I Ate My Heart Out in San Francisco pt II: We Made It!! pt I: Me So Hungry

After driving for what ended up being several more hours (thank you traffic!), we arrived with open arms for this glorious city, and very empty stomachs.  We checked into our bed and breakfast (more info on that to come) and quickly got settled before heading out for sweet sweet food I had read all about.  I was a bit tired from all the driving that day, and sat down taking in my fate.  “I need a cocktail in my mouth,” I sighed.  I really did say this.  I remember quite clearly.

Mom and I didn’t make any real plans.  This was a real organic roadtrip in the sense that we were just going to explore and let the adventures come to us.  That being said, my mom is also a bit of a cartographer.  This woman was up to her elbows in cute little maps with bright colored neighborhoods and rail lines.  We may have decided to explore on our own, but she made it her business to know the neighborhoods and where we were.  Luckily, we were only a few short blocks from Chinatown.  The idea of Chinese food sounded AMAZING to me.  This was something I had really been looking forward to.  I miss NYC and even the Tri State Area for this reason exactly.  I haven’t found decent Chinese food in LA.  Chinatown is just too far for me and everything I’ve had is just plain sub- par.  Come on Asians!!  I’m also spoiled with amazing Japanese food though, so I guess it’s a fair trade off.

Regardless, we thought we’d travel through Chinatown and just let a restaurant wink in our direction, daring us to come hither.  So we started walking.  Up hills.  Down them.  Zig zagging through blocks.  We walked into shops, smelled the produce on the street.  I longingly looked into a shop with all kitchen appliances, forcing myself to keep going.  “I don’t NEED a rice cooker,” I’d repeat over and over.  It was really quite a sight.  As ethnic as you’d think any Chinatown would be.  But all the restaurants looked shady or unappealing.  And there were TONS.  There was always a reason one wouldn’t do.  Finally it started to drizzle.  The rain was coming.  In a moment of desperation I took out my phone, pulled up my yelp app and typed in “Chinese Food” into our location.  The first restaurant that popped up was R&G Lounge.  “Let’s go,” I commanded.  We had a mission.

After a few blocks of back tracking, we opened the door to what seemed like a clean and legitimate establishment.  We were told to go downstairs where we were seated at a roomy table.  I kept wondering why this place seemed familiar to me.  What had I read about it?  I opened the menu and immediately fell in love.  The first page was dedicated to descriptions of all the elements and how they were incorporated into the dishes.  I love crap like that.  Excitedly I flipped through this massive menu.  I glanced around the restaurant.  Everyone was eating crab.  CRAB!  I remembered.  Anthony Bourdain came to San Francisco on his show “No Reservations,” and he came to this very restaurant to eat the deep fried crab!  I opened the cocktail menu and squealed with delight when I saw that they had the very same Lychee Martini he ordered and had loved!  I couldn’t hide my delight, feeling like a full blown dork but I didn’t care.  I trust that man whole heartedly when it comes to food.  We were definitely in for a treat.

Did we get the crab?  Of course not.  It didn’t matter that EVERYONE else in the restaurant had ordered it.  I’m not joking.  Every table had it.  But we had lousy seafood on the mind from that attack of bland mouth ass the night before.  That and everything we seemed to be eating lately was soaked in butter, and I just couldn’t handle another heavy dish.  So I got Chicken and Broccoli.  Classic.  My mother laughed at my choice, offering the obvious hilarity that we had come to Chinatown with tons of options and I was getting something you can get anywhere.  It was true.  But I countered with the fact that at least I know it’s going to probably be the best Chicken and Broccoli I’ve ever had.  And it was.  It was clean, fresh food.  The sauce was delicious and light, barely pooling out under the food.  It wasn’t soaked, but complimentary to the flavors of the food itself.  It was perfect.  Exactly what I wanted.  My mom got duck.  Also pretty incredible.  It was fatty, which I know you’re supposed to eat, but we barely did.  My mom sat there, guiltily peeling off the skin and fat, eating the moist delicious meat.  We both decided to just take a piece and go for it.  The flavor that was packed in that skin was unimaginable.  Well done, R&G Lounge.

