Ed "SF Travel Examiner" U.'s Profile

After much soul-searching and mountaintop-sitting, I decided to lift my rating for Henry's Hunan to four stars. Yes, I know it's a controversial upgrade, and I am willing to take the slings and arrows of those unfortunate snobs who have dismissed this place for lent. What tipped me over was an unexpected dish, the $8.75 Polish Sausage Hunan Style - perhaps the most inauthentic concoction ever served in a Chinese restaurant. Who cares? It's greasy good in a Top Dog meets Yank Sing sorta way. Know what I'm sayin'?

Well, we already know the $6.95 Diana's Meat Pie is about as Chinese as Charlie Chan in an opium den. It's one of the best tostadas you could possibly have outside of the Mission, although I have to remember to pick up some salsa from Taco Del Mar across the street the next time. Between Henry, Howard and Marty having their namesake specials, I was starting to think this was the West Coast outpost for Katz's Delicatessen, but alas, I think they're mostly hotter-than-the-hinges-in-hell kung pao dishes.

Regardless, I just couldn't sleep tonight until I gave Henry's the extra star for their anything-for-a-buck sorta-Hunan dishes. Sure, it ain't David Chang. It ain't even Charlie Chan. Henry's Hunan is like the Kathy Griffin of Chinese restaurants.

FOOD - 4 stars...yes, Sophie didn't have a tougher choice than having the Polish Sausage over Diana's Tostada Greasepool...I mean, Meat Pie
AMBIANCE - 3 stars...well, it still needs a few more gongs
SERVICE - 3.5 stars...getting better, not sure why
TOTAL - 4 stars...this is not a Polish joke

An instant wave of nostalgia came over me when I returned to the Oakland Grill for the first time in at least 15 years last Saturday. As a struggling, puppyish pauper, I used to come here often because I liked the blue-collar vibe of the warehouse district and the grub was cheap. What can I say? I've become a jaundiced snob in the intervening years. As a struggling, old-doggy-style pauper, I get nervous leaving my car unattended, but the grub is still cheap. Not as cheap as before, but $8.95 is not bad for Joe's Special.

It's three eggs scrambled mixed with ground beef, mushrooms, onions, spinach, garlic and cheddar cheese. Eggs were a tad rubbery, but the rest worked fine. The menu doesn't say it comes with potatoes, but they most surely do. Again, they tasted a tad old with a heavy coating of paprika to cover the chunks up. The sourdough toast was fine though. Have I become such a Yelp-crazed foodie that I can't quite appreciate a bargain meal in a warehouse anymore? Nah, I eat grub like this all the time. I just feel Oakland Grill has lost a bit of their original mojo.

I didn't have complaints about the service even if it felt like the waitress was on automatic pilot. The manager had the power vibe going though since he reprimanded another waitress in front of me at the counter. I just thought it wasn't very cool to do that since I'm not big on humiliating your staff in public. Abuse should be done passive-aggressively behind people's backs. It's called manners.

FOOD - 3 stars...ok grub but just doesn't have that mojo no mo'
AMBIANCE - 3.5 stars...still like the warehouse loft coolness factor...too much blond wood though
SERVICE - 2.5 stars...eye contact is not big here
TOTAL - 3 stars...barely...nostalgia ain't what it used to be

Ever been to Japan?...I mean the REAL Japan. Well, you can save the airfare and come here to the Mitsuwa Marketplace in Saratoga. It feels so much like a suburban Tokyo supermarket that I felt like I was late for the bullet train to Okayama. Somebody get me the white gloves, so I can shove my suited brethren into a subway car. Santouka is exactly the type of noodle house you'd find in one of these supermarkets - neatly tucked away with a snaking line waiting to make their orders of ramen. The tables are crowded with so many fellow Japanese-Americans that I felt at home.

Jamie W. and I were on our way back from the Gilroy Discount Outlets when we stopped in and saw the streams of crowds. I was ready to turn right around, but I said to myself, "Dammit, stop being a wimp, and order up some ramen for you and your guy." I stared quite a long time at the plastic replicas of the ramen bowls in the display case before settling on two orders of the $10.45 Extra Pork Large Size bowls with soy sauce flavored broth and two smaller bowls of rice with slow-cooked pork, green onions and sesame seeds ($2.49 each) (see my photos). Squeezed in our little plastic chairs in a densely populated seating area, we waited a good half-hour before our ramen was ready.

