http://themarkersanfrancisco.com/dining/bdk-restaurant-bar Place: BDKRestaurant & Bar 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: Spinach & Feta Scramble ~ served with home fries & choice of toast: wheat/white/cinnamon raisin/rye/English Muffin; and a mighty fine cuppa (and one refilla) Caffé [sic][1]Vita (per my friendly waitress-server lady person ~ whose name I never really got; sorry, Mrs. Honeycutt ~ this was) some kinda Colombian blend http://www.caffevita.com/
(Because I have so deemed it that I can, I have proclaimed the third weekend in August as International Linda Ronstadt Weekend. Sadly, it was two years ago around this date that Linda Ronstadt revealed that she had Parkinson's Disease and "can no longer sing a note". Happily, there is still always EweToob, and we can hear her sing all the notes we want, whenever we want. Best wishes, Ms. Ronstadt!) I had previously eaten at this same location once before, back when it was under its former incarnation of Grand Cafe Brasserie & Bar (see previous 'blog-entry from March 2012). Both the hotel and restaurant (& bar) have changed names since then. The hotel is now known as The Marker San Francisco, and the restaurant (& bar) in the corner location of the building is now called BDKRestaurant & Bar. It is only two blocks down Geary Street from Union Square (and only thirty-seven blocks down Geary Street/Boulevard from last Sunday's 'blog-entry). The restaurant space is now in the front as soon as you walk into the joint. It used to be further back in an interior, high-ceilinged back room. I am pretty sure it is a smaller restaurant than it used to be, too. I think the space up front used to be just the hotel bar/lounge area. There is just seating of: thirteen tables for two (where most of those are along two walls and are half-booth jobbers), three tables for four, three booths along the back wall for up to six people, and two large tables for eight people. You know a place is a typical "Brunch"-ified joint when they use "real" cloth napkins (which are always wasted on the likes of slobs like me). I did like the little bovine-creamers on each table (even if I never use the stuff in my Coffee).
Both the standard breakfast menu and the weekend "Brunch" menu don't really have an awful lot to offer (for either stupid vegetarian-types or dead, decaying animal-fleshivores). Some of the other possible ideas that I was looking at were: Deviled Eggs (white truffle oil, black trumpet mushrooms; if I had ordered this one, I would have had to get a side of homefries, too); Oven Roasted Beets(farro, radish, watercress, goat cheese, basil vinaigrette, smoked almond; again, this would have needed the addition of a side of homefries); or Garden Omelet (three egg whites, goat cheese, seasonal "veggies" [Ugh!], served with a side of fresh fruit). And possibly, as a breakfastary dessert, Sweet Corn Crème Brûlée (which really sounded pretty good).
The scramble was decent enough (heck, even I can scramble eggs with spinach in it). I was a little disappointed that the Feta was just thrown on top of the scramble after cooking it. Not that Feta is a very melty-type cheese, but it still would have been better mixed in with the eggs and spinach and cooked that way. At least there was a decent amount of Feta in the mess. The toast was very good. They don't specify it on their "Brunch" menu (but do so on their on-line breakfast menu), but this was actually walnut-cinnamon-raisin bread. It possibly was a homemade (well, restaurant-made) bread (I forgot to bug my friendly waitress-server lady person about that particular bit of information). For condimentary supplementation, BDK only had Tabasco®Brand Pepper Sauce (which I assume was just the Original Red Sauce type) and a Sriracha sauce (which I also assume was Huy Fung Foods, Inc. brand). I went with some of my own Fairhope Favorites, Inc.Moonshine Hot Sauce XXX (Thanks, Phyll!) on the potatoes and some Marie Sharp's Grapefruit Pulp Habanero Pepper Sauce (Thanks, Mom!) on parts of the scramble mess. I especially would like to point out that they serve their own homemade (well, restaurant-made) jams/jellies/preserves to use with the toast and such. Today's jam/jelly/preserve was a very good raspberry jam. At first I thought that it was a blueberry-raspberry jam, as I noticed that there was a whole blueberry in my serving. My friendly waitress-server lady person informed me that it was just raspberry jam today and maybe some of the last batch of blueberry jam got mixed in with it. I really didn't care, as it was very good, and blueberry-raspberry jam would have been a great combination, anyway. Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Spinach & Feta Scramble ~ 6.3; "Caffé" Vita (even though we all know very well that it should be "Caffè Vita") some kinda Colombian blend ~ 6.8; homemade (well, restaurant-made) (blueberry-)raspberry jam ~ 7.3 ________________ 1. While I may have enjoyed their Coffee (o Caffè), once again, I really have to complain about the mizpelink of the Italiano word for "Coffee". It should be correctly spelled con l'accento grave, non con l'accento acuto. I don't know why so many places can't get that correct (or as they say in vero Italiano*: correctomundo). Fortunately, Caffé Vita only references the "é" on their shipping packages. It just appears as "Caffe Vita" (which is also incorrect, but at least it's not using il maiale-cane accento francese) throughout most of their website. *(Well, the specific Italian dialect of Fonzarelliano.)
