Local: Mission Eatery, revisited

It's official, I have a new favorite brunch place. Local: Mission Eatery/Knead Patisserie. I've posted about both of these places before, and I just can't get enough. I love that I can walk there, I love that it isn't too crowded, I love how low-key the vibe is. And have I mentioned that I love the food? 

This time we combined the best of both worlds - some eggs from the restaurant and some pastries from the patisserie. The poached eggs were exactly, perfectly the way I like them. We sat at the counter and I was excited that I could watch the chef make the eggs, so maybe I could learn her technique.  Turns out her technique consisted of cracking an egg directly into the not-quite boiling water, leaving  it alone to go deal with some other food, and then coming back to scoop the egg out.  My eggs must smell my fear.

The croissant was also insane - so crispy on the outside but so soft and buttery on the inside. I realize that just sounds like a description of any old croissant, but this is something else entirely. You just need to try it for yourself, ok?

Both egg dishes were great, but I particularly liked the one with farro and tomatoes. I'm on a roasted tomato kick right now, so this really hit the spot.

I loved this breakfast so much I'm already planning on returning this coming weekend for my anniversary brunch. Save me a croissant!

Bottega Louie, Los Angeles

I didn't have my camera with me, so here's just a few iPhone photos of the amazing baked goods at Bottega Louie. Dinner with some friends was pretty great also.  AND I bumped into an old friend from high school. A very successful night.

Bottega Louie 

700 S Grand Ave

Los Angeles, CA 90017 

(213) 802-1470

Scenes from Los Angeles

Got to eat some great food while down in LA for the weekend.  We mistakenly left our camera at home, so it's all iPhone photos instead. I like how they turned out! The Cross Process app is awesome.

We spent a lot of time on Abbot Kinney this trip. We had lunch at 3 Square, which we seem to stop at every time we are down there. This was their three sandwich sampler: pulled pork, salmon cake and grilled cheese with shrimp. The grilled cheese was my fave. 

 Intelligentsia Latte

We sort of happened-upon the Brentwood Country Mart by mistake. I was psyched when I realized that's where Farmshop LA was. We had already eaten lunch, so we just got a few snacks. The lemon raspberry cookie was insanely good. I really want to go back there for a meal.

We decided we needed dessert with our dessert, so we got an ice cream cone (Caffe Luxxe Coffee) at Sweet Rose Ice Cream.

So this last picture isn't in LA - it is at the brand new SFO Terminal 2. This place is awesome! Super clean and modern with lots of great restaurants, including the Plant Cafe. We got off the plane and needed to detox from traveling + all the sugar we had eaten.  We were so happy to see this in front of us, and we got a fresh squeezed juice (carrot/ginger/orange juice).  Plus we were able to pick up a loaf of Acme Bread at the Napa Farms Market, which meant we didn't need to go to the grocery store - so convenient!  I think I need to only fly on Virgin America from now on. 

Mayfield Bakery and Cafe, Palo Alto

I had big (eating) plans this weekend: 1) Nopa for dinner on Saturday night and 2) Bakesale Betty for lunch on Sunday. Want to guess how many of those plans happened? (Answer: Zero.)

Plan 1: Nopa, you and I can never seem to get it together. And by you and I, I mean me. I was all psyched to finally have dinner at Nopa (see: here) but forgot we had made plans to babysit. Oops. Another canceled reservation. When we finally get to eat dinner there, maybe in 2014, they are going to have to work really hard to live up to my expectations. 

Plan 2:  We were supposed to head over to Emeryville to go to Ikea, and then reward ourselves with Bakesale Betty, which I have still never had.  As we got on the 101, at 10am on Sunday morning, we were greeted with a sign saying that 3 lanes on the bridge were closed. We got on anyway, saw the traffic, and decided to head South instead, to the Ikea in Palo Alto. Goodbye, Bakesale Betty..... maybe some other day. 

We still needed to reward ourselves for spending our Sunday morning at Ikea, so we decided to hit up Mayfield Bakery and Cafe. Mayfield is part of the Spruce/Cafe Des Amis family, but I don't think you'd guess that if you didn't know.  The vibe in there just feels really different than their other restaurants. Here's a picture to prove my point: 

I think the staff at either one of those restaurants might frown at drawing on the linens.  Mayfield is much more family friendly though (tons of kids in there for brunch) and drawing on the table was not at all out of place.  Mayfield provides all the baked goods for the other restaurants that are part of the same management group. What this means for you as a customer there: if you go for dinner, they frequently give away loaves of bread at the end of the night. If you go for brunch, they give you delicious treats. Last time I was there, we got zucchini bread. Today we got these madeleines, which were really cakey and had the slightest hint of orange and were delicious.

