There’s certainly no shortage of excellent food to be found in San Francisco and the Bay Area — but there’s plenty worth skipping, too. Luckily for you, Eater editors dine out several times a week (or more) and we’re happy to share the standout dishes we encounter as we go.
There may not be a better place to be in San Francisco on a warm, sunny day than the parklet at Yo También Cantina with a tamale and brothy beans in front of you. The Inner Sunset cafe from Isabella Bertorelli and Kenzie Benesh has become a neighborhood stop for jammy eggs and vinegary-slaw-laden bowls, paired with lavender cold brew or fresh cookies. The Best of Both Worlds stays true to its name, bringing together the brothy beans from the Breakfast Bowl and slaw from the Hugo Street Retreat, with a single tamale, chile oil, queso fresco, and a jammy egg. Always make it deluxe by adding avocado and pepita seeds. Snag some bottles of wine to take home or a jar of chile oil on the way out. — Rebecca Roland, deputy editor, Eater Southern California/Southwest
Yo También Cantina (205 Hugo Street, San Francisco) is open from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., Wednesday through Sunday.
There’s plenty to like about JouJou, the latest restaurant from chef David Barzelay and partner Colleen Booth. The space is beautiful, the seafood plentiful and luxurious, and the cocktails and wine flow easily. And while I had a particularly standout lobster salad studded with mango and kiwi, what really caught my attention was a humble-seeming ice cream on the dessert menu from pastry chef Yesenia Castañon. The double vanilla ice cream is listed as a house specialty, made with both Tahitian and Madagascar vanillas. The result is a creamy scoop, bursting with vanilla flavor, and it shows a lot of thoughtfulness in its creation. I opted for the chocolate and passion fruit add-on, and I’m so glad I did — a halved passion fruit arrived, and I was instructed to stir it before adding it to my ice cream. Beneath the passion fruit pulp was a layer of melted chocolate, and the two combined easily for spooning over my scoop of vanilla. The sauce paired the richness of chocolate with the tart-sweet flavor of the fruit, a combination that really complements both flavors. The seeds gave the ice cream texture, and I found it a satisfying end to the meal. It’s perhaps not as showy as the fire-driven bananas Foster, but it’s a pleasant bite all the same. — Dianne de Guzman, regional editor, Northern California/Pacific Northwest
JouJou (65 Division Street, San Francisco) is open from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday, and 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. on Sunday.
Bar Orso is the new addition to tasting menu restaurant Merchant Roots, a bar that channels redwood forest vibes, albeit with clever drinks and snacks. As opposed to the all-in, multicourse dinners at Merchant Roots, Bar Orso features an a la carte menu of snacks, and it was the Golden State dish that really caught my attention. Fans of corn will want to take note: It’s a corn on corn on corn situation, zigzagging between different presentations of the humble produce. The centerpiece is the “corn fries” made with corn grits with grated sweetcorn and plant-based sour cream, which is then molded into a corn shape, then sliced and fried into fry shape. It’s an intense corn flavor (the best kind), and when drizzled in a spiced hot agave, it makes for a corn-y bite that reads lightly hot, sweet, and crisp. The included corn miso dip adds another welcomed dimension to each bite. As a bonus, amongst the fries is a sprinkling of heirloom popcorn tossed in nutritional yeast and lacto-fermented green onion powder that I couldn’t stop eating. It’s a lovely companion dish to the bar’s carefully considered cocktails. — DdG
Bar Orso (1148 Mission Street, San Francisco) is open Tuesday through Saturday, with reservations available via Tock.