Culinary Muse

ON THE ROAD TO MONTEREY, PART TWO: TusCA

TusCA - Tuscan California Cuisine- is the HYATT REGENCY MONTEREY new restaurant (as of February 2007). A great concept well executed. The menu’s inspiration is Tuscany using California’s amazing food resources. And is there any more bountiful location in the state of California than the Monterey area? Nearby Castroville is the Artichoke Capital of the World and the Salinas Valley is the ‘Salad Bowl of the World’ as my sixth grade California geography teacher told us. The Pacific Ocean is within walking distance. And fresh tomatoes are at the height of their season.

Before I continue with this story I should let you know that this has been a tough month for the Culinary Muse. I managed to get through cooking school without anyone learning my secret. I HATE fresh tomatoes. Cooked tomatoes in any form are fine. It’s the fresh ones I despise. Never let anyone in cooking school know your weakness or sooner than you can say ‘I’m a vegetarian’ they will have you butchering piglets. While my ordeal this month may not seem that bad to some, it is still difficult to be a gracious guest when presented with a food you abhor especially for someone like me whose middle name is ‘Gracious Guest’. So far this month I have let a tomato granita melt into a pool of liquid while I picked off the garnish of jalapeno slices. I have closed my eyes and swallowed baby tomatoes whole. How much longer could my luck hold out and when was this tomato season going to be over, anyway? Tonight’s charming waitress presented a beautiful salad, composed of many tomato slices, in front of me. It was a gift from the chef. There was going to be no swallowing these whole. I picked off the micro greens. I watched Mr. Muse devour his tomatoes hoping he would have mercy on me and eat mine. No luck. When the waitress returned I started apologizing as fast as I could. I begged her not to tell the chef. But before she could clear the plates, Chef de Cuisine Neil Dunn came over to our table to ask how we enjoyed the salad. Busted. Luckily he is an affable fellow. I confessed. He forgave and we moved on to the rest of our dinner.

GREAT CHINESE FOOD: DIM SUM IN OAKLAND

I ate my very first Chinese meal at Ming Tse restaurant in San Leandro on East 14^th Street in 1961. It was a combo plate of three items which included chow mein, deep fried prawns (sweet and sour dipping sauce on the side) and pork fried rice. The egg drop soup was included at no additional charge. The whole meal cost $1.65. By the time I was in high school, this became our weekend hang out. Same meal went up to $3.00. I was spoiled. Chinese food became that delicious treat that also came cheap.

I have eaten in Chinese restaurants all over the Bay Area as the years have passed. From Richmond to Oakland to San Ramon to San Francisco. They always start out great and then something happens. The family sells the business, the chef leaves, the rent gets increased and they have to move on. But somehow I have always managed to have at least one great, inexpensive Chinese restaurant up my sleeve. Unfortunately, the pickings have been slim for the past two years. Especially in the dim sum arena. Until today. I have two friends that I enjoy extravagant dim sum feasts with. One is CC the other is Bonnie. Today Bonnie introduced me to one of the best dim sum places that I have been to in an eternity. GRAND’S GOOD OLD PLACE SEAFOOD TEAHOUSE is in Oakland, a block off of Lake Merritt in the Adam’s Point neighborhood. Or for those of you who grew up in the East Bay, a couple blocks away from Fairyland. We feasted on dim sum and the entire check came to $13.65. Including tea. 391 Grand Avenue, Oakland, 94610, 510.286.9899. Monday through Friday, 10:30 am to 10:00 pm. Saturdays, Sundays, Holidays 9:30 am - 10:00 pm. For those of you who live in downtown Oakland and are always complaining that there is no place to eat, they offer free delivery within five miles for a minimum $20 order. Cash only.

