San Francisco Food Blog

Back in December 2008, MillerCoors voluntarily removed caffeine, taurine, guarana, and ginseng from energy drink Sparks, due in part to pressure from San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera. Hipsters everywhere lost their collective shit. The overly sweet malt liquor/energy drink hybrid saturated the fabric of many a party flannel. Subtract the caffeine and all you have left is a really gross drink, instead of a really gross drink that makes you stay up really, really late.

A match made in heaven?

​Luckily, there were drinks like Four-Loko and Joose primed to fill the 16-oz-can shaped hole in our hearts. Their stupid names and potential to dye your tongue as if you were suffering from a nutritional deficiency felt familiar and safe.

But The Man wasn't satisfied.

Herrera issued a statement on Nov. 13 explaining that he and other state attorneys had successfully pressured the FDA into investigating the safety of caffeinated alcoholic beverages, because they create "wide-awake" drunks and "may lead to increased risk-taking and other serious alcohol-related problems such as driving under the influence, violence, sexual assault, and suicide." The desired outcome of this investigation? Herrera hopes "companies that produce these drinks and target youth with their products will take the responsible step and remove these dangerous products from the marketplace immediately."

When life hands you lemons, you make Bathtub Sparks.

m kasahara/Flickr

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

emilylucchettiblog.com

Who doesn't like somethng sweet and fluffy when it's nippy?

​There's a nip in the air, and we hear it might rain next week -- perfect time to whip up some tangy gingerbread. Emily Luchetti, executive pastry chef at both Farallon and Waterbar, dresses up the classic fall cake with apple compôte and a luscious apple sabayon. Check out Luchetti's blog for links to her three cookbooks (Classic Stars Desserts, A Passion for Ice Cream, and A Passion for Desserts) and more recipes.

Gingerbread with Apple Compôte and Apple Sabayon
Yield: one 9" x 13" pan

For the gingerbread:
1 cup molasses
1 1/2 cups boiling water
1 teaspoon baking soda
8 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1 large egg
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1 1/4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon kosher salt

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease the sides and bottom of a 9" x 13" pan.
Mix molasses, boiling water and baking soda together in a large bowl. Cool to room temperature. With an electric mixer, beat the butter and brown sugar until light; mix in the egg. Sift together the ginger, cinnamon, flour, and baking powder. Add salt.
In three additions, alternately add dry ingredients and the molasses mixture to the butter mixture. Mix thoroughly after each addition to make sure there are no lumps.
Spread batter into the prepared pan. Bake 30 minutes, or until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean. Cool before cutting.

M. Brody

Goldstein, serving chunky gazpacho -- but when does she sleep?

​A real treat: an intimate dinner chez Joyce Goldstein, aka the hardest working woman in the food business. Goldstein, veteran of Chez Panisse and her own San Francisco restaurant Square One, is the author of 26 cookbooks, and a restaurant consultant specializing in recipe development, menu design, and staff training. Oh yes, she has a blog, too.

And she still loves to rattle those pots and pans. When we arrived at her Cow Hollow home for a little supper this weekend, the table was set with hand-painted Portuguese plates (the ones from Square One), an array of room temperature foods were waiting in their cazuelas alongside pottery jars of freshly made alioli and romesco sauce, and the wine was open and ready to be poured. Joyce, a miracle of organization, grilled large skewered shrimp and asparagus on a stove-top plancha at the last minute, simultaneously sautéeing scallops with almonds and white wine.

M. Brody

The ratatouille-like samfaina (recipe after the jump).

​We began with chunky hand-chopped gazpacho poured over bread cubes -- as Joyce and one of her guests, Indian chef and restaurateur Suvir Saran (a colleague from shared teaching gigs at the Culinary Institute of America), scoffed at the uniform texture of blended gazpacho -- even, sometimes, strained through muslin! In addition to shrimp and scallops, there were grilled padrone peppers, mushrooms stuffed with chorizo and orange peel, clams cooked with large white beans, a potato and onion tortilla, and a wonderfully fresh-tasting ratatouille-like dish called samfaina.