Richmond (District) Coffeehouses ~ Part V (and also Breakfast on Geary [redux, Rabbit], Part XXI)
(No official ~ nor unofficial ~ web-site.) Place: Café Coco Location: 4201 Geary Boulevard (on the corner of 6th Avenue); phonicular contact: (415) 750-1898 Hours: open Monday through Friday at 6:30am; open Saturday and Sunday at 7:30am Meal: Multiseed Bagel with Chèvre[1]and Tomatoes; for breakfastary dessert, (a day-old) cinnamon-walnut-apple-cranberry bun/roll/thing; and a small (12oz) cuppa Peerless Coffee & Tea® (I didn't ask which blend/roast, though)
(Today's EweToobular juxtaselections are because I heard on the house radio/stereo at Café Coco that tomorrow, August 17th, is National Black Cat Appreciation Day. Dammit! These major holidays always tend to sneak up on me. The other two videos are because we all know that every Cat ~ Black, White, Calico, or Other ~ believes he is a true Lion[2] or Tiger at heart.) https://www.aspca.org/blog/celebrate-black-cat-appreciation-day-on-august-17 Continuing the whole Chocolate/Cocoa theme from yesterday, and also continuing with the Richmond (District) Coffeehousesseries, I decided to go to Café Coco this morning. While it is technically within walking distance of my apartment (well, "technically", that is, if you don't mind walking twenty-six blocks there and back), I just drove over there this morning and easily found an empty parking space right next door on Geary Boulevard. This was a bit of a surprise to me: a quick Intro-Net search revealed that there is just one each Peet's Coffee & Tea® and St*rbucks in the Richmond District. I would have thought that there would be at least a few more of each still. I have been to the Peet's Coffee & Tea® on the corner of Geary Boulevard and 16th Avenue (which is actually walkable distance for a lazy person like me) many, many times before and will be including it in this series somewhere along the way (however, I really can't say as much for that "other" place, though). Café Coco has been open now for approximately three years, and right at a 38 Geary bus stop (and, conveniently enough for the local constabulary, just a half-block from the City & County of San Francisco Police Department Richmond Station on 6th Avenue). There are eleven tables for two-to-three people and five seats/stools along the 6th Avenue window side. I particularly liked the design on the backs of all the wooden seats; I want one for myself now.
Café Coco offers several other toppings (along with hummus and that other ubiquitous bagel-topper soft cheese stuff) like cucumbers, lox, peanut butter (very good with a cinnamon-raisin bagel, by the way), sprouts, and avocado. They also have a decent selection of sandwiches (that is, if you wanted a sandwich for breakfast, which I saw a few people were already ordering that early in the morning) that are named after famous writers/authors, such as: Rabelais (salami, arugula, olive puree, pesto, Swiss cheese, prosciutto, ciabatta; which I would have ordered without any of the dead, decaying porky products); Diderot (ciabatta roll, yellow mustard, pickled jalapeños, grilled ham, Gruyère; diderot on the porcine junk); Tolstoy (rye bread, Swiss or Gruyère, arugula or spinach, tuna salad; I would have submarined the dead, decaying fishy-stuff, too); Hugo (Chèvre, grilled "veggies", pesto, crusty white bread, Vegan option); Zola (Mozzarella, tomato, basil, Balsamic vinaigrette, ciabatta); Kafka (grilled Cheddar, Gruyère, or Swiss, whole wheat bread); or Heller (tomato, veganaise, salt, pepper, whole wheat bread).
