I could try every single Korean restaurant in the Bay Area and still my craving for Korean cuisine wouldn’t be sated. When a group of friends invited me to try out Tobang, I knew it’d be worth the long drive to Santa Clara. Tobang is located in a nondescript strip mall, but a small crowd buzzing outside Tobang’s doors stays pretty consistent.
Eventually we were seated and the feast began. First came a sizzling plate of tender, oniony bulgogi and galbi, complete with an array of banchans. A cornucopia of sesame, salt, pepper and soy dipping bowls accompanied our meats, which we washed down in between bites of pickled vegetables.
Next came a series of stews and egg custard, including my favorite stew, soondubu, filled with comforting soft tofu and tender bits of beef in a fiery red pepper base. The finishing touch for the evening was our kimchi fried rice, which our server prepared at our table.
Tobang is hectic but worth the drive and worth the wait. A bonus was our super friendly waiter, who joked with us throughout our meal and served our kimchi fried rice with a cute gochujang pepper sauce smiley face. It’s the little things that count.
When it comes to taquerias, us Californians are a proud lot. We each have our favorite and nearly every city lays claim to the best tacos around. I grew up in Santa Rosa, and well, we have the best taquerias. Even better than San Francisco’s Mission District, dare I say it.
Case in point: La Fondita is a nondescript taqueria in Santa Rosa’s Roseland neighborhood, an area dotted with no shortage of solid Mexican restaurants. La Fondita often has a taco truck adjacent to its brick and mortar establishment, and it’s here where I had some of the best tacos I’ve eaten in years. Four carne asada tacos, two chicken tamales, and a tamarindo Jarritos later and I was a happy eater. The tacos were the star but there’s lots more on their menu if you’re so inclined: chilaquiles and mole, for starters.
La Fondita standard is as far as taqueria service and ambiance goes, and if you happen to be there on a nice day, take advantage of the outdoor patio and enjoy your tacos in the sun. I can’t think of anything more Californian than that.
La Folie is a San Francisco institution. An old school, fine dining, all-the-bells-and-whistles affair. I’d booked a table for two for Nishan’s birthday a few months ago, with fair notice from friends that La Folie’s multi-course menus are a decadent experience.
I was not prepared.
Internet, I have never eaten so much decadence in one meal. We chose the five-course menu (big mistake: the kitchen at La Folie sends out amuse bouches in between each course) and found ourselves capping out by the third plate. But it was all delicious. Delicious, delicious decadence.
Our first amuse bouche to arrive was the spring panna cotta. This tasted faintly of English peas and and was smooth and cleansing to the palate.
Next came the truffled egg amuse bouche. This was among my favorite tastes of the evening: velvety liquid egg infused with truffles, served in a delicate eggshell and topped with a potato crisp, served alongside a piece of toast to soak up the truffley goodness.
Our third amuse bouche was the smoke salmon lollipop, served with pickled vegetables. So cute and playful, and tasty to boot.
Finally, four plates in, my first course arrived: the dungeness crab salad. A generous hunk of crabmeat was served atop English pea panna cotta with a yellow curry tuile and curried crab vinaigrette. Absolutely delicious, and I appreciated that the curry flavor wasn’t so strong as to overpower the panna cotta.
Our extravaganza of decadence continued with a tempura duck egg, which is exactly what it sounds like: a huge duck egg, coated and fried in tempura batter. This was served on top of a sweetbreads pancake and almond pesto alongside wild mushroom salad and truffle vinaigrette. This dish was beautiful, and while tasty, it was among my least favorites of the evening. More truffle flavor, please!
Next came one of my favorite dishes of the meal: butter poached lobster. This was plated on top of wild nettle ravioli and truffle beurre fondue, wild argula salad, and almonds. I wasn’t expecting such a giant, succulent piece of lobster. And the ravioli? So velvety good.
My next dish (yeah, seriously) was the roti of quail and squab. This was such a creative dish, and I wish I wasn’t so full that I couldn’t eat most of it. Stuffed with wild mushrooms and wrapped in crispy potato strings with truffled jus, this wasn’t a roti in the traditional sense. Still, it tasted incredible.
Are you still with me? Good, because here come the sweets. We tasted a palate-cleansing sorbet and foam amuse bouche, which was thankfully small enough to finish eating. I was grateful for foam and you know, not a giant steak.
Our millionth dish of the evening was the petit fours. We couldn’t finish this, but I did happily nibble at the miniature cannelles. I love cannelles!
My last dish of the evening was the sorbet and berry cake, which I don’t remember much, probably because I was about to black out from overindulgence.
Insane gluttony aside, La Folie remains one of my most memorable meals to date. The service is impeccable, the food outstanding and unique, and the ambience a glamorous throwback to old San Francisco with a heavy touch of Paris. Decadent indeed, and in the best way imaginable.
Sonoma County is my home turf, and every time I go home to visit, I’m impressed by how rapidly the restaurant scene is changing. Healdsburg’s Bravas Bar de Tapas is one of the latest offerings: a chic tapas restaurant downtown, with an adorable outdoor dining patio to boot. I ate there with my sister and Nishan one day, and we were instantly transported to Spain.
We started with the marinated olives, pickled garlic, and Idiazabal cheese to whet our appetites as we perused the menu. This was small but solid.
Next came a huge fried duck egg served with chorizo cracklings and toast. The gooey-richly flavored duck egg was made even richer but the chorizo, and the toast was a perfect vessel by which to soak it all up. A+, would eat again.
In between bites of patatas bravas and nibbles of cheese, we also ordered the Dungeness crab fideua. The crab and thin toasted noodles were a tasty marriage of North Bay-meets-Mediterranean and it came served with a generous dollop of garlicy aioli. Perhaps too generous. The aioli was heavy but the fideua was smoky, tomatoey, and super satisfying.
There’s so much more at Bravas Bar de Tapas that I didn’t have the opportunity to try during my first visit that I can’t wait to go back. Sonoma County may be home, it may be the familiar, but it never ceases to amaze me. And these days, there’s always something new.
Yeah, yeah, I know. Another izakaya. But this one is different, really. Izakaya Yuzuki in San Francisco’s Mission District may be one of the trendiest types of restaurants to pop up in one of the trendiest parts of town, but this place is serious, going so far as to make their tofu and miso in-house.
I met here one evening for a reunion dinner with friends, and we started with the Kyoto-style local vegetables. Light and slightly piquant, these were the perfect palate cleanser for our meal.
Next we shared a plate of simple, unadulterated sashimi. Raw fish isn’t the strongest suit of your average izakaya, but this was an exception. Buttery tuna and rich salmon left me wishing for more.
I was quickly distracted by the seared waygu beef tataki that came next. Served with miso sauce and onion salad, this was one of our heftiest dishes, and among the quickest to go. Speaking of quick to go, my personal favorite dish here was the chawan mushi with uni, an egg-y, custard-y dish so comforting that it was gone before I had a chance to snap a photo.
Next came the grilled mackerel, which was too bland for my taste. I typically love mackerel, but I would have preferred a more flavorful fish here.
Next up: shrimp and root vegetable tempura served with green tea salt, one of Izakaya Yuzuki’s most popular dishes. We loved this so much we ordered it twice.
We finished our meal with the grilled omusubi, a crispy rice dish topped with shoyu-flavored vegetables. A solid end to a solid meal.
True to izakaya form, the servings at Izakaya Yuzuki are small, so keep that in mind when ordering. Our party of four went through nine or ten dishes, and amazingly, it wasn’t too much. Still, not all izakayas are created equal, and Izakaya Yuzuki is clearly paying attention to the details.
