FANCY FOOD at Moscone Center, 1/16-19 Fancy Food is the largest showcase of specialty foods in North America, held annually in NYC and SF, and walking through literally thousands of products from around the world (not to mention tasting them) is massively overwhelming and exciting. It’s a place for industry folk to discover and buy new product, and, in my… Read more →
January 15, 2010
“All great deeds and all great thoughts have a ridiculous beginning. Great works are often born on a street corner or in a restaurant’s revolving door.” – Albert Camus Well into January, I’m looking ahead to travels and adventures for the new year – what will yours be? I love to dream and plan – it’s almost as sweet as… Read more →
SF’s Best Sushi & Italian, South & North Bay Eats & Vegan Mexican
Top Tastes is my usual run-down of favorites. Rather than a list of all-time favorites (another thing altogether), it’s highlights since my last newsletter, often from new openings. Many don’t make the cut, being a revisit written about before or simply not as stand-out as dishes mentioned. MID-RANGE RESTAURANTS At the start of a new year, I visited some… Read more →
The Latest: Southern Elegance at Dollie Marie’s
DOLLIE MARIE’S 1602 South El Camino RealSan Mateo, CA 94402650-638-9238www.dolliemaries.com I can never get enough of that unique-to-the-US cuisine: Southern cooking. Enter Dollie Marie’s, delightful, boisterous Chef Gator’s latest, whose restaurants I’ve had the pleasure of eating at through the years (and sadly saw close), from Noe Valley’s Alcatraces to Gator’s in downtown San Mateo. When you add in white… Read more →
Chicago’s West Loop, The Loop & Ukranian Village
“Chicago sounds rough to the maker of verse. One comfort we have – Cincinnati sounds worse.” – Oliver Wendell Holmes, 1880 Back to Chicago, where my husband once lived for a Summer (part one here). The city remains much as I remember it: gritty, even at it’s “prettiest”, middle America in a big city/New York reminiscent package. It doesn’t woo… Read more →
January 1, 2010
“… sashimi is velvet dust, verging on silk, or a bit of both, and the extraordinary alchemy of its gossamer essence allows it to preserve a milky density unknown even by clouds.” – Muriel Barbery, “Gourmet Rhapsody” I wish you a beautiful new year (and decade!) full of growth, promise and a blossoming. I feel the words of one of… Read more →
Celebrating at Coi, Ice Cream, Asian-French Bakery, My Favorite Crudo & More
Top Tastes is my usual run-down of favorites. Rather than a list of all-time favorites (another thing altogether), it’s highlights since my last newsletter, often from new openings. Many don’t make the cut, being a revisit written about before or simply not as stand-out as dishes mentioned. SAVORY – MEAT • My birthday dinner this year was a GOOD one:… Read more →
Wandering Traveler
YOSEMITE’S BRACEBRIDGE DINNER 9005 Ahwahnee Drive Yosemite National Park, CA 95389 801-559-4884 www.yosemitepark.com/bracebridge Driving through snow-laced Yosemite Valley in Winter… there’s a quiet that is richly restorative. The sound of dripping icicles and waterfalls in the distance create a gentle hum as the backdrop to what is nothing short of Ansel Adams’ photos come alive. A little fog in the… Read more →
December 15, 2009
“Discover in all things that which shines and is beyond corruption. Encourage virtue in whatever heart it may have been driven into secrecy and sorrow by the shame and terror of the world… Be the inferior of no man, nor of any man be the superior… In the time of your life, live – so that in that wondrous time… Read more →
Top Tastes
Top Tastes is my usual run-down of tastes over the past two weeks. Rather than a list of all-time favorites (another thing altogether), it’s highlights since my last newsletter, often from new openings. Many don’t make the cut, being a revisit written about before or simply not as stand-out as dishes mentioned. SAVORY – VEGETARIAN •When eating at Beretta and… Read more →