In my book (which has been pointed out many times before is just a 12-pager colouring type-book; I am almost finished with it now and may need to start another one soon; I know that three years is a pretty long time on one book, but not all of us can be bibliophiles like Mr. Red Kipe) Chèvre (like hummus) is a much better addition to bagels than any plain ol' Philadelphia-brand soft cheese. I was going to go with cucumbers and tomatoes for toppings in addition to the Chèvre, as I felt those would all be nice together. When they brought out the bagel sandwich, it also included capers in it… lots and lots of capers! I hadn't asked for any capers, but, had I known that was an option, I might have done so. It's just a good thing that I like capers. (And "caper", as a verb, goes right along with the whole goaty cheesey stuff, too. Look it up yourself, you buncha lazy etymologists!). I only went with the day-old bun/roll/thing as there were no fresh ones of that sort in the display case. The cranberries are what first caught my eye and I was pleasantly surprised to find that it also had apples in it. For a Chocolate/Cocoa tie-in, I suppose I mighta coulda gotten a Chocolate croissant again, but my choice ended up being a very good decision, anyway. I didn't really feel the need to check out what Café Coco might have to offer in the way of any condimentary supplements. I didn't think I was going to need any of my own hot sauces this morning, either, and didn't bother schlepping any with me even. Does anyone else think that "Black Cat Backgammon Café" would be a cool name for a café/coffeehouse-joint? I only thought of this because of tomorrow's major national holiday and there was a backgammon board in the corner just behind my table this morning. Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Multiseed Bagel with Chèvre and Tomatoes ~ 6.2 (I am giving this an extra 0.2 GBS Points for the surprising ~ and much-welcomed ~ addition of the capers, and especially for the quantity that were added); Coffee ~ 6.5; cinnamon-walnut-apple-cranberry bun/roll/thing ~ 6.6 (and that was for a day-old one; I can only imagine how much better it would have been as a fresher, day-new one); cool Coffee-cup design wooden chairs ~ 7.7 ________________ 1. Stupid, useless cunning linguist pointer of the day, numéro un: "Chèvre" simply means "goat" in French. http://www.cheese.com/chevre/ (And I really hate having to point out once again that Billy-boy and his band of Nazi-spellcheckers at Microsoft do not recognize this type of cheese. The suggestions they are offering: "Cheever", "Chevron"*, "Chives", and a few others. Now, unless the author of "Rabbit, Run" was a Sergeant in the Army and grew wild herbs to feed to his goats before milking them for cheese-production, I really don't care for any of those choices. Perhaps ol' Wild Bill is one of them lactose-intolerant types; in which case, I would like to tell him to "lighten-up" and stop picking on dairy products!) *(At least this word has the same root as Chévre. Look it up yerdamnself!) 2. Stupid, useless cunning linguist pointer of the day, inombolo ezimbili: The original title of the song "the Lion Sleeps Tonight" was "Mbube", which is just the Zulu word for "Lion". And, of course, it was written by some South African guy named Wimo Weh**. **(Nah, not really. It was written by Solomon Popoli Linda. There is really no such Zulu word as "Wimoweh". This was just a mishearing by the Weavers of the chorus of the original song "uyimbube", meaning "he is a lion".)
Man does not live on bread alone... sometimes he needs a good bit o' Chocolate with it, too.
http://www.breadandcocoa.com/ Place: Bread and Cocoa Location: 199 Sutter Street (on the corner of Kearny Street) Hours: open Monday - Friday at 6:30am; and Saturday - Sunday at 8:00am Meal: Haight[1]Sandwich (which would cover the "Bread" part of their name) ~ two eggs, sautéed mushrooms, spinach, & white Cheddar, served on toasted focaccia[1] or multigrain bread; and a large (16oz.) cuppa (more like a small bowla) Rich Hot Chocolate~ prepared using our signature dark Chocolate ganache[1] (which covered the other part of their name)
(There were really only a few good choices that I could come up with for the first part of the restaurant's name for a EweToobular juxtaselection. As for the second part of the name, does anyone really need to hear Tay Zonday[1] ever again?) When you can hear your stomach wamble[1] over the normal cacophony of a noisy, crowded municipal bus, it's always best to head straight to your dining destination. My wambling destination (via the normal cacophonous din of MUNI Line 38) this morning happened to be Bread and Cocoa. It was a pretty busy little place first thing on a Saturday morning (mostly because there really isn't much else in the area that opens that early for any sort of breakfast stuff ~ St*rbucks and the like don't really count). There was lots of indoor seating; plus, there were three round tables on the Sutter Street sidewalk that could accommodate two to three people (two much more comfortably). The breakfast fare that is offered on their menu is really pretty decent for "A Natural Café" (the actual wording on their signage). Some of the other "natural" ideas that I was looking at: Sonoma Sandwich (two eggs, slow roasted tomato, applewood[1] smoked bacon, Tillamook Cheddar; which I would have ordered without the dead, decaying porky bits, of course); Toscana Sandwich (two eggs, Italian sausage, roasted tomato, caramelized onions, Provolone cheese; ditto on the putrid porcine stuff); or Breakfast Frittata (egg, Fontina[1] cheese, asparagus, leeks, and shiitake mushrooms; served with fresh fruit or Cajun Potatoes and toast; I would have gone with this choice normally, but I wanted to keep to the "Bread" and "Cocoa" theme as best as possible).
