Beer

Sunshine on my shoulder

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Products featured: 2006 Solorosa Napa Valley Wine, Church Street Groceteria; Anchor Steam Beer, Anchor Brewing Company; filone di grano duro baguette, Metropolis Baking Company; salami, potato salad, and Greek olive mix, Lucca Delicatessen; brie cheese, Marin French Cheese Co.; crackers and organic strawberries, Rainbow Grocery; bamboo plates and silverware, Cole Hardware; FIFTY24SF Morning Breath pillow, UP Accessories wood tote bag, and custom quilt, Upper Playground

Models (left to right): Lawrence Cuevas, Camille Schindler, Marivel Mendoza, Bethany Wells, and Blaine Merker.

Guardian photo by Pat Mazzera

8 spots for outdoor dining

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San Francisco and dining al fresco aren’t necessarily allies. But they’re not exactly enemies. We do have those gorgeous sunny spring days and plenty of places to enjoy them while we drink and dine. If you’ve been heartbroken over the closed kitchen at Zeitgeist, or if the rooftop deck at Medjool feels more like a frat party gone wrong than an afternoon social gathering, you can rest assured there are even places outside of the Mission that serve food and cocktails outside. So hop on your Yamaha, Bianchi, or Muni and check out some of these fabulous places to catch some sun with your buzz. Keep in mind these spots are best for brunch and lunch. And bring a hoodie in case the sun subsides — San Francisco fog is about as forgiving as a hangover.

PIER 23 CAFE


Check out views of the Bay Bridge and Coit Tower from this waterfront café with surfboard decor. Rain or shine, this dive gets packed with beer guzzlers and sunbathers. Enjoy buckets of Pacificos and top-shelf margaritas alongside pub grub like burgers, nachos, and the best fish tacos in town, until your vision’s blurred and skin is blistered. Then enjoy the live music on warmer nights and heat lamps on cooler ones.

The Embarcadero, SF. (415) 362-5125, www.pier23cafe.com

CAFÉ FLORE


The faint of heart need not attempt Café Flore — sharking a table here takes more nerve than buying booze underage. But there’s a reason to steel one’s resolve: this Castro hotspot, voted Best Café in our 2004 Readers’ Poll, is ideal for any occasion, be it brunch, coffee, or an afternoon brew. With breakfast served daily until 3 p.m. and a full bar, there’s no better spot for sun-drenched boozing and cruising.

2298 Market, SF. (415) 621-8579, www.caféflore.com

LA NOTE


The garden patio at La Note is worth the wait — and wait you will, because they don’t take reservations for weekend brunch. Grab a java beforehand to stave off caffeine withdrawal as you watch other patrons enjoy their succulent crème fraîche pancakes. And don’t worry, you’ll get your turn. Complete with blue-and-white checkered tablecloths, this is the perfect spot for brunch bliss or an afternoon assiette de charcuterie.

2377 Shattuck, Berk. (510) 843-1535, www.lanoterestaurant.com

PARK CHALET


If bike rides through Golden Gate Park leave you craving a wet one to quench your thirst, this spot — located behind the oceanfront Beach Chalet and just steps from Queen Wilhelmina’s Windmill — offers the perfect spot to rest on your laurels and soak up some sun. Choose from an extensive list of beers from the onsite brewery, and when the fog rolls in, head inside to cozy up to the stone fireplace in the glass-ceilinged dining room. On weekends you can nurse a hangover and get a head start on your day’s drinking with crab benedict and a Bloody Mary.

1000 Great Highway, SF. (415) 386-8439, www.beachchalet.com

CAFÉ CLAUDE


Located in a secluded alley between Union Square and the Financial District, Café Claude is a scrumptious substitute to the crowded Belden Lane. This quaint sidewalk café is reminiscent of Parisian bistros, and is therefore the perfect spot to nosh on a Niçoise salad and sip Sancerre. Plus there’s jazz on weekends.

7 Claude, SF. (415) 392-3505, www.cafeclaude.com

EL RIO


For those days in deep summer when everywhere but the Mission District is covered in heavy fog, there’s no reason to look farther than El Rio for a bit of sunny respite. Its multilevel back deck, barbeques, margaritas, and live salsa bands draw a mostly gay male crowd on Sundays, but you can get down with the ladies every fourth Saturday of the month, when the line to get in snakes down the block.

3158 Mission, SF. (415) 282-3325, www.elriosf.com

SAM’S ANCHOR CAFE


If the summer fog has taken even the Mission captive, escape to Sam’s via the Tiburon ferry. From here, you can sip margaritas on the waterfront deck while viewing the cloud-engulfed city. Snack on fried calamari or head inside post-sunset for fine dining and seafood.

27 Main, Tiburon. (415) 435-4527, www.samscafe.com

PILSNER INN


The Pilsner doesn’t serve food, but its state-of-the-art cooling system, which keeps draft beers chilled to 31 degrees, makes this Park Chow neighbor a Castro gem for gay and straight clientele. Expect to throw back a few on the garden patio with cleated patrons just back from the fields, because Pilsner Inn supports a handful of sports teams, including softball, soccer, bowling, and pool.