Afterwards there were slices of a homey raspberry-buttermilk cake served with panna cotta. (Credit where credit is due: "It's Delfina's recipe," Joyce said. "Perfect texture, with a touch of lemon juice that makes all the difference.")

Food Network

​Earlier this week, we spoke with Olympic and World figure skating champion Brian Boitano in anticipation of Sunday's debut of his Food Network program What Would Brian Boitano Make?

Now, we have one answer to that question in the form of a fetching recipe from the man himself.

He created this dish as part of an all-bacon meal requested by a local team of roller derby chicks, something you can fairly easily bake up on Sunday morning and have ready in time for the program's 1 p.m. start.

Brian Boitano's Bacon Corn Muffins with Savory Cream Cheese Frosting
Yield: 24 mini muffins
Prep time: 35 minutes
Cook Time: 22 minutes

For the muffins:
8 strips bacon
Nonstick cooking spray
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup cornmeal
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 tablespoons brown sugar
3/4 cup milk
1 egg
3 tablespoons butter, melted
1 tablespoon reserved bacon fat

For the frosting:
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
2 tablespoons honey
1 tablespoon hot sauce
1 bunch chives, sliced

Equipment you'll need:
2 (24-count) nonstick mini muffin tins
A disposable pastry bag

thcblog.com

Fire Crackers: clang! honk! tweet!

What could be more American? It's no secret that lots of folks will choose to celebrate the 233rd anniversary of the founding of the U.S.A. by creating a few ganja-generated mental fireworks of their own.

Tired no more.

It's a ladies luncheon cliché of the 1980s, the Asian chicken salad bristling with greasy wonton strips, canned Mandarin oranges, and rubbery almonds. Anywhere else, this sweet and tangy relic is likely to seem as outmoded as one of Bea Arthur's pantsuits from The Golden Girls, but not at Blue Barn Gourmet (2105 Chestnut at Steiner). The Marina salad and sandwich cafe has managed to infuse the tired assemblage with new freshness: herbs, oranges that haven't drowned in heavy syrup, the buckwheat noodles called soba (crisp without resorting to the Fryolator), and a light dressing. It's about time.

Blue Barn's Chinese Chicken Salad
Makes one large serving

Ingredients:
4 cups chopped romaine
½ cup shredded carrots
½ cup julienned snow peas
½ cup orange segments
1 tablespoons sesame seeds (a mix of black and white)
1 tablespoon chopped mint
1 tablespoon chopped cilantro
1 tablespoon chopped Italian parsley
2 tablespoons minced green scallions
¾ cup roasted chicken (white meat only), cut into ½-inch cubes
½ cup crunchy soba noodles (see below)
¼ cup Sweet and Sour Dressing (see below)

Toss all ingredients together in a large bowl. Add the dressing and toss thoroughly (it should just coat the ingredients).

For the crunchy soba noodles:
Blanch noodles in boiling water until cooked but not mushy, drain thoroughly, toss with olive oil, and place on a baking sheet. Bake at 375° F until golden brown. Break into small pieces.

At barely 7-months-old, Anthony Myint's Mission Street Food is already a San Francisco institution. Myint and crew are setting examples not only with the playful spirit of experimentation (different themes and menus each time), but also with their business model of supporting local charitable organizations by donating their profits each week.

Responding to our challenge to write a recipe within the 140-character space offered on Twitter, Myint crafted a simple, enticing topper:

Charred Scallion Sour Cream: Grill ~15 scallions until very dark. Cool. Mince. Mix w/ 1 qt sour cream, 1 cup aioli, seasoning

Richie Nakano, sous chef at Nopa (560 Divisadero at Fell), is also a talented multimedia producer with a witty 'n gritty blog and podcast, both called line cook. Nakano jumped at our challenge to put together a recipe in the 140-character space carved out by Twitter. Here's his tweet-worthy method for making pancetta.

