Remember when the blocks surrounding City Hall were just a joyless bureaucratic wasteland and you had to walk to Hayes Valley to eat after dark? The Empire Room is rocking it on Golden Gate Ave., and now
Fine & Rare is opening a permanent location right next door, in the space where Jeremiah Tower’s Stars once stood. The target date is July 15 and, if Instagram tells the truth, they're in the "
choosing enamelware" phase.
Having outgrown Northeast-by-way-of-the-South seafood stall in
The Hall at 1028 Market — a project which incidentally also happened to be their baby — co-founders Scott Peterson and Ted Wilson’s 35-seat dining room will be open for lunch (11 a.m. - 3 p.m.) and dinner (5-9 p.m.) on weekdays, offering comfort foods and upscale fare like Crab Louie and a San Francisco cheese steak made with grass-fed bavette steak, Fiscalini cheese and chimichurri sauce, plus the beer battered fish ‘n’ hush puppies their fans love from the Hall and from Off the Grid (where they will continue service).
And in the great synergistic tradition of Rosamunde-Toronado and El Amigo-Emmy’s Spaghetti Shack 1.0, after 9 p.m., you’ll be able to order Fine & Rare’s bar bites from the Empire Room. But we’re most excited for some of that king salmon pastrami Reuben.
Fine & Rare,
555 Golden Gate Ave.