A PIG IN PROVENCE

Enchanting. That is the word to describe dinner at Chez Panisse on Tuesday night. If you don’t believe me, take a look at this picture of Georgeanne Brennan and me taken by Frankie Frankeny. Do I not look like I am under a spell? And it wasn’t because of the bottle of Domain Tempier Bandol Rose either. We were invited by Chronicle Books to celebrate the release of James Beard Award winning cookbook author Georgeanne Brennan's memoir A Pig in Provence  described as a story about ‘good food and simple pleasures in the south of France’. Which pretty much describes our evening in North Berkeley.

The Chez Panisse menu was inspired by the book and read as follows:

Hors d’oeuvre (which included cubes of head cheese that Mr. Muse devoured)

Goat Cheese with Cannard farm salads and herbs (with garlic fried slices of bread)

Bouillabaisse: fish and shellfish soup with fennel and garlic crouton (which was tucked into the soup and spread with a thick layer of rouille)

Spit-roasted Laughing Stock pork loin and braised shoulder with mustard and capers, Chino Ranch vegetables and creamed greens. (We love that the kitchen left a lovely layer of fat on the pork loin and garnished the top with a crispy cube of pork skin)

Page mandarin, Meyer lemon, and blood orange sherbet in citrus cups (meringue was swirled beautifully on to the top of each and then torched ever so slightly)

The food was divine, the service friendly and efficient, the conversation between tables fun and lively. A feeling of bon temps embraced the evening as old friends and colleagues greeted each other with hugs. Even complete strangers began talking to each other as though they had known each other for years. Something was in the air.

We have enjoyed many meals at Chez Panisse. We have celebrated birthdays, anniversaries and graduations in this dining room. They have all been wonderful evenings but this one was perfect. We floated home. The trick with perfect evenings like these is to see how long the spell lasts. And what was it about the evening that was so mesmerizing? Would the book hold the answer? In a word, yes.

I gave myself the gift of uninterrupted time yesterday to enjoy the book from cover to cover. First things first: the book feels great in the hand. It is the perfect size to toss in a beach bag or hand bag or carry-on. The smooth paper cover with an illustration of the iconic Provencal fields of lavender is lovely. The inside white end papers are embossed with bouquets of rosettes reminiscent of wallpaper in 6^th arr. Paris hotel rooms or the inside of an antique bon bon box. Charming.

The story is organized into a series of chapters that each have a theme. Whether it be about goats or pigs or long summer meals, Ms. Brennan is able to convey how that theme has played itself out in her life in Provence. Goats and the making of goat cheese brought her to Provence. Pigs initiated her into the region’s longtime ‘subsistence rituals’. Long summer meals became the ritual of sharing food and connecting with family, old friends and new neighbors.

The stories transported me to Provence. The Provence of both my real experience and the mystical Provence that lives in my imagination. It was the perfect book to read after just finishing the The Omnivore's Dilemma. The rural life of Province is seductive. It is life played out on a human scale. It is a place where daily life is consciously dependant on the farmer and everyone knows who baked their baguette. Isn’t it this tradition of sharing at the table that we are trying to regain in our own lives? Which gets us back to Ms. Brennan’s book and our dinner together. It wasn’t a mysterious spell that was cast across the dining room on Tuesday night. That’s just what it feels like to enjoy well prepared food fresh from the farm, a glass of wine and the company of new and old friends. Sheer magic.

