Tried and true, R&G Lounge in San Francisco is unanimously agreed upon as one of the top Chinese restaurants in the San Francisco Bay Area. It is Michelin Guide recommended, written about in numerous publications, and even featured in Anthony Bourdain’s (my hero’s) show No Reservations on the Travel Channel as a place to go while in the City.

Located at the edge of Chinatown in San Francisco, R&G is a completely modernized space that is smaller than led to believe from the outside. There are three levels – the upper “nicer” level, the ground floor level with tables behind the bar, and the lower “slumming it, maybe share tables with strangers” level. I personally like sitting downstairs since its less formal and sharing tables with strangers is nothing new to me. Maybe that’s how I’ll meet my future wife.

I usually visit R&G once a week (at least) during lunch since it’s only a ten minute walk from the financial district where my office is located. Without fail, my coworkers and I always order the lunch special beef (more on this later) and the hot & sour soup. It’s really quite a deal – the lunch special costs $7.50 and the soup is $1.50 (Mon, Wed, Fri only for soup). You can’t really beat that price for the quality and amount of food you’re getting.

A few tips for a successful lunch at R&G:

1. Go earlier if possible. Arriving around 11:30-11:45am will most likely get you a table without waiting. If you have a big party, make a reservation.
2. THERE IS A LUNCH SPECIAL MENU. Be sure to ask for the lunch menu. The booklet is the regular menu offered during both lunch and dinner service. The lunch special menu is a big, laminated one page menu.
3. If you’re a party of one or two, be open to sharing a table with strangers. It’ll be awkward only if you make it awkward. So please don’t longingly stare into a stranger’s eyes while they eat.

There are a couple signature dishes offered at R&G. By far the most popular is the Salt & Pepper Crab. During dinner service, you will literally see this dish churning out of the kitchen every minute or two. Almost every table with have a whole crab and every person will have delicious enjoyment on their face while eating it. The crab is perfectly battered with salt and pepper, there is a lot of crab meat, and at ~$38 a crab (depending on market price) it’s actually quite reasonable. Unless you hate crab, you need to order this (see top of post for delicious photo).

And then there is the R&G Special Beef. According to the menu, it is a secret recipe with a secret sauce. The fact that my coworkers and I come to R&G each week to get this beef is a testament to how good it is. The beef is super tender and juicy, the special sauce is a little sweet glaze but nothing too overpowering. It is marinated through so every bite is succulent and delicious. And remember that lunch special I mentioned above? For $7.50, you get a good amount of beef and a side of fried rice. Can’t beat it!

One other staple is the Soy Sauce Chicken. You can order half a chicken or a full chicken. It is also part of the lunch special menu that comes with white rice. The chicken is super juicy (even all the white meat) and the soy sauce is great with white rice. Very flavorful and excellent.

If you can’t tell from this long post, I obviously love eating at R&G. My parents have been bringing me here since I was a little boy and I don’t plan to stop anytime soon. If you have a hankering for Chinese food, this is the first place in the Bay Area I recommend.

———-

R&G Lounge
631 Kearny Street, San Francisco, CA
R&G  Lounge website
R&G Lounge Yelp reviews

This is a super simple dish that almost anyone can prepare. The white wine and clam sauce gives the pasta a sweetness while the bacon gives it a bolder, saltier flavor as well. It’s a pretty light sauce and doesn’t bog you down like creamy white sauces or classic marinara sauces. With prep and cook time, it should take about an hour.

Ingredients you’ll need:

• Clams (I bought a pound. Smaller clams work better)
• Shallots, garlic, onion, parsley
• Lemon juice (from one lemon)
• Bacon (I bought the pre-cooked Canadian bacon packages)
• Butter, salt, pepper to taste
• Pasta (I used spaghetti, but you can use whatever)
• White wine ($2 bottle at Whole Foods)

I’m sorry I don’t give specific amounts of each ingredient. I like cooking by just estimating and adjusting to taste so I really don’t know how much I use of most things.

How do make it:

Before beginning, rinse the clams to wash away any sand and grit that’s still in the shells. Nobody likes biting into crunchy little particles of sand in their food.

While you boil water for the pasta and cook it, you can do all the prep work and begin cooking the wine sauce as well. Find a small to medium-sized pot/pan with a lid that you will use to boil your clams. Chop up the onion, shallot, garlic and bacon, then sautee these items in the pot until the onions are clear and you can smell that great aroma of bacon and caramelized onion hitting your nose.

At this point, add the clams, parsley and lemon juice. Fill the pot with white wine until the clams are fully submerged but no more than that. Add a pinch or two of salt and some butter to balance out the white wine. Without it, the white wine may become too strong and overpower any other taste. Turn down the heat to about a medium or medium-low and cover pot with a lid. Let sit and stir once in a while until the clams pop open by themselves. This should only take a few minutes. Once the clams are open, the clam and sauce is pretty much done.

Additional step if you like:

At this point you can pour the white wine and clam sauce over the pasta and bon appetit.

But I like to throw some pasta into a small sautee pan with some of the white wine clam sauce and really make sure the taste is evenly distributed by sauteing and mixing it together for just a minute. It’s an extra step and there will be an extra pan to wash, but I think it makes a big difference that really distributes the flavor.

And with that you’re ready to eat! Super easy to do – just throw everything into a pot and let the bad boy cook. Accompany the pasta with a nice glass of white wine and you’re ready for a treat.

