Posts Tagged ‘Brenda’s French Soul Food’
July-to-August Review!
t says: We’ve had a pretty month since coming back from London – the summer is flying by! We need to play a little catch-up.

V Street! That’s right – we finally did V Street. Well, to be clear, g had done V Street several times before, but I had not. This is one of her favorite dishes, and was demonstrative, in general, of the style of food there. What you see above I think is called their “Peruvian Fries”. In an interseting-taasting aioli, herbs, and peanuts, the nicely cooked potato wedges were fantastic! However, I have to say that I wasn’t quite as blown away as she, as I was expecting something “punchier” – tangier, spicier, louder. The other dishes, too, just felt a little muted to me, not quite hitting the expectations that I had after having eaten at Vedge and reading V Street’s interesting menu. It’s not “bad”, but I’ll leave this place for the vegans (and g).

Hop on over to Jersey and visit Vineland, our hometown. It’s a quaint little city, Vineland, with not a lot of the craziest gastronomic advances going on – but that’s fine – that’s just Vineland! That said, I’ve had these pretty amazing ravioli at Larry’s so I just had to give them a shout-out! Often filled with ricotta+vegetable (pea, or caramelized onion, or whatever) and sparsely dressed, it’s my new favorite when visiting our parents!

Ah, yes – the good ‘ol blurry photo. Why bother including it? Because it’s a reminder to one and all that Mercato is still frickin’ killing it, Italian-BYO-style. Remember when Philly was reknowned for its Italian BYOs? When Mercato, Melograno, Modo Mio, and La Viola were all the rage? Before we cared about celebrities and expensive tasting menus. Well, we won’t forget those good ‘ol days (obviously we are old and crotchety and resistant to change). The above is a dish from Mercato during the “Summer Tuesday Tastings” they got going on. Pasta, braised meat, pistachio, and some shreds of cheese? Yes please. God it was good.

It has been a while since we did brunch here on adsz – we just kept going to the usual suspects. But now, check out the newest king of the hill: TRIA! Yes, that’s right – TRIA (the one on Fitler Square). These blueberry ricotta pancakes were absolutely insane! So delicately light and fluffy, (but substantive) and full of flavor. It was incredible. And there were still like three other dishes we wanted to try! Get their early, avoid the lines, order a glass of Riesling (obviously!), and enjoy breakfast!

Now here we go … here we go … Look at these four beignets, sitting in a row. Stuffed with apples or chocolate or crawfish, Brenda’s does the most amazing sweetly fried dough that I have ever had. The catch? Brenda’s is in San Francisco (sadtrombone.com). Consequently, we’ll just have to keep going back every time we visit …

Oh – and Brenda’s does upside-down peach cobbler pancakes, too – imagine peach pie (with crumble topping) but in pancake form. Seriously – blew my head off. So delicious.

Also on a recent visit to SF, I dined at Saru, a place we first visited for lunch some time. As usual, it was delicious, from the charred shisito and daikon salad …

… to the nigiri I chose from the menu. Now, because I dined alone, I had the chance to make a few observations. The first one was weird. I arrived at restaurant opening, which meant there was a line. While there were parties of 2 and 3 and 4 being turned away with wait times of about 30 minutes, I knew that a solo diner like me would just sslliiddee right in. So when I finally got up to the host and hostess, I told them, “party of 1, please” and looked over to the bar, eyeing an open seat, smiling. So he nodded and I swear he was about to seat me, right up until, I overheard her lean in to his ear and telling him, “make him wait”. WTF!! But it’s ok – I waited the 20 minutes (I visited a nearby chocolate shop) and it was worth it. The sushi is crazy. The other observation is that Saru is only prepared for a single ordering for each party – the “oh if we’re hungry we’ll just order more” tactic doesn’t work. The kitchen is small, busy, and doesn’t have time to go back and make another order for you – they want you in, ordered, fed, and gone, ready for the next party. Lingering, ordering “just a few more” is discouraged – that messes with their workflow. The couple next to me didn’t understand this. It was an interesting exchange to say the least: “another 45 minutes for just 1 more roll and a few nigiri?”. So remember: order, eat, leave.

k and cm took me to a wonderful little restaurant for seafood pasta, cioppino, and oysters – so great. No idea what it was called, but I can’t wait to go back!

