Carolyn Tillie

It has taken living in the city for three years to beat it into me that I have to get out of my comfortable neighborhoods. I had yet to eat at ANY restaurants in Inner Sunset and I have my eating buddy, Lisa, to thank for bringing me here. Apparently it helps to know the chef or at least insist at sitting at the bar to ask what is special and fresh. We started with the ubiquitous "Spoonfuls of Happiness" - two soup spoons, one filled with a tai-wrapped smoked ankimo dressed with a bit of truffle oil and tobiko, the other a preparation of uni with quail egg and house-made ponzu sauce. The spoonfuls are served with a specialty sake and being an ankimo fan, I thought I would prefer that bite, but the freshness of the uni and the subtlety of the ponzu made the uni the preferred bite. Not wanting to get full on rice, we specifically requested sashimi -- with two slices each of maguro, tai aka, sake, hamachi, and and kanpachi. Note that the fresh, real wasabi is certainly a treat. Indicating we were definitely interested in "unusual" offerings, the chef made us a salad of light mizuna greens, thinly sliced cucumber, and baby raw whole shrimp and squid. I don't recall ever having been served whole squid the size of my thumb. Incredibly tender and lightly dressed, this was an amazing offering. As my client requested salmon, a special offering of crudo was presented -- thinly sliced white salmon, so tender and bright. There was also an unagi course, but I'm not remembering exactly how it was offered. We finished up with my one request of the evening; ama-ebi, as my good friend, Lance (visiting from London), had never had a fried shrimp head before. Perfectly fresh sweet shrimp and the fried heads were light and crunchy. Just perfect. I brought a potential client and I'm sure we must have been given some deals as we drank a lot of sake, ate a lot of sushi, and the tab was only $300 for four.

I'm too busy making sushi jewelry (12-hour days, thankyouverymuch)! The dessert jewelry is an easy sell -- I can get miniature pastries -- but would really like to offer candy sushi...

Wow, a 120+ people looking, but nary a single bite?

I am looking to find a candy maker or confectioner who might just be getting started for a product I would like... I am an artist making food and wine jewelry. I currently have a line based on sushi and at wholesale trade shows, I would like to offer bites of sushi-looking candy. There were two different companies offering; the most famous being Koo-Ki Sushi who is out of business. Those pieces were actually too big for me to want to offer as a free perk and I am hoping someone might be interested in producing some that are smaller (and maybe individually wrapped). Thoughts?

I concur up to the point of Incanto's lamb neck -- therein lies a hunk of roast meat that is incomparable.

Without even taking a cab, you can eat at Ame (order Lissa's staff meal), Anchor & Hope (order the sea urchin), Fifth Floor (splurge), Samovar Tea Lounge (great for lunch), Thirsty Bear (innocuous brewery with fairly good tapas), or XYZ (inside the W).

I tend to hit my old haunts (Ichiban) when I'm in San Diego, but I have been asked for the following advice: Should I just send to Hillcrest?

As far as I know Carolyn, only at their store in Manhattan Beach. There's a store about a mile away from me, and they very occasionally will have a wine-tasting dinner event in the cafe (maybe once a quarter??), with tickets running about $50 to $75 per person, but never any cooking classes at the local stores. I've only ever seen cooking clasess at the Manhattan Beach location, and now not as frequently as they used to. It seems as though they used to be monthly, and now, in thinking about it, I can't remember the last time I saw a promo for one. I suspect when the brand was sold to Albertson's that was one of the cuts. ← I taught at Manhattan Beach. And over a decade ago, it was a weekly class...

You are starting a chocolate-based business? Tell us more!

How sad. I taught cooking classes for Bristol Farms a decade ago. Wonder if they are still doing that...

It DOES help! Thanks, Russell...

Looking forward to hitting Vegas for the first time in June; I will be attending a trade show and will be there on my birthday, so I'll be wanting to find some place extra special to take myself that night. Knowing I live in San Francisco and am fairly spoiled with good food and haute cuisine, I would love to know what anyone's ONE recommendation would be...

Huh? I live across the street from Yoshi's (corner of Fillmore & Eddy) and have walked to North Beach. It takes about an hour-and-a-half. Not remotely close to each other.

Amen, sistah.