225 Church, SF. (415) 621-7058, www.pilsnerinn.com *

9 Manhattans in the Mission

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I’d burned out on vodka sodas. Straight tequila was making me nuts. And I couldn’t seem to find a decent margarita. I needed to find a drink with a punch, but one that didn’t lead to the dark under-eye circles the next morning. I didn’t think I’d love a cocktail again. That is, not until my friend handed me my first Manhattan.

Oh, the Manhattan. So simple and bold, with its combination of whiskey, vermouth, bitters, and a cherry. And so very American, with its East Coast name and Southern origins (the first versions in the 1870s were made with Kentucky bourbon, and most still are). I now have a patriotic devotion to this concoction, as well as an impressive ability to balance a martini glass in a crowded bar.

THE LIBERTIES


This Irish pub’s version of the Manhattan is strong and pure, tasting almost like straight Maker’s Mark. The only reason I knew there was vermouth included is because I caught a flash of green glass as the bartender mixed it. It was even served, unapologetically, without the drink’s trademark cherry (which, honestly, is fine by me). I guessed this particular formula was cultural — the Irish don’t monkey with their whiskey — but I was proved wrong when we tested our anthropological theory at the Phoenix, whose version is cloyingly sweet. If you really like your whiskey, stick with Liberties.

998 Guerrero, SF. (415) 282-6789, www.theliberties.com

LASZLO


When you can’t get a sunny day seat at Revolution Cafe (hey, they only serve beer and wine anyway), head to Laszlo around the corner. Not only does it always have outdoor tables available, but it served one of the best cocktails on my tour: a smooth Maker’s Manhattan. It was stirred, not shaken — which the bartender said keeps the drink from getting watered down — and came with a brandied cherry. An extra bonus for daytime visits? You get to skip the North of Market nighttime crowd.

2526 Mission, SF. (415) 401-0810, www.laszlobar.com

BLOWFISH SUSHI


Need to show your out-of-town friends the Mission? Get them the neighborhood’s namesake drink at Blowfish, made with Ka No Ko Japanese whiskey. Served with a brandied cherry to balance the cocktail’s smoky taste, this Manhattan is certainly a crowd pleaser. Once you’ve liquored up your visitors in style, then you can take them to your favorite Mission Street dive.

2170 Bryant, SF. (415) 285-3848, www.blowfishsushi.com

CONDUIT


The new swankfest on Valencia and 14th streets might break your bank and leave you hungry after dinner, but it’s a great place to treat yourself to sexy cocktails without fear of running into any of your financially-challenged friends. Conduit’s souped-up Manhattan, called the Heart of Islay, is made with Black Bottle 10-year-old Scotch, vermouth, Cointreau, and a splash of blood orange juice. The sweet ingredients help the cocktail go down smooth without overpowering the smoked wooden barrel flavor of the Scotch. Conduit’s classic Manhattan is great too, as it’s made with Old Overholt rye. Have one of each and you might even get the guts to taste the lamb tongue or pay a visit to the coed translucent glass restroom.

280 Valencia, SF. (415) 552-5200

RANGE


The Third Rail is Range’s hybrid version of the classic pre-1940s Manhattan, made with Bulleit bourbon, Lillet Blanc (sweet wine), orange bitters, and lemon. This fusion blend is perfect for beginners, but it ain’t no classic. But a version made with Woodford Reserve, sweet vermouth, Angostura bitters, and a brandied cherry is as good as it gets. If you can find a seat at the bar, order two — but stop there. A wise friend once said, "Manhattans are like breasts: two are perfect, but three are too many — and just plain weird."

842 Valencia, SF. www.rangesf.com

NIHON WHISKY LOUNGE


On the list of Nihon’s special happy hour cocktail, salad, and appetizer menu, where everything’s half price, is the Devil’s Manhattan. This cocktail is made with 100-proof Rittenhouse Kentucky Rye, SoCo, sweet vermouth, and bitters — and for a mere six bucks, is definitely worth it. Sure, Nihon’s out of the way, but you probably need something from Rainbow anyway.

1779 Folsom, SF. (415) 552-4400, www.nihon-sf.com

LATIN AMERICAN CLUB


If you want to test your Jedi glass-balancing skills, order a Manhattan here on a weekend. The Manhattan here was by far the best dive bar version I tried — made with Jim Beam, sweet vermouth, bitters, and a maraschino cherry, it was neither too sweet nor too strong.

3286 22nd St., SF. (415) 647-2732

CASANOVA LOUNGE and ELBO ROOM


These staple Mission bars serve reasonably priced, decent Maker’s Manhattans. You might not even notice how sweet they are by your second one.

Casanova Lounge, 527 Valencia, SF. (415) 863-9328, www.casanovasf.com

Elbo Room, 647 Valencia, SF. (415) 552-7788, www.elbo.com. Not wheelchair accessible. 2

7 places to BYOB

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Remember that old college chant, "Beer before liquor, never been sicker. Liquor before beer; you’re in the clear"? I propose we change that to: "Markups on liquor, never been sicker. Bring your own beer; you’re in the clear."