Bouchon Bakery in Yountville, CA is such a great little bakery full of goodies. You walk into the little shop and their displays are full of freshly baked goods from the day – muffins, croissants, baguettes, macarons, and the list goes on and on. I love the smell of freshly baked goods so it was like a little heaven walking in. Displayed above are the giant macarons they offer. The purple is the seasonal PB&J that’s a really big hit and the green is the pistachio. Great little place to check out in the heart of Yountville restaurant country.

———-

Bouchon Bakery
6528 Washington Street, Yountville, CA
Bouchon Bakery website
Bouchon Bakery Yelp reviews

I was lucky enough to experience Ad Hoc’s brunch menu on a beautiful Sunday morning out in Yountville, CA. Located just outside Napa, Ad Hoc is among a cluster of restaurants in the area that showcases fresh, local ingredients and creates a great dining experience for its guests. From making the reservation to accommodating specific food preferences, the staff at Ad Hoc was always professional and courteous so I was impressed even before I stepped into the restaurant.

A little background about Ad Hoc:- World renowned chef Thomas Keller (of French Laundry, Per Se and Bouchon fame) originally conceptualized and opened Ad Hoc as a temporary restaurant.  The little temp project became so popular that Keller decided to open shop permanently in Yountville. The prix fixe menu changes daily and you literally can’t order anything else unless you are unable eat the food showcased that day due to dietary restrictions.

Brunch is my favorite meal of the day, and this brunch did not disappoint one bit. The meal started with a Salad of Baby Iceberg Rounds served with hobbs’ bacon lardons, lemon cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, sweet yellow corn and thousand island dressing. The ingredients were some of the freshest I’ve tasted – the lettuce was crunchy and the tomatoes and corn were super sweet. But obviously the best part pulling it all together was the BACON. Bacon makes everything great, and amazingly they served extra bacon chunks on the side in case we didn’t have enough. I never knew I could like a salad so much.

The main course was the Chicken Fried Steak and Eggs with pepper cream gravy, soft scrambled hen eggs, roasted broccolini and smashed new potatoes. Let me just say I’ve never had such great chicken fried steak before. The steak was cooked to a perfect medium and the batter coating the steak was not oily at all. That’s such an amazing feat to me. I have never had chicken fried steak where I wasn’t completely disgusted by all the oil dripping out of the batter until this day at Ad Hoc.

The sides of the main course didn’t disappoint either. The eggs were fluffy and still a bit runny (just the way I like them prepared). The potatoes weren’t overcooked and the broccolini had a nice grilled char on them which made them extra tasty. At this point I have already dubbed this meal one of the best brunches I have ever eaten.

And then the dessert came and just knocked this brunch right out of the park. The dessert was Strawberries and Cream with lemon cake, creme fraiche and coconut streusel. The presentation was beautiful, the strawberries were sweet, the cream was fluffy and light, and the whole dessert came together really perfectly. I couldn’t have asked for a better way to end the meal.

I was so thoroughly impressed with Ad Hoc from start to finish. Great service, great presentation, and most importantly, great food. And brunch at $40 a person for 3 courses was more than reasonable. I would return to Ad Hoc in a heartbeat, especially to try their famous fried chicken and prix fixe dinner menus. I 100% recommend Ad Hoc to anyone willing to drive out to Yountville and check it out. You won’t be disappointed.

———-

Ad Hoc Restaurant
6476 Washington Street, Yountville, CA
Ad Hoc website
Ad Hoc Yelp reviews

A few things come to mind when I think of summers in California. Sunshine, the beach, and grilling in the backyard. So to gear up for this summer, I bought a Huntington Patriot Series Grill. Four burners on the main grill, plus an extra side burner for cooking food in pots and pans. 50,000 BTU of fire and power at my fingertips. The grill was a complete pain to put together, but now it’s my favorite piece of cooking equipment.

Over the last two months I have really put some mileage on my new purchase. Below are just a few notable snippets from my adventures in grilling.

Lamb Rib Chops:

My greatest achievement in grilling yet! This was my first time ever cooking lamb chops so I just experimented with ingredients I had in the cupboard. I seasoned the chops with coarse salt, fresh ground pepper, garlic powder, and a little ginger powder. The butcher at Whole Foods instructed that I grill the chops about 5 minutes on each side, but because the chops were so thick I found about 7 minutes on each side yielded the perfect medium rare.

Duck Breast:

Grilled duck breast is one of my favorite things to eat ever. Charred and crispy on the outside, medium rare on the inside. I prepared it by scoring the skin side, then seasoned it with coarse salt and fresh ground pepper for the grill. Always grill the skin side first to get some of that fat out as duck breast has a high fat content under the skin. The duck breast was later paired with a reduced fruit sauce for some major noms.

Rib Eye and Veggies:

Rib eye from Whole Foods. Seasoned with salt, fresh ground pepper, garlic powder, and onion powder. As the rib eye was pretty thick, grilled for about 10 minutes on each side for medium rare (see picture below for perfect medium rare). Also on the grill: asparagus, carrots, mushroom and yellow bell peppers. All were coated with some extra virgin olive oil and salt.

Pork Chops and Carrots:

Seasoned the pork chops with salt, pepper, paprika, garlic powder, onion powder and some other herbs I found in my cupboard. Grilled a couple minutes on each side to ensure it was cooked thoroughly but still juicy. Came out super flavorful, but I’ll need to play with some other seasonings in the future to kick the pork chops up a notch.