Nob Hill – The Answer is Always Pork

When Emily and I go to a restaurant, we ask a simple question: could I make this dish better? Usually, this is really important when we review food in our comfort zone (american, french, etc.). But when it comes to ethnic cuisine, we are not experts and usually the answer to the question above is no. Of course, this doesn’t mean we can’t appreciate ethnic food and pick out the good places.

This just so happened when we went to Darbar, an Indian-Pakistani restaurant on Polk between California and Pine. We’ve been there many times and it is consistently a pleasurable experience. The atmosphere is nice and warm with cheesy murals and photos of Pakistan coating the walls. There’s never a wait for a table and the service is usually pretty good, although they tend to be significantly slower when the room is more than half full with patrons. They’ve shown improvement in this regard over the half a dozen times we’ve dined there. Obviously these flaws are not enough to keep Emily and I away. Darbar has some serious advantages too, namely the food and the price.

We have sampled most of the menu at Darbar and settled on some favorites. From the appetizer section, the Vegetable samosas ($2) are very good with a very crisp crust and a satisfying potato filling. They are very balanced and the tamarind sauce and mint chutney accompany them really nicely. Before I continue, I would like to say that the mint chutney at Darbar is really excellent, one of the best I’ve had. It’s spicy, acidic, and yet still tastes of fresh mint; I could put it on just about anything. On our most recent visit, we ordered a Seekh Kebab ($2.5) from the pakistani side of the menu. The spicy, ground beef came out sizzling on a hot cast iron skillet in all its clichéd glory, served with onions and lemon. The meat itself was a bit dry, but the flavors were all there; the sweetness of the charring onion, the spices of the meat, and the acidity of the lemon worked together beautifully.

The main courses continue the trend of value and taste. Darbar has a nice selection of curries and rice dishes as well as six varieties of naan and a dozen special menu items. Everything we’ve had has been good, simple Indian food at a good price. The creamier curries tend to be a bit mild in spice and flavor, but you can ask them to bump up the heat if you so desire. Emily’s favorite dish is the Mater Paneer ($6), which is fresh cheese and peas cooked in a cream based curry. The peas add a nice sweetness to the dish, which counters the spice of the sauce and the slight saltiness of the cheese. We really love paneer chesse in this context; it is a relatively dry cheese with a slightly chewy texture. This lack of creaminess is what makes it work so well with this curry. My personal favorite dish is the Sindhi Biryani ($8); tender pieces of lamb cooked in curry, served with spicy saffron rice and riata. Unlike the cream based curries, this dish comes pretty spicy. The lamb is tender but sometimes a tiny bit dry, and the riata is very tasty, but not the best I’ve had. It’s the rice that makes this dish; the blend of spices (cardamom, clove, etc.) excite the palate with every bite. Even with the small flaws, the excellent rice brings the whole dish together in a way that really works.

To sum it up, Darbar is great Indian food and an excellent value (a dinner for two tends to cost $25-30 after tax and tip, and we leave with enough leftovers for lunch the next day). Some downsides are the occasional service issues and the lack of a liquor license (although they do make a great mango lassie for $2). The charm and quality of food definitely make up for any mistakes we’ve encountered.

Dessert after Darbar:

One confession regarding the above post: we’ve never had dessert at Darbar. On or most recent trip this didn’t change, but we did try a crepe place right down the street. Crepes Ooh La La is located at 1220 Polk St. They have a large selection of both sweet and savory crepes and their prices are decent too. Fortunately, this is not one of those trendy, sit down places; it’s more of a hole in the wall with two crepe burners in the front window and a counter in the back with tables in between. I love a simple butter, sugar, and lemon juice crepe, so Emily and I shared one. For $3, it was pretty tasty. We got it to go so all the delicious juices ran to the bottom leaving the upper half a bit dry. Overall, it was a nice experience and a pretty good crepe. I would like to go back and try some of their other varieties and maybe have one in house to see if there is a better distribution of juices. One word of warning though: certain additions (like strawberries for example) are pretty pricey, so some crepes end up being quite expensive. But, since I haven’t tried any of their other crepes I can’t comment on them, so who knows, they might be worth it.

-Jordan

Here’s the deal. This is why I wanted to start a blog. Online restaurant reviews are hit and miss; it’s as simple as that. This review of two restaurants, Moussy’s and Nob Hill Grille, is a prime example of what can happen when you trust the common online restaurant review databases. Both have similar ratings; both are in a similar price range, have interesting sounding menus, feature small plates, and have a small, but tasteful wine list. The similarities end there.