Kev ordered the country breakfast, which is like your standard egg/potato/bacon/toast. But the potatoes! They call them "cottage potatoes" on the menu, but they reminded me of a potato pancake, which is weird because the texture is completely different - the insides are smooth and creamy in a crunchy, fried shell - but really, it tasted like your favorite Chanukah treat. Which is pretty awesome.

I ordered the romesco and egg flatbread with chorizo, roasted red peppers, pecans and arugula. Oh and a sundried tomato sauce. It was really, really good. They have a wood fire stove so the crust had that nice charring, and the tang of the sundried tomato sauce plus the spice of the chorizo, plus all the other ingredients, were a winning combination, plus it was nice to have something different for breakfast.  And I just had to stop writing this post to go eat the leftovers, so, there you go.

Mayfield Bakery and Cafe
855 El Camino Real
Palo Alto, CA 94301
(650) 853-9200

Knead Patisserie, Mission

Last week, in a moment of pure brilliance and gluttony, I decided to take a different route to the 101 and stop by Knead Patisserie for coffee and breakfast.

On weekday mornings before 11, you can find Shauna (the owner/baker) and her cart in the doorway of Local Mission Eatery, where the bakery is based.  Once the restaurant opens at 11, the operation moves inside.  You might want to click on that link to check out the website for the restaurant because it is a prime example of a logo so well designed that I'd want to eat there even if the menu didn't look amazing.  I'm such a sucker.

I couldn't decide what I wanted, and I really wanted everything, so I picked up a whole bunch of stuff.  This included the pomme d'amore, which is basically pastry wrapped around awesomeness: melted and brûléed caramel.  I was ordered to purchase this by KelsEats, who happened to show up  at the same time as me.  Luckily it isn't very hard to persuade me, because that pastry was amazing.

I tried a little bit of everything and loved it all. I then begrudgingly shared with my coworkers, because even I realize that eating four whole pastries by myself at once might not be the best idea.

Knead Patisserie
3111 24th Street 
San Francisco, CA 94110
(415) 655-3024

The Comforts of Home

We just came back from a whirlwind two days in NY, celebrating my mom's 60th birthday. Can't get enough of black and white cookies or Dunkin' Donuts coffee.  These black and whites may be the best I've ever had.  According to my mom, they are like "cake air'.  They came from William Greenberg on the Upper East Side (where you can also custom order your colors) and  they are amazing.  You can also get them shipped to you if you happen to be unfortunate like me and live somewhere where you can't find black and whites.

I think if someone opened a Dunkin' Donuts franchise in San Francisco, that also sold black and white cookies, they'd make a fortune. From me alone.

ps: Happy Birthday Mom!

Paulette Macarons, Hayes Valley

Hayes Valley is kind of the mecca for those with a sweet tooth. We've already covered Christopher Elbow and Miette.  And if you aren't satisfied with the options at these two places, there's always Paulette Macarons.

If you go to Paulette, you should know that they have a picture taking policy. The policy is this: you have to ask. You can take a picture but if you don't ask first they will say to you, "excuse me but you have to ask". And then you will say, "I'm so sorry, can I not take photos in here?" and they will say, "yes, you can. But you have to ask". 

I prefer the non-fruit flavored macarons. These here are some combination of espresso, vanilla, chocolate and coconut.  And while they were all excellent, the macarons at Bouchon Bakery remain my favorites.

San Francisco Food Crawl Part 2: The Mission

After a fun - but rained out - first attempt at a food crawl, we finally settled on a date for round two.   This time we decided to keep it all walkable, so all of the places we went were in the Mission. I like the idea of doing a food crawl by region anyway - San Francisco has so many different neighborhoods with great food, plus it's a good excuse to keep doing more of these crawls and exploring different areas of the city. 

Our first stop was The Monk's Kettle. I've said it before and I'll say it again: I like a good font and logo, and this place has both.  Even though they are known for their huge variety of beer - both on tap and in bottles - we were there specifically for the giant pretzel. And since our group was bigger this time (we lost one person, but gained three, for a total of seven) we decided we needed to order more food at each place.  

On the left is the mac and cheese made with house-made cheddar ale sauce and toasted bread crumbs.  We didn't love the mac and cheese - it was ok, but we all wished it were a bit heartier (the non-vegetarians were specifically mentioning it'd be much better with bacon).  The pretzel lived up to it's reputation. It's served with stone ground mustard and more house-made cheddar ale sauce and it is so much better than the pretzels you get from street carts. 

