San Francisco Treats

I know things have been a bit quiet on the blog-front lately so sorry about that. I was in San Francisco, visiting my family for the holidays (see tired dogs above) and while I took a break from photographing every single thing I ate, I did take some, so enjoy!

San Francisco and the entire bay area has some absolutely amazing food that I've enjoyed over the years, but every time I go home, there's always more to try. This time around, I'd been reading a lot about Josey Baker, owner and baker at The Mill. While I didn't actually make it to The Mill, I happened to be shopping at Bi-Rite one evening (where I got some wonderful housemade merguez sausage - incredibly flavorful although I wouldn't have minded a bit more heat) and also found a loaf of Josey Baker's seeded bread.

The bread was substantial and hearty with a lot of nutty flavor from the toasted seeds.It had a nice crust that didn't break any teeth but was dense and soft on the inside. I can only imagine how fantastic it would be fresh and hot out of the oven but even not, I had no trouble making my way through this.

Also while at Bi-Rite, I also stopped by the creamery to enjoy some of their salted caramel ice cream. While they're known more for their traditional ice cream scoops, I opted for the soft serve (it was a shorter line) and thought the flavor was better for it. It had that complex, dark, slightly burnt taste of really excellent caramel with just a touch of mild saltiness. It was smooth and creamy while not losing the intensity of the caramel flavor.


Another bakery with amazing bread I got to enjoy was Tartine, a bakery that's been open for a couple of years, but that I've never managed to get to on my visits home. Either the line is too long (almost always the case - the line wraps around the street pretty much every day) or I just don't have time, but this trip, we made it and purchased a loaf of their legenday and much-celebrated sourdough bread right as it came out of the oven.That's the thing about Tartine - the bread is so in demand that you can't just walk in and pick up a loaf; you need to be there when they start distributing the loaves around 4:30pm everyday, first come first serve, until they run out. Believe me when I say it is worth every second of waiting in line. I already love sourdough bread, but this is a whole other level. It has a fantastically thick, crunchy crust that breaks and gives way to soft, chewy, delicate but hearty and rich bread with an indescribable tang. A wonderful loaf of bread with some salted butter can be one of the best things on this earth and this was proof of that.

 Another highlight was trying Ici Ice Cream in Berkeley, run by former Chez Panisse Pastry Chef Mary Canales. I'd been wanting to try the ice cream and we needed a dessert for Christmas, so in a fortuitous discovery, I saw that Ici was offering different ice cream type desserts for the holidays. We got a Buche de Noel made with vanilla ice cream, wrapped in flourless chocolate cake, and lightly covered in a toasted cocoa meringue. It was amazing. The ice cream was creamy with a very pure vanilla taste and the cake was a nice rich dark chocolate but neither were overly sweet which complemented the sugary meringue perfectly. While I'm sorry I didn't actually get to taste more of the unique and interesting flavors at Ici, this was really an amazing dessert and a fantastic way to finish off our holiday meal. Plus, now that I have no doubt I'll love it, I can look forward to next time to try the ice cream and knowing the wait (again, a place with a lot of lines) will be worth it.

I also found some really beautiful pasta in the East Bay while at Genova's, a long time family favorite. I loved the unique shapes and colors - the long one is called Mother-in-law's tongue and there were also sombreros and striped bow-ties.

Just some of the great things to be had in Northern California. By all appearances, it would seem I just ate bread and ice cream on my trip (I swear I didn't; I just didn't take a lot of food pictures) but those really were some of the best things I had. I definitely recommend trying all of the above if you happen to be in the San Francisco area and if you want any other recommendations, please feel free to ask!