More eats

Haven't blogged in a while - too busy at work, too sucky a browser at home (though we're finally upgrading the stuff on my computer)... Got a few more restaurants that I've visited in the last few weeks.

Citrus Club - 1790 Haight (between Cole and Shrader)
Supposed to be healthy because they replace "heavy oils" with "citrus." Not at all sure what that means. A very noodle-devoted place, where basically every dish has noodles of some kind involved. Also a quite inexpensive place, though my bf and I of course both ended up ordering specials which cost closer to $10 instead of $7 like everything else. The food is pretty decent, nothing spectacular. My bf complained his grilled chicken was burnt and the garlic noodles didn't at all taste like garlic, but he still liked it enough to want to go back. My noodle dish had an interesting tamarind sauce - definitely different tasting. Good cheap option. Not a fast one, though, b/c it's a very popular place.

RNM Restaurant - 598 Haight (between Fillmore and Steiner)
Recommended by a friend and independently found on yelp by my bf. It's a semi-upscale "trendy" place in the Lower Haight with a very odd odor around the doorway which we couldn't figure out. When we arrived, the guy asked if we had a reservation and when we said we didn't, spent some time thinking and looking into the restaurant before finally asking if we were ok with sitting at the bar/counter thing along the back of the room. We had no problem with that, and it worked out quite nicely for us. For one thing, it was a nice deep counter with comfortable high chairs, and hooks underneath for my bags, far enough back we didn't kick my stuff all night. For another, as they brought dishes out, they tended to put them down on the counter next to me while they figured out what should go to who, so I got to eye all sorts of dishes as they went by. And lastly, we got nice whiffs of baking dessert, which was really yummy smelling. Unfortunately, it wasn't as yummy-tasting (the dessert) as it smelled - I'm pretty sure what we smelled was the molten chocolate hazelnut cake with espresso creme (or something) with vanilla ice cream. Turned out to be not at all molten, kind of dry chocolate cake with hazelnut overtones. Disappointing, really. The dinners were better - my bf got the pork tenderloins wrapped in pancetta, which were super juicy and yummy but too few - they only gave him 3 little medallions - on a bed of polenta, which he despises. I got halibut baked in parchment paper with string beans and sugar snaps and cherry tomatoes with lemon butter. The halibut was quite good, but I'm not sure baking string beans in there was the best way to cook them, b/c they were quite tough and tasteless. Overall, though, it was a decent dining experience.

Park Chow - 1238 9th Ave (between Irving and Lincoln)
Came here for brunch with a few friends before visiting the SF Botanical Garden. I thought the reviews had said they had waffles - I was a bit disappointed to find their breakfast menu was a little short (pancakes, blueberry pancakes, baguette French toast, some egg/omelet dishes) but happy that they were even serving breakfast food at 12:30 on Labor Day (supposed to be Sat/Sun). My bf got the French toast. I was skeptical of it being made out of baguettes, but it turned out to be pretty good, quite eggy. My blueberry pancakes disappointed me, to be honest - the blueberry sauce on top looked like it had been allowed to dry there for a while before they brought it out, and it just wasn't that good. One of my friends got the ham omelet and seemed to enjoy it. The other got the fish sandwich and I have no idea whether he liked it. The mango-cantaloupe cooler my bf got was not very good - not sure cantaloupe makes the best drink or they didn't make a very good drink out if it. The place was neat, though - we thought it might not be that big but then you go in and up the stairs and there's this whole upper level roof deck-type seating area, only with retractable roof overhead for when it rained. Lots of capacity. The menu looked like it could be interesting. Might be worth trying agin.

San Tung Chinese Restaurant #2 - 1031 Irving St (between 11th and 12th)
Famous for their chicken wings, so of course we had to get some. We got lucky when we came here for lunch on Sunday - there was a line but it moved pretty fast, and we got seated within 20 minutes (I think). I saw a bigger crowd when we left. The "dry" fried chicken wings came coated in sauce, so I'm not quite sure what the dry part was. They were quite yummy. Not necessarily the "best ever" chicken wings I've had but I liked them. The sauce was kind of sweet and tangy, and I rather enjoy battered/fried chicken wings. We also got the pork dumplings, which were fine (I'm not the biggest connoiseur of dumplings - as long as they taste reasonably good and don't have big chunks of ginger in them, I'm happy). Also got two different homemade noodle dishes - a pork & pickled chinese vegetable noodle soup, and the tomato beef chow mein. The chow mein was more like a lo mein and kind of overdid it in the white pepper, but was reasonably good otherwise. The noodle soup was fine though they didn't give us a ladle or anything to serve it with, so it got quite messy. Might be worth another visit for the chicken wings or to try something else, but the chicken wings were the only thing I really thought stood out here, and the wait is long...