It was very good but in a different way. The ramen noodles were cooked al dente with a slight chew to them, and the pork was sliced thinly over the top. The soy sauce flavor lent a creamier texture than I expected, but that may have something to do with the skin of grease on the broth, which I assume helped keep the ramen at a warm temperature when served. That's kind of the same logic used to justify freezer burn on a tub of ice cream, isn't it? Oh well, this type of ramen apparently comes from Hokkaido (the northern island of Japan, you plebeian) - so I'll give in to tradition as well as my penchant for grease.

The pork bowl was a nice complement since it was like bacon in a bucket. The nice thing is that you can dump it all into the leftover broth and continue enjoying the ramen. I'm not sure if I broke any dining etiquette rules there, but I noticed three people do the same after I did it. Such a trend setter I am, or a bad influence. I can't decide. But alas, I must leave Tokyo for now since we have an hour's drive ahead of us. Definitely worth a stop down here if Tampopo has let you down lately.

FOOD - 4 stars...snow country ramen is what I'd call it with al dente noodles and a creamy broth
AMBIANCE - 3.5 stars...like a food court in a suburban supermarket...in Yokohama!
SERVICE - 3 stars...just point and pay (just cash, no cards)...everything looked pretty good to me
TOTAL - 4 stars...the South Bay has ramen houses worth checking out...don't be a snob.

I first tasted TCHO's chocolates at a Yelp Elite event in Yountville back in June, and I had no idea how I was supposed to eat them. They were wafer-thin rounds in little dishes organized like a clock on a big table, and there was a stack of these cards that had these color wheels like from a paint store. I guess you were supposed to get a chocolate that represents a wedge on the color wheel, and then you eat them counter-clockwise with the darkest to be tasted first. Or so it was explained to me after the fact.

Well, screw that. Like I'm really going to balance the chocolates on this flimsy card while I'm holding a glass of wine. I guess I inappropriately used my card like a scooper and just kept popping them by the handful in my mouth. I kept getting small-mouth from the company representative. Well, flash forward a few months later, and lo and behold, I came upon TCHO's little, lonely-looking store in the Pier 17 warehouse. I banged on the door an hour past its official opening hour, and out from the side door came the slightly miffed server. That's right. I got it again. Small-mouth.

Ah, there's that familiar color wheel again on the wall (see photo), but this time, they have little dishes with little tongs so you can take little bites of the chocolate (see photo). Fair enough. And there are other little bowls with chocolate-covered coffee beans (see photo). You can probably tell I'm not a cocoa bean connoisseur since my idea of a chocolate high is getting the free sample square at the Ghirardelli Chocolate Store when I feign unexpected surprise at the offer of one. But here, they have Blue Bottle coffee as a chaser, so it must be good stuff.

Is there any other reason to come to Tiburon? I'm not saying it's a great reason, but why does anybody come to Tiburon anyway? I think it's for that faux-New England, useless-ye-olde-shoppe vibe you get. It's a California law to have one of these tourist traps every hundred miles along the coast...Half Moon Bay, Tiburon, Mendocino... To add insult to injury, Jamie W. and I went on the Blue & Gold "Sightseeing" ferry from Fishermans' Wharf. I'm not sure when the sightseeing came in (unless they mean "There's the Golden Gate Bridge, look at it"), but it was a frickin' $19 round trip ticket when I could have just driven over.

Anyway, we made it to Sam's, and it was jam-packed at 3:30PM. It's pretty much jam-packed anytime because the deck is admittedly an inviting place on a sunny day like it was last Saturday. But what does strike you after a while is how non-diverse the customers were. As Kathy Griffin described the biological fathers of Michael Jackson's children, it was "Whitey, Whitey McGee and Whitey McWhiterson". And not just Caucasian but the rich and overly entitled type, the kind that pooh-poohs the waiter by telling him that her margarita is not good enough unless it's Top Shelf.

When we were finally seated at our table, we were surrounded by mouthy people talking about their masseuses or their boats or their masseuses on their boats. And they were continually banging their white plastic chairs (...and they are white, I swear) against mine. However, I did like the $8 bowl of Boston-Style Clam Chowder with the little bags of oyster crackers. It's the creamy-lumpy variety that I prefer...and of course, white. And I naturally had the $13 Sam's Burger, which I always liked because of the sourdough bun. The fries weren't bad either. But it's all a bit ka-ching, ka-ching.

Regardless, I gotta tell ya...not that relaxing with the crowds which certainly obscured my marina view. Sam's is truly the land of milk and honey or at least Wonder bread and Best Foods mayonnaise.

