Saturday, May 31, 2014

Sotto Mare (San Francisco)

I know, I know..I've been neglecting my blog for quite some time. By this point I have accumulated a large number of backlogged posts, but to ease myself back into blogging, I thought I'd start out with some recent events (while they are still fresh in my memory!) and slowly go back to some of the earlier outings and cooking adventures that hadn't yet made it to my blog.

What better place to start than to document all the great food I enjoyed in the San Francisco Bay Area, one of the best foodie towns in the country and where I recently spent a week on vacation. (Spoiler: Consumption of seafood was plentiful!)

Prior to the trip, I had appealed to Twitter for restaurant recommendations, and Alison (@azwers) was nice enough to send me a list of awesome suggestions from a local's perspective! I was surprised to learn that many restaurants were already booked solid (for future reference: make reservations several weeks in advance!), but I was able to get into some other great places nonetheless. It was from Alison that I learned about Sotto Mare in the North Beach (Little Italy) neighborhood, which is where we had our first meal in San Francisco.

Sotto Mare doesn't accept reservations for parties of 1 or 2, and luckily the wait wasn't too terrible on a Wednesday night, especially with a glass of wine in hand! To start, I had a small order of West Coast Oysters on half shell ($1.50 each), just because I couldn't resist fresh oysters! For a main course, Alison had specifically recommended the "Best Damn Crab Cioppino" ($41), an order of which is large enough for two people, so naturally R. and I had to get it. In addition to crab, the cioppino (essentially a seafood stew that originated in where else but San Francisco!) also included shrimp, mussels, calamari, clams, scallops, fish, in a tomato-based stew (recipe available here!). It was easily on of the best meals we had in San Francisco and with that, our trip was off to a great start!

Oysters at Sotto Mare (San Francisco)
Oysters

Cioppino at Sotto Mare (San Francisco)
Crab Cioppino

Restaurant Info:
Sotto Mare
552 Green St, San Francisco, CA 94133
(415)398-3181
Web



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