Eclectic, delicious food and microbrews now playing at Broken Record

Broken Record, a relatively new restaurant in the Excelsior District in San Francisco, shows just how much a small restaurant can achieve with talented, imaginative chefs, an urban chic ambience and a handful of well-selected taps.
Formerly a Mexican restaurant called Mom is Cooking, the 7-month-old Broken Record seems out of place on Geneva Ave.; it feels as if it belongs in the Haight or amid the gastropubs on 16th Street in the Mission.
Broken Record is happily devoid of the pretensions and attitude that can plague pseudo-hip restaurants and pubs in the “cooler” neighborhoods, however, and it makes up in personality, charm and flavor what it lacks in amenities. Instead of menus, the few food choices are listed in the backroom restaurant. Service is rudimentary but friendly and courteous: You order drinks in the front of the restaurant at the bar and place your food order in the back. There’s a pool table and juke box in the bar section, but the music is more muted in the restaurant, where a large flat-screen TV (which was playing a kung-fu movie with the sound off) looms over a few booths and tables.
The kitchen is opposite the screen and is arguably more entertaining than the movie. The sparse, eclectic menu is a far cry from typical pub grub fare. Appetizers included crispy broccoli with chili flakes and parmesan and mac ‘n cheese made with bowtie rather than elbow noodles and topped with crispy corn bread (with or without bacon). They were both well-matched with a delicious pint of Green Flash IPA from San Diego
According to our friendly server, who also manned the kitchen and took our order, Broken Record’s extraordinary burger is made using brisket, aged cheese and bacon from Zoe in Petaluma (the optional avocado is highly recommended). Each bite of the perfectly cooked burger in a toasted bun was like a symphony of flavors that were further enhanced by a pint of Pranqster, a Belgian-style strong ale from North Coast Brewing in Ukiah. Pranqster was also refreshing complementing the Crispy Tiger Shrimp sandwich, served with crab mayo and avocado on a fresh baguette.  
Other options included pulled pork with cole slaw and spicy mayo; roasted Portobello mushroom with mozzarella, roasted red peppers, balsamic aioli and fresh basil; bacon French fries; duck confit potato skins; buttermilk biscuit; and chicken wings. The menu seems to rotate frequently.
We could not resist the dessert waffle: a crispy Belgian waffle served with a scoop of home-made roasted banana ice cream, drizzled with Nutella and sprinkled with powder sugar. Bliss.

The menu isn’t extensive and neither are the taps, but they don’t have to be when they’re as intelligently thought out and as well executed as they are at Broken Record. The two cooks and bartender who staffed Broken Record also belie the notion that you have to be aloof to be cool. They all seemed genuinely concerned that patrons have a good experience and sincerely grateful for their business and their compliments, of which there were many.



Broken Record
1166 Geneva Ave
(between Edinburgh St & Naples St)
San Francisco, CA 94112
(415) 963-171
CASH ONLY

Restaurant hours:
Sunday 6pm - 10pm
Monday-Saturday 6pm - 11pm
Bar hours:
Mon-Thu. 5pm - 12am
Fri-Sat. 5pm - 2am
Sun. 5pm - 12am
www.brokenrecordsf.com

Reliable Chow, good craft beer

Chow has been serving hearty local food at reasonable prices since 1997, when it opened on Church Street near Market. In addition to its sister location on Ninth Avenue near Golden Gate Park, Chow has also expanded to Danville and Lafayette, with the latter location also offering a food market. All of the Chows have six well-thought-out taps that match their rustic comfort food.
The tap lists vary by location, and the restaurant seems to touch all the bases, more or less, with beers mostly from Bay Area breweries. At a recent visit to Chow on Church, the choices included Trumer Pils, Marin Brewing’s Tiburon Blonde Ale, Speakeasy’s Big Daddy IPA, Deschutes Green Lakes organic amber ale and the Sless Stimulating stout from Iron Springs. Each location also features a rotating tap (Anchor’s excellent Our Special Christmas Ale in this case), as well as nine bottled beers.
Deschutes, from Bend, Ore., makes consistently good beer and the Green Lakes amber was no exception. It was very tasty matched with a pinto bean and pancetta soup. Hearty soups like this are a natural with flavorful beer.

