Category Archives: Restaurants & Reviews

Your Basic Fried Oyster Po’boy with Slaw

I admit to craving oysters every now and then.  I would have been happy in turn-of-the-century New York City, I think, where oysters were plentiful and every dive sold oyster stew.

I often see an oyster po’boy—or poor boy, if you want to get fancy—in my mind’s eye as I’m driving or doing laundry.  I never know when a strong desire for fried oysters will strike.

The bread in my po’boy fantasy is always an Acme sourdough roll.  The oysters are always large, plump and juicy — and there are so many of them they are falling out of the sandwich.  The breading on these fried pillows of bliss is a little crunchy and has some spice, but not enough to mask that hint of metallic funkiness.  There are slices of the tomatoes I had as a child – huge, red, ripe Beefsteaks from roadside stands in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.  A little cabbage slaw barely dressed in a sweet-sour dressing peeks out, and there might even be a little remoulade, if I’m getting really unhinged.

As you can see, to me, a po’boy is made with fried oysters.  Period.  Even though this Louisiana sandwich is perfectly authentic made with other kinds of fried seafood, or even meat, I figure I can have those things any old time.  Fried oysters make it special.

Believe it or not, it’s the bread that defines a po’boy.  Apparently there is such a thing as Louisiana French bread – something like a baguette – with a flaky exterior and a soft interior.  Perhaps this is like banh mi  – a Vietnamese baguette.  I’ve never had a po’boy in its native habitat, so I don’t know, but I have some time yet.

Matthew at Sea Salt restaurant in Berkeley

Matthew at Sea Salt restaurant in Berkeley

The long and short of this story involves Matthew, my son, and myself driving down San Pablo Avenue one day deciding to pop in to Sea Salt (2512 San Pablo Avenue, Berkeley) for a po’boy pour moi and fish and chips for his nibs.

Sea Salt is a solid seafood restaurant.  I like the fact that they preserve the authenticity of standards like fish and chips and clam chowder.  God knows there are enough places in Northern Cali where these things have been deconstructed and reinvented to death.

It ain’t cheap, being an upscale member of the K2 family of eating establishments, which includes Jimmy Beans, Fonda, T-Rex and LaLime’s.

That said, $14 is a small price to pay for your heart’s desire – served in a very nice space with great service, to boot.  My po’boy came on a quality roll with slaw and remoulade, and housed a respectable number of oysters.  Oh, man, the oysters were good.  Not only perfectly cooked, but fresh, given that they were shucking oysters in the kitchen while we were there eating.  The breading had texture and flavor, too.  Suffice it to say that the whole damned sandwich was slammin’.

I have to mention the hand-cut, house-made potato chips.  They were the thickest pototo chips I ever had in a restaurant, and not at all greasy.  Crunchy and salty, they were terrific.

Matt’s $14 fish and chips plate was fine, if a bit skimpy in the fish department, but the quality was there.  The cod was fresh and nicely cooked.  Matt said he’d get the po’boy next time, though.

Fish and Chips at Sea Salt restaurant in Berkeley

Fish and Chips at Sea Salt restaurant in Berkeley

I think you should try your hand at a po’boy at home.  It can be a bit messsy, and it’s easy to overcook oysters, but the result will be worth it – even if you have to try a couple of times before you nail the oyster-frying process.

If you want to shuck your own oysters, great.  I do not.  I buy them from a fishmonger who will shuck them for me, or I’ll pick up a high quality, fresh, jarred oyster.  Look for sustainably-farmed, and ask your fish guy or gal which local oyster they recommend for po’boys.  Make sure you buy oysters at a reputable shop.  The last thing you want is food-borne illness from a shady oyster.

Renate's home-made po'boy

Po’boy at chez akitachow

Basic Po’boy
1 quart medium-sized fresh oysters (medium is nice and large – small is OK if this is all you can find)
3/4 cup flour
1 teaspoon Old Bay seasoning
1 teaspoon Kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 teaspoon ground mustard
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 – 1/2 cups panko (coarse bread crumbs)
1 teaspoon Kosher salt
3 eggs, scrambled with 2 tablespoons water
2 large, ripe, tomatoes, sliced or diced.  Use really good tomatoes or leave them out of the recipe!
Canola oil for frying
5 long rolls of some kind.  I like Acme sweet or sour rolls.  Use good rolls here!
If you have a large, cast-iron frying pan, this would be a good time to haul it out

