Thursday 17 November
San Francisco is supposed to be a great town for food, but when we began to search our Chowhound-approved options, we found that many of these places were far away, closed outlandishly early, or were only open for lunch. But we called Sam's Grill (opened 1867) and were told that the kitchen would close as late as 8:45, so we scuttled uphill and down to get there in time.
We asked for a booth, and got one - the sort that have curtains and a doorbell for calling the waiter, probably very naughty in the 1890s. All the waiters had rich Italian accents, and the menu made good reading, referring to "oyster pirates like the young Jack London."
We started with Acacia chardonnay 2008 and a dozen oysters - good, though the shucker left too much muscle attached, and they were tilted so that they spilled their juices. Instead of the usual ketchup and horseradish, they were served with Worcestershire - so we just used a drizzle of lemon, as usual.
Our mains: Petrale (sole) meuniere, very sweet and tender floured fillets in lemon sauce, and the amazing boned rex (sole) a la Sam, seemingly hundreds of tiny boned fillets, more resilient than the petrale, cooked simply with parsley and garlic. There was also excellent tartar sauce, but it was too rich for the fish, so we dipped our roasted potatoes and sourdough bread instead.
On the way home, one street guy said Barbara was "rockin' that haircut," and a street poet accompanied us wishing we would adopt him. We loves San Francisco.
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