Chow is the kind of place you can pop into on a whim for a quick bite and beer. Or while strolling the neighborhood, you can have a beer and some grub while the kids have a milkshake and a burger or a pizza from the wood-fired oven. Service is friendly and the restaurant has a nice warm feeling. When well-run, family-style, neighborhood restaurants like Chow offer several good taps, you know that craft beer has become mainstream.
Chow somehow manages to have something for just about everybody while remaining true to its mission of locally sourced products. The beer and food might not be the most eclectic or challenging, but that’s really not the point. You come away from Chow feeling satisfied without leaving a gaping hole in your wallet.

If you haven’t entirely slaked your beer thirst at Chow, you can pop in next door at the Pilsner Inn, which features a cozy enclosed patio at the back of the bar. Pilsners have gotten a bad name as a result of American macro brewers, sometimes literally. Available on tap at the Pilsner Inn is a pilsner called “Czechvar,” which is actually a Czech pilsner named Budvar from Ceske Budejovice of the Czech Republic. As a result of nearly a century of litigation with Anheuser-Busch/Budweiser, Budvar is distributed in the U.S., ironically by Anheuser Busch, under the Czechvar name.
The name is just about the only similarity between America’s Bud and Czechvar/Budvar, however. Whereas Bud has been methodically and painstakingly stripped of it natural malt and hops flavor to appeal to American tastes, Czechvar/Budvar remains refreshingly flavorful, even with restrained noble hops (though Pilsner Inn serves it a little too cold for my taste, even for a pils). There’s really no comparison, and anyone who thinks that Bud is a “true” pilsner should give Budvar/Czechvar a try.

Chow Church
215 Church Street
San Francisco, CA 94114
(415) 552-2469
http://chowfoodbar.com/

Park Chow
1240 9th Ave
San Francisco, CA 94122
(415) 665-9912

Chow Lafayette
53 Lafayette Circle
Lafayette, CA 94549
(925) 962-2469

Chow Danville
445 Railroad Ave
Danville, CA 94526
(925) 838-4510

Pilsner Inn
225 Church Street
San Francisco, CA 94114-1310
(415) 621-7058
http://www.pilsnerinn.com/

Zeitgeist: great craft beer in The Mission, attitude optional

Having a bar named “Zeitgeist” carries with it a certain responsibility and attitude – even more so when it’s located in San Francisco’s Mission District, not far from the seedier side of Market Street. Zeitgeist, the German noun, means the spirit of the time, the general trend of thought or feeling characteristic of a particular period . Culturally, zeitgeist suggests “the general moral, intellectual and cultural climate of an era,” like the Victorians' faith in industrial progress and American settlers' belief in manifest destiny. The zeitgeist of the Zeitgeist Bar and Guesthouse has a rebellious urban edge, as befits a divey tavern, under the shadow of a freeway overpass, whose clientele mostly gets around on two wheels.

Several vehicles adorn one of the walls in the spacious beer garden (“Do not leave your bike here. It will be removed”). The tavern almost revels in being edgy, with kitschy bric a brac and copious signage, including notices about prohibiting videos or pictures next to a mural of pink elephants balancing on a motorcycle.