1).  Whisk together flour, Old Bay, salt, black pepper, ground mustard and cayenne pepper in medium-sized bowl.  Set aside.
2).  Combine panko and salt in medium-sized bowl.  Set aside.
3).  Carefully – very carefully! – pour your oysters into a bowl.  No need to rinse them – just feel around gently for stray shell pieces.  I do this by catching each oyster as it transitions from jar to bowl.
4).  Arrange your breading station:  oysters, flour, egg mixture, panko mixture, receiving plate.
5).  Set up a large, heavy-guage, frying pan with about a 1/2 inch of Canola oil on your burner – but don’t turn on the flame yet.
6).  Set out a small sheet pan lined with paper towels to place fried oysters on, as well as long tongs.
7).  Set out your plates – place a split roll on each and have your slaw on stand-by.
8).  Bread oysters like so:  Add four oysters to your flour mix, allowing juices to drain through your fingers first.  Toss gently.  Move with dry hand into egg mixture, and coat evenly.  Move to panko, toss gently to coat, and move with dry hand to plate.  It’s hard to do the ‘wet hand, dry hand’ thing here, but see if you can keep one hand dry to move coated oysters around.
9).  When you are all ready, turn on a medium flame under your frying pan and let the oil get hot.  Toss in a couple crumbs of panko to see if there’s a sizzle.
10). Gently add oysters (carefully, by hand, because they will be floppy) so you do not crowd them and thus wind up bringing the temperature of the oil down.  You want them to sizzle but not burn.
11).  Once they have browned a bit, turn them over gently with the tongs and let them quickly brown on the other side.
12).  Get them out of the pan and onto your sheet pan as soon as you’ve done this.  If you overcook them, they will shrink and become rubbery.  They do not need more than a few minutes over the heat.
13).  Bring oil back up to proper heat (add a little more oil if you need to) and repeat with remaining oysters.
14).  As soon as your last oyster hits the sheet pan, prep the rolls for the oysters.
15).  Arrange tomato slices in each roll and then heap a nice mound of slaw on top.
16).  Add 4 – 5 oysters on top and serve right away with lots of napkins!  I put the oysters on top of the wet stuff so they don’t get soggy.

Slaw for Po’boys
   Makes enough for about 5 large sandwiches
2 1/2 tablespoons white vinegar
2 tablespoons sugar
1/4 cup good mayonnaise (see my post on this)
1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard
A little salt & pepper
1 pound shredded cabbage or cole slaw mix

1).  Whisk everything but the cabbage together in a bowl until the sugar is dissolved.
2).  Fold in cabbage well.
3).  Leave on counter for an hour, folding the mass together every so often.
4).  Place in fridge until ready to use.

If you want to serve a remoulade*, there are many recipes on the web, but you can’t go wrong mixing a little chili oil, white pepper and salt into some good mayo.

*A remoulade is often something like thousand island dressing, but it can also be akin to tartar sauce, depending upon the recipe.

frying oysters for po'boys  Plate of fried oysters to be used for po'boys

Gathering food for the Jewish holiday season in the East Bay

Whole smoked whitefish from the acme smoked fish corporation

Each year I try to purchase a few things that Steve, my husband, would have been eating during certain holidays as a kid.  Since I’m from the same place and have been eating most of that stuff my whole life, I’m happy to do it.

Note that the idea here is to have some traditional Jewish foods available.  I’m not doing anything “official” or Kosher.

Like a broken record, let me again mention Costco.

I know Purim and Passover are around the corner when those #10 cans of Rokeach* gefilte fish show up there.  The canned version may not the best, but it’s OK, and $7.99 for 14 pieces is nothing to kick out of bed.  While “gefilte fish” literally means “filled fish,” nowadays they are large, poached fish balls made from whitefish or pike, matzoh meal and onions.  Years ago, the fish mixture was stuffed into a fish skin before poaching whole.  This allowed people of limited means to enjoy a whole fish on the Sabbath, even if it was stretched with filler.  Gefilte fish is good chilled with a little horseradish, and I always buy an extra can to have on hand to serve during the summer.

Costco had Rokeach hamentashen, too, but they contained high fructose corn syrup, so I passed.  Hamentashen are pastries made with short dough that’s partially folded over fruit filling, and they can be great if made at home or by a neighborhood bakery.

The Richmond, CA, Costco is good for smoked salmon, both farmed and mild, and, wonder of wonders!, whole smoked whitefish from the Acme Smoked Fish Corporation in Brooklyn, NY.  These fish are sold tail, head and all, in shrink wrap, for $6.99 a pound.  This is an incredible bargain, and I’d buy a Costco membership just to keep us flush with reasonably-priced smoked whitefish.  They used to carry Acme’s whitefish salad at $7.99 for a two-pound tub, but, alas, I have not seen it for over a year.  Maybe the nice Costco blog spies will pass along my request to bring the whitefish salad back to Richmond.

