This is your world Mike, we're just living in it

Never have I had an experience where the service and the food quality was (were?) so mismatched. Each bite at Michael Mina was dreamy, yet its journey to me was painful and chaotic. Upon reading this San Francisco Chronicle review , I knew I had to make it there fast. Sadly, I know the problems stemmed from the fact that the meal must be eaten at the bar - which has always been my favorite place to eat. Michael Mina's bar staff simply isn't equipped to handle five-course meals and manage the bar patrons.

Let's get the bad part out of the way. As the name implies, the five-course "counter menu" is only served at the bar. The restaurant doesn't take reservations, but Adrienne and I had no trouble finding two seats upon our 4:30pm arrival (ha!) The bar menu consists of about ten different bar bites; our bartender informed us of the specific five that would be part of the tasting menu tonight, plus two surprises. The patron next to us was also trying the menu, and the bartender told us this would be a free sneak-preview for us. Sometime thereafter, another bartender came and told us the five selections would be slightly different that we were initially told. Fine. He also asked if we'd like to make any substitutions. Between Adrienne's lack of interest in foie gras and my determination to taste the tuna tartar, we asked if we could swap foie gras for tuna tartar. He had no problem with this request. I was particularly excited for the kobe beef sliders and the crab pop tart.

Our first dish out was not the same dish our neighbor initially received but the shrimp and pork spring rolls were so delicious I wasn't phased at this point. There were so many courses and confusion that the rest is kind of hazy at this point. The unwanted foie gras came out in all its glory; the kobe beef sliders never appeared; only one pop tart came out instead of two (the biggest bummer of them all); hamachi and tortellini arrived despite it not being on the menu nor ever mentioned; the drool-inducing tuna popper came to our neighbor but never us. The food deliverers appeared bewildered and their lack of English caused even more confusion. Our primary bartender was becoming increasingly agitated by the course. I felt bad for her.

On the plus side, because of all the mayhem, I figure Adrienne and I actually had closer to 7 different plates. Without a doubt, my favorite was the crab pop tart, which is basically warm, buttery crab salad encrusted by warm, butter filo dough; or as I like to say, warm'n'buttery wrapped in some warm'n'buttery. Michael Mina's signature dish, tuna tartar, absolutely met my expectations. It's tossed bar-side with sesame oil, diced pears, and pine nuts. According to our server, the tuna was Grade A fresh from somewhere exotic (Hawaii I think) and it tasted it. Naturally, our two favorite dishes were the two that we had to split!

I typically spot check my memory of the meal with the menu on the restaurant's website. Blogging becomes more difficult when half the dishes aren't even on the menu and I have to rely on poor quality iPhone pictures. Among the "very good but not great dishes:" a lobster tortellini, beef (can't get more descriptive than that), and a fried piece of fish. They fall victim to normalcy; while very good, I've had very similar dishes elsewhere. There was no special touch to separate them from the crowd.

If I were to go back - which I would - I wouldn't even look at the menu and just let the plates fall were they may. I got so caught up in tracking what we'd had versus what was coming and stressing about all the various discrepancies that I forgot to stop and just savor the moment - and there were many.

Michael Mina Revisted

I blogged about my Michael Mina visit back in June so I'll keep my revisit review short other than to say it was fantastic, fabulous, mouth-watering, drop-what-you're-doing-and-go good. I didn't want to leave. Please, Michael, bring a 7th course, just this once!

My main complaint last time was the service. Not the case this time. This may have had something to do with the completely empty bar, but regardless, the food and service nailed it. From the time we entered the bar area at 11:45am until when we left more than an hour later, we were the ONLY diners. Seriously, why isn't this place packed? Puzzling.

At $39 a head, the six-courser is actually quite a good value. Each of the six courses is a mini-meal in itself. My dad each and I each had a course of pork & shrimp spring rolls, tuna tartare (not pictured), lobster pop tart, halibut, steak & eggs, and a dessert (me: chocolate delice, dad: butterscotch custard). I waddled back to the office.

Thursday night’s dinner with Brooke & Jeff at RN74 contrasted starkly with Friday’s parent lunch at Lafitte. I truly believe it is healthy to have a bad dining experience (Lafitte) to make one appreciate the great ones (RN74).