Service was fast.  We had originally wanted to order and appetizer, and just now got around to it about halfway through our meal.  We signaled our guy and got one of their selected items.  Salmon and Avocado Egg Rolls.  Holy crap.  I didn’t know what I was getting into.  If I was thinking I would be getting light, jammed packed flavorful yet silky salmon, crisped perfectly in an egg roll then I was right.  I never would have thought these ingredients would all make sense in this form, but they were really on to something.  I can still kind of taste the sweet/ salty soft mass disintegrating on my tongue.  I’m very glad we had decided to go for these.  They were my favorite part of the meal, besides of course…

The. Lychee. Martini.  Never have I gotten the chills from a drink before.  This was like a familiar lover embracing me.  A bit dramatic, but you get the point.  I’ve had lychee before.  I always thought it was ok.  Usually far too sweet for me.  I don’t know what they did to this drink, but it is everything I ever want in a drink.  It wasn’t too sweet, but ended on a sweet note after every sip.  It was most definitely boozy.  You could taste that this drink packed a punch, but it was overcome with harmonious lychee notes that dissipated any alcohol taste.  It was just so refreshing.  Anthony Bourdain, THANK YOU for introducing this to me.  This is one of the things that stayed with me all weekend.  I would wonder if we had time to just stop in for a quick drink.  And at the end of it all, when I had to reflect on my favorite food experience from the trip, this freaking drink definitely made the Top 3.  I must learn how to make such magic.

I Ate My Heart Out in San Francisco pt 1: Commence Road Trip pt 2: We got Punk’d

I hate HATE myself for referencing ‘Punk’d’ like that, but I’m very tired today and it was the best I could come up with at the moment.  Also, get ready for long titles and confusing series of posts.  Booyah!

After a full day of driving, and seeing that we were in Monterey Bay, we had seafood on the mind.  We went downstairs to the lobby of our hotel and asked for a recommendation.  Robert was very friendly in offering suggestions.  There was one in particular that was the best.  I can’t for the life of me remember the name at the moment, which is probably a good thing because I’m going to rip it a new one.  As we were discussing options I had one condition: we were looking for awesome.  Apparently Robert didn’t realize who he was dealing with.  The end result was far from awesome.  I would go as far to say sub par.

Everything was starting out perfectly though.  Robert called and made a reservation for us right then and there.  “A table overlooking the water.  Next to the fire.”  It sounded like we were in good hands.  And we were starving.

As we approached the restaurant, we were asked by 2 people on the street if we’d like a sample of chowder.  I couldn’t be happier.  Monterey seemed like my kind of place.  We got to our destination where we hit the first red flag.  (I want to say that our rumbling stomachs caused us to ignore what was going on.)  4 plates of specials were sitting on a table in the entrance to the restaurant.  I should have realized at this moment, that we were not in a fine dining scenario.  We’re by no means snobs (actually you can decide for yourself at the end of this post), but we were led to believe we were in for some upscale seafood.  The very diner- like display of food was suggesting otherwise.

We pranced over to the host, who seated us in a very beautiful area.  We were both overlooking the water (where magic hour was upon us) and next to a fire.  I settled in, and we were given the behemoth menus.  Red flag number 2: a grotesque amount of options for a seafood joint.  I am now a firm believer that pages of options are a sign of trouble.  I prefer a place that has a few plates that are excellent.  The specials alone yielded about 15 different plates, often pairing 2 different proteins.  I was impressed in the moment, thinking they were very skilled in being able to pull this off.  No such luck, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

My mother and I had been talking very seriously about Mojitos.  It was time to enjoy.  We ordered our drinks and went back to our literature.  When they came, we both took a sip and made a face.  Too sweet.  Way too sweet.  We politely asked if they could somehow be de-sweetened.  They could.  But not really.  We couldn’t take it.  Sadly, we had to say goodbye to the idea of the mojito.  Instead I got a Blood Orange Cosmo and my mom got a Blackberry Martini (right?).  Those were both excellent.  Back on track.

