, and it'll be up to you to suss out what's on the plate (or in your glass). Points are awarded for partial and full guesses -- if you can nail the potato as a fingerling, for example, you get the full 10 points (but only five for IDing "potato"). Winos will be able to demonstrate varietal knowledge, too. Warning: "The competition becomes friendly but fierce," according to Maverick's Web site. The grand prize for all this? Each table gets a free bottle of vino for the guest who nails the most ingredients or wines. Reserve a table at 863-3061.

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Pace yourself -- you don't want to wake up looking like this Tuesday morning.

​On Monday night, explore Day of the Dead, with a splash of Halloween. La Cocina is devising an evening of Yucatecan food by Chaac Mool's Luis Vazques, and there'll be potent mezcal drinks. The mysteries of mescal -- including whether to spell it with an s or a z -- will all be revealed, and chef Vazques is preparing Day of the Dead bread, cochinita pibil, and screaming hot habanero salsa. Mixmaster Duggan McDonnell is the evening's bartender-instructor -- in fact, the festivities are going down at his hot spot, Cantina (580 Sutter at Mason), starting at 6:30 p.m. Tasting, mixing, educating, and some wildness are all likely, or is that the worm talking? The program benefits La Cocina, which offers training and assistance for low-income food entrepreneurs, and held a wildly popular San Francisco Street Food Festival this summer. Remember: 75 percent of the $80 ticket price is tax deductible. Tickets are available at Brown Paper Tickets, or by e-mailing La Cocina's Caleb Zigas: caleb@lacocinasf.org

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Divali central: Dosa on Fillmore.

​Dosa is celebrating Divali (aka Diwali or Deepavaili), the Festival of Lights, a holiday as important to Hindus as Christmas is to Episcopalians (okay, other Christians too). Starting tonight, Dosa is offering special Divali dinners at both locations (995 Valencia at 21st St., and 1700 Fillmore at Post); they continue through Sunday, Oct. 18 (Divali itself runs Saturday through Monday). Dosa chef Anjan Mitra's holiday menu includes chickpea and avocado salad, potato leek and red bell pepper soup, lamb biryani, spicy andrha prawns, spicy sweet scallops, and batter-fried chile bhaja with onion chutney. Mitra slipped us this unusual scallop recipe, which juxtaposes maple syrup and Thai chiles, in quantities suitable for two. Perhaps illuminated by candlelight.

Dosa's Spicy Sweet Scallops
Yield: Two servings

4 tablespoons maple syrup (preferably organic)
1 ½ teaspoons lime juice (more to taste)
4 Thai chiles, finely chopped
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
2 sprigs cilantro, finely chopped
1 red bell pepper
2 tablespoons vegetable oil, plus more for the bell pepper
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
6 scallops
Salt and pepper to taste
Microgreens for garnishing

Suppenkuche

It doesn't look nearly this scary in person.

​Now through October 4 -- in honor of Oktoberfest -- Suppenküche (525 Laguna at Hayes) is offering a special daytime menu,11 a.m.-2 p.m. The midday hours (they started last Saturday) are new for the Hayes Valley outpost of Bavarian cooking, which can best be described as simple and hearty. Fans of stuff on bread will be happy to note the Lunchtoberfest menu's selection of sandwiches, all $8. You can get leberkäse, a kind of Bavarian meatloaf, sausage with sauerkraut, roasted pork with sea salt, or house cured salmon. Side dishes include potato salad, sauerkraut, cucumber salad, and späetzle (all $4). Giant pretzels with cheese spread are also $4.

And where there's Oktoberfest, naturally, there's beer. Suppenküche's beer special is called, simply enough, Oktoberfest, available as Hefeweizen or lager, both $4 a half liter or $8 a liter. Indulge during Lunchtoberfest, and you'll probably end up to sloppy to return to the office. Start trying out possible excuses now.

Cobalt123/Flickr

Gruesome thought, isn't it?

​It's that delicious moment when San Francisco summer starts for real. Who can think about Thanksgiving, with its scramble for pies, its making-nice-with-your-brother-the-Christian, its turkey, for chrissake.

