Eating in San Francisco in 2020
Local trends, my favorite takeaway spots, and what I'm excited for in 2021
tl;dr
2020 Trends
The creation/scaling of small craft businesses via social media (Frolic and Detour, Dumpling Club, Basuku)
Scoring a takeaway order at well known pop-ups is the new queueing for the new Michelin starred restaurant
Accessibility is no longer gated by physical restaurant space, but rather by delivery radius. Previously scarce restaurants have suddenly become the easiest to access
Favorites
Weekly rotation: Benkyodo, Frolic and Detour, Yuanbao Jiaozi, Rintaro
Splurge rotations: Benu/San Ho Wan, Sushi Yoshizumi, Saru Sushi
Honorable mentions: Afuri Ramen, Taishoken, Garden Creamery, Hong Kong Lounge
Exciting things in 2021
Restaurants have realized that takeaway is the new norm and are continuing to expand menu offerings for takeaway dining
The incorporation of environment in fine dining, further elevating experience beyond just the immediate food
Discovering more new pop-ups!
Context
2020 needs no introduction. While my 2019 food reflection was a list of international restaurants I was most excited about visiting, my 2020 eating wishlist evolved from a list of cities to a list of obscure pop-ups in my backyard.
Given how much the industry has changed in the last year, I thought it’d be valuable to document new trends I’m particularly excited about in San Francisco, my new weekly takeaway routine, and what I look forward to in 2021.
2020 Trends
The creation/scaling of small craft businesses via social media (Frolic and Detour, Dumpling Club, Basuku)
I’m embarrassed to admit this as a foodie; despite being a local diner in San Francisco, I’ve always indexed toward brick and mortar restaurants over smaller craft businesses. It’s not because I’m not interested - to be honest, it’s because I just didn’t know they were there. I had a pop-up phase in 2018 where I did visit new pop-ups, but I forgot that before a restaurant has enough demand to temporarily borrow physical space, they have to first get a loyal following. That’s the area of the industry I’m most excited about now.
In particular, I’m thinking of the names above. Frolic and Detour (cookies), Dumpling Club, Basuku (cheesecakes). These are the three I follow most religiously, and I’ve found that the local food bloggers have been the source of the most interesting recommendations. It’s funny how one’s recommendation sources evolve from Yelp, established publications, then Instagram over the course of their time spent in the location.
To be clear, they aren’t “new” to the industry. Noodle in a Haystack is one of my favorite examples of these businesses, but 2020 is the year where I feel like I’ve spent the majority of my time chasing them down. They’re also the new “restaurants” that have sparked the most joy for me.
The small craft business (please help me with a better name for them) tends to be a one-person shop. They run incredibly scrappy operations. Many start as the side hustle and then with proper demand graduate to becoming a full-time business. Their marketing presence on Instagram is superb. Their founders tell narratives with their businesses. They are socially conscience. They are incredibly approachable and friendly. And many of them produce a niche product that they excel at.
There’s a lot I’m personally interested in learning more about for these businesses, but suffice it to say, I’ve found some of the “best” version of each food group in each one of these startups. And it’s pretty incredible to see how these businesses have scaled so much with the power of storytelling on social media.
Scoring a takeaway order at well known pop-ups is the new queueing for the new Michelin starred restaurant
Gone are the days when you waited months before eating at State Bird Provisions on a Saturday night. Now I’m refreshing my screen ten seconds before the drop time, and then often waiting another twenty minutes before buggy reservation systems let me score one of the ten coveted Basuku cheesecakes. I’m thankful that my years of preparing for my Noma and Alchemist (my best 2020 meals, on a separate note. Consumed on back-to-back days the day the Bay Area lockdown started) have prepared me to understand the glitches in Tock to score Basuku on three separate occasions.
Which leads me to…
Accessibility is no longer gated by physical restaurant space, but rather by delivery radius. Previously scarce restaurants have suddenly become the easiest to access
Access has been completely redefined. Many kitchens are constrained by the physical capacity they can seat rather than the volume of food they can produce. As a result, many of the “hottest” spots have become incredibly accessible without crazy waits, and even the most expensive restaurants have started producing affordable takeaway meals for flawless executed food (Benu/San Ho Wan). I remember queueing for two hours in the rain for Taishoken pre-COVID, and now I’m reheating their soup midmeal to help with palette fatigue. I’m sure I would have never gone to Afuri before COVID, but now I schedule when I want their noodles and cook their perfect Yuzu Shio in the comfort of my kitchen.
The only thing getting between the hungry yelper and their favorite businesses has now become if they have a car to drive them up and down the valley to these places with limited delivery radii.
The converse effect is ironically that smaller batched produced foods have become incredibly difficult to order. Garden Creamery’s ice cream drops have been described as more competitive than sneaker drops, and Basuku cheesecakes often sell out in ten seconds.
As the world moves into the new normal in 2021, I’m curious to see if these places have experienced an general uptick in volume of orders and if it’ll be worth continuing to service takeaway or even raw orders of dishes once regular indoor dining is back in place.
Favorite Takeaway Spots
I’m guilty of being biased toward east Asian food. My palette is pretty limited in that the food that brings me the most joy is likely only from three countries, so take that with a grain of salt. But each of these places has held a special place in my heart this quarantine.
