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spicey food does that to teh fatsink, also.
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The Meat
- Thread starter Florida Jim
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spicey food does that to teh fatsink, also.
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Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
After the excellent dinner at La Ciccia, we had lunch at Zuni Café, followed by a Segway tour of the waterfront (terrific fun, highly recommended) and dinner at Aziza, our favorite from last year.
Before commenting on the restaurants, two quickie diatribes on seating and waiters.
At La Ciccia and Zuni Café, as we were taken to our respective tables, I realized that there was a seat with a better view and a seat with a worse view. Being an artisan father, I gave the better seat to my lovely blue-haired daughter but, while I could not hope for a better view, was otherwise not too impressed with the surrounding frames, of the entrance to the bathroom at La Ciccia and a brick wall at Zuni. Is it so difficult to create a seating plan that has no uninteresting views of the restaurant and its cornucopial denizens? Are there not enough people who care about vantage point? Zuni has many contrasting seating areas, and they gave us a table at what seemed to be the nicest area, but a brick wall is, well, a brick wall. The paintings hanging on the Zuni walls did not correspond to the hegemonic esthetic as manifested by contemporary museums, and their varied and varying unattractiveness contrasted with the sleek and elegant modern appointments. Usually a sign that the decorator was a pro and the chooser of paintings a family member. Sometimes I wonder: most people wouldn’t dream of performing brain surgery on themselves, yet seem to think that choosing an acceptable painting for a public setting is an easier task, one that can be left to uninformed whim. This is unsettling.
At Aziza this was not, and cannot be, a problem, as there is not a bad seat in the house, and the black and white photographs are as unintrusive as the service.
Wait staff. At La Ciccia, we were expertly coddled by Phil, while at Zuni and Aziza we were cared for by brisk, efficient, ponytailed Barbie phenotypes. The similarity between the latter two went no further, because the androgynously named Jules, at Zuni, was like a slab of cold, pretty marble, while Sonja at Aziza constantly hovered at a discreet but watchful distance, responsive without crossing the familiarity horizon. While paying the check we asked for a cab and waited at the table. After ten minutes, still no cab, so we decided to wait by the door. Wanting to thank Sonja, for the first time could not see her, because she was outside, on the curb, trying to hail a cab because the ones the restaurant had called were taking too long. This was certainly a first in the annals of (my) wait-experience.
OK, about the food. We went to Zuni primed for the roast chicken, but found that it takes an hour to prepare. Too much, squire. We shared a very good Caesar's Salad, an excellent burger, a very good paprika sausage. The parmesan-infused polenta did not wow us. I had a half bottle of first rate Marie Courtin champagne. Beautiful all-pinot base wine for the taking, if one can go beyond the fizz static. Which I could. All in all, a very good experience, but not more than the sigma of its constituents.
Aziza was sensational, like last year. Shorn of surprise, the tacky Arabian night club ambiance seemed of a piece this time. The surprise and appeal were considerable (see menu below) and the btg pairings creative and, for the most part, successful (see menu below; there were some substitutions), perhaps because Morocco is not an island on the wrong latitude and its wines were not an option. The Japanese sake and ale, while not usually my cuppa, were an aromatic change of pace. Perhaps there is some Momofuku influence at play here, or just some colinearity. Part of what was so satisfying about Aziza was the clear grounding of the worldly and sophisticated cuisine on a local tradition. Sort of like San Francisco itself, a blend of euro-cosmopolitan and hopperesque-provincial.
The contrast between the different poles of experience at La Ciccia and Aziza was itself food for thought. The rustic, almost homemade food at La Ciccia, superbly prepared within narrower invention parameters, was the sort of stuff that can be had every day, while the dazzling fireworks at Aziza, while too much for the quotidian, was inventive cuisine at its most satisfying. The room, the hailing of the taxi cab, and the wines tipped my scales in favor of Aziza in terms of weltanschauung-gestalt, but La Ciccia is in the cards for a repeat visit next year. Maybe a different table, and no more mister Sardinian nice guy with (dis)respect to the wines.
Before commenting on the restaurants, two quickie diatribes on seating and waiters.
