Pancetta

I was invited to dinner at a work family's home in Noe Valley. What an absolutely beautiful home; I was taken aback by the gorgeous city views. The highlight of the evening was meeting Pancetta, the family's pet pig! I love how Pancetta oinks around the house. Too cute.

Tea Time

No longer just dirty water.

Otoro Sushi

It's my third time at Otoro Sushi! A big part of why I keep returning is that the restaurant actually takes reservations! I also like the ambiance because it's never too loud or too crowded but has a nice buzz to it.

It's also hard for sushi restaurants to really stand out in my opinion but Otoro has a really tasty specials board menu that I like to order off of in pursuit of something unique. This time we ordered the Hamachi Carpaccio with avocado, mango, and truffle oil. So fresh and good! I wanted to try a new roll and got the Cherry Blossom Roll, which had salmon and avocado with tuna on top. I also had a small bowl of miso ramen and sipped some sake. The only other time I had sake, it was warm sake and I thought it was disgusting. Not so bad this time.

Hamachi Carpaccio

Zuni Café

Finally got to try the legendary Zuni Café! Knowing in advance that the famous roasted chicken with warm bread salad takes an hour to cook in the oven, we made reservations for early Sunday evening. I requested a table near the kitchen because I always enjoy watching the kitchen staff prepare the food. 

We started with the (also famous) Caesar Salad, which I really wanted to try so that I can learn to make better caesar dressing. But the dressing was almost too tart so I might stick with my own recipe for now... The roasted chicken took around 40 minutes rather than the approximately one hour notice and while the chicken was delicious, the warm bread salad was the best part of the whole dish. Also, the menu says "chicken for two" but we found that it could easily fill 3-4 people. I took home leftovers and am excited to eat it again, yay.

Tasty but not sure if it's worth the hype. If you like roasted chicken, you'll obviously like Zuni's roasted chicken. So now it's my turn to try and make the chicken at home following Judy Rodger's recipe. Stay tuned.

P.S. The staff were super nice so they win on that.

Zuni Caesar Salad

Chicken for two roasted in the brick oven; warm bread salad with scallions, garlic, dandelion greens, dried currants, and pine nuts

Inspiration Point

That bay view.

B★Star Bar

My first time trying Burmese food!

I've never heard of Burmese food until I came to San Francisco and kept hearing about how great Burma Superstar is. I attempted to get in the door at Burma Superstar but over an hour wait just wasn't going to happen for me. So my friend and I walked less than two blocks down to Burma Superstar's more Asian Fusion little sister restaurant, B★Star Bar. With virtually no wait and even the option to make reservations or call ahead and put a name down, I was already a fan.

The Tea Leaf Salad was a must order and our waitress recommended the Kau Soi and Lamb Curry. The salad was amazing. I'm big on food texture and love crunch (i.e. crunchy peanut butter, granola, cereal...), and this salad was unlike anything I've ever had before. The waiter even explained the ingredients and mixed it up for us tableside.

The Kau Soi is very rich and is basically a noodle dish with coconut and chicken. I've only had lamb maybe two times before and never really liked it so I was pleasantly surprised by how tender the lamb in the Lamb Curry was. I'm also big on coconut rice so win! I also ordered a Lychee Martini but the order got lost and I got a Lychee Smoothie instead... which was good but not what I ordered. I received the martini at the end though so I got to try it. Very lychee-y...

Left so full.

Pumpkin and Kale Lasagna FAIL

I had a lot of ricotta leftover as per usual when I buy a tub and was at a loss of what to use it for. I loosely followed a recipe for this lasagna and it completely bombed. It looks tasty and pretty with all its lasagna noodle layers but I might have improvised one too many ingredients because it came out pretty bland. It's currently sitting in my fridge waiting to be eaten and I really don't want to...