FOOD - 3 stars...good bar-type food (and I also like the Hangtown Fry Omelette when I get there earlier in the day)...but certainly pricey, obviously to match the clientele
AMBIANCE - 3.5 stars....nice on the deck on a sunny day but you still feel like you're in an elevator during rush hour
SERVICE - 3 stars...the servers are busy, and ours was a bit, shall we say, forgetful
TOTAL - 3 stars...the ultimate Tiburon experience, if there is such a thing

Merritt Restaurant & Bakery is not only in Oakland ...it IS Oakland. I can't think of a time in my past life in the East Bay when I wasn't conscious of this place, for better or worse. I remember having more than one birthday cake from here, and the there were those late study nights when we'd drive over from Berkeley to have one of their cake squares. A gazillion years later, it looks nearly the same. Like Fingerhut had a fire sale and then sold all their decorative items to the owner of this place. I've never seen cornucopia cozies on counter seats before. Precious.

Don't go expecting culinary surprises here. Know what I'm sayin'? You ever notice how Whitney Houston said "Know what I'm sayin'?" after every three sentences during her Oprah interview. Annoying, wasn't it? Anyhow, I just wanted some comfort food between appointments in Oakland. Know what I'm sayin'? So I saw a Tuna Melt ($9.95) that had my name on it, and I needed a bowl of Chicken Soup ($4.75) to go with it (see photos). Know what I'm sayin'? BOB-BBEEE!

Well, it wasn't great except kudos on using real chicken in the soup. But who cares? It's a one-franchise Denny's without all that irritating Day-Glo orange. Merritt is there when you need it. Merritt will always be there when you need it. Merritt is strong. Merritt is invincible. Merritt is Oakland.

FOOD - 3 stars...you came here for cuisine?...what planet are you from?
AMBIANCE - 3 stars...like I said...Fingerhut deluxe
SERVICE - 3 stars...I'm sure she came and went with a pencil in her hairdo
TOTAL - 3 stars....Merritt is an institution...could someone sweep out the cobwebs?

Oh, I remember Cefiore when I was in LA three years ago. It was (and probably still is) in the Japanese Village in Little Tokyo, so I always associate this place with spiky-haired adolescent servers and very tart-tasting fro-yo. Not terrible (as my old Yelp review will attest...http://www.yelp.com/bi...) but nothing I would race down south for either. Flash forward three years later, and Jamie W. walks us down to New Montgomery where lo and behold, a Cefiore has opened. It's calmed down a bit on the style quotient.

No spiky hair here, just a personable, responsible-looking woman who obviously uses conditioner. The tartness seems to be gone. Not her, the fro-yo...well, at least with what I had ...a $3.50 medium-sized swirl of Chocolate and Pumpkin with bits of Reese's Peanut Butter Cup on top (see photo). Really tasty, and it lasted all the way to Jessie Square in front of the Contemporary Jewish Museum where we parked our ample derrieres and licked to our heart's content. Life can be good that way. Know what I mean?

FRO-YO - 4 stars...the tartness was gone, and golly, it's the great pumpkin, Charlie Brown
AMBIANCE - 3 stars...a shoebox of a place but clean and well-kept
SERVICE - 3.5 stars...nice conditioner
TOTAL - 4 stars...fro-yo fo sho

It took Anthony Bourdain's cynically sinister stroll through the Ferry Building Farmers' Market on his addictive show, "No Reservations", to tempt me to come here against my bitter...uhhh, I mean my better judgment. That and the fact that rising star chef David Chang was signing his new Momofuku cookbook at Sur Le Table later that morning. He's the one that recently said that "...every restaurant in San Francisco is serving figs on a plate with ...nothing on it". (BTW, he's also the one with me in my current profile picture...his food is amazing regardless of his smarmy comment!)

Anyway, I never felt motivated to walk beyond the Rose Pistola kiosk to navigate the swarming crowds at the market until I saw the tamale plate Bourdain had on the show. Since Jamie W. and I had an hour before the book signing, we waited in line at the Primavera stand for one of their fabled Mexican breakfasts. There were four desirable selections on the framed menu, and I went with the $9.50 Chilaquiles "El Cardenal", which was a paper plate of chilaquiles with tomato and chipotle in adobe sauce accompanied by scrambled eggs, onions, crema, and refried beans (see photo).

It was a tad pricey for what you get, but the combination of flavors burst in my mouth with every bite, especially the spicy kick of the chipotle. You certainly can't beat the view of the Bay Bridge, and there was never a shortage of weather-worn wooden benches to sit on to be able to lap it all up. I'll definitely come back for the tamales and the enchiladas on some other Saturday, and perhaps I can also be cool and cynical like those bad-boy chefs.

