Farina Pizza near opening at 18th and Valencia

The comely white-tile wall, white leather seat diner on the corner of 18th and Valencia (doors down from a slew of new or newish places such as Craftsman and Wolves bakery cafe, Grub restaurant, and the underway Dandelion small-batch chocolate factory) now has a sign up saying it is Farina Pizza. Makes sense since Farina restaurant is just a half-block away on 18th. Pardon me while I leave to get in line now. This place looks like it will be red hot. Have you seen the ceiling tiles with portraits done in comic style?

Banh mi sandwiches at Duc Loi – Burgers go to the new Mission Bowl

MissionMission reports that Duc Loi (Mission at 18th) is serving their own Banh Mi sandwiches. And survey says they are quite special, prepared in their own kitchen, with house-made charcuterie, with fresh asian veggies on La Brea bread! They look great – I’ll try to get there this week and report back. I like to go produce browsing at Duc Loi anyway, for all those vegetables and fruits that look great and I have no idea what they’re called.

In the meantime, the burgers that were “popping up” at Duc Loi on weekday afternoon have found a home at the new Mission Bowl, and the evening price tag of $15 for a burger has raised some Mission eyebrows, but the owner has some decent reasoning – the test will be whether they last.

Doc’s of the Bay coming to 22nd and Mission

The smash burger. Be careful, it's loaded!

Don’t miss the upcoming premier of the Doc’s of the Bay award-winning “Smash Burger” at 22nd and Mission Streets. They just got their DPW permit for Saturday nights. Later to come to Valencia and 16th Streets on Friday nights, but the permits and details are still being worked out.

 

Via MissionMission!

Majestic, and just a bit ominous…

A line of clouds is spearing across the sunset sky here in SF tonight. Pink and beautiful, and just a touch ominous. A perfect line of clouds?

What’s your most-wasted vegetable?

Mine is usually celery. I need it as a flavoring in sauces (the familiar holy trinity of diced celery, carrot and onion) but rarely use it otherwise except in tuna or chicken salads. Supermarkets usually wrap it up in whole bunches — I end up with limp stalks way before I can use much.  Even Trader Joe wraps it up in huge (already trimmed) bags.

But whoa! The other day I saw at Whole Foods small bunches of celery – perfect for any family smaller than twelve or thirteen people. Even at their price-per-pound I saved, and saved from wasting food.

P.S. – I now have another celery use: celery, date, walnut, goat cheese salad. Had it at a restaurant in Hanalei and it was crunchy, rich and nutritious. All at once.

2 legit 2 quit

I don’t think this has gone viral, yet. I like it. Make it so!

Tartine at home!

Today’s mail brought me a new book, Tartine Bread. Yes, that Tartine. And in the chapter on baguettes, I’m already reading about how, in the early twentieth century, bread bakers got away from using wild leavening (a.k.a. starters) with the advent of commercial baker’s yeast and the realization that on the normal scale of commercial baking the yeast gave a much more consistent, and quicker, result.

Of course, what was lost was the flavor that was created by the traditional long. slow rising process that the wild leaven required. So it was in the 80s that bakers began to experiment again with the old methods-just before the original knowledge of the process was nearly lost.

I’ve recently gotten a sourdough starter from wild San Francisco yeasts from a friend, and have been doing some baking with it. Now I’ll be getting deeper into this, to see how close I can come at home to bread with the texture and flavor of breads from Semi Freddi, Tartine and Acme.