Nopa Pancetta: 1 organic pork belly. 2% salt by weight. Curing salt. A lot of black pepper. Fennel seed, chili. Cure 10 days. Ferment a few days. Eat.

If you think you recognize the executive chef of Scala's Bistro (432 Powell at Post) wihtout ever having eaten there, it's because Jen Biesty competed on the fourth season of Bravo's Top Chef in 2008, where she cooked meals inspired by penguins and the film Il Postino. SFoodie challenged Biesty to create a recipe the length of a Twitter message; she responded with a squid salad in two tasty tweets:

Pt. 1 (Squid salad): Squid rings & tentacles sauteed over hi heat w/few whole grlc+dried chillis 3-5min. Vinaigrette: 3 grlc clvs, red wine, vinegar, salt, evoo

Pt. 2 (Potatoes): Boil fingerlings w/peppercorns & bay leaf, remove skin, slice. Toss w/ squid, chopped parsley, celery, pitted gaeta olives, piquillo peppers

We've challenged chefs and other food pros to create recipes in the 140-character space carved out by Twitter. SFoodie's first liquid offering comes from Sierra Zimei, cocktail director at Seasons Bar and Lounge in the Four Seasons Hotel (757 Market at Grant). Last year, readers of San Francisco magazine voted Zimei the city's Best Mixologist, and her Sake75 offers up a glimmer of why.

Sake75: 2 oz Magellan gin, ½ oz lemon juice, splash simple syrup; shake, strain into champagne glass, top with blue sake, garnish w/twist

A carefully crafted julep is not only a work of art and a delectable evocation of those lazy summer days just over the horizon, it's one of the two or three greatest American cocktails. The hardest part of the preparation is the crushing of the ice, and since you'll probably become addicted to juleps by the end of the afternoon anyway, you might as well invest in an electric ice crusher. (Otherwise, wrap ice cubes in a towel and smash the hell out of them with a hammer.)

Place three or four mint leaves, a spoonful of superfine sugar, and a splash of water in the bottom of a sturdy tumbler or, better yet, a sterling silver mug. Muddle them together until you can smell the mint, then pack the tumbler to the top with crushed ice. Pour good bourbon over the ice to just below the rim (we like Woodford Reserve, but no true Southerner would sneer at Mr. Jim Beam), then chop away at the mint, sugar, ice, and bourbon with a long-handled spoon until thoroughly combined. Put the glass or mug in the freezer and let it get frosty and slushy for an hour or so.

Tuck a straw and a branch of mint into the ice, garnish the rim with a wheel of lemon, dust the mint leaves with powdered sugar, and sprinkle a few drops of cognac atop the ice for a nice introductory yowzah.

Caution: We're talking about a lot of liquor here, 8 ounces if you're using the right kind of glass, so sip the thing very slowly over the course of the afternoon, preferably in a hammock with a bowl of fried pecans at hand.

In this week's box:

• asparagus, 11 oz.
  
• salad mix, 9 oz.
• green garlic, 8 oz.
• tokyo turnips (first of the season), 15 oz.
• chard, 10 oz.
• spinach, 8 oz.
• sugar snap peas, 8 oz.
• radishes, 12 oz.

The huge radishes we just washed and ate with salt as an hors d'oeuvre. For variety, I also put out some smoked salt, which was pretty good.

I chopped the white parts of the green garlic, sauteed them in olive oil with chile flakes, toasted and ground fennel seed, and salt, added some tomato sauce, and simmered it for a while. Then I stirred in some shredded leftover halibut and simmered just long enough to heat the fish. Oddly, given the ingredients, the flavor was reminiscent of Thai catfish salad.

We continue our experiment of challenging local chefs to create recipes that fit in the 140-character space normally reserved for Twitter with an idea from Eddie Lau. Since moving to the Bay Area from his native Boston, Lau has worked for Orson and Poleng Lounge, still cooks for events and private occasions, and was recently named a new co-chef at Mission Street Food, for which he was also a guest chef this past Saturday. He also produces his own local blog Hot Food Porn, which is bursting of enticing examples of his cuisine, which he calls "seasonal modern interpreatation."

