A Remembrance of Repasts Past

I took a walking tour of San Francisco the other day. Although I've lived here for more than three decades, I can still blend in easily as a tourist. Of course, having 40-thousand conventioneers from Oracle in town lent me an easier sense of anonymity. I still feel like a visitor most of the time. When I think about it, I'm just a guest on the planet anyway. On the bright side, guests usually get to eat well. As I wander, I consider all the great San Francisco restaurants that have come, and gone over the years. This is a remembrance of repasts past.

What happened to all of those sweet, little French bistros that permeated the Sunset, and Richmond Districts? La Maisonette, on 6th Avenue, I think, could not have had more than a ten tables. Like so many places, it was family-owned and operated. It was a charming place.
You'd quickly become friends of the family. There was Le Cyrano on Geary Blvd. ... La Boucane ... the Place Pigalle, near what is now the Marina Safeway. That's where they filmed a scene for "The Days of Wine and Roses."

San Francisco was the perfect location for such a wistful story about being wasted. There was a great French joint on Lombard & Fillmore that specialized in quenelles -- fish dumplings served with lobster (Americaine, which is not American at all) sauce, and fish velouté. The food in these places was incredibly rich, French classic cuisine. The days of wine and roses included butter sauces, glace de viande (reduced veal stock), foie gras, sweetbreads, steak pommes frite, Tripe a la mode de Caen, Beef Bourguignon, Vol au Vent (that was chicken and mushrooms in a puff pastry shell), Coq au Vin (that's chicken that was slightly drunker than I was), Blanquette de Veau, Canard a la Orange. And lots and lots of wine. This was all before the invasion of nouveau cuisine, and the zealous nutritionists who followed.

I recall those old times, as a non-drinking vegan today, and I want to burst into tears. Not out of remorse, but from longing for one little taste of Jacqueline's magnificent soufflés at her place on Grant Avenue. So, there. Let's face it: you can eat anything when you're twenty. Now I can put on weight from breathing.

I rarely talk about this but I was a chef at the Squire Room of the Fairmont Hotel in the 1970s. How did I get a gig like that without being an apprentice from the age of 12 in France? I was introduced to the head chef, Jean Barlerin, and he asked me how much I knew about cuisine. I told him I knew just about enough to read a menu. "For an American," Jean snorted, "you are very honest. Do you want to learn?"

He gave me a chance. I stayed at the Squire Room, dressed in a white cook's jacket, and toque blanche, for seven years. In those days, there were about nine restaurants in the Fairmont, if you can believe that.

There was the Squire, the Brasserie, the Tonga Room, Mason's, Canlis, the Crown Room, the New Orleans Room, and there was room service, and the banquets, too. But my favorite was the legendary Venetian Room, where I'd go upstairs, and sneak into the Venetian on Tuesday
afternoons to watch the musicians run through their sound-checks. The Mills Brothers were the best. There was never an act like them. Do you remember "Across the Alley from the Alamo"? Sure, you do.

One time, Harry Mills called out to me, "Does it sound all right, Bruce?" It sounded all right. Quite all right.

Later I cooked at the St. Tropez on Clement Street, and at a French Basque restaurant on Polk Street. Now don't get any ideas about me coming over to your place, and preparing a knockout meal for you. I don't recall anything about cooking. It was another life. Today I wouldn't know a stockpot from a Birkenstock.

I do miss those great Basque family-style restaurants that were all over North Beach: Elu's ... The Basque Hotel ... the Café des Alpes ... and my favorite, The Obrero Hotel on Stockton. The Goyenetche family used to offer a four-course meal with all the red table wine your could
drink -- for $3.25. When they raised the price to $3.50, there was a near riot. We'd eat at long tables, and shared our meals (one serving, at 6:30 p.m.) with the Basque men who lived in the hotel. They loved to drink, and they loved to sing. Eventually, I'd bring my guitar, then
have a few musicians in tow, shlepping a fiddle, an accordion, harmonicas, maracas, tambourines, Everyone would sing, stomp their feet, slam their palms on the tables in time to the tunes. I swear, the old building would actually shake.

I miss Vlasta's, the Czech restaurant on Lombard in the Marina. Vlasta Kucera made the most wonderful Moravian duck with red cabbage and dumplings. Vlasta's son, John, would command the little bar. He and I would habitually consume far too many shots of Slivovitz, that fiery
Yugoslav plum brandy. It tasted like kerosene but that never discouraged us from toasting one nebulous thing after another.

San Francisco has always been a great food town, going back to the Gold Rush days with the invention of the Hangtown Fry -- a scramble of eggs, oysters, and fried bacon -- and an array of concoctions, such as the Pisco Punch, the Black Russian, the White Russian, and the Green
Goddess. All nostalgia aside, it's still a great food town, and whatever is in vogue these days, we can be sure that the next meal will be all right. Quite all right.

Bruce Bellingham is the Arts & Entertainment Editor of Northside and the author of Bellingham by the Bay, a collection of stories about San Francisco and some of her memorable characters.