There are so many great food events going on in the next few weeks, it's hard to choose. Here are three that particularly caught my eye and whet my appetite.


Next Thursday March 27th, 2008 is the Wine Enthusiast Toast of the Town. Attending will be 70 domestic and international wine producers including Trinchero, Mumm Napa, Champagne Piper-Heidsiek, Rodney Strong Vineyards and J. Lohr Vineyards. A complete list of invited wine vendors is available here. The event will be held at the War Memorial Opera House.

I spoke to one of the organizers and got a sneak peek at just a few of the dishes that participating restaurants will be serving.

Bar Tartine
Blood Orange-cured Sardines with Asparagus & Soft-boiled Egg Vinaigrette

Bistro Jeanty
Crème de Tomate en Croûte - Tomato Soup in Puff Pastry

Café Gibraltar
• Moroccan Lamb & Beef Tagine – Savory Mélange of Beef and Lamb Shoulder, with Seasonal Vegetables, Chickpeas and Fingerling Potatoes in a Savory Date-mild Chile-Harissa Glaze

• Algerian Vegetable Couscous – Seasonal Vegetables, Chickpeas and Currants in a Roasted Sweet Pepper-Saffron broth, Served Atop House-Rolled Couscous

Campton Place
Spot Prawn Sashimi on Watermelon Carpaccio Chutnied Mango Chili Fizz with Apple & Wild Rocket Gazpacho Air

Étoile at Domaine Chandon
Braised Veal Cheek, Morel Mushrooms, English Pea Purée and Preserved Meyer Lemon

Go Fish Restaurant
Scallop and Shrimp Ceviche

PlumpJack Cafe
Ramp Panna Cotta with Langoustine and Pickled Cloud

Poleng Lounge
Walu Kinilaw – Hawaiian Butterfish, Toybox Tomatoes, Shallots, Cilantro, Coconut Milk, hand-harvested Philippine Sea Salt

Postrio
Tuna en Ponzu Gelée with Wasabi Tobiko, Lemon and Shiso

Pres a Vi
Hamachi Two Ways –
• Teradito with Anju Pepper Aioli, Siracha, Blood Orange Oil and Micro Cilantro
• Poke with Inamona, Soy, Lemon Zest and Wasabi Tobiko

Rivoli Restaurant
Rivoli Smoked Beef on a Cheddar Biscuit with Horseradish Cream and Pickled Onion Relish

The Grand Tasting is from 7-10 pm and tickets are $95. A silent auction at the event will benefit America's Second Harvest The Nation's Food Bank.



Share our Strength's Taste of the Nation is also a benefit for America's Second Harvest with a focus on ending childhood hunger. It will be held April 6th, 2008 at Acme Chophouse.

From 6:30-7:30pm you'll enjoy appetizers from top local restaurants before a sit-down dinner prepared by the Next Iron Chef contenders and wine pairings from top sommeliers and live and silent auctions. The chefs for the dinner will be:

Michael Symon of Cleveland's Lola and Lolita

Traci Des Jardins of Acme Chophouse, Jardiniere and Mijita

Chris Cosentino of Incanto

Gavin Kaysen of NYC's Café Boulud

Elizabeth Falkner of Citizen Cake and Orson (dessert)

Tickets are $250 and 100% of your ticket purchase goes directly to Share Our Strength.



If you are still waiting for your economic stimulus check, here's a bargain opportunity to enjoy a taste of Spain.

Tonight, March 19th, 2008, at 6 pm Gerald Hirigoyen of Bocadillos and Piperade will create Basque-inspired small plates at Macy's Union Square as part of A Mosaic of Spain, Macy's Annual Flower Show. Jon Bonne, wine editor at the SF Chronicle and Andy Booth, owner of the Spanish Table will be on hand to discuss wine pairings.

In addition to food and wine samples, you'll receive a 60-day subscrition to Zagat.com and VIP card from City Dish.

Tickets are $10 and benefit the Espanola de California.

Labels: amy sherman, events, restaurants, san francisco, Spanish food, wine

When a new restaurant opens, it's hard to know ahead of time how things will turn out. Some places get a lot of buzz but never live up to it, others turn out fabulous food but can't make ends meet. Some places are packed night after night, even if the food isn't anything to scream and shout about. Unless you have a trusted crystal ball in front of you, sorting out a restaurant's fate is usually the job of Father Time.