A certain amount of the attitude is cosmetic – the bartenders are no worse than, say, Toronado’s and the food server pandering for tips is more amusing than menacing. Part is real, though, manifested in a disdain for the proliferation of young “hipsters” who seem to have descended in great numbers upon the Mission and Zeitgeist in particular. (Several of the hipsters apparently are not very hip to craft beer, since there seemed to be as many people sipping PBR, Tecate and Pacifico as there were drinking microbrews.) It's as if the zeitgeist of gritty urban defiance is being undermined and threatened by the indifference of the Blackberry-wielding newcomers.
Some patrons have voiced their umbrage in response to rude treatment. One Yelp critic complained, “The bartenders are all despondent apathetic slugs that think their sh*t is ice cream,” yet concluded, “Just because I give this place one star does not mean you'll have great time, you will, in spite of the bar.” Last year, Esquire voted Zeitgeist one of the best bars in the U.S. This is because Zeitgeist offers excellent beer among its two dozen or so taps; pours a good, clean pint for a decent price; and has a nice, spacious patio where you can enjoy your brew with a good cheeseburger ($5, but don’t forget to tip) or a tamale from the Tamale Lady. They also make a mean Bloody Mary.

Among the brews on tap on a recent visit were a couple of dark beers from Moonlight Brewing Company in Santa Rosa. Although Moonlight’s Death and Taxes California black lager was listed, it wasn’t available. Instead, the bar was pouring Moonlight’s excellent dark lager called Toast and a dark ale that Zeitgeist had dubbed “xxxmas,” a beer I wasn’t familiar with. To clear up the details on the mystery beer, I contacted Moonlight owner and brewer (and just about everything else at the brewery) Brian Hunt, who explained: “Zeitgeist sometimes uses some creative license in naming beers, and last year or before they began calling the Tipple ‘Rated Xmas.’ I think they shortened the name this year and made it more ‘hard core!’"
Hunt described the dark ale (top, with a grilled cheese) as “porterish without going quite that dark. It is aged on wet/dry hops. These are the same hops that were picked at the brewery and put in the aging tanks and filled with Homegrown. The timing works just right so that when the Homegrown is all sold, I refill the tanks with Tipple. There is a resulting freshhop character that makes the dark ale more almost fruity, as opposed to hoppy. It is as if the dark malt flavor masks some of the grassier freshhop notes, and the richer notes are able to surface up with the malt flavors. It was at least three weeks old when first released, likely about five or six weeks old when the last keg went out the week before Christmas.”
He described Toast as a slightly burned strong lager, “an exercise in toasty flavor. I just used all the malts that I felt would make a beer that tasted like Toast. Hops were just minimal enough to round off the dry edges. This beer, however, was a year old. Last year I released two versions: a small amount 3 years old, and the bulk that was 4 weeks old. My intention from now on is to only release it at one year, except for a few extra-old kegs. All aging is in stainless. Both are 6.0% (abv).”
Needless to say, both were delicious and especially excellent sipping in the outdoor patio on a partially gray San Francisco afternoon.
My advice: ignore the attitude, bring a hoodie, buy a burger or tamale and enjoy some great beer.

Zeitgeist
199 Valencia at Duboce
(415) 255-7505

Nix the champagne and ring in a hoppy new year with beer

National Public Radio recently reported that Americans aren’t buying French bubbly the way they used to, and some of it is even being sent back to France. That’s not too surprising. Given the state of the economy and the number of people who are out of work, paying more than $50 for a classy French champagne borders on extravagance.
For that kind of money, New Year’s revelers can quaff some excellent beer. According to beeradvocate.com, “One of the newest and most interesting styles of beer, the Bière de Champagne has much potential within the beer industry as a top-shelf crossover beer.” Primarily brewed in Belgium, biere de champagne is ale that goes through a lengthy maturation process and is sometimes aged in caves in France’s Champagne region before being put through the “methode de champenoise” process of remuage and degorgement to remove yeast from the bottle. These ales look like champagne, pop and fizz like champagne, and like French bubbly are best served chilled in flute glasses.
Whole Foods in San Francisco sells DeuS made by Brouwerij Bosteels of Belgium for $32.99. Other biere de champagne to consider are Malheur Bière Brut (Brut Reserve) from Brouwerij De Landtsheer NV and Bush Prestige from Brasserie Dubuisson Frères sprl.
Another option could be to get hoppy with some of the fine India pale ales and double IPAs that are available in California. A few to consider are: Blind Pig and Pliny the Elder from Russian River Brewing, Racer 5 and Red Rocket from Bear Republic, Valley Brewing’s IPA and Uberhoppy, Stone IPA and Ruination, Drake’s IPA, AleSmith IPA and YuleSmith, and many others. All would ring in a very hoppy new year at a fraction of the price of good champagne.
Or you could enjoy a seasonal winter warmer, like a beautiful magnum of Anchor’s excellent Our Special Ale ($14.99 at BevMo), welcome the new year with Samuel Smith’s subtle yet enticing Winter Welcome Ale, or quaff one of my seasonal favorites, Deschutes Jubelale.