Seriously, San Francisco is a city that likes its liquor with a side of food, and no one knows that more than restaurant owners — from the outright avaricious to those just trying to stay above their astronomical overhead in this real estate-deprived city. Haven’t you been to a dinner where the bar tab doubles that of the food? And did you know that a martini usually costs the restaurant a tenth of what it charges you?

We’ve rarely been a city to sit by and tolerate injustice. But in this case, there’s no need to go on a hunger strike about it: in fact, quite the opposite. Join the BYOB movement with a sit-in demonstration at any of these restaurants. (Interestingly, many are in the Tenderloin, which makes sense considering that the entire TL is pretty much a BYOB zone.) Refuse to pay ridiculous drink prices and sip the sweet nectar of freedom from bar tabs. It tastes kind of like Charles Shaw.

And remember: bring cash along with your booze. These places don’t have liquor licenses — or credit card machines. But you can swing most of these places at around $10 per person, so I trust you’ll work it out.

SHALIMAR


Shalimar is the Starbucks of the city’s BYOB Indian places, boasting two locations within eight blocks of each other. I prefer the one on Jones Street. The ambiance is group-therapy-room-at-a-public-clinic: wood laminate tables, green and white linoleum checked floor, institutional yellowed-cream walls. The service is fast, though never brusque. The food? Transcendent. The chicken tikka masala consists of plump balls of good-quality white meat chicken swimming in a delightful pool of clarified butter and masala. The garlic naan is heaven — doughy, buttery, and flavorful. Also delectable is the palak paneer — spinach and cheese sweetly spiced with cinnamon, cumin, cloves, and bay leaf. After dinner, cross the street to speakeasy-themed Bourbon and Branch for the ultimate lowbrow/highbrow evening.

Pairing: Try a sparkling wine — like Italian Prosecco or Spanish cava — with the dense multilayered spice of Shalimar’s cuisine. Or bring along any of these Indian beers: Flying Horse Royal Lager Beer, Kingfisher, Himalayan Blue Lager, or Maharaja Lager.

532 Jones, SF. (415) 928-0333;

1409 Polk, SF. (415) 776-4642, www.shalimarsf.com

TAJINE


The orange walls of Tajine denote a more cheerful atmosphere than Shalimar, but this Nob Hill gem is tiny … er, cozy. I meant to say cozy. If you do BYOB here, make sure you keep it mellow — no flailing, weaving, or expansive hand gestures in this tight space. As for dinner, start with the chicken bastilla to share — phyllo dough stuffed with chicken and almonds and topped with cinnamon and powdered sugar. For less than $10, the lamb or kufta kebab dinners come with zalook (eggplant, tomatoes, garlic, and parsley sautéed in olive oil), shalada (tomatoes, green onions, and parsley dressed in olive oil and lemon juice), and Moroccan bread. Or try the eponymous tajines — the name for both a Moroccan clay slow cooker and the stews made inside it — which have the same melt-in-your-mouth meat- and vegetable-infused flavor as your standard Crock-Pot dish. The chicken is cooked with lemon and olive; the lamb stewed with prunes and almonds. Tajine warns that if you BYOB, you must also buy a beverage from them.

Pairing: Morocco’s native beer, Casablanca, is hard to find in the States, so opt for a full-bodied, fruity New World pinot noir instead.

1338 Polk, SF. (415) 440-1718, www.tajinerestaurant.com

PAKWAN


I’ll give Pakwan, the ridiculously inexpensive Indian and Pakistani favorite in the Mission, this over Shalimar: it has seating right outside. Which, on a sunny Mission day with a six-pack of beer from the liquor store across the street, has a certain allure. And … sigh … I must give Pakwan its due for having tandoori fish on the menu. (But Shalimar has brains! Brains masala!) Pakwan also does justice to Indian standards like saab gosht (lamb curry), bhengan bartha (eggplant), and aloo palak (spinach and potatoes). And its garlic naan gives Shalimar’s a run for its money. But, I keep reminding myself, it’s not a competition if both are supporting the common cause — cheap food and cheaper liquor.

Pairing: The recommendations for Shalimar will work here, but if you’re going with the tandoori fish, try the citrusy notes of a muscadet.

3180 16th St., SF. (415)215-2440, www.pakwanrestaurant.com

TAWAN’S THAI


Two reasons to take the bus to this Inner Richmond favorite: parking is notoriously sparse and, two bottles of wine in, you probably shouldn’t be driving anyway. Tawan’s Thai is named after the owners’ son, whose childhood drawings decorate its walls. On the front of the menu, Tawan (meaning little sun) warns that his mom’s food is "the best, just be sure not to order it too hot unless you can handle it" — and he’s right. Consider yourself warned. Start with the thung thong appetizer — chicken, potatoes, and spices fried in rice paper. Then share the tom yung gung soup, a spicy, sour chicken soup flavored with lemongrass and lime. The gaeng khiaw-warn — chicken, beef, or pork simmered in green curry and coconut milk with bamboo shoots, bell pepper, and basil — also is divine. And for you insane people who don’t like spicy food, you can never go wrong with pad thai.

Pairing: An Alsatian wine, like a Gewürztraminer or Riesling, goes nicely with Thai food. A reliable alternative is a Thai beer like Singha, Phuket Lager, or Chang Lager.

