Lounge Dining @ Fifth Floor

Tonight, I finally went to the Fifth Floor lounge to try the Fifth Floor burger! I've been wanting to check this out for ages, for a number of reasons: The burger itself has been on my list of burgers to try, as it has been on a bunch of top burger lists. And it comes with comte cheese, one of my absolute favorite cheeses. The burger is served only in the lounge area, where you can also order anything a la carte off the restaurant's main menu (including the dessert...

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Dinner @ Haven

We got to check out the brand new Daniel Patterson restaurant in Oakland tonight. Overall, a great experience! The space is brand new and really lovely. Swanky and rustic at the same time, with lots of stonework and wood. It gives an upscale yet relaxed vibe. The kitchen is an open kitchen, with bar seating all along it. We were seated at a table since we were a party of four, but I'd love to sit at the counter and watch the action sometime. The food was slightly...

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Cocktails and Bar Food @ Lucky Strike

Tonight's culinary adventures were pretty radically different from the dining I've been doing lately.  No Michelin stars were involved, yet amusingly, a dress code was.  In a big change of pace, we headed to Lucky Strike, a swanky new bowling alley in SOMA. The space used to be a Borders, and is now filled with a very large bar and lounge area, tons of flat screen TVs, and of course, the bowling alley (10 lanes?).  It is all very modern, sleek, and...

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Three Twins Ice Cream

Another local, organic ice cream maker.  And again, I fail to be really impressed with most the flavors or the consistency, but they are really friendly folks! Lemon Cookie. Chocolate Peanut Butter:  Smooth, chocolate and peanut butter flavors are mixed into the base itself.  I tasted mostly chocolate, and not much peanut butter.  Really would have loved a peanut butter swirl or chunks. Dad's Cardamon: Good cardamon flavor, if you want that...

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Cako Ice Cream

The Metreon is being revamped, and with the renovations are a slew of new food vendors.  I was very excited to see a new ice cream shop - Cako Creamery.  They are the same company as Cako Cupcakes, and you can see the influence.  Most of the ice cream flavors are a base ice cream with some flavor of cake mixed in.  Unfortunately, I haven't really liked any of the ice creams.  The consistency has been really hard, too frozen.  I tried each...

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Dinner @ Lot 7

Tonight for dinner we checked out a fairly new seafood restaurant in the Mission, Lot 7.  They've only been open a few weeks, but I've had my eye on them since I first read about it.  There are plenty of restaurants featuring seafood in the city, so why care about another one?  The big appeal for me was that they are on the more casual end of the dining spectrum, while still offering high quality seafood.  I enjoy fine dining obviously, and...

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Cooking Demo: Season's Restaurant

Today's second demo was by Chef Mark Richardson, from Seasons Restaurant.  He prepared not one, but two dishes! I haven't actually been to Season's yet, but it has been on my list for a while.  In particular, on Sunday and Monday nights, in the lounge, they have burger specials for $20.  There are a bunch of different burgers, each paired with either a beer, wine, or cocktail.  I don't even know how I'd pick one, as they all sound great.  And...

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Cooking Demo: Fifth Floor

Today's first demo was by Chef Nicoali Lipscomb from the Fifth Floor. The Fifth Floor chefs are busy these days!  I saw a demo by the executive chef David Bazirgan at Williams-Sonoma a few weeks ago and by Pastry Chef Francis Ang at the Ferry Building a few months ago.  It was actually that demo that inspired me to organize a dinner at the Fifth Floor with some out of town visitors.  They were also at the Taste of the Nation event two weeks...

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Cooking Demo: Fifth Floor

Today's Demo was by pastry chef Francis Ang, from the Fifth Floor.  He made amazing beignets. Almond Beignet with Hamada Farms Satsuma marmalade, crème fraîche, candied sage. This was the tastiest beignet I've had in ages! For some reason, I've had a lot of beignets lately, and I've been pretty disappointed by them. I'd actually decided that I must just not really like beignets. And then this came along ... Fresh out of the fryer, rolled in cinnamon, sugar,...

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