My family just got back last week from spending a month in San Francisco. While we’ve lived (quite happily) in Boulder over the past three years, we spent 17 years in the Bay Area and like to get back there on a regular basis for an extended stay to reconnect with old friends and to reconnect with the great cuisine the Bay Area has to offer.
Any of you who follow me on Twitter or Facebook probably saw me post status updates as we did our food tour, but I didn’t always remember to do it at each meal. So I looked back at my calendar (and my news feeds) to try to reconstruct a (mostly) comprehensive list of where we went out to eat during our month in the Bay Area. While we tried a couple new places (La Ciccia and Range), our destinations were more oriented towards old favorites, honed over many years of living in Northern California. Here goes:
7/18 – Yank Sing, San Francisco (lunch)
7/18 – Kokkari, San Francisco
7/19 – Pizzeria Picco, Larkspur (lunch)
7/19 – Taylor’s Refresher, San Francisco
7/20 – Sushi Ran, Sausalito
7/21 – Golden Flower, San Francisco (lunch)
7/21 – Slanted Door, San Francisco
7/30 – Tres Agaves, San Francisco (lunch)
7/30 – Mijita, San Francisco (dinner)
7/31 – La Ciccia, San Francisco
8/01 – The Village Pub, Woodside
8/02 – Tacubaya, Berkeley (lunch)
8/02 – Little Star Pizza, San Francisco
8/03 – 21st Amendment, San Francisco (lunch)
8/04 – Quadrus Cafe, Menlo Park
8/04 – Spruce, San Francisco
8/05 – Sancho’s Taqueria, Redwood City (lunch)
8/06 – Stern Dining Hall, Stanford University (lunch)
8/06 – Straits Cafe, Palo Alto
8/07 – Tres Agaves, San Francisco (lunch)
8/08 – Ame, San Francisco
8/12 – Yoshi’s SF, San Francisco
8/13 – Gialina Pizzeria, San Francisco
8/14 – Fish, Sausalito (lunch)
8/14 – Isa, San Francisco
8/15 – Yank Sing, San Francisco (lunch)
8/15 – Range, San Francisco
We also made numerous trips (in person and takeout) to Pizzeria Delfina (Pacific Heights location), Bittersweet Cafe and La Boulange (Fillmore & Union St. locations), but I can’t recall the precise days we visited those fine establishments. The careful reader no doubt noticed my pizzeria and taqueria fixation. What can I say, they are two of my favorite food groups.
We also hit the world’s best farmer’s market (the San Francisco Ferry Plaza Farmer’s Market) numerous times during our stay. Late July and early August are prime season for heirloom tomatoes and peaches and nectarines. And the king of all purveyors of stone fruit is, of course, Frog Hollow Farm.
The stand-out dinners for me during the month were La Ciccia, Ame and Range. The restaurant I’m most disappointed we didn’t make it to was A16, which we really enjoy, but somehow never made it there.
I’m always looking for suggestions of new places to try when I’m in SF (which is often). Please mention your favorites in the comments!