4403 Geary, SF. (415)751-5175

CORDON BLEU VIETNAMESE RESTAURANT


Don’t come to Cordon Bleu expecting its namesake cuisine. Don’t come expecting French food at all. Instead, expect to gorge on this Vietnamese BBQ joint’s highly touted five-spice chicken. Seven bucks will get you half a chicken (not half a breast or leg, half a bird) rubbed with spice and grilled until its blackened, spicy, crisp skin seals in the juicy, tender meat. That comes with "salad," a deep-fried imperial roll, and another delicious enigma — a meat sauce (ingredients unknown, but who cares when it’s this freaking good?) poured over rice. Suggestions: ask for extra meat sauce and lock your valuables in your trunk.

Pairing: Cordon Bleu’s meat-centric delectability needs beer; wine is just not going to cut through the greasy vittles. Try a regional beer such as Singha, Red Horse Dark or San Miguel Dark from the Philippines, or Singapore’s Tiger Gold Medal Lager.

1574 California, SF. (415)673-5167. Not wheelchair accessible.

DE AFGHANAN KEBAB HOUSE


The number one reason I could never be a vegetarian: kebabs, those seasoned, juicy, sizzling, glistening, dripping, perfect little skewered morsels of meat rotating hypnotically in restaurant windows, expelling wafts of their spicy, meaty aroma. (Try to wax that poetic about soysages.) If you too hold the kebab in high esteem, count on De Afghanan Kebab House to do it justice. There also are veggie options, like the borani badenjan (eggplant sautéed with tomato, garlic, peppers, and topped with yogurt) — or the borani kadoo (pumpkin sautéed with garlic, peppers, and also topped with yogurt). And De Afghanan Kebab has mantu, those steamed dumplings stuffed with beef and onions topped with (you guessed it) yogurt and a spicy tomato sauce. Yum.

Pairing: The Middle Eastern flavor of De Afghanan Kebab House would do well with the crisp fruitiness of a Sauvignon Blanc or the spiciness of a Zinfandel. An offbeat, oft-ignored, and underrated choice might also be a rosé; its brightness pairs well with yogurt-heavy items and grilled meats.

1303 Polk, SF. (415) 345-9947;

1160 University, Berk. (510) 549-3781;

37405 Fremont, Fremont. (510) 745-9599, www.deafghanan.net

HAN IL KWAN


All I’ve heard about Korean food in the Richmond is, "You have to go to Brothers!" Well, here’s why Outer Richmond’s Han Il Kwan might make you want to break free of the siblings’ sovereignty: food so authentic that San Francisco’s Korean Tour Buses make a daily stop here; better ventilation, so you don’t need a dry cleaner to get the funk of smoke and bulgogi out of your jacket; much easier parking than in the Inner Richmond; no wait for a table; and, for the win, you can bring your beverage of choice. It’ll be hard to choose between the wonderful kalbi — marinated short ribs cooked at the table and served with rice, tofu soup, and banchan — and the equally killer bulgogi — tender BBQ beef cooked like the kalbi.

Pairing: Korean food and wine just don’t mix. Maybe it’s the acidity of the kimchi competing with the acidity of the wine; maybe it’s just that the cold bite of a beer is the only thing that’ll make your mouth stop burning. Either way, try the Korean beer, OB Lager, or another East Asian brew — like China’s Tsingtao, Harbin Lager, or Macau Beer.

1802 Balboa, SF. (415) 752-4447 *

6 African feasts

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If there’s one thing I learned while traveling in Africa, it’s that you can never predict the sublime. With little to guide you except your nose and your gut, eating "out" usually means perching on the side of the road in front of an unprepossessing stall and entrusting your appetite’s fate to the dish of the day. Luckily it seems there’s no end to the possibilities created from a handful of humble ingredients — tomatoes, onions, legumes, and yams — and the deft talents of a multitude of unsung culinary geniuses. Even luckier, in San Francisco, traveling gastronomically around an entire continent is as easy as hopping the bus to the next neighborhood, proving that even local travel can broaden one’s horizons — not to mention waistline.

TAJINE


Ever the sentimentalist, I have been known to wax nostalgic about Tajine’s former gritty Jones Street location, which was so tiny it only had two or three tables and a bustling to-go trade among the city’s taxi drivers. But because I consciously strive to embrace change (no, really!), I am able to appreciate their newer, bigger, and admittedly more expensive Polk Gulch location. Though its menu includes kebab plates, flaky bastilles (savory phyllo dough pastries), and an array of salads, it’s the hearty, meaty, one-pot stews (tajines) that really get my tastebuds tingling.

1338 Polk, SF, (415) 440-1718, www.tajinerestaurant.com

BISSAP BAOBAB/LITTLE BAOBAB


From the national dish of Senegal (thiebou djen, a tilapia-based stew, served with red rice) to the regional specialties of yapou khar (a melt-in-your-mouth lamb dish from the city of Thiès) and yassa chicken from Casamance, Bissap Baobab dishes up pan-Senegalese cuisine with friendly flair. The not-to-be missed drinks, mixed with bissap (hibiscus), ginger, and tamarind juices inspire smooth (and otherwise) moves on the dance floor of Little Baobab once the tables have been pushed away and the rotating lineup of DJs comes out to play at 10 p.m.