Uni and Shoyu Gelee in Mint Elderflower Glaze: On cold spoon, uni, cubed shoyu gelee(reduce shoyu, chx gelee, star anise, five spice, lemongrass, cane sugar), elderflower mint syrup glaze

In this week's box:

• fresh onion, 6 oz.
  
• asparagus, 11 oz.
• fennel, 11 oz.
• lemons, 12 oz.
• red chard, 10 oz.
  
• spinach, 8 oz.
• salad mix, 8 oz.
• mibuna, 12 oz.
• sugar snap peas, 7 oz.

I used the fennel leaves to make baked halibut using the recipe I posted last week (above, before baking; below, after), and served the baby fennel bulbs with salt as an appetizer, along with some chorizo, Marcona almonds, and anchovy-stuffed olives.

(Photo by Chris Andre)

We're having fun with local chefs, challenging them to create a recipe with only 140 characters, the same amount of space allowed for messages on Twitter. After last week's pig head Mu-Shu recipe from Ryan Farr, we have a lovely vegetarian offering to follow. At age 22, Thomas Martinez, who leads the kitchen at Mission Beach Cafe (198 Guerrero), is one of the youngest (if not the youngest) executive chef in San Francisco, and has also worked at Aziza, Greens, and Roots:

Early Spring Artichoke Soup: Peel baby artichoke stems & outer leaves, cut off tops. Cook w/mirepoix/Hvy crm/veg stik/garlic/salt,cover. Sim 30min,blend&pass thru chinois.

In this week's box:

• grapefruit, 1 lb. 3 oz.
  
• salad mix, 8 oz.
• asparagus, 12 oz.
• fennel, 1 lb.
• red chard, 10 oz.
• green garlic, 8 oz.
• walnuts, 8 oz.

I'll use the fennel leaves and green parts of the garlic in a baked fish dish adapted from a recipe in Richard Olney's 1994 book Lulu's Provencal Table.

UK daily newspaper the Guardian recently asked leading chefs in England to create recipes within the brief, 140-character limit normally reserved for messages (or "tweets") on Twitter. (Don't forget to follow SFoodie on Twitter for up-to-the-minute news and headlines from us.)

We thought this was such a cute idea that we're asking local chefs to take the same challenge. We have a doozy of a recipe for the first one, courtesy of Ryan Farr, who has crafted creative cuisine for the likes of Orson and Fifth Floor and now heads up his own companies Ivy Elegance and 4505 Meats (maker of fantastic chicharrones). He's famous for his pig butchery demonstrations, showing other people how to minimize waste, as well as edgy recipes that push the animal's boundaries (mirrors lined with rails of bacon "snow," anyone?):

Pig Head Mu Shu: Start w/ hd rub w/oil cvr ears&nose w/ foil, cook @ 350 3 hr. eat w/ Mu Shu pancake siracha cucumber cilantro hoisin & beer

In this week's box (I accidentally deleted the usual photo in the course of switching to a new camera):

• asparagus, 14 oz.
• carrots, 1 lb. 4 oz.
• chard, 11 oz.
• 1 head green lettuce, 8 oz.
• 1 head red lettuce, 10 oz.
• fresh oregano, 3/4 oz.
• rutabagas, 1 lb. 13 oz.
• radishes, 9 0z.
• fresh onions, 11 oz.

The first-of-the-season radishes were devoured almost immediately as an hors d'oeuvres (French-style, with butter and salt) while I cooked the chard with the onions (recipe below) and poached the asparagus in garlic butter, both to go with a lamb rib roast almost exactly like the one I blogged about in January. I gave the oregano to one of my dinner guests since we have a big, healthy plant (shown above).

The next night we ate most of the lettuce and carrots in a big salad. So that was most of the box gone within 48 hours. We're getting a little backed up on rutabagas, but they keep in the fridge for months.

