Yeh F.'s Profile

Organic and "cage-free" is a good first step.  But apparently they debeak their chickens: http://science.kqed.or...

Also, they say their chickens are 100% vegetarian, but chickens are meant to eat worms and bugs as part of their diet.  Pastured eggs are the way to go for the absolute best eggs possible as they actually get to roam around outside in the open and peck around for bugs in the ground.

One of the only suppliers of REAL (pastured) eggs in San Francisco.  To other farms: chickens are supposed to eat bugs.  Advertising that your chickens have a 100% vegetarian diet to appeal to the vegans just tells me your eggs are crap.  It's the same deal as restaurants advertising that their steak comes from corn-fed cows.  No thanks.

The two times I've been here have been after 36 hour fasts (no dinner the day before, no lunch the day of) so I can get my money's worth.

This place is also awesome if you're just low-carbing in general as you can just stack on the meat for grilling and then add in some vegetables in the hot pot.  Their sauce selection is pretty good as well.

Haven't had any food hygiene problems either, but I tend to just stick with the beef/short ribs, especially the ones that look like they're more frozen and then cook them till the redness is gone.

Service has been fine in my experience.  They fill your hot pot, take away your dishes, re-adjust your heat if you screw it up, etc.  Only thing is you need to keep asking for more butter if you grill a lot of meat.  Pretty standard for a buffet place.

While this chain also exists in Taiwan, I've heard it's different there.  It's not a buffet and you don't get to grill your meat.  Just straight up hot pot.  I think I prefer the American version.

Shitty private party policy is shitty.  But IGN stepped up to the plate and gave us an office tour instead, which was cool.  But if you plan to have a party where people enter and leave, 21st Amendment is one of the shittiest places you could pick.

Double-check how much you're getting charged.  I have caught them adding an extra dollar to the price and called them out on it twice.

Specifically, the guy on the 3rd register from the right made a mistake and typed the number wrong.  However, the girl on the 1st register from the right I have seen her actually add an extra dollar to the total cost.  First time I let it go thinking maybe there was something else.  But second time I called her out on it.

So be careful when you go to these two registers.

Other than that, I love the food here.

So I first heard about them when they opened in Noe Valley.  I had wanted to go but it wasn't exactly convenient so I never did go.

Was looking for some meetups to do today and basically found their meetup group by accident.  And they were meeting today.  And best of all, they had moved to a much more convenient location!  So of course I went.

The owners, Erik and Shane were really friendly, as were pretty much all the people who were there.  They have open games which you can use to play as well, which is what we used tonight.  There were at least 3 games going at some point.

They just had their grand re-opening on the 1st so they have some freebies if you spend X amount of money, and they offer 14% discounts to students, soldiers, and seniors.

They may not have the best stock but they do have a lot of new and popular games, so you can probably find something there you'll enjoy.  So if you're looking for CCGs, Warhammer, and RPGs, you may want to hit up Gamescape or the stores in Berkeley and Oakland instead.  But if you're looking for the designer games (mostly from Europe, but some local ones too) that are more likely to appeal to both gamers and non-gamers, or just a nice, bright store close to the Muni to play games in San Francisco, definitely check out Just Awesome!

Edit: The 20% discount for attending meetups has been phased out.  Instead there is now a $35 annual membership program that gives you the same discount on their best-selling games, as well as a monthly coupon book that gives about the same amount of discount (sometimes less, sometimes more) for other games.

A waste of $4.50 on free tickets to VAMPS that I won at fanime.

$1.50 for the two bottles of water they confiscated at the door.
$3.00 for making me coat check my bag because I had a "professional camera" (DSLR) and only "digital cameras" are allowed.

If you're gonna coat check my damn bag then don't grab and throw my water away without warning.  Also, when you do that to people, I'm not gonna pay $5 for your water inside.

Also, be consistent on the photography rules.
1) The MC actually said no *flash* photography allowed for the band, despite what your sign and security guy said.  Get it straight which it's supposed to be.
2) If flash photography is not allowed, then it makes even less sense to force people with DSLRs to coat check those given those are the type of camera that can have the big ass lenses that don't require flash in the first place.

Fire your idiot security.  Or management.

You know what I'll always be reminded of when I think about Jean-Georges?

The fly.  Specifically, the fly on my friend's plate.  Ok, it was a very small fly.  And we were done.  But still.  A fly.  At such an expensive restaurant!

Well ok, we were only there for lunch, so it wasn't that pricey.  $14/plate minimum 2 plates per person.  And $8 dessert.  It's like Dine About Town prices (this is an SF thing I think), except they have it every day for lunch!

Food-wise the presentation was great.  As for the taste itself... several of the dishes had a sour taste to it, but not in a bad way.  Perhaps that's the secret ingredient for restaurants to charge about $100/person for dinner.  I may never know.

Service was probably what you'd expect from restaurants at this price range.  In other words, no complaints.  They did try to coat check us at first but we were able to keep them on us (all my stuff was in there).

Still, we agreed this was the best place out of all the places we ate in our week in NY.

I only live a block away and have been reading about it on Yelp, but it was only tonight that I decided to actually go in and take a look.

I think the first thing I noticed was that the restaurant was not as dark as I had expected and somewhat noisier.  Also, the crowd was a lot younger than I'd expected from the other reviews, but then again, it IS Feb. 14.

Came in at the same time as another couple, no reservations, at 9PM, and I think we were all seated within 15 minutes, which wasn't bad.

The complimentary bread was typical for restaurants of this type, but I liked the butter.  For the main course, I got a rack of lamb, which was one of the specials.  It came with 8 pieces of lamb and some potatoes and cucumbers.  It's a good thing I didn't order the full special which would've come with soup/salad and pasta, or I don't think I could've finished it all.  But I do want to try those, maybe next time (I was also sick, so my appetite wasn't fully there)

Special things of note:

The waiter noticed my Cal jacket and said Go Bears! when I went in, and also as I left. +$1 tip
He made more conversation and jokes than 99% of the restaurants I've been to, which was great!  More waiters should do that.  +$1 tip
He didn't make a comment or stare at my very... untraditional date.  +$1 tip

So I think I ended up overtipping by 20% or so.  But I do expect to go back in the future, preferably with a more traditional date so I consider it a good investment (sorry, weighted companion cube, but I do expect my date to speak to me...)

Professional and they know what their stuff.  Went there last week to buy a binocular and let me try out the binoculars (settled on the Orion Ultraview 10x50 WA).  Also have a lot of good astronomy books that are about $5 less than the list price.  Yeah it's always cheaper online but the books they stock are the ones that are generally recommended and you can flip through them.

Also have a lot of accessories like red LED flashlights (to preserve your night vision).  Only bad thing is they were out of stock for some of their items, but you could always order from their online store as well.