2323 Mission, SF. (415) 826-9287

3388 19th St., SF. (415) 643-3558

www.bissapbaobab.com

AXUM CAFÉ


The axis of the San Francisco Ethiopian restaurant "scene" for many years, Axum Café serves a fine, spicy kifto (Ethiopia’s version of steak tartare), tender lamb tibsie, and an array of vegetarian options that would make even a diehard carnivore’s mouth water. Tucked behind an unpretentious facade on Haight Street, what Axum might lack in slickster glamour it more than makes up for with its solid menu and neighborhood-friendly prices. Plus, you can mistake their injera for a tablecloth — it’s that big (though much tastier).

698 Haight, SF. (415) 252-7912, www.axumcafe.com

A TASTE OF AFRICA


If you’ve come down, as I’ve been known to, with a persistent craving for fufu and egusi soup, you’ll be relieved to know that your hankering can be satisfied at A Taste of Africa without having to jump on the next plane to West Africa. This cheerful Cameroonian establishment also serves steamed corn koki (call ahead for availability) and a variety of savory vegetable dishes and meat stews. For an even more accurate taste of Africa, their food truck at the Ashby BART flea market definitely reminds me of the open air food stalls where I sampled so many of these dishes the first time around.

3015 Shattuck and Ashby BART station, Berk. (510) 981-1939

NEW ERITREA RESTAURANT


Though the cuisines are virtually identical, you don’t want to confuse Eritrea for Ethiopia in polite company. Still, for those who love their Ethiopian restaurant experiences, the drill at New Eritrea Restaurant will be familiar. Receive platters of flavorful food, plunge in sans silverware, and chase with copious amounts of Harar beer or steamed milk with honey. For the frugal and adventurous alike, they offer the familiar vegetarian sampler platter and a less usual meat one, plus three varieties of sambusas (stuffed East African fritters).

907 Irving, SF. (415) 691-1288

TROPICAL PARADISE


I love eating out in Berkeley period. You never have to stand in hipster hell waiting for admittance to food heaven, even on weekends. And for my money, as far as heavenly goes, you can’t beat the Ghanaian grub at Tropical Paradise. Try the tastiest fried plantains in the Bay, served piping hot alongside delicately seasoned black-eyed peas — a deceptively simple dish known as Red Red. The ubiquitous fermented corn dumplings (kenkey), hearty waachi, and a blood-warming "light" soup with fufu and generous portions of goat, chicken, or salmon bring Ghana to life in your mouth — especially when pleasantly washed down with a spicy sweet blend of fruit and ginger.

2021 University Avenue, Berkeley, (510) 665-4380 *

Violet Blue vs. Violet Blue

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By Justin Juul

I totally got hoodwinked.

Two years ago, I bought expensive tickets to the 2006 Exotic Erotic Expo because the flyer for the event advertised a live appearance by Violet Blue, who is one of my favorite sex writers, and who I’d wanted to meet for a very long time. I never got to meet her though. Turns out there’s a porn star also named Violet Blue, and she was the one appearing. So, instead of schmoozing with a journalist, I spent my time at the expo drinking cheap beer and stalking a porn star. Snore.

violet.jpg
The real Violet Blue

Naturally Violet Blue the writer is pretty pissed about this kind of mix up — she claims the fake Violet Blue is using her name to attract a bigger following — and the name feud has finally made it to the courthouse. (Full disclosure: I’m a witness for the writer’s side – my story was a direct catalyst for the suit.) It seems after our missed encounter, the real Violet Blue decided she’d had enough and started looking into patent laws and ways to challenge the star of Who Violet Blew, Planet of the Gapes 4, and Beauty and the Bitch. The initial court proceedings went down last October, but the case is far from over. The porn star has been quite successful under her moniker – winning multiple AVN awards, getting countless roles, and even hosting her own radio show — and she doesn’t want to give the name up (she “officially” changed it to Violetta Blue, but continues to use the original name whenever she appears at events or stars in videos).

othervioleta.jpg
The other Violet Blue (not posing with the author!)

What’s the big deal, you ask? Both of these women are involved in porn aren’t they?

Well, yes and no. The writer, whose real name actually is Violet Blue, has dedicated her entire life to showing the good side of the sex industry, whereas the other Violet Blue is just a plain ol’ sex worker. In her award winning blog, www.tinynibbles.com, and in her books, the real Violet Blue tries to show that an obsession with sex is totally natural and that “sex people” can be funny, smart, technologically advanced, artistically inclined, and full of unique ideas. She tours the world holding sex seminars on college campuses and even makes appearances on popular television shows to champion her conviction that any sex is good sex as long as it’s safe and consensual. She also believes that, contrary to popular belief, women like to watch pornography as much as men. Good deal.

But the issue isn’t about whether or not Violet Blue the imposter should be doing porn or whether or not she’s a good role model. The issue is that the real Violet Blue is constantly being mistaken for a so-so porn star and it’s fucking with her career. She can’t even win national awards, like Forbes’ Top 25 Web Celebs of 2007 (in which she won 25th place as the best pornstar/blogger) or get invited to conventions without someone thinking she does double anal for extra cash when her book sales are down. Not that that’s bad in itself, but come on. I’d be pretty pissed as well. Especially about Planet of the Gapes 4.