Smoked whitefish is salty and rich, and you can mix the flesh with a little good mayo and serve it on bagels.  Alternatively,  cut the whole fish into sections and eat it just like that with rye bread.  Serve the smoked salmon (lox) with some sliced cucumbers, red onion and sour cream on the side if you want to go the non-bagel route.

I like to buy chocolate covered jelly rings and candied fruit slices, too.  I have yet to find these anywhere other than Saul’s Restaurant & Delicatessen (1475 Shattuck Avenue, Berkeley), a place I don’t like to go .  I find them significantly overpriced – to the point of being laughable.  Their whitefish salad has celery and costs $15.75 a pound, and the sandwiches are skimpy for the price.  Whole smoked whitefish is $18.00 a pound – which is insane.  This is what happens when there’s no competition.  While I prefer to give my business to a local place, moral indignation prevents me from doing so here.

I always have high hopes for Cost Plus World Market in terms of the jelly rings and fruit slices, but no luck so far.  (That reminds me to get over there to buy what I can of the Cadbury chocolate before Kraft is involved in its production!)

There is no reason to buy cooked brisket, another popular food item this time of year.  Brisket is a primal cut of beef from the forequarter just below the chuck.  Many supermarkets have trimmed, whole briskets shrink-wrapped, and they run about 7 pounds.  Make sure you get one with the fat cap intact.  A good place to purchase brisket in the SF Bay Area is Smart & Final.  A long, boneless, flat, tough cut, it needs to be cooked for some time, after which it’ll be tender and flavorful.  Just rub with Kosher salt and pepper and roast (at a low temperature) or braise with aromatics and then slice against the grain after resting.  If you roast it, add some liquid to the pan and replenish it as it evaporates.  Whatever  your method, place it in your pan fat side up so the fat can run through and tenderize the meat during the cooking process.  Serve with potatoes or slice and pile high on good rye bread while warm.  Provide good mustard and horseradish.

I also make a small batch of chopped chicken liver, which Steve loves, having childhood memories of chopping the livers with a mezzaluna for his mother.  There are a million recipes for this on the Web, but the lowdown is that you’ll need rendered chicken fat for any reputable recipe.  This is why I tell you to freeze the bits of chicken fat you trim from whole chickens and thighs.  See my previous post about the chicken fat.  You’ll need chicken livers, of course, which should be trimmed of connective tissue, which feels like string; use kitchen shears or a paring knife against a cutting board.  Also, some finely chopped onion, hard-boiled egg that has been chopped, and salt and pepper.  This is bare-bones but very good, and I’ll give you the process, if not a full recipe:

Saute the livers in some rendered chicken fat until just done and set aside.  Do not overcook them!  Saute the onions in the same pan.  Chop the livers.  Put chopped livers, egg, onion, salt and pepper in a bowl and mix with enough extra hot rendered chicken fat to wind up with a moist spread.  Your ratio will be something like 1/2 cup of rendered chicken fat to each pound and a quarter of livers.  One egg and a very small yellow onion will be fine if you make the base quantity of livers.  Feel free to process the mass, but no need, really, unless you want it smooth.

I promise to make my own gefilte fish next year, so if you have a good recipe, please email it to me.

*In case you didn’t know this, Manischewitz owns numerous brands, including Rokeach, Mother’s, Goodman’s and Mrs. Adler’s, so these names don’t mean what they used to.

gefilte fish 2010

North Beach Pizza Tour with GraceAnn Walden

If you’re looking for an interesting outing that involves food and fun, check out GraceAnn Walden’s North Beach Pizza tour.  Have friends visiting San Francisco?  This would be an excellent activity for them.  GraceAnn Walden’s tours – and there are several of them – are a Bay Area institution and people rave about them.

* * *

North Beach Pizza Lovers’ tour with food writer GraceAnn Walden

This is the only tour that gives participants the full North Beach experience, including Italian history, food knowledge and a spectacular repast at Tony’s Pizza Napoletana. We dine on salad, green beans with garlic, meatballs and 3 kinds of pizza. We’re celebrating 20 years of fun & food!

We go behind the scenes in a focaccia bakery, a chocolatier and a professional kitchen, and visit a butcher, shrine and ceramic store. Of course, we visit Sts. Peter & Paul church.

We meet across from Sts. Peter & Paul church
There are two Parking lots at Filbert and Columbus.
There are about 8 blocks walking, in total, with many stops. We go rain or shine, but not in monsoons.
The tour runs from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. including lunch -$80.
Private tours weekdays for 10 or more; on Saturdays 14 participants.