A NOT SO AMUSED MUSE

Dear Restaurant Owner,

I am a disgruntled and miffed customer. Last Friday I enjoyed a late lunch with a business colleague (also in the food biz). We ate at your new restaurant. The lunch itself was just okay but the desserts were amazing. Truly amazing. We asked the waitress if the Pastry Chef was in as we would love to meet him/her and tell them how much we had enjoyed their creations. The lunch rush was over. Of course, said the perky waitress, I will see if he will come out of the kitchen. He did. He should not have. He approached our table and stared at us with disdain. I hardly need to describe him as this look is prevalent among the male kitchen corp: shaved head, smallish thick rimmed black glasses (I would guess ‘Paul Smith’ brand) with a look of contempt and boredom. We attempted, as is expected in our business, to engage him and ask him interesting questions about his desserts, training etc. He would barely mutter his name. He stared at us blankly.  I thought perhaps he couldn't hear us.  It was like watching Helen Mirren in the QUEEN movie chastising Tony Blair in that imperious way that only the English Upper class can carry off.  This continued for such a long time that my business colleague finally said ‘It is clear that you are bored with us, please don’t let us keep you’. Do you have any idea how far she needs to be pushed to say something like this? I mean, the woman is in PR for goodness sakes. She can deal. But, dear Restaurant Owner, this boorish behavior from your Pastry Chef was over the top.

The restaurant business is a hospitality business. This means that restaurant employees should be, at the very least, hospitable. If your Pastry Chef is not someone who wants to come out of the kitchen, that is fine. This needs to be expressed to the wait staff so that they can field requests like ours (which is not so unusual these days) with a polite "no, I am sorry, he is too busy, not here, bashful" or whatever. Unfortunately, the success of a restaurant these days can hinge on not only the talent but also the personality of the chef. That is just the way it is. Do I agree that this is correct? No. We all hope that talent would win out but that is not enough these days to set you apart from the other restaurants. The guest wants to be finessed, acknowledged and well fed. Believe me when I say that I do my best to be a low maintenance guest.  I have managed both the front and back of a restaurant.  I know how tough it is just to keep the food consistent let alone micro manage the personality of the staff.  Just do yourself a favor and keep this guy in the kitchen.

Yours truly,

The Culinary Muse

LA TERRASSE RESTAURANT & BAR OPENS IN THE PRESIDIO

Every so often you want to enjoy a very late lunch that melts into dinner. It is hard to find a restaurant that happily serves lunch after 2:30. And even if you arrive at 2:00 the wait staff stares at you and declares ‘lunch is over at 2:30'. Well, yes, but it is only 2. Then they huff, shrug their shoulders, take you to a table, toss the menu down and practically make you sign a document that says you will eat really fast, and leave a big tip. This happened recently to the Muse at a certain café that I have been frequenting since 1993. I was not amused. But I digress.....

So who will get my afternoon business now? The warm and inviting LA TERRASSE RESTAURANT AND BAR in the Presidio. We rolled in at 2:30 yesterday (lots of parking) and were greeted with smiles and our choice of any table in the house. When I noticed a pair of tipsy Pacific Heights gals finishing off a bottle of champagne I immediately fell in love with the place. I can appreciate any restaurant that hosts this kind of joie de vie in the middle of the afternoon.

And the food? French Bistro fare. We went for the classics. A beautiful butter lettuce salad, steak frites (with the HOTTEST frites I have ever had), and a pan seared chicken breast that was every bit as good as the one at Chez Panisse Café. In the spirit of a classic French bistro, they serve food all day long. The menu changes depending on the time of day but you will not go hungry whatever hour you walk in. And something tells me this is the sort of restaurant that you could order a bottle of champagne at 8 am and they would be delighted to accommodate. The wonderful thing about a bistro is that they are a food oasis for you at almost any hour of the day. We need this in our hectic urban lives. We wish La Terrasse well....

TARTINE COOKBOOK ARRIVES!

There are lots of delicious ways to spend a morning. For some it is remaining in bed with the covers pulled over their head, a loved one snuggled up close. For others it is the morning ritual of coffee making. Pouring the water in the electric kettle and turning it on. Grinding the coffee beans. Putting away the clean dinner dishes while the kettle heats up. For a lucky few it means throwing on a fleece jacket and heading down the street to TARTINE BAKERY. The light streams in the front windows. The counter is brimming full of just out of the oven delicacies. Are the scones out of the oven yet? What about the croissants? Morning buns? A quiet hum pervades. All is good in the world....And if you can’t get to Tartine every morning? The next best thing is TARTINE COOKBOOK just published by Chronicle Books.