In this week's box:

• asparagus, 12 oz.
• broccoli, 1 lb.
• salad mix, 7 oz.
• green garlic, 5 oz.
• yellow chard, 12 oz.
• potatoes, 1 lb 7 oz.
• carrots, 1 lb 6 oz.

More signs of spring: salad mix, green garlic, asparagus, and fatter carrots. The green garlic went to season the spinach and dino kale from last week's box. Here's a recipe:

Serious foodies are supposed to prefer salt-packed anchovies, but rinsing and filleting them is a pain. If you're going to serve them whole and marinate them, their superior texture might be worth the trouble, but if you're going to chop or mash them up for a sauce or or dip, it's a lot of work for a small or perhaps undetectable difference.

The lazy cook's alternative is filleted anchovies packed in olive oil. The best price around for good quality is at Costco (450 10th St.), which sells a six-pack of Crown Prince for $5.89. These are caught wild off the coast of Morocco, cured in salt, then cleaned and packed by hand in olive oil.

Here's a recipe for people who really love that anchovy flavor:

In Friday''s box:

• 1 bag walnuts, 1/4 lb.
• 1 celery root, 1 lb. 6 oz.
• 1 bunch carrots, 1 lb. 1 oz.
• 3 fresh onions, 1 lb. 2 oz.
• 1 cabbage, 1 lb. 5 oz.
• 1 bunch dino kale, 1 lb.
• 1 bag spinach, 8 oz.

Most of the cabbage and carrots went into a batch of the Gujarati-style warm salad I posted the recipe for a few weeks back.

The celery root I'm saving for a batch of celeri remoulade, a classic French appetizer salad. There are two basic kinds of remoulade, one made with crème fraîche, the other with mayonnaise. I prefer the latter (and we can't get real, French, raw-milk crème fraîche around here any more anyway). It's almost too simple to bother with a recipe, but here goes:

If you are what you eat, I'm a loaf of Acme pain au levain (French for sourdough), made with natural sourdough starter and a blend of white and whole wheat. Even if you've never bought a loaf, you may have encountered it on the table at Zuni Cafe, downstairs at Chez Panisse (where founder-owner Steve Sullivan first plied his craft), or at one of the many other local restaurants that serve it.

This is the ideal crusty loaf for sponging up soup or pasta sauce, and for making bruschetta or open-faced grilled sandwiches.. Toasted, it's the perfect crunchy vehicle for rich, spreadable charcuterie such as pâtés, rilettes, ciccoli, and pork butter.

Virtually all the cookbook reviews I see are for new cookbooks, most of which are soon forgotten. Personally I don't see newness as a plus: the cookbooks I want to know about are the tried and true, the books that people have been cooking out of for years, that are food-stained and falling apart from overuse.

On my short list of such books, Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cookery stands out as particularly reliable. Everything I've cooked out of it has been delicious, and the recipes all work perfectly, probably because they were thoroughly tested in the course of producing the 1980s BBC TV series of the same name.

The book is out of print, but it's readily available used online for under $10 including shipping from the UK. Here are a couple of favorite recipes that I've streamlined from her originals a bit over the years:

In most parts of Italy, canned tomatoes and tomato paste aren't used nearly as often as passato di pomodoro, a delicious and versatile product that's not well known in this country. The homemade version is made by simmering ripe, peak-season tomatoes to a pulp, then passing them through a sieve to strain out the seeds and skins and make a smooth puree. Traditionally, the puree would then be canned, though these days it's more likely to go in the deep freeze. But most modern Italians just buy the stuff at the supermarket.

The best brand avaialble locally is Pomi (made by Parmalat, best known for its milk products), which is 100% tomatoes, no salt, preservatives, or seasonings. Even homemade sauce made from peak-season plum tomatoes would be hard-pressed to match the intense, rich flavor of this puree, which is superior to any canned tomatoes or tomato paste I've had, imported or domestic. Pomi's skinned and seedless chopped tomatoes are similar but have a chunky rather than smooth texture. Both come in 750-gram (26 oz.) boxes. Most places charge around $4 a box, but shop around and you can find it for closer to (and sometimes under) $3. I don't recommend the Pomi marinara sauce.