But this is the very moment to start thinking turkey, or else risk wrestling a frozen ball of industrial quick-grow flesh Thanksgiving morning (no, you can't thaw it in the microwave).

It so happens Marin Sun Farms and BN Ranch are offering a special on heritage breed turkeys. (You know BN: it's the Bolinas ranch owned by Niman Ranch founder Bill Niman and his wife Nicolette -- think super-eco Slow Food.) From now through September, you can order from five breeds Niman chose in Kansas last year, including turkey superstars Standard Brown, Bourbon Red, and Narragansett. You know: range-roaming, free of hormones and antibiotics, and -- after the nasty part happens -- air-chilled.

Place your order now through September and the cost is $6.59 a pound (wait, and it bumps up to $6.89 -- something like a $5 savings for every 10 pounds of bird). You have to give them a $30 deposit, and arrange for pickup at one of several locations, but that's far, far in the future, right? Order online, or call 633-8997, extension 207.

Get ready to party like Kirsten Dunst.

On Tuesday, sip some bubbly and let yourself eat cake. Several Frenchified dinners are happening around town on July 13 and 14 in honor of Bastille Day, France's independence celebration. Well, not everyone will be toasting liberté, égalité, and fraternité. La Provence is bucking the trend by hosting a No Bastille Day dinner, a nod to the idea that some of you out there might be closet Royalists (the first 25 customers who whisper the anti-revolutionary password fleur-de-lys will score a free bottle of wine).

Kick things off Monday night at Jardiniere (300 Grove at Franklin), which is going French for its weekly prix fixe dinner ($45 per person, including wine pairings). Say oui-oui to courses of paté de campagne, Hoffman Ranch chicken fricassée, and apricot and almond claufoutis.

La Provence (1001 Guerrero at 22nd St.) is a warm and friendly bistro that, despite the name, holds to butter and cream rather than strictly hewing to the olive oil-steeped cooking of southern France. Tuesday's No Bastille Day dinner is slated to be a feast, and each diner receives a free treat: a glass of champagne or dessert.

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Epic Roasthouse and Waterbar: The fireworks may move indoors this year.

Toasting and noshing on the town can be the tastiest way to enjoy this Fourth of July. Here are some SFoodie recommended spots to hit before -- or instead of -- the usual fireworks or fog.

El Rio (3158 Mission at Precita): From 1:30 to 8 p.m., eight smackers (aka $8) gets you an afternoon of traditional BBQ, drink specials, and live music ... from eight bands. Outdoor patio seating is available, and the sign says it all: Your dive.

Epic Roasthouse (369 The Embarcadero at Folsom) and Waterbar (399 The Embarcadero at Folsom): Pat Kuleto and co. offer two (nearly) adjoining posh posts on the waterfront. Both restaurants will have regular à la carte lunch and dinner menus, and enticing drinks.

Jardinière (300 Grove at Franklin): Chef Traci Des Jardins is keeping a family feel to this year's rib-sticking barbeque, priced at $55 per person. Kids of all ages may giggle with glee over their root-beer floats. Mains include Hoffman Ranch fried chicken and Berkshire pork ribs, with Southern inspired sides ranging from buttermilk biscuits to mac and cheese. Cherry pie à la mode fills out the roster of sweet treats.

Lighto via Flickr

Baby Blues BBQ will be slinging ribs on Monday

It makes us cranky: dumping the remnants of rain from the backyard barbecue's inverted lid, then scrubbing the detritus of carbonized chicken skin from the grate. Finish the scouring, the lighting, and the stoking, and you have to face the smoke, all those acrid billows of vaporized pork fat. Sure, we crave barbecue on Memorial Day as much as the next guy, but prefer not to reek as if we'd taken a sponge bath with bong water. Help!

Thankfully, five of the city's 'cue joints plan to open on Monday, slinging rib tips, hot links, and chicken halves for the carbon-averse. It's a holiday -- relax a little. That rusted-out Weber will still be waiting for you on the Fourth of July.