My (almost) weekly rotation
Local mochi shop in Japantown. The best flavors are the fruit ones: mango and blueberry. Cash only. The place is 100 years old!
My favorite cookies as discovered on Instagram. Anabel is incredibly nice and I love the personal flair she adds to her pop-up orders. My favorites are birthday cake, snickerdoodle, and strawberry. The cookies have the most perfect, soft texture. She also has other more exciting combinations like peanut butter and jujube or pineapple shortbread with cocoa nibs and walnuts.
They were closed for the first two months during the pandemic and I had a mild heart attack that they weren’t open anymore. You can also buy their dumplings as takeaway (which was not something they did pre COVID). However, I recommend the napa cabbage and pork in soup, with tofu sticks as a side dish.
When I don’t want to cook Japanese food, I come to Rintaro for a very reliable hiyashi udon (nabeyaki is great as well). I love Rintaro for offering consistently high quality dashi and udon.
Splurge rotations
There is no more affordable way of enjoying the quality of Benu at ~$70 (post tip)/pax. San Ho Wan has consistently stayed exciting and interesting by rotating meals every other week. The format has changed a bit - rotations are less frequent, but this is the finest, most perfectly executed Korean food you’ll get in the city. Follow Corey Lee on IG to learn more about the methodology behind many of the featured dishes.
Probably the best chirashi, but it is in San Mateo, and it is pretty expensive. Message me if you have more questions about sushi since it is highly subjective, but this is probably where I go when I want to splurge.
Saru Sushi (for sans car SF dwellers)
Saru is another great example of a previously very inaccessible restaurant now conveniently delivered to home! I’ve chosen Saru has my Bay Area sushi spot over several of the more Instagram famous options because of its price point and quality. Saru’s omakase is no frills and hits the spot.
Honorable mentions
I’d probably order here more frequently if I went down to Cupertino more frequently. The Yuzu Shio is executed with flawless perfection. Get the take away kit and prep it at home with easy reheating instructions.
Besides their outstanding tsukemen, they’re the only place that offers an abura soba. Both are available in takeaway kits (requires 48 hrs advance ordering) for you to assemble at home and to have an above par restaurant experience. Pro-tip, consider putting the tsukemen broth into the microwave midmeal. Game changer.
My mom texted me the other day asking me where how she could order another pint of their Island Jam. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that Garden Creamery’s ice cream is highly seasonal, and some flavors may not show up for awhile. Pro-tip: as long as you refresh at exactly 7pm with clarity on what you order, you should be able to grab something.
Dim sum carries extraordinarily well in cars. The best dim sum restaurants in the Bay merit an article by themselves, but their ham sui gok in itself is a must.
Things I’m excited by in 2021
Restaurants have realized that takeaway is the new norm and are continuing to expand menu offerings for takeaway dining
One of the most tragic things for me in 2020 was that two of my weekly favorites didn’t have takeaway orders that made sense for me: Iza Ramen and Cotogna. Imagine my surprise on Jan 1 when I saw two interesting changes:
Iza is finally offering their tsukemen. I used to eat here almost every week. They did takeout during all of 2020, but only for their ramen.
Cotoga is finally offering cooked pasta dishes. Cotogna was running a pantry and “daily specials” menu, but my favorite dishes at Cotogna have always been the pasta. We could not execute Cotogna at home with the same fidelity as the restaurant, so did not go as much as I had hoped.
Seeing these two places change their takeaway strategy is both a moment of celebration and worry for me. Celebration since these dishes constituted a significant part of my pre-COVID dining habits, but sadness, since for these restaurants to have so staunchly chosen to not do this and reverse that decision means that the impact on the industry from COVID is likely worse than anyone could have imagined.
The incorporation of environment in fine dining, further elevating experience beyond just the immediate food
Kevin and I are on the more conservative side of the dining out spectrum relative to others. We do not indoor or outdoor dine anywhere. The only exception to this is when 1/ case counts have consistently stayed low despite outdoor dining being open for at least 3 months and 2/ when we are confident that the physical location and staff are taking heightened safety measures.
As a result, the only place that passed our sniff test in 2020 was Quince on the Farm. Quince on the Farm allowed us to visit Chef Tusk’s farm and have the most delightful European-style four-hour lunch in an incredibly spacious and beautiful farm setting.
I’m a bougeball so I’ll just say it. I have my favorites for fine dining in the city, but at this point, I’ve visited for a number of consecutive years. While the food continues to delight, rarely does the experience differ. I’ve loved having new scenery for these meals. It’s moving dining toward being a more holistic experience (part of why I loved Alchemist so much). Single Thread is the next one that passes our sniff test that I’m particularly excited about.
Discovering more new pop-ups!
My favorite affordable go tos this year have been these little pop ups. It is incredibly cool to see the behind the scenes for these businesses and immensely satisfying to eat perfectly executed foods. I can’t wait to see how this continues to evolve in 2021!
In particular, if you have any recommendations, I am searching for authentic CDMX tacos and Singaporean kopitiam food.
What are some pop-ups I should have on my radar?