Brew Holster Cult: Sling ’em!

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By Justin Juul

brewholster.jpg
Snazzy!

My birthday’s coming up in May, so for all of my fans out there, here’s what you should get me: A Brew Holster. And don’t just get one for me. Get one for yourself too. Just imagine all the BBQ’s you’ll be attending this spring and summer. Don’t you want to be the freshest dude/chick in the park? Yes you do. But what exactly is a Brew Holster you ask. It’s a gun sling for beer, but the awesomeness doesn’t stop there. Brew Holsters are made by two members of SF’s very own all-girl AC/DC tribute band, AC/DShe, so they’re extra-extra cool.

brews.jpg

Nici and Sara, the guitarist and bassist from Ac/DShe, came up with the idea when they realized that double-fisting cheap beer, while simultaneously jammin’ out with their clams out, was not as great as it sounded. Following a few close calls with drenched t-shirts and wet amps, the girls hit their backyard chop shop and The Brew Holster Cult was born. All you need to do to join the cult is to buy one of the things, so go visit their website and prepare yourself for the biggest balls of them all: backyard BBQ’s, outdoor concerts, and Bay to Breakers. Springtime in SF just got a whole lot cooler.

Get ’em here, suds-slingers: www.brewholstercult.com

The punch line

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› le_chicken_farmer@yahoo.com

CHEAP EATS I wrote a joke. I don’t mean that I tried to write something funny. I’ve been doing that (which is to say, this) since I was nine. I mean that for the first time, I wrote a joke joke, the kind that gets told by comedians, barbers … basically everybody in the world tells jokes. Except me, cause I can never remember the punch line.

For the joke I wrote, I made the punch line first. It was twisted, diabolical, clever, goofy, and just generally pretzels — such an amazing and unthinkable payoff that it took me hours and hours and hours to earn it, to craft the hard part of the joke, the long part, in my head. I was driving. By the time I got the getting-there down, I had forgotten the punch line.

Not really. But I knew I would. So as soon as I got out of the car, I wrote it down in an e-mail and, to be mean, sent it to my most inquisitive, most curious, most questioning, most nearly neurotic friend. I said, "I wrote a joke. Here’s the punch line."

Then I forgot it. I could find it in my out box, maybe, but it’s more fun, in my opinion, not to remember the punch line to the joke you wrote, or not to know the joke to the greatest punch line in the history of humor. My friend probably disagrees.

I never said I was nice. Sweet, yes. Cute. And sometimes, like when I’m not splashing green salsa or dumping noodle soup all over myself (admittedly the moments are rare), I can be charming, dignified, even ladylike. But I’m not a good person.

For example, I hate dogs. I don’t know what dogs ever did to me, or what I ever did to dogs, but I hate them and the feeling seems mutual. I do know what I did, actually, but it was so long ago! I was five! And socially awkward! And incontinent!

My kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Plant, left her toy poodle Muffy in her car, windows closed, on the hottest day of the year, and the poor little feller just melted. When, from the playground, we heard Mrs. Plant’s shriek, we of course went running to see what was biting her.

Well, poor little Muffy had been perched on the armrest, scratching at the passenger seat window, when she gave up the … whatever. Thus, when poor shrieky Mrs. Plant finally opened the car door, Muffy just sort of oozed out into the parking lot. Rigor mortis had not set in. I mean, this dog was practically liquid, sort of steaming, sort of wavy, like a mirage.

Here’s where accounts vary. I say: while my angelic, dog-loving classmates wrapped themselves comfortingly around Mrs. Plant’s considerable legs — I believe there were two of them — I stepped up to little liquid Muffy and, with a perfectly healthy and appropriately morbid curiosity, touched it with my toes. At which, quite naturally, considering the magnitude of the moment, I wet my pants, kind of adding to the mess.

What Mrs. Plant told the principal was I squatted over her dear, departed doggy, lifted my skirt (figuratively speaking) and "scatologically degraded its corpse."

Truth be told, I prefer her version. It’s so punk!

In any case, not to date myself (although it might eventually come to that) … but this was back when corporal punishment was quite in style at public schools. Our principal’s weapon of ass destruction, as we called it, was nicely varnished at the handle, then raw wood at the business end, scuffed and scored to encourage splinters.

I was still crying when my mom, a top-shelf linguistics prof with poetic powers (or at least a liking of alliteration) came home from work.

My mother was a sensible, kind, instructive woman, and at this point anyone who knows her suddenly realizes, without a shred of doubt, that this is a joke. However, exactly what my mother said to me after I tearfully told all, only one person in this wide world knows. And it isn’t me, and it’s certainly not my mom.

What’s in it for you is dinner.

My new least favorite restaurant is La Corneta in Glen Park. I’ve always had a love/hate relationship with it. Now it’s hate. The green salsa, which I love, got stuck in the squeeze bottle. Why anyone would keep salsa in a squeeze bottle is beyond me. But there it was, and stuck it was. Until I squeezed too hard. It became unstuck in dramatic fashion. My face, my eye, my hair, my new dress, my cousins, the wall. I’m still finding green salsa in places where no color salsas should be. Bullshit!