(I think they were attempting one of those fancy-schmancy foamed milk designs there.) This had to be much larger than the 16oz cuppa they say it was supposed to be. It was all very tasty, too. I also happened to notice that the Coffee brand that they serve was Mr. Esppresso®, which I have had many times before and know to be a decent local roastery.
I liked my choice of multigrain bread for this sandwich. I probably would have gone with Focaccia as my preference if I had ordered either the Sonoma Sandwich or Toscana Sandwich, as that probably would have paired much better with those ingredients. This was much better than any pedestrian breakfastary sandwich that you might get at Ronald's RainbowRoom. It wasn't an awful lot of food, though, and I probably shoulda ordered a side of the Cajun Potatoes, too (besides, potatoes are always great with every breakfast). For condimentary supplementation, Bread and Cocoa offered Tabasco®Brand Hot Sauce (both Original Red Sauce and Green Jalapeño Sauce). I used some of my own Lucky DogMedium Fire-Roasted Pepper Sauce (Thanks, Brian!) on the sandwich. I figured the hot Chocolate was fine on its own (but, maybe, if I had just had some chipotle hot sauce with me…) I will have to get back there again one of these days for the Breakfast Frittata. Plus, this place deserves checking out for lunch some day, too. Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Haight Sandwich ~ 6.3; Rich Hot Chocolate~ 6.6 ________________ 1. All of these are common, everyday words that are seemingly unrecognized by Wild Bill Gates and his troupe of Braunhemden Spell-checkering Nazi-boys at Microsoft.
(No official web-site. Yet?) Place: Buttermilk ~ Southern Kitchen Location: 2848 23rd Street (on the corner of Bryant Street) Hours: open for "Brunch" at 10:00am weekends Meal: breakfast vegetarian griddle cake ~ buckwheat griddle cake (Nu?! You were expecting maybe buttermilk pancakes?), poached egg, black eyed pea ragu, tomato confit, sauteed collards, green garlic, sour cream, and cornbread; a side of house pickles; a glassa lemonade; and, beforehand, for a pre-breakfast dessert, an apricot cardamomdoughnut from dynamo donut + coffee and a small cuppa (hot) Gingersnap at Philz Coffee (the original one on 24th Street, en el corazón de la Misión) http://dynamodonut.com/ http://www.philzcoffee.com/
(Well, both Jackson Browne and the Eagles got their starts in "Southern" California, so that is a good enough EweToobular juxtaselection for me. And for a little side-note, on my way out to Monterey, California for Intermediate Russkij training at Defense Language Institute, Presidio of Monterey, we made a stop in Winslow, Arizona for the night ~ it was Hallowe'en 1982 ~ and we made sure to stand on a corner while there. Unfortunately, no girls in flatbed Fords slowed down to take a look at me… heck, no one in Chevys or Dodges did either.) Buttermilk ~ Southern Kitchen has only been open for about four to five months now (since late April). They are located in an old space that used to be a laundromat (lavandería). I bet they mighta coulda maybe called the joint "the Mission Laundry" or "La Lavandería Mexicana" (but I am sure that those snooty, Frenchy bastages up in Yountville might have something to say about that). As could be expected, the place is typical laundromat-sized and has seating of seven tables for four, seven tables for two, and one large table right inside the front door for eight people (which could always be split in half for two more tables of four if needed, I suppose). Plus, outside, along the Bryant Street sidewalk, there are five to six more tables for four.
(The Wall of Fame of Pickles.)
There really were only a few other good ideas on the menu for stupid vegetarians (in the South, they call you a "vegetarian" if you order a side salad with your meal). There was either veggie omelet (beech mushrooms, okra, asparagus, bell peppers, pimento cheese, with roasted potatoes on the side; and despite its odious name, I almost went with that choice due to the asparagus and okra, both of which are two of my favourite "veggies") or baked french toast (which I would have had to order with some kinda side dish like whipped sweet potatoes with brown sugar and goat cheese or house picklesthat I had today).
