Pan Grill Sandwich Shop

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For the most part pop ups and Asian fusion doesn't really get me excited like it used to, but Pan Grill has that old feeling come back again.  This very tiny pop up inside Butterfly on the Embarcadero is an awesome little treat amongst all a somewhat touristy area.  While it doesn't have any seating inside, there are plenty of places to sit by the water to enjoy their food.

One of the things that brought me here was their own housemade buns.  Not just any old bun, its like a baked chao siu bao bun so soft and fluffy with a just a hint of sweetness.  I did wish there was a little honey or sweet glaze on top like the baked chao siu bao buns I love so much.  The menu here is a headscratcher with so many things you want to try, you have to just pick a couple and then vow you'll be back to try the rest.

The yuzu lemonade was perfectly balanced and refreshing with just the right hint of citrus flavor.

While everything I had here was pretty tasty, the best by far were the yaki tots.  Essentially mini yaki onigiris shaped like slightly bigger than average tater tots, these super crunchy chunks of rice were one of those things that you eat and think genius.  Along with a spicy sauce drizzle, that seems to be made out of sriarcha, I would definitely come back again for just these.  Although I did order the additional tuna poke to be added onto this, its much better without it.

The yaki onigiri was just as crunchy as the yaki tots, maybe even more so.  Rather than the typical grilliing of the rice ball, it seems that they were actually deep fried so the outside crust is extra crisp.  Its a little hard to break off a piece, but once you do you can't stop eating away at them.

With all the choices of sandwiches, its hard to pick a couple to try.  The potato croquette was made with a sweet potato filing so it was pretty sweet.  Overall, this sandwich was a little too sweet tasting for me with the sweet bun and then the sweet potato curry.  Its was good, but it also needed some more crunchy texture since the sweet potato filling and the bread were so soft.

The hangar steak niku also had a sweetness from the glaze.  Its been a while since I had meat so tender and juicy.  In each bite, the meat practically melts in your mouth.  Out of the two, I think this one was my favorite. 

  

Address:                 Pan Grill Sandwich Shop
                                Pier 33
                                San Francisco, CA
   

Type:                       Japanese

Popular chomps:     yaki tot
                                 hangar steak niku sandwich
                                 kim chi pulled pork sandwich
                                 curry potato croquette sandwich

Chomp worthy:        yaki tot

Beanstalk Cafe

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I'm really loving all these small cafes popping up all over the city where you can catch either a bite for breakfast, lunch, or something in between.  Beanstalk Cafe is a welcome sight in an otherwise dreary block. 

Lately it seems that there is a new twist to a breakfast item around every corner.  Just when you think you've seen every breakfast and eggy concoction, a new one comes along.  This is the first I've seen of a toast cup.  You almost have to admire how innovative this small breakfast bite is.  A piece of toast is wrapped up to form a cup and then stuffed with egg and sausage.  Cute concept, but I wished the toast cup was served warm and the egg was runny.

Most of the sandwiches here are pretty traditional, but the Korean sandwich was quite yummy.  A sandwich gently piled high with pickled cucumbers, lettuce, tomato, pickles, onions, mayo, and a good amount of gochujang (Korean spicy sauce).  

Address:                    Beanstalk Cafe
                                   724 Bush St.
                                   San Francisco, CA
 

Type:                          cafe

Popular chomps:        Korean sandwich
                                    toast cup

Chomp worthy:           Korean sandwich

Koja Kitchen

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The food truck has gone a little bit and for me I don't get as giddy when I see one parked on a side of the street or driving by.  Its common appearance gives a ho hum feeling for me these days.  KoJa is one of the food trucks that still has quite a buzz around it.  So much so they just recently opened a brick and mortar location in Berkeley.  At a recent food truck event in San Mateo, this truck had the longest line out of the four food trucks there.

Not just your average Asian fusion, this food truck specializes in koja burgers, which are pressed rice that make up the bun of the "burger".  The pressed rice reminded me a lot of the delicious rice burgers I had at 903 (see post HERE), but without the crispy outside.  The rice bun held up as well as you would think a bun made up purely of rice would.  In other words, almost to the last bite till the inevitable crumble at the end.  The beef is juicy and heavily marinaded.  The kamikaze fries were another popular item with crisscut fries that were surprisingly perfectly fluffy and not burnt at all and topped with pieces of Korean beef, kimchi, green onions, and sirarcha mayo.