A good way to appreciate the flavor is with this super-simple pasta sauce:

Via: VirtualErn on Flickr

Whenever the weather gets as cold and rainy as it's gotten over the past several days, a young glutton's fancy turns to thoughts of chili. We're not talking here about the high-class seared-pork-and-tomatillo variety encountered at your typical suburban chili cook-off or even the authentic bean-free stuff served up across Texas and the Southwest with a side of attitude. What we want is the simple, elementary, blissfully retro chili con carne that you can prepare in 10 minutes and enjoy medicinally as a response to the wet cold weather slashing at the windowpane.

Sautee a chopped onion and a chopped sweet pepper in olive oil. Add a pound of ground beef. When it's nicely browned, pour in a 16 oz. can of tomato sauce and a teaspoon of salt. Simmer a few minutes, then stir in a 16 oz. can of drained kidney beans and a heaping teaspoon (or more) of chili powder. That's all there is to it, but if you want to get fancy you can toss together a salad, bake up some cornbread with sharp cheddar ribboned through the batter and open a bottle of beer, preferably something light, like a Hefeweizen. Take two bowls and think about spring training.

I bought my first jar of Turkish red pepper paste (biber salçası) to make kisir, a bulgur salad similar to tabbouleh, which I first encountered at the since-closed Ephesus Kebab Lounge in Walnut Creek. Since it was in the fridge, we started experimenting, using it to spice up scrambled eggs and sandwiches, and it has become a staple.

I'm partial to the (slightly) hot version from Sera, which you can find at the 22nd & Irving Market or Indus Foods (1920 San Pablo in Berkeley), which also stocks the mild version and several other brands. Haig's Delicacies at 642 Clement has a domestic brand, Selena, which I haven't tried. All three also carry the pomegranate molasses and fine bulgur (which Haig's labels "cracked wheat") called for in the following recipe. I've found two specifically Turkish shops in the Bay Area, but due to their inconvenient locations haven't checked them out yet: European Turkish Market in Burlingame, and Turkaz Market in Dublin.

Kisir

This week, our CSA box contained:

• 1 bunch carrots (1 lb.)
• 1.5 lbs. potatoes
• 1 Napa cabbage (2 lbs.)
• 1 bunch karinata kale (12 oz.)
• 2 navel oranges (1.75 lbs.)
• 1 butternut squash (2.5 lbs.)
• 1 lb. spinach
  

The night we got the box, we made a spinach gratin with béchamel and Parmigiano-Reggiano, and diced half the squash and sautéed it in butter. Another night, we used the potatoes, half the cabbage, and kale to make colcannon, using a Williams-Sonoma recipe as a rough template. We've found that you can use any kind of cabbage, any kind of kale, substitute celery root for some or all of the potatoes, or substitute onions for the shallots with equally delicious results. The oranges were the best I've had in several years: highly aromatic, heavy with juice, with a great balance of sweet and tart.

I'll most like use the carrots and the rest of the cabbage to make this Gujarati-style warm salad (recipe adapted from one of my favorite cookbooks, Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cookery):

It's an open secret that halal markets offer some of the tastiest meat around, often at prices lower than you'll find even at Costco. I've learned from talking with the butchers that the animals are often grass-fed and come from farms in the Central Valley. Lambs and goats are brought in whole, and most of the innards are available.

This week I bought a 2.5-pound bone-in lamb rib roast for $10. I told the butcher, who didn't speak much English, to leave it whole. He took it over to the bandsaw anyway, and thinking he intended to slice it into chops, I called out to him to stop. I took the roast home, rubbed it with two tablespoons of ras el-hanout (recipe follows) mixed with two teaspoons of salt, wrapped it in plastic, let it sit in the fridge for a few hours, roasted it at 350 degrees to an internal temperature of 145 degrees, wrapped it loosely in foil to hold the heat, and let it sit for ten minutes before serving.