FOOD - 4 stars...a solid four-star plate of food with Ferry Building prices
AMBIANCE - 4 stars...the Bay Bridge on a sunny day
SERVICE - 3.5 stars...efficient for sure
TOTAL - 4 stars...Bourdain is right again, dammit

Upside, inside out I'm lickin' la copa loca!
It'll push your belly out, lickin' la copa loca!

Whatever happened to Ricky Martin anyway? Oh well, with Humphry Slocombe just down the block now and Bi-Rite, Bombay and Mitchell's not that much further away, I'm afraid La Copa Loca may just get lost in the lactose-intolerant shadows of the Mission. That would be a shame because there are pleasures here that involve the tongue and the palate and don't involve me taking off my clothes. See, I just gave you another reason to come here.

It's a compact place that you would pass by were it not for the glow-in-the-dark, giant ice cream cone (see photo). Enter and you're immediately struck by all the color in the glass case - a blinding combination of gelato, sorbets and sherbets, about thirty in all (see photos). I have to admit I was immediately drawn to the pumpkin sherbet and the pineapple sorbet since it felt like the appropriately lighter treat to have after a pan full of lobster paella at Esperpento.

Then I went truly decadent by asking for a peanut-encrusted, chocolate-dipped cone to house those tantalizing flavors. Somehow it all worked. It was refreshing, and I honestly didn't miss the creaminess of the gelato. I just may have to skip the Blue Bottle Vietnamese at Humphry Slocombe and go for something tropical at La Copa Loca on a hot summer night. Hey, it could happen.

SORBET/SHERBET - 4 stars...refreshing and then some
AMBIANCE - 3 stars...it's a small, comforting place...be prepared to take it outside
SERVICE - 3.5 stars...scoops with the best of them
TOTAL - 4 stars...if you get tired of Humphry, Mitchell's, Bi-Rite or Bombay, you probably need a tummy tuck...but do come to La Copa Loca for the sorbets and sherbets

Vegan soul food. That's an oxymoron, isn't it? Like fat-free ice cream or savory manure. Not that I've had savory manure, at least not that I know of. Souley Vegan doesn't serve manure either, savory or otherwise, and my curiosity peaked as to what their food was all about last Sunday when I happened upon their new location in Jack London Square. Ironically, it's two doors down from Nation's Giant Hamburgers, so you have both extremes of the nutrition spectrum on the same block. Oakland is cool that way.

Empty as the place was, I don't think many people know that they are open on Sundays and actually serve a limited brunch menu - $8 for three items and $10 for four. Sadly, they don't serve their house specialties like the BBQ and Crispy Tofu dishes on Sunday morning. Instead, it's purely breakfast fixings. Luckily, I had a cheery server to help me maneuver the chalkboard menu. I ended up ordering the Scrambled Tofu, Smothered Potatoes, and "Sausages" (see photo). You let her know at the counter and sit anywhere you like. Red stencils of jazz greats freckle the walls.

When the food arrived, I picked at it because I suddenly became fearful of eating something way too healthy for me. Let me start with the best selection. The Scrambled Tofu turned out to be surprisingly hearty with cubes of firm tofu mixed well with peppers and onions among whatever was the egg substitute. The net result was tastier than it had any right to be. The Smothered Potatoes were in the "pretty good" range, a big pile of smashed potatoes with plenty of texture and seasoning though a tad too oily for my taste. I assume it must have been vegetable oil.

The "Sausages" were the least of the three in flavor and looks - two links that were shaped more like finger potatoes, they were made of ground soy mixed with cilantro. The texture was more bready than meaty, so the masquerade was not successful. Still, it was hearty enough to complement the other items. There is definitely a sense of craftsmanship that I admired about the meticulously prepared food. I'm sure if I was a vegan, I'd be peeing for joy in my biodegradable underpants. As a carnivore, however, I have to admit I was thinking an Extra Giant Triple-Egger at Nation's might have hit the spot in a weaker moment.

FOOD - 3 stars...vegan craftsmanship, variable taste
AMBIANCE - 2.5 stars...kinda empty in there
SERVICE - 3.5 stars...cheery server wanted to see me smile...I obliged
TOTAL - 3 stars...does Souley Vegan allow your inner soulful vegan to emerge?...I'm not sure 'cause I'll be next door having a Harvester