This came with two poached eggs and two griddle cakes (they have both in the singular on the menu). The menu stated that it had sautéed collards in it (which was one of the reasons I went with this choice; I love collard greens), but I really didn't notice any in the dish. It really didn't end up mattering as, in place of that, it had lots of asparagus, mange-tout (that would be "snow peas" to those of you not from England or France), and cauliflower in it instead, which more than makes up for any lack of collard greens in my book. I asked my waiter-server dude what kind of flour the griddle cakes were made with and he said they were gluten-free and made with something that sounded like "suka meal". Now, I did a quick Google-search and couldn't find anything that referenced "suka" or "souka" (maybe the guy was Russian and was just insulting me[1]). I liked that the lemonade came in a glass jar/mug thing with a handle (and extra added bonus points for coming with a bendy straw). I asked what they had to offer in the way of condimentary supplements and they said they only had Crystal®Louisiana’s Pure Hot Sauce. I probably didn't really need to accessorize in any culinaristic way, but I had brought my own Palo Alto Firefighters Pepper Sauce(Thanks, Amys and Brian!) with me and used some (well, a lot, actually) on top of one of the poached eggs. I loaned it out to a guy at the next table and he also really liked it. Plus, one of the other waiter-server-type guys tried it and said it really was pretty good, too. I have had many of the doughnuts from dynamo donut + coffee already and there were several other good choices this morning (e.g.strawberry earl grey, passion fruit milk chocolate, caramel apple, chocolate rose, or caramel de sel). However, much like asparagus trumps collard greens, anything with cardamom trumps just about anything else with me. Normally, Philz Coffee has the Gingersnap as an iced Coffee entry, but I have found it makes an excellent hot Coffee, too. Of course, with the above doughnut, it ended up being a bit of a sugar-rush just before breakfast ("Brunch", whatever) and I was glad to go with something savoury there. If Humphry Slocombe had been open early enough after I had finished eating, I coulda made it a Breakfastary Perfecta with: Breakfast ("Brunch", whatever), Coffee, Doughnuts, and Ice Cream. the Wild Parrots of San Francisco Interlude On the way back to my car after breakfast ("Brunch", whatever), I saw two pairs of the Wild Parrotsflying overhead. I suppose that small amount wouldn't exactly be considered a "Pandemonium of Parrots", but just more of a "Minor Infraction of Parrots". All in all, today's entire breakfast (including the pre-breakfast dessert and Coffee beforehand) was a very good experience. Even though Buttermilk ~ Southern Kitchen doesn't open until 10:00am (and for a meal which they call "Brunch"), I really liked this meal today and can definitely recommend it to anyone; of course, it will probably be another year or more before I ever get back there again. Glen Bacon Scale Rating: breakfast vegetarian griddle cake ~ 7.4 (this received an extra 0.1 GBS points for having the good sense to not call it a "brunch" "veggie" griddle cake); house pickles~ 6.6; apricot cardamomdoughnut ~ 7.5; Gingersnap ~ 7.3; the Wild Parrots of San Francisco ~ 8.5 ________________ 1. Stupid, useless cunning linguist pointer of the day: In Russkij (and some other Slavic languages), the phrase "son of a bitch" is "Сукин сын/(Sukin syn)". This is a pretty literal translation, as the word for a "female dog" in Russkij is "сука/(suka)" and the word for "son" is "сын/(syn)".
Richmond (District) Coffeehouses ~ Part the Fourth
http://www.bazaarcafe.com/ Place: Bazaar Café Location: 5927 California Street (between 21st and 22nd Avenues) Hours: open every day at 9:00am Meal: Bagel w/ Hummus & Tomato~ (Do I really need to go into the specifics for this one?); for breakfastary dessert, a slice of peach pie; and a medium cuppa whatever the (coffee)house Coffee was
(I couldn't think of a more "bazaar" EweToobular duo than these two. [They just also happened to be playing this old song and other coffeehouse standards on the (coffee)house stereo this morning.]) If I had any actual ratiocinative sense, I probably shoulda started this whole Richmond District Coffeehouses Series by going from East (that would be Arguello Boulevard) to West (that would be the Pacific Ocean, or the Great Highway) and from North (basically Lake Street) to South (Fulton Street, along Golden Gate Park). I really don't think that there are any coffeehouses along Lake Street (and no dives[1], either). I do know that there are several coffeehouses along California Street and probably twice that amount (is twice "several" ~ "fourteeral"?) on Clement Street. As it is, I am just going willy-nilly (basically wherever my imagination will-nill take me) hither and thither (Hither Avenue is just west of Arguello Boulevard and Thither Street is just a few blocks north of Fulton Street). Luckily, Bazaar Café is located within walkable distance (well, about thirteen or double-several streets away from my place), so there wasn't too much willy-nilly, hithering-thithering going on. It is a normal-enough-sized coffeehouse place. There are several tables and chairs and a couch or two; plus, they have a backyard garden-patio area (for days ~ unlike this morning ~ when it ain't quite so foggy and overcast). They also have live music performing there a few nights a week.