I am certainly a lucky person this week; a variety of visiting friends are insisting on taking me out to eat so I will have lots of reports this week... Monday's adventure was (finally) experiencing Zare's Monday Meatball Madness with the Divine Miss Spieler. We got to experience a variety of tastes before the meatball arrived, including several appetizers; Smoked trout on cucumber "linguini' with dilled creme fraiche. This was an early favorite, both Miss S and I adoring the coolness of the dressing with the smoked fish and lovely cucumber strips (we are both cucumber fans). The "pistachio meatball" is a small appetizer but with a huge taste; a harrisa/honey/pomegranate glaze which is just divine in its sticky sweet-spiceness. The cinnamon-braised lamb's tongue with apple chutney and chestnuts. God, I love this dish.... Perfectly tender tongue and the flavors of fruit and spice juxtaposes what becomes umami in the chestnuts. Lovely. Spice-roasted marrow bones served with bergamot preserves, Persian baby pickles, fresh greens and toast. You know, Bix's marrow bones used to be my favorite, but these have surpassed that. The spice is very subtle and the bergamot preserves, which could be sickly sweet is just a great, clean taste that helps cleanse the palate to the Persian pickle which has quite a bite. One entrée we shared was the Moroccan-spiced Salmon with toasted fregola, seasonal vegetables, and cucumber raita. Again, the brightness of cucumber and dill complemented the ras al hanout compote with some of the best Salmon I've had in ages. I admit to saving a rather large portion of this to have for breakfast the next day and was not disappointed. Then there was The Meatball. Six- or eight-inches in diameter, ours was stuffed with two small lamb chops. Barely swimming in a light broth, the meatball was surrounded with a few slices of oven-roasted tomatoes and wild mushrooms. The Meatball had pinenuts, spices, and was so tender and flavorful. There was obviously going to be leftovers and the neighboring table advised eating it cold, on a sandwich. They were right. Two desserts were shared; a goat-cheese cheesecake and ..... wait for it ..... Fried Dough! Hoorah! Sing praises to the heavens.... What are called "fried milk torrijas" these long, rectangle delights might be the second best hunk of fried dough I've found in the city (Piperade's is a nudge higher on my Fried Dough Scale of ecstasy, but not by much). What a grand night -- and what encouragement for me to get there more often.

I've also been in the La Cienaga building -- and still adore See's.... (coincidentally, today I bought two pieces from See's, two pieces from Godiva, two pieces from Michel Cluizel, and two pieces from Elbow. The See's tasted best.

Ummmm.... telling us what CITY you are in would help. California is an awfully big state.

There is also a brand new branch of Dosa opened on Fillmore, a block north of Geary (right at the edge of Japantown); it is bigger and prettier and generally has no lines that you see at the Mission.

Where are you coming from? For example, I would hardly recommend Italian San Francisco restaurants to someone from Boston or a Mission burrito to someone from SoCal. Along with Incanto, DO consider, however, the following: Aziza (no brainer) Coi (best Molecular Gastronomy in the city) Bar Crudo and/or Ame (to-die-for fish crudos) SPQR (moreso than A16) Canteen (better for lunch - same menu)

Rock-n-Roll, Baby! I hope you left your contact information so the owner can thank you appropriately!

Well, for starters, "wine country" is really vast so you need to narrow down where you want to go; Napa, Sonoma, Healdsburg, Mendocino? Williams Selyem's vineyards are in the Russian River Valley and I don't believe they offer tastings or tours at their facility (could be wrong - I'd give them a call to check). Newton, on the other hand, is a few miles out of St. Helena which is the north end of the Napa Valley (probably closer to a 3-hour commute from here to the Russian River Valley). The better restaurants are in Napa, but you haven't indicated when you are doing this. A lot of restaurants are closed for the down season -- into February. That said, my favorite restaurants in Napa are: Ubuntu Terra Meadowood Ubuntu Martini House Oh yeah, and Ubuntu Cyrus in Healdsburg gets a lot of raves as well. I'd suggest looking at this map and figure out what looks appealing. You are not going to want to commute 2 hours from one town to another (they don't look that far apart, but the curvy, 2-lane roads are deceptive).

I think that pegs it. It received its fame for something other than really exceptional food and the crowds have just followed suit that because it is always busy, it must be good.

Campton Place is probably your best choice. They were booked, so I'll be at Plumpjack tomorrow evening...

I still don't get Slanted Door -- I find most of the food too sweet and over priced for my taste. It is consistently busy and oft-recommended, but it never shows up on my lists of great restaurants in this city.

I have not been to Perbacco in ages either but it is still consistently busy so I gather it is holding up. There are also great reports coming from Beretta but I haven't been there yet. I walked into Ducca on Thursday evening and was surprised to be told there was a 45-minute wait for a table, but that might be the result of Dine About Town; hard to say.