3/6, 3/13, 3/20 and 3/27 – with more dates in April

On regularly scheduled tours, you must give us at least 72 hours notice to receive a refund.

 Reservations are a must. Send your check and cell phone number to:

G.A. Walden
P.O. Box 475877
San Francisco, CA  94147
CELL (415) 302-5898
gaw@sbcglobal.net

Lunch at Jimmy Beans in Berkeley

Matt ready for lunch at Jimmy Bean's in Berkeley

Matt ready for lunch at Jimmy Beans in Berkeley

We used to go to Jimmy Beans (1290 6th Street, Berkeley) all the time but then stopped, mainly because it was just too jam-packed and claustrophobic in there, and then dealing with only one restroom – a drag.  Maybe it was also because we got tired of this kind of casual Berkeley restaurant, of which there are several, and needed a break.  After all, there are only so many dishes of eggs with chicken-apple sausage and vegetable wraps one can eat over a short period.  Maybe it also had to do with not being crazy about T-Rex, another in the K2 family of restaurants, and feeling somewhat ripped-off by that establishment and not wanting to line the pockets of the owners in any way.  Who can remember?  All I know is that Matthew and I started going back to Jimmy Beans recently and rediscovered the things we loved about it in the first place, and found that there have been some improvements – to the space, I mean; the food was never lacking.

Chicken Panini at Jimmy Beans

Chicken Panini at Jimmy Beans

First off, they now have sturdy metal chairs, not those rickety wooden ones, and expanded their dining space.  While it’s still crowded during peak hours, it’s not as bad.  They also now serve dinner, which means that you have until at least 9:00 p.m. to get your fix.  Do what we do, though:  go during off hours, like 2:30 p.m., if you’re able.

Steak sandwich special at Jimmy Beans

Steak Sandwich at Jimmy Beans

Yesterday we had a Steak Sandwich ($12) and Chicken Panini ($9.50).  With one coffee (Matthew, who else?), and a bowl of soup ($4.50), it set us back $30.49 plus a couple bucks for the tip jar.  The steak sand had two thick slices of ribeye, rare, as requested, tomato, caramelized red onion, melted Swiss cheese and a bit of mayo and mustard.  Served on a soft, long roll, the whole thing kind of melted together.  I have to say it was very good, and was not expecting it to be so decadent.  Sometimes things sound good on paper…you know how that works.  My sandwich came with a small portion of fries, really crispy and hot, and a small salad of spring mix, pre-tossed in a nicely-balanced vinaigrette-type dressing.  The chix sand was griddled crispy, which gave the flatbread nice texture, and there was a little veggie action in there.  Matt didn’t allow me to fully inspect his sandwich, but he was very happy with it.  It came with a larger spring mix salad.

Potato Leek soup at Jimmy Beans

Potato Leek soup at Jimmy Beans

We split the soup, which was excellent, as soups here tend to be.  This one was vegetarian with deep flavor, and not a run-in-the-mill, clumpy potato leek, rather more brothy, with large pieces of potato and other soft veggies.  It came with bread and butter.

Other things we did not have on this visit but which we have regularly and can recommend, are:

Entrees involving chicken on the bone.  They make a fabulous, flavorful roast chicken here.  If I can’t make it to Cafe Rouge to get a whole chicken to go, this is my next choice.

Breakfasts.  Their homefries are more like roast potatoes, and they serve good bread.  When my stepfather used to visit from New York City, we would have the Grilled Pork Chop and Eggs ($12.95) as a treat.  The morning he passed away we drove to Jimmy Beans from UCSF, after having been up all night, to have this dish in his honor and as some small form of comfort.  That should tell you something.

The Cheddar Quesadilla ($5.25).  Enough cheese and nice and crispy.  Matthew, the house expert in this area, says they’re very good.

They serve a good cup of coffee, which is endless and self-serve.  This is a must, really, but you can’t take it for granted.

The specials are often very good, and I tend to order sandwiches from from this menu.

I have not yet tried the fixed-price, three-course, evening meal ($15), which they probably added because of the economic situation.  They are very good at updating their website with daily specials, and you can see what the fixed-price menus are a week in advance.  For example, today it’s meatloaf with mashed and veg, soup or salad, and dessert.

Check the website for their exact hours, but they average about 7:00 a.m. – 9:00 p.m.  Although you can order from the lunch/dinner menu all day, they start table service at 5:00 p.m.  Before 5 you order and pay at the counter and they bring your food to you.