I sat at a cool table with a Triceratops lamp. This was also just below a shelf of toys for kids to play with. (Okay, I did take down one of the Killer Whales and one of the Porpoises(?) and made them battle for the last bite of peach pie: Porpoise - 1, Killer Whale - 0. Ha!) And like La Promenade Café last week, they also have a bookshelf in one corner where there are books for sale at $5.00 each. This is also the same corner where they have shelves with several more toys for kids to play with and several board games for older-type kids to play with, too.
Their bathroom (W.C., loo, das Klo, etc.) door was a cunning linguist smörgåsbord (if cunning linguists ate buffets off bathroom doors, that is [which is pretty gross if you ask me, but I know many old 208's that are fond of saying that they "eat their dead"; so, there is that]) of information. I recognized several of the languages: "Toilettes" (Français); "Zu Den Toiletten" (Deutsch); "Caballeros" y "Damas" (Español); "Homens" e "Senhoras" (Português); and "Женски/(Zhenski)" и "Mушки/(Mushki)" (Српски, which they have on there twice). There are few others at which I can make an educated (well, Defense Language Institute-educated) guess for the specific languages: Arabic, Hebrew, Korean, and Thai. Like a lot of smaller coffeehouses, they have a minimal breakfast menu (my criteria for any of these places in this series is that they must have something to eat on their menus, be it just bagels or pastries), but there were a few other ideas that I could have chosen: Egg 'n' Bagel with Cheese (which, I assume, is just what it sounds like); Veggie Bagel (I didn't ask what that one included, but there is that odious "Veggie" moniker once again); and three different types of Vegetarian (which is how they specify them on the menu-board, not "Veggie", thankfully) Quiches: Artichoke Greek, Mushroom Chard, or "the Vile Weed" Cheddar (the first two of which sounded good, at least; what did poor ol' Cheddar ever do to be paired up with that one?!).
I chose a sesame bagel once again, because sesame and hummus are a great duo (much like little Robbie Zimmerman and J.R. Cash above); however, I forgot to ask from where they procured their bagels. This was a very good hummus. It had specks of green-stuff all throughout it; so, I had to ask if it was homemade (coffeehouse-made, whatever). The counter-lady person told me they get it from some place called Aunt Nettie's[2]. She told me that the verdancy was probably due to parsley and green onions in it. The hummus came in a small paper cup on the side so that you can put as much or as little (I went with "as much" and used the entire thing up, of course) as you like on the bagel halves. The peach pie was okay (good, but I've had better), and I really shoulda went with a piece of the cherry pie in the display counter; cherry pie is always the best, and I will almost invariably choose that one over most other pies. When I asked what brand of Coffee they served, the counter-lady person said she didn't know exactly, but it was some kinda special blend of dark roast that the owner had come up with. So, for the sake of clarity, I am calling it Bazaar Café Dark Roast Blend. It was good and strong, and the best part of the breakfast, too. Once again, I really didn't bother to ask what they may have had to offer for condimentary supplementation. So I just went with some of my own Fat Cat®Chairman Meow's Revenge (Scorpion Pepper Sauce) (Thanks, Greg & Cindy!) on one half of the bagel on top of some hummus. Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Bagel w/ Hummus & Tomato~ 6.2 (I am giving them an extra 0.2 GBS points for the good hummus); peach pie ~ 6.3; Bazaar Café Dark Roast Blend ~ 6.9 ________________ 1. Which was really just a quick plug for this new-ish band that I enjoy:
2. A quick Google-search showed they are some kinda bakery place out of Santa Cruz (the city along the California Pacific Coast, not the more popular municipality in the archipelago of Cabo Verdein the Atlantic Ocean). I can only assume the peach pie was also from the same place.
