#54 Spiced-Chocolate Doughnut at Dynamo Donut

This morning, B and I headed to Dynamo Donut in the Mission for our first breakfast item on the list. Interestingly, though Dynamo has gained renown for the maple-bacon doughnut, the Big Eat list points to the spiced-chocolate doughnut as the one to order (also interestingly, #54 uses both spellings of doughnut—you can tell from my typing which version I prefer). We ordered three doughnuts and two drinks. For beverage, I had a Four Barrel latte (Google taught me that Four Barrel is a coffee-roasting company in the Mission). B had orange juice; good flavor, but pulp-less. Now for the doughnut rundown:

1. The spiced-chocolate doughnut, as B pointed out, is a) not that spiced and b) more like a cake than a doughnut. It went very well with my latte. If you're in the mood for chocolate cake at breakfast, this one's for you.

2. The banana de leche was a modern filled doughnut, gooey on the inside without being overly sweet. Also, the "de leche" is a nice nod to the neighborhood, where there are almost as many signs in Spanish as in English.

3. And now, for the doughnut that reportedly landed Dynamo on the Food Network: the maple bacon apple doughnut. Readers of my other blog will know that I am a big fan of salty and sweet. (Speaking of, saw Fran's caramels for sale near the cash register at Sur la Table in the Ferry Building today!) I also enjoy pork products, and am not able to indulge in them with frequency because of my hog-hating husband. I know that chefs on the Food Network routinely add pork to anything and everything (as Michael Pollan pointed out in his recent article in the NYT, adding bacon is a gimmick that basically guarantees you the win on most of those shows). And I know that it seems particularly weird to add bacon to a doughnut; it seems weird, but it tastes delicious. I'm the kind of person who pours some maple syrup on her French toast, and then pours extra on the bacon that shares the plate. Ergo, this doughnut was made for me. B took one bite, decreed that the bacon didn't add anything special, and left the rest of the doughnut for me. I was happy about that state of affairs! My only critique—and it's a minor one—is that I didn't taste the apple at all.

Well, that's the end of that adventure. Clearly I like doughnuts. Sometimes I like making them, but Dynamo provides a delicious excuse not to. It's a little far away for regular visits, which is probably good for my LDL cholesterol, but I'll be back. Maybe without B, who prefers savory breakfasts.

P.S. Sorry for the lack of pictures! I totally intended to take my camera on our excursion this morning, and, obviously, totally forgot.

#60 The Brass Monkey at Little Star

I was skeptical when I saw this on the list. B and I have eaten at Little Star many times, and there is no "brass monkey" on the menu. I checked again online. It's not there.

Is it a drink? It sounds like a drink. How could they put A DRINK as the thing to order from Little Star, which has such phenomenal deep dish pizza?

Nope, it turns out that it's like ordering your burger "animal-style" at In-N-Out: the brass monkey is a secret, off-the-menu variation. It's just the Little Star deep dish pizza, our standby favorite featuring spinach, mushroom, and ricotta, with the top-secret addition of sausage. I felt sort of cool and in-the-know when I ordered our take-out on Friday, August 21st.

Unfortunately, I felt less cool and in-the-know when I tasted the pizza itself. The sausage dotted over the pizza came across as superfluous in light of all the other strong flavors. Still delicious, especially when combined with a side of the house salad, but comforting and homey rather than transporting. The best part of the pizza is still the amazingly rich and flavorful tomato sauce. I've heard talk of the crust being better at Zachary's in the East Bay, but haven't eaten there enough to make a direct comparison.

#60 was worth trying. In the future, though, we'll go back to ordering the Little Star pizza straight up, sans brass monkey variation.

(A couple of side-notes: the Divisadero location is cash-only; Little Star is one of the many restaurants we frequent that is closed on Mondays.)

#36 Dry-Fried Chicken Wings at San Tung

It was an obvious beginning. We kicked off the check-list on Monday, August 17th with #36.

We live in the Inner Sunset, mere blocks from the goodness that is San Tung, and we already know and love the dry-fried chicken wings. For whatever reason, we often get take-out on Mondays, and many restaurants are closed on Mondays. San Tung, blessedly, is not.

B likes trying something new every time we go to a restaurant (he dreads falling into a restaurant rut), but he makes an exception for San Tung. We therefore picked up our usual order on Monday: shrimp-and-leek dumplings, green beans, and two orders of dry-fried chicken wings. All delicious as usual! The wings, of course, were the standout: such a wonderful combination of sweet and spicy with a little bit of crunch. The flavor is still good the next day, should you happen to have leftovers (you probably won't), but the texture isn't quite as good.

I can't imagine how many chicken wings they go through at San Tung. It must be hundreds and hundreds each day! The staff must be so sick of seeing the wings that they probably can't even eat them anymore. On a Yelp review I read a while ago, a new visitor to the restaurant asked what was a popular dish, and the server supposedly rolled his eyes, sighed, and said, simply, "The wings." I imagine that with the taste of those recommended chicken wings yet another follower was born. It's hard not to be convinced with just a few bites. Who could ever go back to those spicy Buffalo wings with blue cheese after tasting these!

Special recognition goes to WT, who now lives in Seattle, for introducing us to San Tung when we moved to San Francisco two and a half years ago.

SF Chronicle list, you are officially one for one.

100 Things to Eat Before You Die

In general, I'm not the biggest fan of Top 10 or Top 100 lists. They're pretty artificial, right? Things inevitably get left out, and maybe other things get artificially elevated to the top of the heap. But then I discovered, with the help of my attending in the ICU last week, this amazing list from the San Francisco Chronicle. (It was a slow day in the ICU.)

First, we salivated over it, all the restaurants we wanted to try and all the restaurants we had already tried. Then, we started strategizing. The pulmonary fellow who was part of the conversation has only lived in San Francisco for two months, but she made plans to drive home via #9 (tofu soup with kimchi at My Tofu House) for lunch. I was on call, but already thinking about coming home post-call for #36 (dry-fried chicken wings at San Tung).

So I e-mailed the list to people I thought would appreciate it, and printed out a copy of my own. When I got home last Monday, I put it up on the fridge.

B and I had already decided that we were going to systematically check off highlights on the list. I hadn't decided about blogging the results though, since it seems like one blog is probably enough. However, I'm plunging ahead. This new blog is going to be more literally a log than the other blog: the restaurants we hit and our experiences at them. It'll be for just the two of us, though any followers are welcome as well; maybe we'll also be able to use it to guide the restaurant choices of visitors to our foggy city. There will be no artificial deadlines, and, though it would probably be delicious, no plan to complete all the check-boxes in one year (shades of the Julie/Julia project, etc.). Here are the ground rules:

1. We will visit every restaurant on the list, regardless of whether we've eaten there before. We will re-evaluate the recommended menu selections in a new, "Top 100" mindset. We will order what is suggested, even when we're skeptical and would never previously have ordered the dish, like, say, #69 (licorice parfait at South).

2. We will not hit the restaurants in any particular order.

3. We may eat take-out instead of dining in the actual restaurant. Obviously this is not reasonable for many on the fancier end of the spectrum, including #100 (cheese course at Gary Danko) or #90 (slow-cooked egg at Coi).

4. B may end up being the blogger on this site sometimes. He hasn't quite decided.

5. We may occasionally write about other restaurants, as I do think the list leaves off some obvious favorites (Foreign Cinema, anyone? Or our new favorite, the tamal de puerco from the adorably-named Nopalito? Or, for that matter, the food from parent Nopa?). Overall, however, B and I are extremely excited about having a new guide for our restaurant adventures.

So, here we go!

Mmm.