WE ARE NOT FRENCH

I know this may come as a complete shock to some of you, but it is true. We are not French. Nor do most of us want to be. We are Californians and more specifically we live in the Bay Area. We are different. We think differently, we eat differently. Our fellow Californians who live just 30 miles north, south and east of us don’t get us. The President of our country never dares to visit. So how can we expect the French to get us? And why, may we ask, do we need them to? Well, we don’t. I understand that a high rating in the Michelin Guide has meant the difference between success and failure for a restaurant. But I am having a hard time believing that it will make much difference to the restaurants we, the people, support night after night after night. My friends that go to Gary Danko’s and La Folie on a regular basis are not going to stop going. A few egos will be bruised for a while. And then one day the chefs will wake up and understand that they are in business because we love them. I am pleased that the Michelin Guide doesn’t quite know what to make of us and the restaurants we love.

A DAY IN BERKELEY

Sometimes I just have to get out of the City but not so far away that I lose sight of the San Francisco skyline. On days like this I head over to Berkeley’s Gourmet Ghetto for shoe shopping, shortbread cookies, lunch and a view with roses.

The only thing better than a good piece of chocolate is a great pair of shoes. First stop: EARTHLY GOODS. Don’t let the Eco-Berkeley name fool you. This is no Earth Mama store. Along with a complete line of Eileen Fischer clothes they carry a great line of authentically reproduced vintage shoes from REMIX VINTAGE SHOES Los Angeles. And darn if those cute black and white spectators didn’t have my name on them. With shopping bag tossed over my arm and new shoes on my feet I walked (strutted actually) over to CESAR for lunch. A cool glass of rose wine, some hot fried potato wedges dusted with cumin seed and a small ramekin of salt cod and potato cazuela (a cod and potato spread) were enough to refuel and launch me on my way to more shopping.

TONY DOES THE TONGA ROOM?

Dear Mr. Prime Minister,

The nice San Francisco police officer in the black flack suit (perfect for this cold and foggy San Francisco evening) just told me that you were dining at the Fairmont this evening. Might I suggest cocktails in the Tonga Room first?  If you make it in before 7 pm you might be able to take advantage of the free hors d'oeuvre.  But, hey, I bet you're on an expense account.  So live it up.  Order the puu-puu platter.  And one of those crazy drinks with 10 different liquors served in a coconut shell.  Please don't let that thunder scare you, or your secret service mates.  It's just the tropical rain storm that passes through, every 20 minutes.  So authentic.  So tropical.

I always feel so safe when folks like you come to town.  After all, who would dare try anything on Nob Hill with all those FBI snipers positioned on our rooftops?

Anyway, have a great time, Mr. Blair.  We hope you packed a coat because summer as we know it has finally arrived.

SIPPING COCKTAILS WHERE NO MAN WOULD HAVE TREAD BEFORE

The Muse turned to Mr. Muse Sunday evening over cocktails at the AMERICANO and said "If someone had told me 20 years ago that I would be sitting outside on the Embarcadero, sipping a cocktail and perusing a bar menu and that the temperature would be 70 degrees at 6 pm in July in San Francisco I would have called them a nut case". Yesterday’s nut case has become today’s prophet.

First, let’s talk about the flora and fauna of the neighborhood. To get an idea of what it looked like in 1968 watch the Steve McQueen movie BULLITT. The flophouse where Bullitt is assigned to protect a witness stood just a few feet away from the HOTEL VITALE. The movie gives you a good idea of what a dark and grimy part of town this was. The Ferry Building was a very scary place. Mr. Muse was once shooting photographs from inside the tower of the Ferry Building and he heard a loud hissing behind him. He turned around to face a cat-sized wharf rat up on its hind legs, baring its teeth. Lovely. Using his tripod to keep the rat with the glowing red eyes at bay, Mr. Muse escaped. Trust me. This was not an area that you would want to hang out in.