Remember when we said we needed to go back to Mercato more? Done! Boom! My dish: pasta, meat, cheese – done! g’s dish: pasta, meat, cheese – done! So simple, SO GOOD. It used to be second fiddle to Melograno, but no more – Mercato is our new-old-fave Italian BYO.

From “All Abour Roasting”, the lovely sage, rosemary, thyme, and garlic sang between the two slabs of meat (5lb pork belly, 3lb tenderloin). Yea – it was as good as it looked – had it with some broccoli rabe, provolone, potato rolls. Next time, I’ll cook it a little slower so it’ll be a bit more tender, but nevertheless, 6 people demolished 8lbs of meat over two days. Success!
would you sell your soul for a beignet?
t says: g and I found ourselves in San Francisco (and Bay Area) recently, and, like our last trip to Cali, we made sure to go around and frequent delicious restaurants and cupcakes. But rather than bore you with every single thing we ate, I will instead tell you about the awesomest thing we ate. On the Saturday morning before leaving, g and I wanted to get some brunch. Unfortunately, the places we remembered from our research for our last trip were primarily Sunday brunch spots. The Ferry Building could have been had, however, we did it once before and we were taunted by g’s cousin: “Don’t do that again – you’ve already done it once – do something else!” We pulled out the iPad and started googling “Best Saturday Brunch” and limiting our scope to within walking distance from our hotel. A place called “Brenda’s” popped up, and it felt like a place I had heard of before. Boasting “soul food”, it promised to offer a little something different than we were used to.
When we arrived, we promptly put our name on a giant chalkboard that allowed us to see where we were on the waiting list. As far as two-top tables were concerned, we were fourth in line. We secured some seats in the waiting area (g does not like to wait standing) and cast hungry eyes in the general direction of the diners. The specials on the board in the dining room included Bananas Foster French Toast and Pork Belly with Brussels Sprouts and Grits … simply put: I refused to go anywhere else.
Now, I could tell you all about how the French Toast was delicious (but honestly, Cochon, in the hayday of the Elvis French Toast does it better), and how the watermelon iced tea was very refreshing, blah blah blah. But really, the dish of the meal was our first dish:
When we ordered them, we figured they’d be tiny, kind of like Talula’s Garden’s beignets. They were not. Seriously, one order of Beignets would have KO’d both of us had we finished them (we saved some to go for later). The three powdered sugar ones consisted of the following: plain (i.e. unfilled), apple-filled, Ghiardelli chocolate-filled. The last one, which did not have powdered sugar on it, was “crawfish-filled”. Don’t believe me? Look for yourself.
The crawfish one was delightful. Chunks of seafood in a delectable sauce of creole spices all inside a perfectly fried crust. Sooo good. It was like some sort of seafood stew but shoved inside fried dough. But as good as it was, it was only second place in my book because that chocolate one haunts me to this very day. It has single handedly ruined beignets for me. The chocolate tasted exactly like Ghiardelli chocolate chips (trust me, I’ve eaten enough of them in our chocolate chip cookies to know). It was powerful and rich and wonderful. It made my bananas foster French Toast seem kind of “boring” in comparison – that’s how good it was.
g, who’s a sucker for doughnuts, was similarly in heaven. I’m not sure which one was her favorite (maybe the apple one), but I can tell you that by the time we were leaving, she was adding Brenda’s to the short list of restaurants we absolutely have to eat at the next time we’re in town (actually, “the list” only includes Kiss Seafood and Kara’s Cupcakes so that’s pretty impressive!).
Long story short: go to Brenda’s for brunch – the beignets are worth the wait. That’s right – it’s a brunch spot worth waiting for – a g&t first!