At La Ciccia and Zuni Café, as we were taken to our respective tables, I realized that there was a seat with a better view and a seat with a worse view. Being an artisan father, I gave the better seat to my lovely blue-haired daughter but, while I could not hope for a better view, was otherwise not too impressed with the surrounding frames, of the entrance to the bathroom at La Ciccia and a brick wall at Zuni. Is it so difficult to create a seating plan that has no uninteresting views of the restaurant and its cornucopial denizens? Are there not enough people who care about vantage point? Zuni has many contrasting seating areas, and they gave us a table at what seemed to be the nicest area, but a brick wall is, well, a brick wall. The paintings hanging on the Zuni walls did not correspond to the hegemonic esthetic as manifested by contemporary museums, and their varied and varying unattractiveness contrasted with the sleek and elegant modern appointments. Usually a sign that the decorator was a pro and the chooser of paintings a family member. Sometimes I wonder: most people wouldn’t dream of performing brain surgery on themselves, yet seem to think that choosing an acceptable painting for a public setting is an easier task, one that can be left to uninformed whim. This is unsettling.
At Aziza this was not, and cannot be, a problem, as there is not a bad seat in the house, and the black and white photographs are as unintrusive as the service.
Wait staff. At La Ciccia, we were expertly coddled by Phil, while at Zuni and Aziza we were cared for by brisk, efficient, ponytailed Barbie phenotypes. The similarity between the latter two went no further, because the androgynously named Jules, at Zuni, was like a slab of cold, pretty marble, while Sonja at Aziza constantly hovered at a discreet but watchful distance, responsive without crossing the familiarity horizon. While paying the check we asked for a cab and waited at the table. After ten minutes, still no cab, so we decided to wait by the door. Wanting to thank Sonja, for the first time could not see her, because she was outside, on the curb, trying to hail a cab because the ones the restaurant had called were taking too long. This was certainly a first in the annals of (my) wait-experience.
OK, about the food. We went to Zuni primed for the roast chicken, but found that it takes an hour to prepare. Too much, squire. We shared a very good Caesar's Salad, an excellent burger, a very good paprika sausage. The parmesan-infused polenta did not wow us. I had a half bottle of first rate Marie Courtin champagne. Beautiful all-pinot base wine for the taking, if one can go beyond the fizz static. Which I could. All in all, a very good experience, but not more than the sigma of its constituents.
Aziza was sensational, like last year. Shorn of surprise, the tacky Arabian night club ambiance seemed of a piece this time. The surprise and appeal were considerable (see menu below) and the btg pairings creative and, for the most part, successful (see menu below; there were some substitutions), perhaps because Morocco is not an island on the wrong latitude and its wines were not an option. The Japanese sake and ale, while not usually my cuppa, were an aromatic change of pace. Perhaps there is some Momofuku influence at play here, or just some colinearity. Part of what was so satisfying about Aziza was the clear grounding of the worldly and sophisticated cuisine on a local tradition. Sort of like San Francisco itself, a blend of euro-cosmopolitan and hopperesque-provincial.
The contrast between the different poles of experience at La Ciccia and Aziza was itself food for thought. The rustic, almost homemade food at La Ciccia, superbly prepared within narrower invention parameters, was the sort of stuff that can be had every day, while the dazzling fireworks at Aziza, while too much for the quotidian, was inventive cuisine at its most satisfying. The room, the hailing of the taxi cab, and the wines tipped my scales in favor of Aziza in terms of weltanschauung-gestalt, but La Ciccia is in the cards for a repeat visit next year. Maybe a different table, and no more mister Sardinian nice guy with (dis)respect to the wines.
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
Alas, it was one of two that had to be substituted. For expressing disappointment, was given a glass of 2008 Heidi Schrock Ausbruch "on the wings of dawn"(a very nice stickie) at the end.
kirk wallace
kirk wallace
Sorry you didn't like the polenta at Zuni, Oswaldo. As for the artworks, they are almost always bad, but they change all the time. As I recall, the resto supports local artists by displaying their works on the walls. Just part of the restaurant's vision of itself in its community. (The late great Judy Rodgers did go to California in the first place to go to Standford where she studied Art History, so maybe there is a tie in there.)
I appreciate the enthusiasm and respect for aesthetics, although the comparison obviously doesn't fully hold up.
I only ate at La Ciccia once, this past spring, and yes the space was not the most inspiring but I probably place less importance on that than you do. And in the grand scheme of things I found their wine list very very commendable.
Michael K.
Michael John Kanbergs
certainly an epitaph fitted only to the written word
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
The comparison wasn't so much about esthetics in a restaurant room but about how, in evaluating a painting, everybody's a critic.
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
Well, for an answer, you can have a choice between the joys of rhetorical license or an underestimation of the consequences of offering uninformed evaluations of paintings.
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
Thank you. They were joyful experiences.
Sharon Bowman
Sharon Bowman
I, too, love writing.