Address:                     KoJa Kitchen
                                    various locations
                                    Bay Area, CA
 

Type:                           Asian Fusion

Popular chomps:         kamikaze fries
                                    pork belly koja
                                    beef koja
                                    mochimisu
                                      

Chomp worthy:           kamikaze fries
                                    beef koja    

85 Degrees Bakery Cafe

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The Taiwanese bakery 85C has finally opened a branch in Northern California.  A massive line has hungry customers waiting approximately 30 minutes to up to an hour just to get inside the store to purchase their baked goods.

Similar to chains like Paris Baguette (see post HERE) and Kee Wah (see post HERE), the shelves are filled with all sorts of sweet and savory goodies.

Besides their bakery items, 85 Degrees is known for their drinks, specifically their sea salt drinks.  The sea salt coffee is sealed up like a boba drink and then you shake it and drink up.  The sea salt coffee tastes like a sweet mocha drink with a tiny hint of salt.

The milk pudding bread was my favorite of all my pickings.  The softest, fluffiest of the bunch with a sweet condensed milk type filling on the inside.

The garlic bread was a little dry and stale tasting.

The french cheese was a soft French bread topped with cheddar cheese, garlic, and Parmesan cheese.  It was better tasting than the garlic bread.

The cheese bread was topped with shredded cheese and filled with cream cheese.  This would probably be my second favorite.

It seems to always be a must to get anything with hot dogs in an Asian bakery, but the cheese dog was disappointing with the bread somewhat hard in texture.

Premium milk was a sweet bread, but still lacked that special oomph I love so much in Asian breads.

While most of the breads here I've eaten in some form or another at other Asian bakeries, this calamari stick was one that I've never seen before.  I wasn't expecting this squid ink based bread to be tasty.  The sweet bread was comboed nicely with the garlic spread and mozzarella cheese.

The hot dog & cheese made for another disappointing hot dog bread here.

The chocolate chip bowl reminded me so much of an armadillo.  This one wasn't very tasty at all and after a couple bites I abandoned it.

The sweet toast here is probably some of the worst I've had.  Neither sweet, nor fluffy, it was super disappointing. 

The seasonal pumpkin dessert was a little too creamy for me.  The pumpkin was more of an Asian pumpkin rather than the pumpkin found in pumpkin pie.

Overall, I still prefer Paris or Kee Wah to this bakery.  The bread isn't as soft, fluffy, or tasty, even though the bakery items seem to be refilled quite frequently.

  

Address:                   85 Degrees Bakery Cafe
                                  35201 Newark Blvd
                                  Newark, CA 
 

Type:                         bakery

Popular chomps:       sea salt coffee
 

Chomp worthy:          milk pudding bread 
                                   cheese bread

Aroma Coffee and Snacks

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Aroma Coffee and Snacks is hidden inside the Seafood City plaza.  The menu mostly serves banh mi, some soups, and che.  

Literally, everyone that walks up to the counter of Aroma gets this smashed avocado drink.  I've had many avocado shakes, but this one is up there with some of the best.  Its like slurping a thick avocado milkshake mixed with just the right amount of jellies.  Even better was knowing that there were slurpable chunks of avocado in the drink.

I got a little excited to see a banh mi with spam and egg on the menu.  After encountering a couple incorrectly made eggs, I had to make sure this egg would come out runny.  The first odd thing about this banh mi is the bread.  Its sort of shiny and smooth, which was the first red flag.  The second was even after being assured that there would be a runny egg, it came out cooked all the way through.  After another inspection of the spam, I noticed the spam didn't have a nice burnt crispiness and it was an odd pink color.   Not sure if this actually the real spam (if there is such thing as fake spam) or if it was a lite spam (which I'm no fan of), all I know is that it didn't have any of the spam qualities that I liked - salty or crispy.