(No official web-site. 3717 Balboa Street ~ between 38th and 39th Avenues; phonicular contact: 415-379-6468) Place: La PROMENADE Café Location: 3634 Balboa Street (between 37th and 38th Avenues) Hours: open Monday to Friday at 7:00am, Saturday and Sunday at 7:30am Meal: Tuscany Bagel ~ sun dried tomato and cream cheese; a medium cuppa allegro®COFFEE Blend No. 4; and for breakfastary dessert, Bob's Lemon-Blueberry Scone from Nibs Bakery & Café http://www.allegrocoffee.com/ Today was Day Two of the 50¢ Tour of San Francisco for Ed and Janan (and I would just like to point out that neither of the two have ponied-up the two bits yet; heck, they haven’t even donkeyed-down any coins). Today's itinerary ended up being: Sausalito for Lunch (Scoma's) and Ice Cream (Lappert's), and then Golden Gate Park (to include: Raccoon Island, the Bison Paddock, and Stow Lake) in the afternoon; however, we never got around to checking out either Japantown, nor Haight-Ashbury. As such, this was a good opportunity to do another 'blog-entry for the Richmond (District) Coffeehouses Series in the morning, before I had to meet up with them. La PROMENADE Café is even larger than it's older sister Café ENCHANTE (see Saturday's 'blog-entry; if you are too lazy to look it up, I am too lazy to provide a hyperlink-thing), and probably twice as large as any stupid St*rbucks dive. It is located in the old Zephyr Café location (and this came in handy as I needed to catch up on some laundry this weekend and there is a decent wash-o-mat just in the next block of Balboa Street). I think they have been (re)open for just over a year now. I like some of the new interactive activities that they have added. Tuesday night is Game Night (featuring many of the old board games we all loved to play when we were growing up to waste our spare time; of course, that was long before the advent of video games or defacedbook) and (sometimes) Friday night has a Jazz Night with live music.
Like Café ENCHANTE, they also have Paris (the lesser-known one in France, not the much more popular city in Texas) street scenes painted on a few of the walls.
They even have a bookshelf that covers the entire back wall. So, even if you don't drink Coffee, you can always peruse the shelves while other normal people do enjoy their cuppas. All of the used (there may have been some new ones, too) books are for sale at $5.00 (so, basically, the cost of an over-priced, fancy-schmancy kinda Coffee at that St*rbucks joint), which is really quite reasonable.
I went with an onion bagel as the base for this sandwich, which I felt was a good pairing/choice. The bagel-sandwich had a nice amount of sliced up sundried tomatoes in it, which is always a good thing. Other than that, it wasn't really anything extraordinary that I couldn't have prepared at home myself (well, if I ever had bagels… or cream cheese… or sundried tomatoes in my kitchen, that is). The same as yesterday, I really didn't bother to ask what kind of condimentary supplements they might have had to offer. I used a little of my own El Yucateco® XXXtra Hot SauceSalsa Kutbil-ik® deChile Habanero (Thanks, Brian!) on just one half of the bagel sandwich. (There is no photo of the scone. It was a triangular baked-good looking thing. Just use your imaginations.) This morning ended up being a breakfastary two-fer. While finishing up my laundry detail, I figured I would pop-in next door to Nibs Bakery & Café (see last 'blog-entry from April 18th, 2010). The scone was great as always; it was still warm outta the oven, with lots of plump, fresh (and, as I was informed, in-season) blueberries and a nice lemon sugar-glaze on top. The key to the perfect scone is not to make it as hard as a rock and as dry as dirt; and these guys make them correctly. The outer shell is crunchy, but the inside remains nice and moist and fluffy (just as they are supposed to be made in that Ol' Blighty[1] place). "Wash Day tomorrow. Nothing clean, right?!" "Nothing clean, right… Your scones, give them to me… now!" Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Tuscany Bagel ~ 6.0; allegro®COFFEE Blend No. 4 ~ 6.5; Bob's Lemon-Blueberry Scone ~ 7.2 ________________ 1. Stupid, useless cunning linguist pointer of the day (that I bet not many Ol' Blighters are even aware of its origin): "Blighty" derives from the Hindi word "bilāyati", which means "foreign land" (and, in this case, specifically Eng-foreign-land).