LA CORNETA

Mon.–Sat., 10 a.m.–10 p.m.; Sun., 11 a.m.–9 p.m.

2834 Diamond, SF

(415) 469-8757

Beer

Cash only

Alembic

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› paulr@sfbg.com

If Cheers had served good food instead of cheap beer and persiflage, Dr. Frasier Crane might never have fled to Seattle to start anew. Also, the place might have come to resemble the Alembic, a smallish installation along upper Haight that has been distilled from that nearby citadel of suds, Magnolia Pub and Brewery, now an institution. Unlike Cheers, the Alembic isn’t in a basement; it occupies a storefront that was most recently home to Maroc. But, like its distant sitcom relation, it does have a bar scene that radiates human energy, not to mention a bar that looks the way a bar should: busy and used.

The bar is a spectacle, but it isn’t there for show. The bottles arranged on the high wall shelves aren’t all perfectly turned so the label faces outward, and they’re not all in immaculate rows. This is because the bartenders are constantly reaching for them, then reaching for measuring cups, strainers, napkins, and glasses for the whipping up of various libations, from simple to complex. (There’s wine too, and if you’re a fat guy named Norm, you can even get a beer.) The action is blurring but precise, and Sam Malone probably wouldn’t last five minutes under the strain. Like so many other food industry jobs, bartending is a game for the young.

Speaking of the young: there are tons of them at the Alembic, and not just behind the bar. The clientele has a modern Mission District look, yet the Mission, for all its cultural variety, has no street to match Haight Street, no comparable collection of goofballs, edge-dwellers, hustlers, dropouts, and misfits prowling the sidewalks, or just sitting on them. But that’s outside, and inside … well, out is out and in is in, as Kipling might have put it, and never (or at least hardly ever) the twain shall meet. Getting to the Alembic can be an excellent adventure, but once you’re inside, you might as well be at 16th and Valencia streets.

Because the front of the small space is dominated by the shrine-like bar, it’s possible to overlook the dining area toward the rear. Here people are eating food, and it’s surprisingly sophisticated food — sophisticated for a bar, sophisticated for the Haight, which despite or because of its international reputation is a little short on interesting places to eat.

Let’s say you were interested in a dish with truffles, for instance, and you could only look on Haight Street. You might try RNM, which is probably the best restaurant on either Lower or Upper Haight. But the Alembic has truffled dishes; one is the macaroni and cheese ($9), which carries the definite black-earth perfume of truffles as relayed through infused oil. The mac and cheese is also made with Gruyère (another discreet flash of toniness) and, we thought, a bit of bacon or pancetta for some meatiness. If the truffle is an incitement to class warfare, how clever to put its essence in dish that’s the very picture of Middle American modesty.

Truffling the gnocchi ($9) might be riskier — the word is harder to pronounce, for one thing. But the truffle infusion goes nicely with the hedgehog mushrooms nestled next to the gnocchi pillows themselves, while splintered asparagus stalks bring some green and speak of spring.

The menu is notably vegetarian-friendly, even beyond the gnocchi. The kitchen performs discreet wonders with that revolting winter beauty, the beet, by turning both red and yellow examples into carpaccio ($6) and topping each slender, glistening, geutf8ous coin with a dab of goat cheese and sprig of watercress. And let’s give some extra credit for the presentation, which is on a slightly concave porcelain rectangle like those used for serving sushi rolls. (All the plates and platters are handsome, incidentally. Very unbarlike.)

Then there are the little snacks, or nibbles, among them slightly sweet nuts roasted with sage ($3) and a cone of excellent herbed frites ($5) spiked with lemongrass and accompanied by with a small tub of chipotle aioli. We found the nuts underpowered; they could have used some salt and maybe some chili heat to balance the sweetness. But the fries were svelte, crisp, and sublime.

They also went nicely with one of the menu’s handful of meaty dishes: Moroccan-style sliders ($10), halves of a beautifully juicy, medium-rare lamb burger served on toast points, with harissa aioli, roasted peppers, and tapenade. The burger doesn’t come with the fries, but you might think about having them together, in part because burgers cry out for fries, and if you’re interested in a burger you’re probably pretty hungry, and this burger isn’t that big. A man in full dinner mode could easily eat three, and that would put the tab at a Manhattan-ish $30.

If that seems a little(or a lot) steep, you could go to Plan B: dessert. No one would ever mistake the Alembic for Sweet Inspiration, but the kitchen does manage to turn out some respectable confections. A strawberry beignet ($7), for example, turns out to be an actual freshly fried doughnut, complete with a tight hole in the middle, but the strawberry refers only to the pat of strawberry ice cream on top, which was a pretty pink but too sweet. Better balanced are the troika of s’mores ($7), with homemade marshmallow, lengths of fresh banana on top, and a chocolate hazelnut sauce slithering around the plate. The sauce is tasty but difficult to eat, since the s’mores themselves aren’t very absorbent and have a way of disappearing in a single, gratifying bite. A smaller s’more need not be a lesser s’more.

ALEMBIC

Dinner: nightly, 5 p.m.–midnight

Lunch: Fri.–Sun., noon–5 p.m.

