little ms foodie

What about Carmelita's in Phinny? Don't know their hours. Also what about Italian?? Lot's of noodles, mushroom and cheese stuff??

Are they vegetarian, no seafood?? or is fish ok? My pescatarian friend really liked Lola. She also likes Etta's. If fish is ok I think you have lots of options.

haha! lemony, I was telling my friends that for some reason I loved those flames! kitchy and wacky!! oh well....very funny!

4 of us went to Lola last night for the first time. The first thing we noticed was how nice the space actually is. From pictures I thought it looked very cafeteria, but it's not at all. It was busy for a sunday with all but 2 tables filled. Definately loud but we had no problem hearing each other and it just seemed fun and lively. We all started with cocktails and the 6 spreads. Ordered extra pita from the start but had to order one more addition too. We thought the spreads were great. The flavors were very pronounced so that you didn't need much on the pita. Personal favorites were the Barrel aged minty feta, Thick yogurt tzatziki and Garlic scented skordalia. One had the Scallop, halibut, prawns, saffron broth which she thought was fantastic. She said all the seafood was done perfectly. She is very picky about her seafood as she is a pescatarian (sp). Another had the roasted chicken in Avgolemono which was also received with praise. She said it was one of the best roasted chickens she's had (I know she's never been to Le Pichet though! haha!) Hubby had the Beef short ribs, they were spicy!!! He loved them. I had the Olive oil braised rabbit, lemon, artichokes. this was sensational and absolutely the best rabbit I've had. Meat literally falling off the bones. Amazing flavor and there was a lot of it!! We had dinner with an inexpensive greek cab which was fine. Shared the donuts and the goat cheese turnovers for dessert. Loved the turnovers, the donuts were fine but not amazing IMO. The honey they use is really good! 4 for dinner, tons of food and drinks, we spent about $50 per person. All loved it and we'll be back. The bar is a very cool space also! And the lobby of the new hotel is beautiful!

I picked up some really nice leeks this weekend at the market which will turn into potato leek soup. Also some fennel for fennel, parsley, red onion salad. I think we will use the chantrelles in either a creamy sauce for penne or a risotto. And still lots of cucumbers......going to try to recreate the roasted salmon with tarragon cream fraiche and cucumbers that we had at Chez Panisse.

Dayne and I had a fantastic time talking with you all last night! We really enjoyed our evening. Personally I wasn't impressed with the meal however I have eaten at Lark twice and have been more than happy both times. I actually didn't feel that the food served last night was a very good gauge of what Lark is doing. But cocktails after dinner at ZigZag were a hit!! Thanks again for the great company and many thanks to laurel for handling the reservations! Wendy

The food was fine, nothing amazing but good. What we found interesting was that without seeing the food we really had to pay attention. At one point we all (table of 6) were trying to figure out what a certain vegtable was....one of the girls put a piece in her pocket for later dissertation. It was brocolli, I kid you not!! 1 Suisse, 1 Scot, 1 Kiwi, 1 Canadian and 2 Americans could not pinpoint the brocolli! too funny. Also hot and cold, crunchy and soft take on all new meanings. None of us thought it was hoky or gimmicky. We all still talk about it and we know that proceeds went to job training for the blind in the city. When you first enter there is a menu so you can see before you enter into the darkness. We made reservations well in advance.

The most memorable dining experience I had in Zurich was eating at Blindekuh, a restaurant run by the blind where you experience the same. I can not tell you how strange it is to eat in complete darkness, relying on your senses of smell and taste. And pouring red wine without being able to see it??? Let's just say we were happy to be wearing black. Seriously it gave us such an overwhelming respect for people without sight as well as pointed out to us how much we rely on the beauty of food to give us hints to it's tastes! Blindekuh Muhlebachstrasse 148 8008 Zurich Switzerland Tel: 01 421 50 50 Fax: 01 421 50 55 www.blindekuh.ch

See you all tonight! Well the 7:45ers anyway!!

Are you referring to "on the house" mini desserts or specifically coffee compliments? If it's the later I always think that rock sugar on swizzel sticks is great and fun!

hmmm...like a POM royale? inplace of Cassis, cool!

ok, I'm a west coast-ie and have no idea what gerolstainer, please inform!

Here's their website/menu: http://www.tomdouglas.com/dahlia-bakery/

Just stopped in the bakery last night, they still have the corn bread!! Oh and it is so good, heated up and slathered with butter! yum!!! She didn't know what the next flavor was going to be but said they will have the corn flavor for at least another week or 2!

I want to know who's booths have splinnters! I see your point but I think that they really had no other responsibility than to apologize and comp dessert, which they did. I would however write the manager a note, via email or snail mail. I also think that asking them to cover the price of repair is a good idea. Get an estimate from an alterations shop or drycleaner asap.

I think we may take one of our knives to the U Dist market this weekend and test out the sharpener there.

I'm planning on picking up chantrelles this weekend at the market! Haven't had a chance to use any yet but I have lots of ideas! Will also be using some plums from my tree tonight to do a nice pork chop dish!

Pretty good article, I have never eaten there. My friends did a few years back and weren't very impressed. They especially were dissapointed in the atmosphere and commented on the elderly patrons?? Anyone been there recently??

YEAHHHH! I'm in Whole Paycheck (as we call it) weekly so I will scout it out, thank you!

What about Palomino? Also the Icon Grill?

What about at the raw bar at BlueWater?

Since we were in San Fran last week we are very much looking forward to the Fare Start dinner this Thurs! Anyone have any good parking lessons learned??

