When the ancient Polynesians invented surfing, they often used a paddle to help them navigate. Fast-forward a few millennia, and Stand-Up Paddleboarding, or SUP, finds itself trendy again. Part of its increasing popularity is that standing upright allows surfers to spot waves more easily and thus catch more of them, multiplying the fun factor. Paddling back to the wave becomes less of a strain as well. The ability to cruise along on flat inland water, surveying the sights, is another advantage. Finally, it’s a good core workout. If you’re sold on the idea, schedule an intro SUP lesson, free with board and paddle rental, and you may find yourself riding the waves like a Polynesian king.More
Many of us remember coming home from our elementary schools with freshly glazed pinchpots, cups, or whatever else our young imaginations could conjure up. Saturday mornings at the Randall Museum can bring that memory back, or create a new one for the youngsters. Ceramics make great gifts — especially on Mothers' and Fathers' Day. Hop on board for the Randall's once-weekly class, and for $6 and two weeks to have your work fired and glazed, you'll have all the materials you need.More
December is almost over - the New Year is coming up and everyone is busy drying off from the rain or holiday shopping. Let's take a look at what's happened this month.
Of all the pizzas made in North Beach, perhaps none are made as fondly (or with as much flair) as those of pizza maestro Tony Gemignani, owner of Tony's Pizza Napoletana and recent top dog of the World Pizza Championships in Italy.
The immortal moment came decades ago: a long-suffering fan already, at 8 years old, slumped against a rail at the ballpark for what could be the last time, defeated on the field and off of it, where the Giants were planning to possibly decamp from Candlestick Park to Florida.
Today at Grist, Bonnie Azab Powell considers the legal heat the National Pork Board is bringing against the website ThinkGeek for canned unicorn meat.
That's right: unicorn meat.
Back on April Fool's Day, the smartassy site offered readers a fake ad for the sparkly delicacy, "Radiant Farms Canned Unicorn Meat" ― which, by the way, Pork Board, in case you're reading, doesn't actually exist. Only ThinkGeek also expropriated the Pork Board's decades'-old tagline, the Other White Meat, for its Spam-like spoof, which it called the new white meat. Now, Big Pork has sent ThinkGeek a 12-page cease-and-desist order.
PostedByTamara Palmer
on Wed, Jun 23, 2010 at 5:23 PM
Ghostshrimp
It's gonna be vicious.
SF Food Wars has declared its next battle to be a deathmatch, with a really long name. (3.14159 Delicious) Pie or Die (ameter) will pit competitors against each other for sweet-leaning pie supremacy. The call for prospective candidates was announced today and the decision for the final lineup of 20 will be made in a few days. This blogger, as always, is one of the guest judges, and we hope to see a nice balance of innovative new ideas and straight-up classics.
Get your trigger fingers ready if you're interested in attending; the last one sold out all 200 tickets three minutes after the noon on-sale time.
SF Food Wars: (3.14159 Delicious) Pie or Die (ameter)
PostedByBrian Yaeger
on Wed, Jun 23, 2010 at 5:17 PM
John Birdsall
Ryan Farr.
Tomorrow, CUESA is igniting summer in fine form by throwing a sustainable sausage fest, featuring wieners prepared by seven area butchers and pairing them with all seven members of the San Francisco Brewers Guild. For the price of admission ($30), attendees receive a mini sausage prepared by each chef and a sample from each city-based brewer. Additionally, there will be an "Ask the Butcher" booth with Dave "the Butcher" Budworth of Avedano's and Marina Meats, and an "Ask the Rancher" booth with Doug Stonebreaker from Prather Ranch. So bring all your sausage-related questions, and possibly your favorite condiments, since there's no word on whether the event is BYO sauerkraut. But for thirty bucks, that's unlikely.
Clones, leathermen, bears: The Castro's long been known as a neighborhood of self-expression, not culinary revelation. Last year, that began to change. How to navigate the ultimate gayborhood's new edible landscape? As a nod to S.F. Pride Week, we're cruising the Castro's newest hot spots and longtime favorites.
Saturday mornings, Castro Tarts attracts grumpy retail boys in sunglasses getting takeout clamshells of eggs to eat en route to H&M or Banana, portly guys from the neighborhood poring over the Chron with lattes, and whoever else happens to be up on Castro Street at 8:30.
Owner Raymond ― that's the only name he'd give us ― offers up a modern take on the Chinese-American diner, only Raymond, we have to assume, is from Vietnam. That means pho and banh mi (on house-baked rolls that look like the hoagie equivalent of the brioche wrapped around pigs in blankets) along with whitebread-style sandwiches and eggy breakfasts.
You can get enormous flabby croissants (Omnivore Books owner Cecilia Sack swears they're the best in the city) that, if you take them to go, fill your car with the most amazing scent of butter. You can get New Orleans-style Vietnamese coffee made from chicory-laced Café du Monde grounds, and good, strong house coffee brewed from oak-roasted Mr. Espresso.
The truck made its debut last Saturday at Fort Mason Pavilion.
Last Saturday's Bay Area Derby Girls throwdown at Fort Mason Pavilion saw more than S.F.'s ShEvil Dead kick ass on the Santa Cruz Boardwalk Bombshells. It also unleashed Senor Sisig, a Filipino taco truck making its soft-open debut.