      

Address:                Aroma Coffee and Snacks
                               1535 Landess Ave. Ste 159
                                San Jose, CA
                                

Type:                       Vietnamese

Popular chomps:     smashed avocado
                                 banh mi 
                                 banh mi thit nuong

Chomp worthy:        smashed avocado   

Sno-Zen Shaved Snow & Dessert Cafe

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Shaved snow!  This was one of my favorite Asian desserts and I'm super glad that its finally made its way to the Peninsula/South Bay area.  After having a decent amount of shaved snow, I think I'm qualified to distinguish good shaved snow.  Not all shaved snow are made equal!  The common gold standard is LA's Class 302 (see post HERE), but I thought that it was a little watery for my taste.  Most of the ones in the Bay Area having either been lacking flavor or have a weird consistency.  I finally found the best shaved snow in the Bay Area - Sno-Zen!   

The snow ice here satisfies all the checkboxes to perfect snow ice.  Creamy texture, perfect layers, and bold flavors.  The peanut butter flavor isn't something I would normally get, but its definitely my favorite.  A strong sweet peanut taste that makes you want to lick the whole plate. 

Strawberry is a common flavor in these dessert cafes, but this strawberry flavor actually tastes like strawberry not the artificial flavoring. 

Mango is another very popular flavor (its often sold out!).  Delicious and so fun to eat.  I always like to decorate my snow ice with condensed milk and fresh fruits.

Unlike most shaved snow spots, Sno-Zen has a seasonal special flavors that I've never seen before.  The avocado flavor is creamy and tastes just like avocado.  It was hard to pick a topping that matched the avocado flavor, but I loved the crunchy almond slivers and chewy mochi balls.  And of course, condensed milk.

Address:                        Sno-Zen Shaved Snow & Dessert Cafe
                                       2101 Shower Dr.
                                       Mountain View, CA
 

Type:                             dessert

Popular chomps:           mango
                                      strawberry 

                                      taro                                     

Chomp worthy:             mango
                                      strawberry
                                      avocado
                                      peanut butter   

Fifty fifty coffee and tea

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Fifty fifty coffee and tea is a cafe that bridges San Francisco's love of fancy coffee and its fondness for milk tea.

I love the minimalistic design.  Its nice to find a place that serves pour over coffee in this neighborhood.

Along with the minimalistic design comes a very simple menu. 

I'm one of those people who have never gone gaga for milk tea even though I'm Asian.  The salted caramel milk tea, however, did bring out my curiosity.  I was really hoping for that salty bite in a sweet, creamy slurp, but I only got plain milk tea taste.  Didn't see much of a correlation to salted caramel in this drink.  Really cool concept though, just didn't execute well. 

Although the blended strawberry hot chocolate says hot, really its served cold.  I was thinking it would come out like Serendipity's frozen hot chocolate, but its more of a very liquidy shake.  It doesn't taste like chocolate at all.  Oddly, it reminded me of Nesquik's strawberry flavored milk (same color too!) with some fresh strawberries blended in.  Pretty good, but just wished there was some chocolate flavor to it.

      

Address:                Fifty fifty coffee and tea 
                               3157 Geary Blvd
                               San Francisco, CA    
 

Type:                      coffee/cafe

Popular chomps:    honey coconut milk tea
                                salted caramel milk tea
                                blended strawberry hot chocolate                                

Chomp worthy:       blended strawberry hot chocolate        

Talde

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Talde was my sole reason for my first trip into Park Slope.  Having watched Dale Talde on Top Chef, I was pretty excited to get to taste his food.  Talde's quirky twist on Asian Fusion was fun and whimsical.  I only wished I could have made it out for dinner to try more of his dishes.

Inside of Talde.

The pretzel pork and chive dumplings are one of the popular dishes here.  Its served with a sauce that reminds me of the Chinese spicy mustard sauce popular with dim sum.  The dumplings are made with wrappers that taste somewhat like the outside of a pretzel.  The bits of salt and dry texture of the outside does a good job of mimicking the outside of a pretzel.

Not your average bowl of ramen.  This butter toast ramen's broth is supposedly made with buttered toast.  Butter and ramen is actually quite common, but this buttery broth was not as rich as I thought.  Its buttery flavor was just the right amount of velvety richness and the large chunks of pork belly make this dish.

As most people say, bacon makes everything better.  This pad thai is mixed with large chunks of thick cut bacon and slapped with a runny egg on top.  I wished the runny egg would be a little more runny so I could mix the yolk around the noodles.  A good try at something funky and different with pad thai, but really its just a well made pad thai with bacon thrown in. 