Brothers Restaurant - 4128 Geary Blvd (between 5th and 6th Ave)
Korean bbq at its smokiest =). We got pretty lucky here on lines too - we had to wait but there was a huge crowd waiting by the time we left. It was real wood/charcoal bbq at the table - the guy came with these trays of coals which he put into the thing in the middle of our table and then later took away when we were done - which definitely enhanced the experience and the flavor. We got the bulgogi and the kalpi. Both were quite yummy, the kalpi a bit more so than the bulgogi. Apparently we weren't cooking fast enough for the waitress, though - we were happily cooking at the rate we ate, making sure the food was always fresh off the grill and evenly cooked, but then she came along and dumped all our meat on the grill and spread it out efficiently but somewhat haphazardly, and then left it there for us to deal with. That was rather disappointing though probably did make us eat more efficiently. We figured out later that we probably should have left the cooked meat on the foil lining the side of the bbq area to keep it warm. Instead, we piled it all into our plates and tried to eat it as fast as possible before it cooled. The side little dishes they gave were plentiful but ok. I'm not a huge fan of anything bright red and glowy but I chomped down on all the little side veggie dishes - the bean sprouts, the sweet/tart radishes, the cucumbers (which I wish were sweet/tart), and the seaweed. They also gave us a tofu soup which I didn't realize came with the meal (I hope it came with the meal - we didn't order it). That was quite good except for my low tolerance for spice. Overall the meal was quite yummy, if a bit expensive (the dishes were $22 and $20 each, I think, and you had to get a minimum order of 2 bbq dishes to do the table bbq), and we left smelling very very smoky. In fact, we went into a tea shop out of curiousity afterwards b/c my bf's coworkers like tea, and the proprietor, while giving us our free sample, speculated that we went to brothers after we mentioned feeling particularly smoky, 'cause he could smell it. BTW, that tea shop - Aroma Tea - was fun since he gave out free samples, talking as he prepared the tea, and while I usually really dislike tea, I actually quite enjoyed the ginseng oolong whatever it was he served us. Very mild taste with a nice sweet aftertaste that wasn't at all apparent in the tea itself.

Bambino's Ristorante - 945 Cole St (between Carl and Parnassus)
Next door to Zazie's and apparently a good brunch alternative when the lines are too long (as they always are), so I need to try that sometime. In the meantime, we went there for dinner the other night when lines at the Citrus Club were too long (not that it's that close to the Citrus Club). It's Italian food - pretty decent stuff. I got the pasta primavera with marinara sauce, which I don't think you can expect to be exceptional anywhere. It was loaded with veggies, including peas, corn, and arugula, which I don't usually see in Pasta Primavera, I don't think. At least I felt healthier after eating it. My bf got the prosciutto and sun-dried tomato pasta (in the dim lighting, we couldn't tell which was which) which was quite good except I don't like rosemary and that was one of its primary spices. Our friends got one of the pizzas and the angel hair pasta and seemed to enjoy both. Not the cheapest Italian place (I didn't think pasta was that complex, why are so many Italian places so expensive?) but I'd probably go back.

Akiko's Sushi Bar - 542 Mason St (between Post and Sutter)
This place amuses me b/c the bar in the alley next door is super-popular, so sitting in the window, we watched all these people go to the bar, or the occasional person wander into the restaurant and then get redirected to the bar. And a waitress from the bar come next door to order and then later pick up some food to go. The place had decent, if unspectacular and slightly high priced sushi/food combos. I got the sashimi combo with udon. The chicken udon was pretty good, the "chef's choice" of 7 pieces of sashimi was somewhat disappointingly 3 pieces of maguro, 2 pieces of sake, and 2 pieces of a white fish with reddish edges (red snapper??). The maguro was decent, the sake was pretty good, the last fish wasn't that good - texture or taste. My bf got the katsu donburi which looked pretty good, along with an order of shiro maguro sashimi which was quite yummy. You can't go far wrong with shiro maguro. The sashimi slices were on the thin side, IMO, but overall it was a decent meal.

We've hit a few places more than once now - Magnolia (got a garlic/cumin crusted pork/ham/cheese sandwich last time that was ok - not fond enough for pickles or mustard to really like it), Abacus (went with a bunch of friends so got to try more stuff - better for sure than the first time I tried it but didn't really love any dish - however they were really sweet. I never told them it was my birthday and my friends all claim they didn't talk to the waiters, but they must have overheard, b/c I got surprised with a chocolate mousse cake with a candle in it at the end of my meal, which was the yummiest thing I ate there), etc.

I feel like there must have been more meals than this since the last time I blogged (though we have been eating at home slightly more now) but not remembering what off the top of my head...