Swarup "no one on the corner has swagga like me" B.'s Profile

great potential here!  the food is good and the ambiance is very nice.

we went to celebrate the in-law's anniversary and had a nice time.  chilango has a very chill feel to it and an atmosphere that lends itself to that.  we got there super early (5:30pm) so we had no problem getting a seat.  we did notice that there was hardly anyone there yet our waiter was running around like it was a packed restaurant.  it came off as annoying at first (and may still be so) but i attributed it to his personality.  his personality completely shined later as he was cracking jokes back at us as we cracked them at him.

on the food front, we started w/ guac and tortilla soup.  the guac was very nice though it may have been a bit heavy on the lime.  the soup was very nice and had a great flavor to it.

mains, we tried a lot of stuff.  fish tacos, chili relleno, pambazo (torta w/ the bread soaked in a hot sauce), chicken enchiladas, deep fried quesadillas (empanada-ish) and tostadas.  all the flavors were very very good.  i had gotten the fish tacos and absolutely loved them.  the chili relleno's sauce was outstanding but the dish may have had a tad bit too much cheese.  the deep fried quesadilla had a great flavor to it too.  i didn't get to try the other dishes but everyone was very happy with their food.

we ended the meal with flan and tres leches cake.  the flan was miss for me from a texture standpoint.  the flavor was spot on but it was too dense.  the tres leches cake was very very good and my favorite of the two.  what was curious was that churros was on the menu but not available.  according to our hyperactive waiter, he said the chef put it on their just to make the dessert menu look fuller and they are waiting for the right equipment.

when we told our waiter that it was the in-law's anniversary, he surprised them a glass of moscato each which definitely earned him some brownie points.

there are other items on the menu that look very appealing and definitely warrant a return to try out.

a great concept and a place that we'll probably going back to for some quick eats.  the idea behind the kati roll is the same as any street food which is a getting a good fulfilling piece of food on the go.  

we ordered to go so we got the chicken tikka, 2 chicken tikka masala (1 unda style w/ egg) and karahi paneer kati rolls.  everything was pretty darn good.  the roti used for the rolls was buttery and flaky and the meat and paneer were all cooked very well with great flavor.  my only draw back would be the price is pretty high for kati rolls but you can't win em all.

when i picked up the food, the decor of the restaurant is pretty chill and cool so next time we'll have to try and stop by for food.  having the option to pick up or even delivery is very nice though.

i arranged a large group dinner for my wife's b-day here so this review is more about how well dos caminos accommodated us.

with a group of 21, it was pretty hard finding a restaurant that is very flexible.  a lot of restaurants force you into a fixed menu and fixed price.  dos caminos offers their regular menu and that at minimum it's $35/person.  this is incredible in comparison to the $50+ fixed price menus other restaurants start at.  julie, the special events manager, is very helpful and can certainly help out w/ special requests like a special dessert for the b-day girl.

the food ranged from good to really good.  i was pretty busy ensuring folks were having a great time that i don't remember if i ate or not!  i do remember the guac and dessert platters being amazing.  people were raving about the scallops and the enchiladas.

it's a skewed 5 star rating but honestly how often can you find a place so easily accommodating for a group of 21 people.  not to often if ever.  thank you to julie and the fun dos caminos staff!

so close to being great it hurts.  everything was great.  awesome ambiance and decor, friendly service and incredible food.  but notice how service was just friendly.  attentiveness on part of the service staff was not there.

we first got some bread w/ some incredible honey truffle butter.  honestly, this should be sold.  so addictive w/ a great balance of flavors.  for appetizer we decided to split the burrata w/ tomatoes and basil.  unreal.  the cheese was beautifully soft and the pesto vibrant.  a tad bit more salt would be nice but still a fabulous dish.

for mains, she got a custom dish which was a linguini w/ beets and broccoli in a black truffle creme sauce and i got the lobster gnocchi.  we both got white truffle shavings on our dishes.  both of our dishes were freaking good.  the lobster in my dish was cooked perfectly and the gnocchi was light and pillowy.  the beets in her dish added a beautiful sweetness and texture w/ her pasta.  both were stellar dishes.

what truly lacked in the restaurant was that we were practically forgotten about after we put in our order.  we would go long periods of time where our wine glasses would be empty (we had gotten a nice spatlese).  our waiter hardly checked in on us though he was incredibly friendly.  we were perplexed with how attentive they were before we put our order in and how non-existent they were afterwards.  we primarily decided not to have dessert due to this (that and we were pretty darn full).  only this one busboy would notice that we were looking around waiting and then call someone over.  i'll only dock one star because every other aspect of the restaurant was beautiful.  the service could be an isolated incident and i'm pretty sure others probably did not experience what we did.  if you're learned anything from this review, go to eat and enjoy some great food!

we came here for my wife's b-day for a low key dinner.  the ambiance and decor lent itself well to that but i was expecting a bit more out of the food.

we got there around 7pm and the place was empty.  good for us since we'll get our food quickly!  we looked over the menu and after a bit we came down to getting a few apps and a few entrees.  for apps we got the pearl onion, pomegranate and grape vinaigrette cold salad and the persimmon, fennel and prawn salad.  the pearl onion salad was nice but nothing special.  the prawn salad was nice but there was way too much fennel and it over took the lovely persimmon.  the prawn was cooked very well.