I've recently been buying the 2003 McCrea Late Harvest Viognier, WA. I like the lighter sweetness of this one. Also I just tried but haven't been able to locate a bottle of 1998 Chateau la Grave Sainte Croix du Mont which had a sweet/herby taste. mmmmm!

Thanks! and I thought of you when I was at the Ferry Market...I remember on my original post you said you would cry if I didn't go! Well no worries! We had a ball And jschyun, we really wanted to have gellato at the market but we were STUFFED to the gills! So we decided we will wait until the next trip. Also saw Gary Danko restaurant on the trolley, surprised at the location. We couldn't get ressies this time but it's on the list for next.

Well my husband and I had a fantastic time in San Fran over the weekend, thanks in part to all of your suggestions!!!! We stayed at the Omni, across from the BofA tower. Very nice hotel and the staff is quite personable. Right on the California cable car line which is convienent too. As soon as we landed and checked in we headed over to Belden Ln. We wanted to eat at Plouf! What a cute street of restaurants. Got a great table outside, under the heat lamps and had a kir while we checked out the menu. Of course we were having the mussles but which ones??? Decided on a bottle of Sancerre, 1 dish of mariniere and one of poulette both with frites. Very good especially the poulette. More than enough food. Espresso after, bill was $105 before tip. Back to the hotel to drink the champagne the manager had sent up and eat the chocolate covered strawberries!! FYI the kitchen at Plouf closes at 10:15pm on weeknights. Lunch the next day after the Alcatraz tour was at Hog Island Oyster Co. YUM!!! We got the dozen sweetwaters with a bottle of wine. Really good oysters! Then we decided to split the cowgirl creamery grilled cheese sandwich. Because it took the kitchen a while to make it our server Tabitha comp'd us 1/2 dozen mixed oysters. Very nice. And the sandwich was wonderful too! I really like the Ferry Market. We picked up cookies at Miette, chocolates at Riccheul (sp), had some wine at the Wine Market, and poked around the other shops. Didn't go on a saturday as I knew that I would want to buy yummy produce that I couldn't use! Drinks that night at the Top of the Mark, very nice but we had to wait 20 mins to be seated. Maybe they take reservations? Anyway we were a bit rushed as we needed to catch BART to berkeley. The hotel gave us the use of their towncar to take us to the Embarcaderro station at no cost, very nice. Very easy to take Bart and then a cab to Chez Panisse. Wonderful dinner but not what we were expecting. Very 'casual' and the food was great but not over the top. Started with an aperitif and ordered a wonderful CA pinot- Barham. The first course was our favorite! Slow roasted salmon with tarragon creme fraiche with caviar on cucumbers. Oh this was really good!! We are going to try to recreate this at home. Next was ravioli with sheeps milk ricotta, nettles and walnuts. I honestly thought that the flavor was very bland, the bite of the homemade pasta was great though! But I actually had my husband finish the ravioli. Main course was lamb 3 ways- leg of lamb, tenderloin and rack. All done perfectly with a nice au jus, but again the flavor was what lamb always should be, I thought a nice finishing salt or something would have been good here. We added the cheese course and the stand out here was the Red Hawk, I am going to search for this here in Seattle! so tasty! Dessert was an amazingly simple and perfect apple tart. Oh this was really good!!! They invited us to walk through the kitchen and check out the pastery area as well as the wine cave, very fun. 2 glasses of dessert wine and the bill was $303, 15% included, almost didn't see that! But of course added a bit more. Very nice evening and experience. Sat night we started off with drinks at the Carnelian Room (?), there was a wedding reception going on so we were in the very small Bankers room I think it was called? Is there normally a larger cocktail room? Anyway it was nice but looked a bit old and tired. People were dressed very casually which surprised me. And our cocktail waitress didn't know what premium gins they had to the disappointment of my husband. Anyway we walked down to Aqua for our 7:45 reservation. They had placed an anniversary card on the table before we arrived which was very nice. The restaurant was full and moderately loud but in a nice "everyone is having a good time" kind of way. We started with a glass each of Laurent Perrier NV Grand Siecle champagne, oh my that is sooooo good! The amuse bouche was an amazing chantrelle soup with lemon creme fraich. I wanted a whole bowl of this! Also there was a risotto ball with a light sauce which was just ok. Bottle of 96 Burgandy, sorry I can't recall the winery but they steamed the lable off for me and put it on a card so I could take it with me, it's at home. My husband had the tuna tartare appetizer and I had the trio of foie gras. Uh, can we say amazing??? Each foie gras was exceptional, my favorite a tie between the pepper and the syrah poached. The tuna was awesome and prepared on the table which is fun. Took the waiters suggestions and went with the brioch crusted halibut. My husband said it was much better than he expected it to be, with a nice sauce and on a bed of dungeness crab and tomato. I had the skate which was done perfectly with a light butter sauce. Cheese course...I gotta have my cheese!!! Dessert.....ok here it is..... Tahitian Vanilla souffle with blueberry pomegrante sauce. Perfectly done, hot to the table...the waiter breaks the top and in goes the sauce! yeah, heaven! We actually spent our honeymoon in the Tahitian islands so it was a fitting dessert. Glass of port for DH and a glass of dessert vouvray for me. $380 without tip and a very memorable meal. This restaurant should get more attention, the service, the sommelier, the chef...all top notch! Thank you all for your recommendations! A weekend just isn't enough time to eat around SF. We will be back soon and look forward to trying more restaurants! I'm in Seattle so if anyone is ever looking for info on my town, I'm just a PM away! Thanks again for helping me plan such a great getaway!!!