It's a little bit awkward going into a restaurant with seven people and then telling them you aren't really there for a meal - just to try a couple of things. Our waiter totally went with it and was very sweet about having us taking up a whole table.  We definitely could have eaten more there - and I fully intend to go back to try the lobster pot pie - but we were pacing ourselves for the rest of the day. 

Round two was easy enough to get to - across the street from The Monk's Kettle is a Pakistani/Indian restaurant called Pakwan.  We stopped in here quickly to get some chai to go.  I have to admit that I am used to the American-ized chai from places like Starbucks and Peets.  This was so much more subtle and not nearly as sweet - and at $1 a cup, it's also a way better deal. We took our chais and headed down 16th Street to our next stop, Balompie Cafe. 

So this place is tricky to find if you're like me and rely on Google maps, because Google maps will tell you it is on 18th Street and Alabama.  Ignore that, because it isn't there. We were lucky because as we headed down 18th Street we happened to find it in front of us (it's at Capp, between Mission and Van Ness, if you're wondering). 

There are a few locations of Balompies, but this one is the oldest one. The 7x7 list tells you to go to Balompies #3 (in the outer Mission/Bernal Heights area) but that wasn't walkable for us and really, I don't know how necessary that is because we all loved the papusas here. We ordered three different types - bean & cheese, zucchini & cheese and the loroco con queso, which was "native Salvadorean vegetables & cheese". Are you seeing the cheese theme here? Our group was comprised of cheese lovers, so we were all very, very happy.  Each order comes with two papusas and costs $2.50. I really don't know of a cheaper meal than that.

This was my first ever papusa, and I am now a big fan. Usually if we want cheap eats in the Mission, we go to one of the many taquerias in the neighborhood, and I'm so excited to have a new option. We all left here talking about how we want to come back.

Next up on our list: Dynamo Donuts. By the time we got there - around 2pm - they were sold out of all donuts except the cornmeal rosemary cherry and lemon thyme. I was slightly disappointed because I had wanted to try the spiced chocolate donut. Once we tried these two though I didn't mind missing the chocolate - they were both incredible.   The owner was also there and very friendly: he told me that on any given day they have about 7 - 10 different varieties, and that the spiced chocolate is not one of his favorites. The most popular donut, which they have daily, is the maple glazed bacon apple. I guess I'll have to go back for that one too.

He also took me out back to show me the patio that they were just finishing getting ready to debut - it opens tomorrow!

Our group had dwindled by this point, but our group of four persevered and headed back up 24th Street to Humphry Slocombe.

They are always so nice there and let you sample all of their crazy flavors. I tried two that I would never want to have a whole cup of - golden beet safron sorbet and thai chili lime sorbet. The beet one really tasted of beets, probably not something you'd really want for dessert. The chili lime was surprising - at first I didn't taste much, and then it really gives you a big chili punch. 

In the end, we picked three: Secret Breakfast (cornflakes and bourbon), Balsamic Caramel and Chocolate Smoked Salt. We were too late to try the Harvey Milk & Honey Graham Cracker ice cream, which was only available today, for Harvey Milk Day.   None of us liked the Balsamic Caramel - too much balsamic, not enough caramel. We all liked the Secret Breakfast but our favorite was the Chocolate Smoked Salt.  

We left there full but not yet done with our mission: we had one last stop, at Anthony's Cookies. 

I'm not sure if this is true in all cities, but I love that in San Francisco you can find, in walking distance from each other, shops that specialize in just donuts or just cookies.  I wouldn't think that would be a sustainable business model, but Anthony's has been around since 1997 so they must be doing something right. We ordered three different types: Cookies and Cream, Toffee Chip and German Chocolate.  Much like with the ice cream, the one we liked best was not the one on the 7x7 list: the toffee chip was the hands down winner. We all liked the cookies and cream and none of us liked the German Chocolate,  which didn't really have much flavor.

Though we could have followed up our cookies with pie from Mission Pie or cupcakes from Mission Minis, we decided to call it a day here. We walked three miles, spent about $15 each and consumed more calories than those three miles could possibly offset. What a perfect way to spend a Saturday afternoon.

(for restaurant addresses and phone numbers, click below)

Bouchon Bakery, Yountville

Before eating dinner at Ad Hoc, we had dessert at Bouchon Bakery. This is another one of those places that I'd like even if the desserts weren't amazing - it is so well designed and everything in there I really, really wanted to try. It was incredibly hard to pick what to eat - so we picked lots of things, and had dessert tapas.

There's a window in the bakery where you can see the pastry chef at work. It must be incredibly annoying to be this guy and have people taking pictures and gawking at you all day as you create amazingly intricate pastries. 

