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 →
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 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 →
“… 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 →
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 →
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 →
“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 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 →
650 Gough Street 415-869-1900 www.smugglerscovesf.com I’m crazy about all things Tiki and its accompanying kitsch… which is why I’ve long been a fan of Alameda’s Forbidden Island Tiki Lounge. Martin Cate helped make that bar great with his cocktails, going beyond the usual too-sweet, one-note swill often paired with such a setting. Though he departed Forbidden Island awhile back, we’ve… Read more →
“[San Francisco] sparkles with that crystalline northern California light that makes everything pop out from the background. All the buildings and people have hard, crisp edges. It’s bucolic and hard to believe – a picture postcard, unreal.” – David Byrne, “Bicycle Diaries” A beautiful Thanksgiving it was, with family, food, excursions, a peaceful stay at Lake Tahoe. As usual, plenty… Read more →