Tratto

Breakfast on Geary (redux), Part 30

Sometimes "Rust Never Sleeps", but that don't mean that it can't be gold-plated none the same...

http://www.tratto-sf.com/#home


Place: Tratto[1]
Location: 501 Geary Boulevard (on the corner of Taylor Street)
Hours: open Monday through Friday at 7:00am (for breakfast); open Saturday and Sunday at 8:00am (for "Brunch")
Meal: Garden omelet ~ three egg whites, goat cheese, seasonal veggies, side of fruit (which I had substituted for breakfast potatoes, because we all know that potatoes are better than plain ol' fruits any day); and a cuppa (and 1-1/2 refillas) Mr. Espresso® (I didn't get which specific roast/blend it was, though)

http://mrespresso.com/

(Happy 71st Birthday to Noel Yang!

The first song is one of my All-Time Favourite Noel Yang Songs of All-time, which would make it one of my All-Time Favourite Songs of All-time, too.

The second song is just a cover of one of his songs by Gillian Welch[2] and David Rawlings.

And because I think that Gillian is just awesome, I am providing a third song by her, which is also a great cover of one of my favourite songs from the Band.)


I am running out of "new" places to check out ("out which to check..."? whatever) for breakfasts in San Francisco, so I am always on the lookout ("out on the look..."? whatever) for restaurants at which I have not had breakfast yet. This was my first visit to Tratto.  I have passed by Tratto many times since it recently opened (sometime in June of this year) in the same location that once housed BDK Restaurant & Bar (see previous 'blog-entry from Saturday, August 22nd, 2015), which was only open for about two years or so itself. This is the third incarnation for this restaurant-space in the past five years already. It seems like a decent enough spot and it is the house-restaurant for a large, upscale hotel, the Marker San Francisco; so I don't know why it has changed so often of late.

Tratto does not really have a lot of choices from which to choose (because those "choices from which not to choose" are really the worst) for breakfast (or, in this case, on the weekends, "Brunch"). Otherwise, there were just a few others that I saw: Chilaquiles (red and green sauces, two eggs, corn tortilla chips, sour cream, queso fresco; Really?!? ~ I thought this was una trattoria italiana, not una trattoria mexicana) and they also offer a standard Eggs benedict (Do I really need to list the ingredients in this dish?). 

Now, I had checked out their on-line menu just the other day to make sure that there would be suitable ideas for a stupid vegetarian and it also listed a Breakfast Pizza (soft egg, crème fraiche [ sic ][3], prosciutto). However, when I looked over their printed menu this morning it was nowhere to be found. This was really okay as I just had an excellent Pizza (Farm Egg, Roasted Mushrooms, Spinach, Ricotta, Calabrian Chili Oil at -Pizzetta- 211) yesterday for lunch, anyway (not that I wouldn't have ordered their Pizza choice this morning if I had the opportunity, too).

https://pizzetta211.com/

(Not that I used it or needed it, but they still have the same cool little cow-creamers that used to be at the previous restaurant, too.)

You know, I don't think that I have ever had an "egg-white omelette" before. It tasted just like a chicken-egg omelette to me...

(And, yes, I have been waiting years to use that terrible joke.)

I liked the taste of this omelette very much. As best as I can figure, this season's "veggies" (uggh!) included: spinach, yellow (Summer?) squash, tomatoes, bell peppers, and mushrooms (lots and lots of mushrooms ~ this would definitely not be a good choice for the fungo-faint of heart). Although, seeing as this joint is basically an Italiano bistro kinda place, I was hoping to see some "veggies" della tradizione italiana in it; perhaps some scarola (escarole ~ one of my favourites of the bitter green leafy foodstuffs) or zucchini. 

I was very happy that I was allowed the substitution of their breakfast potatoes because these were pretty good, with slices of green and red bell peppers and white onions and lots of herbs and such.

I went with an English muffin for my toast side-choice (because they didn't offer the choice of focaccina italiana). This proved to be a perfect receptacle for their homemade (trattoria-made, whatever) raspberry jam.

For condimentary supplementation, Tratto only had Tabasco® Brand Pepper Sauce (Original Red Sauce). Non importa, I simply used some of my own 
★ Pope's ★ Whiskey River Hot Sauce (Thanks, Amy and Chef Joe!) on the potatoes and some Lucky Dog Hot Sauce Medium Fire-Roasted Pepper Sauce (Thanks, Brian!) on the omelette.


Glen Bacon Scale Rating: 
Giardino frittata ~ 6.7;
raspberry jam ~ 7.0

___________________

1. Stupid, useless cunning linguist pointer of the day:

part a:
"Tratto" in Italian means "stroke (of a pen)".

part b:
The word "trattoria" (meaning a type of restaurant/bistro in Italy) comes from "trattore" ("host, keeper of an eating house"), from "trattare" ("to treat"), from Latin "tractare", frequentative of "trahere" (past participle "tractus") ("to draw") (see tract [n.1]).

2. If you ever get the chance to see Gillian Welch perform live, I highly recommend it. I have probably seen her (and David Rawlings) perform live now at least a half-dozen times (probably closer to ten or more, really) and always enjoy her performances.

http://gillianwelch.com/

3. Now, while I âpplâûd them for their correctly accented use of the "è" in "crème", why didn't they also include the correctly accented "î" in "fraîche"?