Let’s start in chronological order. Brooke & Jeff asked me to join them at RN74, Michael Mina’s newest outpost in the Millennium Tower, to celebrate an assortment of things. I had been there once for lunch when it first opened but was tickled with excitement to see how Mina does dinner. I remember remarking to B&J that RN74 has one of the neatest interiors I’ve seen in SF; it’s modeled after an old-fashioned train station.

PETA members, pig-lovers, and animal-rights activists – please overt your eyes now. As an appetizer, I had the sautéed pork belly & manila clams. Pork belly: fattier and thicker version of bacon. Jackpot. Jeff also got the maitake mushroom tempura for the table to share (fried – ‘nuff said). For my main course, I had the bacon-wrapped pork loin (like I said, not a good day for Babe). Let me say, this place is pricey but the servings are generous. These are not two-bite meals (appetizers included) like many high-end restaurants. In fact, I only ate half of my main and packed the rest for the weekend. Everything was delicious, but when I’m on my deathbed, I will remember that pork belly. Ya can cut it with a fork and it melts in your mouth. All this washed down with a good glass of wine – how did I get this lucky? Seriously.

Fast forward approximately 18 hours to lunch with the parentals along the Embarcadero. On my weekly waterfront runs, I noticed a new restaurant popped out – literally – of the north end of Pier 5. The space is an enclosed outdoor dining patio (check out the website for better visuals). Anyway, the place is called Lafitte and is about six weeks old. My diagnosis here is the chef is trying to be clever and innovative with his menu options – but it just totally backfires.

Parents both ordered the “Dagwood” sandwich. Take a look at the picture: WTF is that? Let’s just say anchovies, bacon, pork pate, and four pieces of bread were involved. I’m really glad I didn’t order it because:

-I had a few bites of mom’s and it was dry
-I honestly didn’t know how approach it
o pick it up?
o Eat it as two different sandwiches?
o Knife and fork?
o Four separate pieces of toast?

I ordered the seafood chowder (still blocked up from RN74) and out came a bowl consisting primarily carrots and potatoes. Sorry to be harsh, but an $18 bowl of soup should have more than two pieces of shrimp. Oh, and I used my fork to eat it. Huh?

Thank you Brooke & Jeff for providing me with such a special treat. Thanks Mom & Dad for hanging in there during an unfortunate SF showing. We’ll get ‘em next time.

I haven't starved to death

It's been a chunk since I updated and the break doesn't mean I've been deprived of delicious food! In fact, the past few weeks have been jam-packed with memorable dining experiences. But if one stands out, it was my evening at Acquerello. If dreams could dream, they would fantasize about dining here. I've always referred to it as the unsung hero of fine dining in San Francisco. It's supposed to be as good as Michael Mina and Gary Danko, yet most people haven't even heard of it. It's location (buried next to a auto shop on Sacramento at Polk) adds to its under-the-radar status. Yet, it has received a coveted Michelin star rating and countless other awards.

I walked in and upon finding my chair, the maitre d' asked approached me with a black napkin to see if I would prefer it over the white one already on my lap (presumably to match my pants? or to make lint less visible?). He also brought over a foot chair, so god forbid, my Nordstrom Rack purse wouldn't touch the ground.

Diners can choose between three, four, or five courses from the menu. With the bread, various "surprises from the chef," and complimentary truffles at the end - three courses is plenty. I started with a chilled melon soup, then moved to a pasta with foie gras, black truffles and Marsala; and closed with a Monkfish. The soup was like a five star smoothie - refreshing, flavorful, and not something I have access to often (ever since I had the chilled melon soup at Jean George in NYC, I've always been drawn to them). The highlight was the pasta. I am not a big pasta eater at all, but this dish may turn me into a convert. The pasta was so perfect, I could imagine the chefs in the kitchen carefully crafting each rigatoni ring; add in the sauce - which tasted like a slightly savory carmel sauce - and I was in heaven. To be brutally honest, the monkfish wasn't a homerun for me but I blame it on bad ordering. Monkfish is, by nature, mild and thus the flavors didn't pop like the previous two. No fault of the restaurant.

The service is what transforms this from a simple meal into an experience. Each diner at the table has a personal waiter who brings her the plate and explains exactly what's going on. The dining room is large and open, yet I felt like I was the only one there. Lastly, the waiter brings a truffle cart with about six different varieties and lets you pick out the ones you want to try (you can try all if you want to!). Oh, I was also brought out a small gift box on my way out (home-made biscotti for the road).

As you may imagine, this stuff ain't cheap - it is a "once a year" type of place. Only 345 days to go....