You won't find much to eat here, but you can learn a lot about west coast seafood, investigate climate change and dissect a squid! Make plans to tour the visitor center next time you're at the Presidio of San Francisco's Crissy Field or schedule a field trip for your kids' class at school.
The cocktails and wine are very good here. So is the jerk chicken with black-eyed peas and collard greens. Palm House is a nice place to sit in the sun, for an early evening drink or dinner.
Terzo smells faintly of woodsmoke, with a stylish yet comfy vibe. Dare I say, it reminds me a bit of Manka's Inverness Lodge? My favorite destination restaurant from the past. Also like Manka's, the menu here changes daily and uses lots of local ingredients in season, like Monterey Bay calamari, brussels sprouts, beets and asparagus.
The Imperial Rolls here transport me back to a Cambodian kitchen from my childhood: the home of a refugee family we knew back in New Jersey in the 1970s. These are the best in town. Lunch from My Father's Kitchen also takes the sting out of UCSF's pediatrics practice moving out of our neighborhood: now we get lunch when we visit the doctor.
Nopalito's cactus colored interior is just about perfect. They have the best salsas in town and their Pozole Rojo is my favorite lunch in all of San Francisco: spicy, beefy, with cabbage, lime and their own chili blend served alongside, in case you still need to turn up the heat. Delicious!
We finally went out and ate at State Bird, the seemingly most sought after dinner spot in San Francisco, to celebrate our 13th wedding anniversary. Some people are able to make reservations here, but we just tag teamed and lined up outside. My husband left work early, I fed the kids, then we met up after scoring seats at the bar for 7:15. Perfect!
Padrecito has some of the best salsas in town. Tonight for dinner I shared a bowl of tomato soup that was smooth and spicy, yet still retained the goodness of summer tomatoes that comes across in a more textured soup. The arctic char tacos are reliably delicious here, and the crispy chicken tacos are tasty bites of summertime, a California-ized version of the taco salad of yesteryear.
I've been to Hopwater Distribution twice now, it's a fabulous place for a beer and bite to eat. Their rotating beer list is large and well chosen, the salads make good small meals and the crab tater tots are very tasty! My favorite brew so far is Coronado Frog's Breath IPA. When you go, look for the twinkling old-school lights out front. You won't see Hopwater's name, but it's an awesome sign.
Yes, it's true. I often leave my children at home with nothing more to eat than a bowl of pasta. This time we just happened to have a few mini-sausages and a gift of ripe strawberries from another CSA member, which inched their meal's nutritional content above moderately sub-par. Plus, our babysitter was thoughtful enough to bring cake pops to celebrate my son's birthday!
My choices are to either make the soup with the cauliflower I bought last Sunday, or to work on the gigantic project I've been meaning to get to. But not both. I choose the project. And so we will order take-out Chinese for dinner, which always makes my kids happy. Dumplings, fried rice, won-ton soup, string beans and chicken. Our order never changes.
This is where we like to go for sushi in San Francisco.