I’ll start with the bad news first. Moussy’s is located in Lower Nob Hill on Bush Street between Larkin and Polk. Emily and I decided to give this place a try on Saturday night because (I swear this is the last time I’ll say this) of its positive reviews on google, yelp, etc. We looked at the menu online and it seemed promising. Upon entering the cavernous dining room we were greeted promptly and seated at a table off the bar. The atmosphere was dark and intimate, but cozy at the same time. Definitely a place I could see myself in for a couple of hours enjoying some wine and relaxing. We sat down and looked over the paper menu and decided on a couple appetizers to start. The grilled oysters sounded nice, unfortunately they had just run out so we settled on the charcuterie plate. This is where things went downhill. The waiter took our order for the charcuterie and left. About ten minutes later we received a plate with four slices each of salumi, hot coppa and prosciutto, as well as a bit of grain mustard and some dried figs that tasted like they had been reconstituted in balsamic vinegar and honey. There was nothing terrible about the dish, but for $13 it was definitely lackluster. There was one star on that plate: the prosciutto. It was very interesting in that it had the usual porky goodness of your typical cured ham, but it was much spicier than most prosciutto. After taking our plate, the waiter continued to watch the Giants game before coming back to see if we wanted anything else. Unfortunately we did, and proceeded to order the grilled cheese, pomme frites, and the angus burger. First came out the fries with a spicy aioli ($6). The flavors were all there; a nice amount of seasoning on the fries and a good heat to the aioli. Unfortunately the chef had made an egregious error: some of the fries (and by some, I mean about 1/3) were STALE! Then Emily’s grilled cheese ($9) came. It smelled of melted butter and cheese; two of our favorite things, but it fell completely flat; it had absolutely no flavor. There was one upside to the evening, and that was my burger. I chose the aged gruyere and grain mustard aioli. The angus beef was very nicely seasoned and the brioche bun was soft and absorbed all the delicious juices. The gruyere and aioli did little other than add a creaminess. At $12 it was a tasty hamburger, if not the best value. Overall, the service was slow, the food was pretty bad, and most of the interesting items shown on their menu online were missing from the actual menu. On the upside, I liked the burger a lot and the atmosphere was nice, but the thought of stale french fries will keep me away for a long time.

On a more positive note, Emily’s mom came into the city on Sunday and wanted to grab a bite close to our house; we decided to walk up to Nob Hill Grille at Pine and Hyde. Let me get some business out of the way first. Emily and I went to Nob Hill Grille on a whim a few weeks ago and really enjoyed it. One reason we went to Moussy’s was to do a little comparison, and going back to Nob Hill Grille was just a little bonus so I could give a fair opinion on both restaurants. We went in around 6pm for an early dinner and the tiny dining room was mostly empty. The decor is simple with a few black and white photos of San Francisco on the walls. It is a comfortable and inviting atmosphere; more classic than lush or trendy. We sat down and received water immediately, which was filled constantly by the attentive waitstaff. The three of us shared a number of small plates and we each had a glass of wine. Rich, one of the guys who runs the show, knew off the top of his head that they were out of the syrah I had selected and steered me toward the “Rubystone” ventenna blend, from Monterey ($10). Not the most balanced wine, but it was mild and paired well with all the dishes. Rich broke our meal of six small plates into two courses of three plates each. First we had the beet salad with warm goat cheese ($6), magic mac ($6), and the braised pork belly ($9). The salad was nice and classic, but nothing extraordinary. The magic mac (macaroni and cheese with house-cured bacon) was terrific: seasoned well, creamy and cheesy with a very nice brown crust on top. The pork belly is one of my favorite dishes that I’ve had recently. It is slow cooked to tender perfection and then is seared to order making the top super crispy. Thinking about it gives me a slight chill. It’s served over garlic mashed potatoes with wild molasses and stone fruit tapenade. This dish shows a lot of skill because these are some very bold flavors, but they are so balanced they complement each other beautifully. Another reason for me to praise this dish is the nature of the ingredients; obviously, by the name of our blog, we love pork, but when it comes to putting sweet fruit stuff in with it, Emily and I agree this is generally not right. The chef at Nob Hill Grille makes this dish so well that even with our fruity-phobia, we embraced the dish and loved it as if it were our own. Moving on. Next up we had the braised beef sliders ($9), special pasta ($?), and sautéed french beans ($4) to make us feel a bit better about all the bacon. Starting with the beans, they are very good. Simple salt pepper and a little chile and maybe a squeeze of lemon. The pasta was orecchiette with bacon rapini and white wine butter sauce. The bacon was delicious, of course, and the sauce was mellow and blended nicely with the other flavors, but the pasta and the rapini were both a bit overcooked. The braised beef sliders were nice but not spectacular. I’m personally not a big fan of braised beef, but I can recognize when it’s done well and when it’s not. The beef here was done very nicely and the slaw was a refreshing match to the rich meatiness. Only one flaw really sticks out in my mind, and that is the choice of bun for the sliders; they were very hard and the meat slid off almost immediately. It was a decent dish, but I would much rather have twice as much pork belly.

I’ll leave it at that. Pork (especially when it’s cured and from the belly) makes me like a restaurant! Seriously though, this is my first time writing a formal restaurant review and I hope my insights help someone make the right choice when finding a small bistro-style eatery in Lower Nob Hill.

-Jordan