For someone who lives in the Bay Area, I don't travel to the city all that often, and I probably don't give it enough props for what the city offers. I often say things like "Why do I need to go all the up to city to have sushi when I have sushi restaurants right here on the Peninsula that are equally as good?" or my favorite: "I can't live without my car, and San Francisco punishes you for owning one". Indeed, without a car, life in San Francisco is a lot easier. Muni and BART will get you where you need to go within the city, without the horrors of driving and parking.
Saturday mornings in SF in the fall are much quieter than the summertime. The tourists are gone, and what remains are the locals heading to the Farmer's Market at the Ferry Building. I've been to the Ferry Building only a few times since they've renovated it, with most of my memories are from my days at Berkeley, where the buildings beside the Pier were largely vacant and decrepit. Seeing a lively San Francisco's Ferry Building again on a beautiful autumn day was in stark contrast to the paint-peeled abandoned buildings and parking lots that used to be used as overflow for Pier 39 in my undergraduate days.
It was at the Ferry Building that we had lunch at the Slanted Door, a Vietnamese-fusion restaurant headed by chef Charles Phan. Slanted Door separates itself from other Vietnamese-fusion restaurants with the use of local and organic ingredients in their cuisine. At 11 in the morning on a Saturday, we were the third party in the door, and we were seated quickly after queuing outside for half an hour. Those behind us, may not have been so lucky, as a good majority of the tables were reserved, and the waiting area and the bar quickly filled up.
The restaurant is family style, and the food is meant to be shared, even if the primitive, hunger-starved portion of your brain wants to selfishly hoard it all because it all tastes so good. Their bar, I am told, holds a rather impressive selection of wine and spirits, and I could not leave without sampling a cocktail. I chose the sweet and citrus French 75, made with Grower Cognac and Tissot Crémant du Jura, fresh lemon and served on the rocks ($10). meta ordered a Blue Bottle organic Wotona french press coffee ($4) to go along with the Summer on the Danube (Prosecco with a splash of Nikolaihof biodynamic elderflower syrup - $10). These drink of course, were not nearly half as interesting as the table show given by littlestar's Heavenly Flower tea, which blossomed as it released its flavor into the hot water.
We started off with an order of crispy vegetarian imperial rolls and Manila clams. Served with lettuce, mint leaves, and a dipping sauce, the Imperial rolls were filled with taro root, cabbage and glass noodles. They were perfect in their crispness, and wrapped with the leaves and dunked in the dipping sauce, they proved to be challenging to eat without falling apart, even with the amount of skill our party had with chopsticks. The Manila clams were served with thai basil, crispy pork belly and fresh chilies in a shallow ceramic dish, and the restaurant was conscientious enough to provide us with a dish to dispose of the clamshells.
One of the things that I notice about eating well-prepared organic foods is that you can taste the difference between organic and conventional; organics have a little more flavor to them, and this is especially more apparent in the meats more than anything else. In eating the Grilled Niman Ranch double-cut pork chops with ginger-soy-shallot sauce and crispy potatoes, one is reminded that this is exactly what pork should taste like.
For the seafood portion of our lunch, we had cellophane noodles with fresh dungeness crab meat, and caramelized tiger prawns with garlic, onions and chili sauce. These two simples dishes are staples for Vietnamese restaurants like the Slanted Door, and they did not disappoint; the taste of the crab accompanied the texture of the noodles well, and the tiger prawns were big and juicy.
The Slanted Door has a large selection of desserts on their menu, and we indulged ourselves with the following: Warm chocolate cake, Warm fig-goat cheese tart, and the E. Guittard dark chocolate pot de crème. All were beautiful presented, and quite tasty. The dark chocolate pot was rich and chocolately, and the warm chocolate cake was light and fluffy without losing any of the richness. Small scoops of ice cream accompany the warm desserts, to contrast the warm with cold. Vanilla bean with the fig goat cheese tart, and coconut with the warm chocolate cake. The fig and goat cheese tart was probably my favorite of the three, owing to the crispy tart crust and the sweetness of the figs.
The Slanted Door: Food: 5/5, Service 4/5.
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