Our complimentary appetizer arrived, which was fried calamari and artichokes.  We had discovered that northern CA was home to the artichoke.  We saw fields upon fields of them growing, often on the side of the road for you to buy.  This particular one was prepared with a vinegar and from what I remember, was roasted.  Very nice flavor.  The calamari, I was very worried about.  I have often judged restaurants by their calamari because it says a lot about doing very simple things very well.  It’s just fried, but if handled incorrectly is no longer pleasant to eat.  This was not the Italian fried calamari I was used to eating.  Instead it came in rounder chunks and was excellent.  Soft and smooth, it was far from chewy.  I was starting to feel better about this place.

When it came time to order, our waiter talked about the fish they had caught that day and which dishes we could find it in.  Alright, fresh fish.  Another plus.  We both ordered a cup of their New England Clam Chowder.  “It’s award winning,” bragged our waiter.  I was excited, refusing to intervene and tell this man I used to live in Boston, where I’m sure there is better chowder.  I decided to go with the Tuna and Scallops special.  The addition of bok choy made it an easy decision for me.  The tuna was to be seared, which is a favorite of mine.  It was on.

The chowder came out quickly.  I really enjoyed it.  It was a touch salty for my mom.  It was smooth and buttery, which to me means it’s amazing.  Butter was all over this restaurant.  In the end, the chowder wasn’t anything to write home about.  It was certainly a good cup of chowder, but the clams didn’t have much flavor.  That’s what we were expecting from an award winning chowder in Monterey.  But it was also better than many I’ve had before.  I’m willing to give the soup a pass.

Our entrees came out before I even had a chance to finish the soup.  My plate was very long, showcasing way too much going on.  On one end, were my three little plump scallops basking in a butter sauce.  This was by far the best thing on my plate.  The scallops were light and soft, breaking apart on their own.  I could have eaten them all night.  Next to them a ball of white rice that looked a touch out of place.  The bok choy came next.  I couldn’t figure out how this was prepared.  It was a bright green color, suggesting it was probably blanched.  The leave were a little bitter and tough, so I went for the stems.  It was odd to me that I wasn’t enjoying this bok choy.  I had yet to come across a preparation of it that I didn’t like.

Finally the tuna.  Pepper crusted and seared.  Um, not so much.  Firstly, if you can try to pick it out in this picture, it is the steak looking thing under all those hairy beet shavings.  I politely pushed them aside for each bite.  Surrounded the tuna was a small tub of spicy mustard (was this dish Asian inspired?) and a papaya chutney of some sort.  At this point I was a bit lost, unsure of what I was supposed to do with all these things.  I decided to start small.  I cut a piece of the tuna to taste without anything accompanying it.  The first thing I noticed was that I actually had to cut this– it was tough.  Not something I usually experience with seared tuna.  It’s always fluffy and tender.  Then I saw that all the edges were a white color, which said to me that it had been cooked for longer than a sear.  The middle wasn’t that bright purple I was used to seeing either.  And the worst part, is that it was bland.  It was such an upsetting moment.  I started to slather it with mustard and chutney, trying to pull out some sort of fresh flavor I knew should be there.  It was a bit of a mess.  I came to the conclusion that this piece of fish had probably been refrigerated or frozen and it was cooked and heated at the same time.  What a bummer.

I didn’t even finish it, nor did my mom finish her plate.  We were both dissecting trying to figure out what had happened to our decadent meal next to the roaring fire overlooking the water.  At that moment I snapped to attention.  I began to take in our surroundings and things finally seemed as off kilter as they looked.  For the first time all night I heard generic smooth jazz playing throughout the restaurant.  A Kenny G vibe gave me shivers as I remembered the plates in the front of the restaurant, taunting patrons from the street.  All of a sudden they seemed to scream desperation.  “Come eat here.  See, there’s proof we can cook things.  And there’s seafood here too!”

We looked around and realized that we just expected a lot and had more refined palettes.  We just like to eat, dammit!  And we wanted awesome seafood.

After paying the way overpriced bill, we walked around the neighborhood a bit.  Still venting, it took blocks for us to finally let the meal die.  Tomorrow we would start anew.