The macarons really caught my eye - they always look so colorful and perfect. It's hard to tell in the photo, but the diameter is much bigger than the other french macarons I've had. We got two of these - the chocolate and the espresso. 

We also got the strawberry rhubarb tart, which was really more like a cheesecake. A very good cheesecake. That's the espresso macaron above. I loved how the inside was actually a little bit cold- I've never had that before. Are they all supposed to be like that, and I've only been eating sub-par ones?   We also ordered the chocolate bouchon, which was kind of like a brownie and really amazing. We all agreed that the bouchon and the macarons were the big winners. The cookies - both the chocolate chip and the chocolate chocolate chip - were only just ok.

Our celebrity sighting for the day - hello, Beethoven!

Bouchon Bakery

6534 Washington Street
Yountville, CA 94599-1397
(707) 944-8037

San Francisco Food Crawl Part 1: Ferry Building

Last year, a co-worker told me she had gone on a food crawl with some friends. This was the first time I had heard of a food crawl, which is basically like a pub crawl but with food - so obviously way better. I had been wanting to do my own version ever since I heard about it, and so after about a hundred emails trying to figure out what date works best for 4 people, we decided on this past Sunday.  We picked a bunch of places (mostly based off the 7x7 100 Things To Eat List) where we could go as a group of 4 and order one item and share it between us, which would allow us to try lots of different things before we got full. 

We started out at the Ferry Building, at Mijita. They are on the list for their Albondigas soup, which I learned when I ordered it is actually meatball soup. This was a slight problem because two of our four are vegetarian. They ordered something else, and Brittany and I shared the soup.

It turns out that Mexican meatball soup tastes a lot like tortilla soup - the flavors to me were really similar, plus meatballs. It was good - but I don't know that it would be on my top 100 things to eat list. The two of us made a small dent in the giant bowl before we called it quits and got ready to move on to the next stop, Miette.

Remember when I said I'm a font snob?  Miette's branding has the opposite effect on me that Philz Coffee does. Everything about this place - the logo, the packaging, the displays - makes me want to buy something. How could it not be good when it looks like this?

We managed to only buy the one thing on the list: gingerbread snaps.  They had a good crunch to them, but again, I'm not sure that of all the amazing things at Miette that this one would be at the top of my list.

Our last stop at the Ferry Building was supposed to be Out The Door (for their spring rolls). We showed up and found this sign: 

And.... that was it for the food crawl. We hadn't accounted for the fact that it would be pouring on Sunday, the kind of rain that would not be fun to roam around the city in, looking for food. Instead, we headed to my apartment, ordered pizza and watched the Devil Wears Prada.   It worked out though, because pizza + movie + your girl friends is high on my list of 100 things to do (many, many times) before you die.

Tartine, Mission

Remember when I said I prefer Tartine's bread, quiche and tarts to their cakes? Today we bought all three. I didn't take a picture of the bread because there is already this post.  The quiche and lemon tart are our other favorite things to buy there. The quiche is so light and fluffy - this time we bought the ham version, but the veggie quiche is just as good. They reheat really well too - it's a good thing to have in the fridge when you get home from work and are in no mood to make dinner (which for me is every night).  The lemon cream tart tastes as good as it looks and is well worth the wait in line.

5PM Fresh baked bread at Tartine, Mission

Last year I got really into the 7x7 100 Things to Try Before you Die list.  Tartine is on the list twice - for their morning bun and also for their fresh bread - specifically, a loaf fresh out of the oven. We live just a couple of blocks away from Tartine, and go there often enough, but somehow we had never gotten the bread. I'd always forget at 5PM, or I'd be walking by and it would be hours earlier, or more recently, wait in line for 20 minutes to find out that they don't bake bread on Mondays.

Yesterday though, the stars aligned and as we were driving home we passed Tartine at 4:45 and I remembered! And it was a Sunday, and they make bread on Sunday! We parked the car and I walked over, and of course there was a long line (is there ever not a long line?) and I waited and waited and then it was my turn and they handed over this giant loaf of bread, that was in fact still warm. 

So. How much can you really say about a loaf of bread? It's just bread right? This bread though really may be the Best Bread in the Entire World Ever. Super crunchy outside + chewy inside, with just the teensiest flavor of sourdough. Just look at it! You see all those crumbs? You cut into it and little crumbs start flying everywhere, which normally I do not like because I know I'm the one who is going to have to clean up those crumbs.  Yesterday though, I did not care. Fly crumbs, fly wherever you would like to go, I will be too busy enjoying my bread to care.