Richmond (District) Coffeehouses ~ Deuxième Partie (et aussiBreakfast on Geary[redux],Vingtième Partie)
(No official web-site.) Place: Café ENCHANTE[1] Location: 6157 Geary Boulevard (on the corner of 26th Avenue); phonicular contact: (415) 500-3345 Hours: open Monday through Friday at 6:00am, Saturday and Sunday at 7:00am Meal: Hummus Veggie Bagel ~ hummus, cucumbers, and sprouts; for breakfastary dessert, three (drei) mini-strudel (Mini-Strudel): Chocolate (Schokolade), Apple (Apfel), and (und) Raspberry (Himbeere); and a cuppa La Colombe Torrefaction Pacific Blend, Dark Roast http://www.lacolombe.com/
(What other EweToobular juxtaselection would you expect to go avec un café français 'blog-entry?) Today seemed like another good excuse to add to the Richmond (District) Coffeehouses Series, as I have some friends in town from Chania (the one in Crete, not the more famous one in Arkansas) and didn't have a lot of time to waste on breakfast this morning, because we had a full day of tourista activities planned. (Hey, Ed and Janan!) The next closest coffeehouse to my apartment happens to be Café ENCHANTE (at only six blocks away ~ downhill, but which seems more like ten blocks away back uphill) and I figured I should check them out for breakfast and not just their Coffee (see previous 'blog-entry from May 7th, 2012) for a change. This place is pretty large(-ish) for just a nebby coffeehouse, and it is about one-and-a half times the size of one of your normal St*rbucks dives. There are lots of tables at which to sit and several couches and comfy chairs in which to lounge (and steal free Wi-Fi if you want, too).
There are French/Paris street scenes painted on some of the walls (and that is a working clock, by the way; at first, I just thought it was part of the wall painting, but then I noticed that it was keeping the correct time). Plus, there is an actual working fountain (well, it wasn't turned on yet for the morning) indoors. There is a (newer) sister coffeehouse (which is also in my neighborhood) called La Promenade Café (which does have its own official web-site) that I will be 'blog-entering about in the future (tomorrow, perhaps). http://www.lapromenadecafe.com/ There were several other bagel-type ideas from which to choose: Le Mediterranean Bagel (cream cheese, tomato, and avocado; however, if you ask me, none of those ingredients are remotely of "Mediterranean" origin in the least); Veggie Breakfast Bagel (egg, cheese, and tomato); Le Jardin[2]Bagel (cream cheese, onion, tomato, sprouts, and garlic); Enchante Bagel (cream cheese, turkey, green apple, and cranberry sauce; which I would have ordered sans les galliformes morts en décompostition).
(Do not adjust your computer sets; this photo is not out of focus. I just used the French Impressionist setting on my camera to get the whole frenchified atmosphere experience.) I went with a sesame (sésame) bagel for the basis of the sandwich; they had several other types from which to choose, but I figured hummus and sesame are always a good combination. There really isn't much to say about this one, it was a sesame bagel sandwich with hummus, cucumber slices, and sprouts in it ~ so it was pretty much what I had expected. I don't know if their hummus was homemade (coffeehouse-made, whatever), but it wasn't nearly as good as the stuff at Simple Pleasures Cafe (see previous 'blog-entry from March 15th, 2010), which I know is homemade (coffeehouse-made, whatever). I don't know why they don't just call it "Hummus-Cucumber-Sprouts Bagel"; this whole "Veggie" moniker has always bugged me. Of the three mini-strudels, I liked the Raspberry best. I think that if they had been heated, it would have been a little better, too. Once again, I really didn't bother to ask what Café ENCHANTE had to offer in the way of condimentary supplementation. I just went with some of my own Hot LicksSerranoHot Sauce (Thanks, Brian!) on one half of the bagel sandwich thing. For their Coffee selection, they also offer a Light Roast, a Medium Roast, a Hazelnut, and a French Vanilla (and a decaf, but we don't really need to speak about that), which they have ready to dispense at several large thermos things in the front. They don't offer free refillas, but at only 85¢ a refilla, that is still a pretty good deal (and I really didn't need a refilla this morning, anyway). If I hadn't just bought a new bag of Coffee last weekend already at the last coffeehouse joint, I might have picked up one of the bags (12oz?) that they sell at the front counter. ♪ "I can't get no… Torrefaction!" ♪ Glen Bacon Scale Rating: Hummus Veggie Bagel ~ 6.0; Strudel (cumulatively) ~ 6.4; La Colombe Torrefaction Pacific Blend, Dark Roast ~ 6.7 ________________ 1. As was pointed out in the previous 'blog-entry, for some reason they have no problem avec cet accent aigu on "Café", but they don't want to acknowledge it on "ENCHANTÉ". 2. Stupid, useless cunning linguist pointer of the day: This is not named after one of the founding members of the Beach Boys. "Jardin" in French simply means "garden", Al.