Toronado: holiday beer in a classic San Francisco dive bar

Big Daddy Dave Keene and his Toronado bar have come a long way in the past 22 years, and the lower-Haight Street beer institution has come close to defining the American public house experience. This might come as a bit of a shock to those who have felt slighted and even humiliated by the Toronado bartenders for such perceived transgressions as the wrong attire (“we don’t serve yuppies in here”), lack of beer knowledge or simply indecision. Others malign the “ambiance”: It’s too dark and dingy, too loud, and it smells too much of urine. While all of this is demonstrably true, what the detractors fail to realize is that the Toronado really is all about the beer.
The Toronado opened in 1987 with just two taps and Keene bought out the original owners a couple of years later. The rise of the Toronado, not incidentally, has matched the trajectory of the craft brew movement in the Bay Area and there exists a rare synergy between producers and purveyor that would be hard to fathom in the American macro beer environment. Speakeasy Brewery in San Francisco named its signature IPA “Big Daddy” in honor of Keene and Anderson Valley Brewery named two of its Belgian ales after him: Brother David's Double and Triple, according to a 2007 interview. Beer gurus such as Shaun O’Sullivan of 21st Amendment and Vinnie Cilurzo of Russian River Brewing Company often hold beer-release events or attend parties at the Toronado. In 2007, Cilurzo debuted a new beer, a Flanders Red-style ale, to celebrate the Toronado’s 20th anniversary and threw a party at the Santa Rosa brewery in Keene’s honor.

Toronado’s nearly 50 beers on tap (with more in bottles) extends far beyond the Bay Area, though, mostly in the direction of Belgium, with the likes of Chimay, Brasserie d'Achouffe and Brasserie Dubuisson, and American brewers whose beers reflect the Belgian tradition, such as the sublime Allagash White (pictured above with a beer sausage from Rosamunde) from Portland, Maine. Keene has a soft spot for Belgian ales. During the holidays, seasonal beers dominate the taps, like Scaldis Noel, Santa's Little Elf, Santa's Little Helper, St Bernardus Christmas and many more.
The Toronado has become the epicenter of the craft beer scene in San Francisco. February will mark the 17th year that the Toronado has hosted the annual barley wine festival – a sort of strong ale Olympics – in conjunction with San Francisco Beer Week. The Toronado brand has even extended beyond the Bay Area, as Keene licensed the name to former employee Ian Black, who opened a San Diego pub in 2008.
The Toronado’s taps are among the best in the Bay Area, but you can have a more enjoyable experience if you remember a few simple rules.
1) Don’t overdress. No one will be impressed, least of all the bartenders.
2) If you’re hungry, stop at the excellent Rosamunde Sausage Grill next door and place your order. Beer loves sausages. You will be told to return in 5-10 minutes to pick it up. You are welcome to bring your sausage in a yellow basket into the bar as long as you clean up after yourself.