But with Laiola, even before I stepped inside I knew that the place was going to take off. Mostly, because a mere four days after opening -- without a liquor license, no less -- it already had.

I rolled up to the old Pizza My Heart location on Chestnut Street near 8 pm on a weekday night. The narrow storefront is all windows, and it was packed full of P.Y.T.s, with more hanging around outside, madly texting friends to meet them there. A faint pinkish glow emanated from within thanks to the stunning pressed copper ceiling; it's a very flattering light for all the pretties (and the not-so-pretties, too).

When I walked in, I was smacked in the face by the cold, hard truth: Laiola couldn't serve any wine yet. I looked behind the bar at all the shiny wine bottles and sighed. The good news? They were waiving corkage, and Nectar Wine Lounge down the street was kindly selling their retail wines at 10% off. I turned to my friend Karen to discuss who would go fetch a bottle, when I got even better news: My friend Brett was just finishing his meal at the bar, and he had more than half a bottle of albarino left. Would Karen and I like it?

Let's see. Is Thomas Keller a perfectionist?

We plopped down next to Brett and, from our perch at the bar, watched one of the cooks drape thick slabs of succulent-looking slow-roasted piglet over a pile of gigante beans ($19). Plate after plate, the aroma was enough to reverse my unfavorable impression of roast suckling pig formed years ago in a heavy wooden-beamed restaurant outside Madrid. I vowed to try it again one day.

Laiola bills itself as a "California restaurant inspired by Spain" -- and it's heavy on the Spain. A glance at the wine list showed it's all Spanish-grown or Spanish varietals, with most offerings by the individual miniature carafe or the bottle. A clever touch, those carafinas, which hold one-third of a bottle of wine. They look to be a great value, too, hovering near $10 apiece. Rumor has it that cocktails created by Camber Lay (Range, Frisson) will rock the house soon.

Chef Mark Denham (42 Degrees, Hawthorne Lane, Manresa, Postrio) has created a flexible menu, with a small selection of house-cured charcuterie, a dozen appetizers, a handful of entrees, and a few quick desserts. We opted to share a series of tapas, and loved the spicy salchicon ($6), five fire-engine red coins of pork sausage served on a slab of wood. Laiola's website says it's made from "a mix of coarsely ground Niman Ranch pork shoulder and back fat seasoned with plenty of Pimenton garlic, chile powder and cayenne pepper." Mmm.



We also oohed and aahed over the marinated local sardines, garden vegetables in escabeche ($11), crisp local sardines roasted and served atop baby vegetables like carrots, shallots, and cauliflower, each pickled in their own brine. I'm calling this the dish of the summer. Like the equally good version at Nua, it alternates between salty and sweet, cool and hot, crisp and soft.

The deep fryer was down so we didn't get to sample the patatas bravas ($6), a classic Spanish dish comprised of thick wedges of potatoes dressed with spicy aioli. But the bacon-wrapped Medjool dates stuffed with chorizo, grilled, and drizzled with aged Balsamic vinegar more than made up for their absence. They looked like small brown lumps when they arrived, but they were so smoky-sweet and good that I didn't mind burning my fingers or my tongue to finish them off.

Service was adept, and our knowledageable waitress was full of passionate recommendations. Not all of them paid off -- the side dish of rapini, for example, was undercooked and fibrous -- but given that Laiola was only four days old and besieged by malfunctioning kitchen equipment, delinquent paperwork, and masses of hungry diners, I forgave them their trespasses.



We didn't have dessert, but I was sorely tempted, especially after watching Brett slather toast with thick chocolate ganache drizzled with fruity Arbequina olive oil and a dash of Maldon sea salt ($7). It's a dish I've had before, even made before, and I speak from experience when I say it is the epitome of divine simplicity.

When we left Laiola, it was still buzzing (still!) even though no wine could be sold on premises in this notoriously "thirsty" neighborhood. It is already a place to see and be seen, but it is also a place to eat -- and eat well -- and, like the patina on the copper bar, I expect it will only improve with age.

Laiola
2031 Chestnut Street
(415) 346-5641
San Francisco
*No reservations*
Open 7 days a week, 5:30 - 10:30 pm (bar open till 11 pm)

Labels: catherine nash, Laiola, Marina, Mark Denham, restaurants, reviews, Spanish food, tapas