S.F. native Evan Kidera, 27, launched the truck with high school buddy Gil Payumo, 29, a CCA graduate currently cooking at the Marriott. Senor Sisig is a couple of years in the making, says Kidera, who ― like a lot of aspiring truck vendors ― caught fire from L.A.'s Kogi. "I thought, This was amazing, but I didn't really want to do Korean tacos," says Kidera, who's Japanese American. "I thought, What else can I do?" The answer: Filipino.
Kidera enlisted Payumo, who is Filipino. They acquired a second-hand taco truck at the beginning of the year (gotta love Craigslist), replaced the vending windows, had it painted and decaled. Unlike Hapa SF, which does contemporary versions of Filipino dishes, Senor Sisig skews street food: tacos, burritos, nachos, and rice plates, all starring sisig. Well, some heavily adapted version of sisig, a dish traditionally made of fried-up boiled bits from a pig's head.
Social Kitchen's loco moco burger is the rare dish that delivers as much pleasure as the house brews.
The local food press ― us included ― logs the odd story about beer sommeliers and prix-fixe suds dinners, but really, how many S.F. eateries are committing their beverage programs to craft brews? Today in SF Weekly, food critic Jonathan Kauffman focuses on two recent specimens, Traci Des Jardins' Public House at AT&T Park, and Social Kitchen and Brewery at Ninth and Irving. Both places are serious as a beer geek about what's on tap, but when it comes to the food. Well, maybe if you down enough IPAs, you won't notice the lackluster plates in front of you.
At Public House, Kauffman finds a whiff of cynicism in the offerings at the former Acme Chophouse, as if Des Jardins had decided that, if San Francisco didn't want an earnestly sustainable steakhouse, she'd sling jalapeño poppers and mini corn dogs instead. And across town at Social Kitchen, chef Rob Lam's clunky gray-brown starches are no match for brewmaster Rich Higgins' lithe, sophisticated beers.
Drink in the details at SFWeekly.com; meantime, enjoy a tasting in our extended excerpt (after the jump).
PostedByAndy Wright
on Wed, Jun 23, 2010 at 12:03 PM
Thank you, Japan, for consistently bringing the crazy in your animated entertainment. I'm not sure what is more disturbing in the above clip in which a group of vegetables decide to cook themselves. Is it the part where the potato calls his frightened carrot friend "weak" and then proceeds to peel himself? Or the part where the sobbing carrot has to push his (NEWLY BLINDED) potato friend into a pot of boiling water? You be the judge. Video after the jump. (Via John Biggs)
Yesterday, SFoodie received, via Twitter, the best restaurant-recommendation request we've ever fielded. From EB:
My cousin in the navy just docked here. I need to find a place for dinner for me and 5 sailors. Any suggestions? #notjoescrabshack
The mind reels. I e-mailed EB for more specifics, and she said she had arranged to take the guys to Puccini & Pinetti last night, and wanted something tonight in the same price range. Oh, and she had convinced them to wear their sailors' whites tonight.
PostedByBrian Yaeger
on Wed, Jun 23, 2010 at 10:03 AM
There, on the bottom right corner of the official Pride website, four tiny, alternating ads flash that link to corporate sponsors, each with a tagline that winks to their support of the LGBT community. Anheuser-Busch, a corporation that pulls in almost $37 billion in sales by virtue of controlling roughly half of the entire beer market (and that's just for America), encourages gays and lesbians to "be yourself."
In contrast, when the Teamsters started boycotting Coors in 1973 over labor disputes, they reached out to minorities including homosexuals, enlisting the aid of community organizer Harvey Milk. The official boycott is over, but the damage has yet to be repaired.
There was actually a PR effort to mend the hurt feelings between Adolph Coors Co. and the LGBT community when Scott Coors ― an actual gay Coors, akin to Dick Cheney's lesbian daughter, Mary ― launched a charm offensive, but the family's ties to ultraconservative organizations such as the Heritage Foundation meant that those efforts have not been fruitful. Good luck trying to find Coors Light on tap anywhere in the Castro.
A summary of the past 24 hours of rumor, innuendo,
and straight-up facts about San Francisco restaurant openings and
closings.
Marcia G. of Tablehopper has a couple of bits of good news. Number one: Brenda's French Soul Food is preparing to expand by renovating the laundromat next door ― which is four times bigger than her present space ― without losing a day of business. Ms. G. also pounced on an announcement that Kyle Anderson is opening a bistro in Berkeley named Slow (1966 University Ave., Berkeley, 510-647-3663) in July. The pitch: Chef who trained under Daniel Bolud & Charlie Trotter opening 30-seat resto with big back patio, $12 dinner entrees. If you can't guess what the chef's philosophy behind the food is, well, there's just no hope for you.
Sub Pop recording artists 'clipping.' brought their brand of noise-driven experimental hip hop to the closing night of 2016's San Francisco Electronic Music Fest this past Sunday. The packed Brava Theater hosted an initially seated crowd that ended the night jumping and dancing against the front of the stage. The trio performed a set focused on their recently released Sci-Fi Horror concept album, 'Splendor & Misery', then delved into their dancier and more aggressive back catalogue, and recent single 'Wriggle'.
Opening performances included local experimental electronic duo 'Tujurikkuja' and computer music artist 'Madalyn Merkey.'"