3) There really is a caste system at the Toronado; it’s the “regulars” and everybody else. If you belong to the latter category, do not expect any conversation or pleasantries or any other sort of human interaction with the bartenders. Don’t take it personally, they treat everybody this way.
4) Know what you want. There’s a beer board at the back of the bar. Study it and be ready to place your order when the bartender acknowledges you. No questions, no conversation. Grab your beer, tip $1 and find a place to drink it. As you drink your first one, strategize about your second. A session beer, under 5.5% abv (like Moonlight's Reality Czech, pictured above), is a good start; you can always go higher with your next beers.
5) Get to know your neighbors. Unlike the bartenders, most of your fellow beer drinkers are quite friendly and more than willing to share information and beer knowledge. This can help you make your next beer decision.
6) Finally, try to pick a day and time when it’s not likely to be too busy. Mid-afternoons are perfect, even on weekends. The experience is literally night and day.

Special holiday and seasonal beers on tap at Toronado on 12/21/09
Dubuisson: Scaldis Noel
Widmer: brr Winter
Affligem: Noel
St. Bernardus: Christmas
Schneider: Aventinus
Port: Santa’s Little Helper
Sierra Nevada: Celebration
Drakes: Jolly Roger Brown
Anderson Valley: Winter Solstice
Marin: Hoppy Holidaze
Half Moon Bay: Old Solstice Winter
Shmaltz: Jewbelation
Moonlight: Tipple Ale
Iron Springs: Epiphany Amber
Anchor: Christmas
Mikkeller: Santa’s Little Elf
New Belgium: 2 below
Magnolia: Winter Warmer
Triple Rock: Reindeer
Avery: Old Jubilation
Kern River Brewing: Holiday Ale
Lost Abbey: Gift of the Magi
Russian River Brewing: Damnation, Consecration, Publication

Toronado
547 Haight St.
San Francisco, CA 94117-3406
(415) 863-2276
Hours: 11:30 a.m.-2 a.m. daily

Nopalito: sustainable Mexican food meets craft beer

Nopa Restaurant in San Francisco and its smaller sibling, Nopalito, are doing their part for sustainable organic farming by serving “simple food created with seasonal ingredients sourced from local purveyors.”
At Nopalito, the emphasis is on Mexican dishes like enchiladas mole with chicken, carnitas (slow-cooked pork), ceviche (marinated seafood) and pozole rojo, a soup made with pork shoulder, hominy, chile mulato, radishes, cabbage and onion. The rustic pozole in particular is Mexican comfort food and very satisfying on a dreary December afternoon.
Nopa and Nopalito also look to local producers for some of their beer, although the selection is sparse compared to the restaurants’ wine lists. Nopa’s wine menu runs 11 pages, compared with two beers on tap and seven in bottles. Nopalito actually has more beer than its larger sibling, with four beers on tap and nine in bottles. Although pickings are slim, you can make some good beer/food matches with what’s available from Magnolia, which is just down the street in the Haight; Mission Brewing Company in Chula Vista; the popular Russian River Brewing Company in Santa Rosa; and Moonlight Brewing Company in Santa Rosa.
Owned and almost solely operated by Brian Hunt, Moonlight only produces about 1,000 barrels per year, which is tiny even by microbrew standards. Nopalito features Moonlight’s delicious Death and Taxes California black lager on tap, which makes for a nice match paired with the soulful pozolo rojo. The other draught options are Magnolia’s Kalifornia Kolsch, a pale, relatively light German-style beer; Negra Modelo, a Munich dunkel lager made in Mexico; and Michelada, which is something like a bloody Mary, but with beer.
Nopalito also has some interesting bottles to choose from, including a 16.9-ounce bottle of Russian River’s tasty Blind Pig India Pale Ale; a Schonramer “Gold” Spezialbier, a German marzen/Oktoberfest beer; and a 22-ounce “bomber” of Mission Brewing Amber Ale. There are some interesting imports from Belgium as well: a Dupont “Foret” Organic Saison, a De Proef “Reinaert” Flemish Wild Ale and a Verhaeghe “Duchesse de Bourgogne” Red Ale.
Lagers are a good choice with Mexican food. The gentle carbonation is refreshing against the Mexican spices and the subtle, understated hops in the beer don’t overpower the simple food. Death and Taxes is a very good California dark beer, and at 4.2% abv, it won’t paralyze you for the rest of the afternoon.