for mains we got a pasta w/ brussel sprouts and onions and a pizza w/ arugula and potato.  both were decent but not great.  the pizza was unique due to the small cubes of potato.

overall it was a decent restaurant but i don't see ourselves jumping to go back.

i've been waiting for burger bar to open in SF for years and i'm so glad that it's finally here!

what makes burger bar work is the variety of burgers, particularly the non-beef and veggie options.  this makes it very accessible to everyone.  that and the milkshake bar but more on that later.

the decor of the place is nice but what's intriguing is that it boasts that it has the biggest beer selection in union square.  when i saw a sign for chimay i naturally asked for a pour of it but was told that the sign was there for show.  huh?!?  in any case, the views from the window areas are pretty sweet.

on to the food.  i decided to go w/ the hubert keller burger and my wife custom made a chicken burger w/ black truffles and truffle sauce.  my burger was beautifully cooked and incredibly juicy.  the blue cheese added a great complexity and tanginess.  yum!  my wife's burger was pretty darn good but what stole the show was the truffle sauce rather than the truffles themselves.  i could just drink this stuff!

we decided to grab a milkshake too but decided to get some help from hubert keller himself!  he looked happy like a school boy when describing the desserts.  we were steered towards the caramel latte milkshake.  the milkshake was very sweet and had a nice coffee undertone too it that worked well together.

my only drawback to burger bar is the cost.  it's pretty freakin costly (the hubert keller burger was $22).  the hostess was working there was pretty incompetent too as she put us in places that were either dark or had no view even though it was 11:15am and the place was not full at that time.  the hostess did a complete 180 though once chef keller showed up.

when we left we saw that the wait here was insane so remember to go here at off peak times or you will have a 1-2 hour wait.

been wanting to go here for a while and was happily surprised when my wife decided to take me here for my b-day!  we heard stories about the line and seen them whenever we had driven by so we decided to get there right around when they open.  this proved to be a very good idea as there was already a queue on their blackboard for seats.  fyi, this same strategy is needed at flour + water.  well either that or get there really late.

so we decided to go for 1 app and 2 pizzas so that we can try out a bit of everything and take home leftovers.  the app was a special on the menu whose name eludes me now but was a fried cheese dish.  it was very tasty but a lil oily.  for pizzas we got the margherita and 4 fromaggi.  i was torn between both in terms of which one i liked better but i give the slight edge to the margherita as the sauce was allowed to shine thru.  the 4 fromaggi had great flavor due to the cheeses but the sauce here is very very good.  we had leftovers from both pies and they both tasted very well the next day.

i'm liking this pizza movement that SF is undergoing right now and am looking forward to the other pizza joints on the horizon (i.e. pizza by farina i believe).  flour + water still hold as my favorite of the city so far since their crust had more flavor.  pizzeria delfina wins in the sauce department though.

almost a 5 star but not there yet.

went here w/ my buddy for lunch on my b-day and found out that sushi toni's had only been open for a month or two.  we sat down at the bar and decided to go omakase.  what came next were a plethora of items.  live scallop nigiri, soup w/ shrimps head, tempura of said shrimp's body, a fair amount of very good nigiri, collarbone of hamachi and black sesame ice cream.  what's holding me back from going the full 5 stars is that i've had better fish in the city, namely sebo.  not to say there's anything bad going on here.  in fact, it's pretty damn good.

toni was working the bar and we had a great time just talking and hanging with him.  not sure of the attention time we'd get w/ him at peak time but it was just right especially on my b-day.

this was a real nice surprise.  while this may seem like a typical indian restaurant on the surface, it actually offers a rare variety of the cuisine apart from the "traditional" punjabi, south or pakistani fare that everyone has become accustomed to.  there are a large number of dishes that concentrate on goan cuisine from the coastal city of goa.  knowing this i got even more excited!

we ordered quite a large number of dishes to try a bit of everything.  chicken cafreal, shrimp piri piri, and fish balchao were the goan dishes we chose and we threw in a regular chicken tikka masala and a portobello mushroom & paneer dish.  standouts were the shrimp piri piri, fish balchao and the mushroom dish.  the piri piri dish was a dry dish while the other two were saucy dishes.  the flavors were very unique and very nice.  the other dishes were very nicely prepared too.  one thing that stood out w/ each dish was how well plated everything was.  the chef definitely has a nice eye for presentation.

one drawback for mynt is the service.  while they are very informative, they can be slow and easily distracted by other happenings in the restaurant.  also the naan was just OK.  overall, a great find w/ some non-standard indian food and i can't wait to try the other dishes!

a pretty cool concept and we can see this type of ice cream shop opening country wide, should the price of liquid nitrogen drop.

all the ice cream here is made in front of you.  you pick the type of base you want (ice cream, fro-yo, sorbet) and the flavors, color and mixins you want and the whip it up for you and freeze it w/ a dose of liquid nitrogen to make it ice cream.  it's a pretty cool process to watch.

i got the a purple honey hazelnut ice cream w/ graham crackers and wifey got white chocolate hazelnut ice cream w/ nutella, chocolate chips and strawberries.  we both really liked our concoctions but mine could've had a bit more hazelnut flavor.  the texture was nice but the funny part was when it melted.  instead of a creamy liquid we ended up w/ a very water liquid, probably because the lack of fat and no actual churning.

overall a great idea and like i said, i'd like to see more places like this!