Address:                   Talde
                                  369 7th Ave.
                                  Brooklyn, NY
 

Type:                         Asian

Popular chomps:       lemongrass chicken
                                  butter toast ramen
                                  pad thai with bacon
                                  pretzel dumplings
                                  roasted branzino
                                  captain crunch halo halo
                                  Korean chicken and waffles

Chomp worthy:         butter toast ramen

Crepe Temptations

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The order was already placed before I realized Crepe Temptations has a custom menu, where you can build your own crepe with toppings such as gummy bears, bacon, and even cornflakes.  Even more awesome, is that you can customize how crunch you want the crepe to be made (extra crunchy, of course).  I'll have to go back to concoct my own special creation, but for now I just had to enjoy my red velvet crepe.  Still on my red velvet kick from the red velvet latte at Bitter + Sweet (see post HERE), I had to get the red velvet crepe.  Large slices of red velvet crepe stuffed with vanilla ice cream and topped with fresh strawberries and whipped cream.  Loved the creativity of this place, but the crepe was on the soggy side, most likely due to all the ingredients stuffed inside.  Next time I'll have to ask for extra crunchy, no matter what.

There are a couple other cake stuffed in a crepe type options.  Tiramisu is another one.  Four slices of tiramisu cake layered around mint chocolate chip ice cream (you can pick whatever flavor ice cream you want) and then topped with whipped cream.  I do think the actual crepe at Genki Crepes (see post HERE) have a better taste and texture, but the creativity of all the crepes here make it a must repeat spot, not to mention its open till midnight.

       

Address:                  Crepe Temptations
                                 2575 Judah St.
                                 San Francisco, CA
 

Type:                       dessert

Popular chomps:      mango crepe
                                 red velvet
                                

Chomp worthy:        red velvet crepe       

Jae Bu Do

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I've had a lot of Korean bbq in my life, but Jae Bu Do was an eating experience I've never had before.  Korean seafood bbq!  No to mention it doesn't exist in the Bay Area.  Let's face it, regular Korean bbq is delicious, but its more like been there, done that!  Jae Bu Do is all seafood and also challenges your cooking skills since seafood cooks a lot faster than meat.

Jae Bu Do's menu - notice the different prices for cash and credit.

The waitstaff here can get pretty busy helping the diners cook their seafood, but if you absolutely need something, then ringing the bell always helps.

As with all other Korean restaurants, a handful panchans (banchan) are laid on the tables for nibbling.  The kimchee has a ton of spicy kim chee flavor.

Peppers, carrots, and cucumbers make for some fresh veggie noshing between seafood bites.

Just one glove is given so you can open and eat the shellfish without burning your hands.  Its a little Michael Jackson, but its a must do because even with the glove on some of the seafood is still pretty hot.

Whats Korean food without Korean beer?  Hite is the only Korean choice though, but still a must when eating bbq.

A seafood "ceviche" is also brought along with the banchan.  Lots of fish, squid, and shrimp are mixed with hot sauce and cabbage.

This seafood pancake is probably one of the better tasting seafood pancakes I've had.  Not oily at all, but full of flavor and nice crispy edges.

Love cheese corn!  This cheese corn was served in a very shallow pan.  Gloppy cheese mixed with sweet corn kernels.  Not as sweet or rich as others I've had, but still delicious.

The egg custard is a common item at Korean bbq.  This seafood one is no different.  Light and airy, although I've always found most Korean egg custards to be a little bland for my taste.

Believe it or not, this combination B is meant for 3 people.  A seriously large tray of seafood that includes: conch, oyster, shrimp, large clam, ork shell, abalone, squid, mussel, sweet potato.  Its hard to say what was the best seafood, but all of it was fresh and tasty.

The servers put each of the seafood on the grill methodologically and come to check on it every once in a while so you don't have to worry too much about overcooking it.

As always the usual sauce for Korean bbq, but I think the seafood is fresh enough that no sauce is really needed.

A large bowl of noodles and vegetables finished off the meal.  Also, if you had more room the roasted sweet potatoes under the grill make for a tasty sweet snack.

     

Address:                    Jae Bu Do
                                   474 N. Western
                                   Los Angeles, CA
 

Type:                          Korean

Popular chomps:        seafood platter                                 

Chomp worthy:           seafood platter