Nopalito
306 Broderick
San Francisco, CA

Phone: 415-437-0303

Hours: 11:30 a.m.-10 p.m. seven days a week.

Luka’s Taproom: good beer in Uptown Oakland

Uptown Oakland is enjoying something of a renaissance, attempting to recapture some of the luster of the early to mid 20th century, when the area was a prime shopping and entertainment destination. A lot of the old department store buildings remain from that era, and the Fox Theater on Telegraph and the art deco Paramount Theater on Broadway have been beautifully restored and attract world-class talent. Oakland has also made an effort to revitalize the residential aspects of this historic part of the city. Opened in 2008, the Uptown on William Street has created 665 new apartments, 9,000 square feet of retail and a public park.
Uptown Oakland is also home to some nightclubs, like The Uptown Nightclub on Telegraph, and several very nice, up-scale eateries such as Ozumo and Pican. But sometimes before or after a show, say, or during a day of shopping, you just need a quick bite and a good beer. A cone of Belgian-style French fries with a little aioli and a pint of Old Speckled Hen English Pale Ale at Luka’s Taproom fills that bill admirably.
Luka’s 16 beers on tap nicely balance Belgian ales (Chimay, Nice Chouffe, Lindemanns Framboise, Delerium Tremens, Maredsous No. 8, Blanche de Bruxelles, Stella Artois) and beer from the U.S. (Racer 5, Boont Amber, Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, Blue Star Hefeweizen, Lagunitas Brown Sugga and Dogfish Head 90), with a couple of beers tossed in from the British Isles (Old Speckled Hen and Guinness) and a Jever lager from Germany. Several nice Belgian beers are also available in bottles, including 750ml bottles of Deus biere de champagne and Fantome La Dalmatienne.
The frequently changing “California brasserie” menu is a bit of a mish-mash – a Belgian influence with mussels, oysters and Belgian-style fries; American standbys like burgers, sandwiches and mac and cheese; and Southern-style brunch on Sundays. On a recent Sunday, we tried the Mac and cheese (pretty good), fried chicken (a bit dry), beet soup (tasty), Belgian fries and aioli (good), a biscuit sandwich (underseasoned) and a frittata with artichokes and Brussel sprouts. Overall, the food is OK but not memorable. The real stars are the beer, like the smooth Old Speckled Hen Pale Ale, served from a nitrogen tap to reduce carbonation, and the tasty Maredsous 8 dubbel-style abbey ale from Brouwerij Duvel Moortgat NV. Luka’s might not be the place you want to go for an amazing dining experience, but sometimes a casual environment, good beer and something to snack on is just what the doctor ordered. 
Luka’s becomes a music venue at night, with DJs spinning hip-hop, soul, funk and reggae. Cover is $10 on Fridays and Saturdays. Luka's walls feature local artists, and art exhibits rotate regularly in the lounge, dining room and hallway.
Luka’s, which was named after a stray dog and replaced a hofbrau in 2004, fills a vital niche in the up-and-coming Uptown Oakland, with good beer and decent food, and support for local artists and musicians. If it wasn’t there already, someone would probably have to invent it.

Luka’s Taproom
2221 Broadway
Oakland, Calif, 94612.
Near 19th street BART and close to Lake Merritt
Phone: (510) 451-4677

Hours of operation:
Monday & Tuesday 11:30am-12:00am
Wednesday, Thursday & Friday 11:30am - 2:00am
Saturday 5:30pm - 2:00am
Sunday 10:30am - 12:00am
Lunch is served 11:30am - 2:30pm, Monday - Friday.
Dinner is served 5:30pm - 10:30pm, 7 days a week.
Brunch is served 10:30am - 2:30pm on Sunday.