1725 Haight, SF

(415) 666-0822

www.alembicbar.com

MC/V

Full bar

Noisy

Wheelchair accessible

Chickens and cake

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› le_chicken_farmer@yahoo.com

CHEAP EATS I put the chocolate chip cookies in my purse and of course forgot about them. There were three, homemade and perfect, and the small plastic bag that they were in immediately entangled itself with feed store receipts, directions to junkyards, takeout menus from restaurants I’ve been meaning to eat at for 14 years, a barrette, some lipstick, and hand cream. The pills, pen, loose change, and wads of ones go without saying, I presume. And the sunflower seeds.

My chickens, who will go to their skillets believing that grass falls out of the sky, have more of a sweet tooth than I do. Which is saying something if you know anything at all about chickens. And especially if the thing you know is that they don’t have teeth. That’s why they need stones and grit, to churn around in their gizzards, like nickels in a purse, and grind up the wads of grass, grain, bugs, and birthday cake that make up their diet. And sunflower seeds.

Oh, and grass does fall out of the sky, by the way, if you are one of my chickens, and you live in the woods, and the floor of your woodsy world is redwood needles and dirt but you are lucky enough to have a caring and dedicated farmer whose time, in defiance of tens of thousands of years of human thinking on the subject, is not valuable. Meaning she will happily goat around every day in greener environs, on the "other side of the fence," pulling up grass and throwing it over to your side.

Long pause.

Even longer pause …

As long a pause as you will let me get away with without losing you to your horoscope or the page with pictures of even sexier trannies than me.

Then: birthday cake?

Well, yeah, what were you expecting? Chocolate chip cookies? Didn’t I tell you I forgot about them? And that they were perfect? Whereas the cake, on the other hand, was already leftover when it was left at my shack by some superheroes. And that was more than a week ago. And my birthday isn’t until May. And I don’t have a sweet tooth or a sweet gizzard.

Still, I would have eaten the whole, huge, three-quarters of a cake, instead of none of it, in the interest of having healthier chickens, and therefore healthier eggs, and therefore being healthier myself … except that the superhero who made the cake, first time ever from scratch, insisted that it sucked.

If it doesn’t taste good or have nutritional value, I’ll still eat it, but not if it’s cake. I’ll leave it on the counter until it’s almost moldy and then, at the risk of one day getting my head chopped off by chickens, I’ll let them eat it. As the saying goes.

I set half of three-quarters of the homemade chocolate cake on the ground and watched them treat it the way any small group of women would. Chickens see one thing out of one eye, and something else out of the other. They looked and they looked, with adoration and with horror, and then finally one took a peck and ran away. Then came back. Then they all started doing that, eating, retreating, chattering. And then they didn’t bother to retreat or chatter — they just chowed down.

I put the rest of the cake in their coop, closed them up with it, and went to the city, half-expecting to come home the next morning and find them not only dead, but dead on the ceiling instead of the floor.

As we speak I am inventing spaghetti-cue, lest anyone think me a slacker. There’s a bag of cookie crumbs in my purse, a carton of post–expiration date milk in the fridge, and chickens in my yard, alive, well, and running. Like every day, they have left me a nest full of eggs, some smudged with chocolate frosting.

My new favorite restaurant is Robata Grill & Sushi in Mill Valley. Not that I ate there. They let me use their phone and ladies room when my engine popped en route to the city. One of the last four or five people without a cell phone or a reliable car, I stood outside on the corner, cold night, lamenting these facts and others, waiting for my rescue. The people on the other side of the windows seemed warm, happy, well-fed, and yeah, a little bit rich. I was wearing my sexiest skirt and my rabbit. Late for a gig. Probably looked, from the inside out, like a prostitute. New favorite restaurant.

ROBATA GRILL & SUSHI

591 Redwood Highway, Mill Valley

(415) 381-8400

Lunch: Mon.–Fri., 11:30 a.m.–2 p.m.; Dinner: Mon.–Thu., 5:30–9:30 p.m.; Fri.–Sat., 5:30–10 p.m.; Sun., 5–9 p.m.

Beer and wine

AE/D/MC/V

Clubs: Anavan sans Ativan

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Holy Spazmosis!. Jumpy young rockers Anavan drove up from Salt Lake City to play the queer (and friends!) punk monthly Trans Am at Club Eight for a rapturous beer-spurtin’ crowd last Saturday.

Anavan, “You’re Taking Me Out”

The frantic foursome greeted us with mucho fog machine, trademark hockey helmets, drum, bass, and a wall of synths. And then everything got crazy in a voices-in-your-head way (mostly thanks to the skittering, hyperactive vocals mixed waaaay back in the echo-delay mix.)

anavan.jpg
Courtesy of the muthafuckin’ LA Times

In the case of the hockey helmets, visual connections to those masked masters Daft Punk, MSTRKRFT, and occasionally (if primly painted-on facial scruff counts — yes, I’m calling those skinny French boys out) Justice might be made. And sonically they can sometimes resemble those glam-tech outfits a teeny-tad, mostly in their boppy keyboard riffs. But Anavan adds its own cymbal-crashing, wildly energetic No-Wave twist, sure to please the art school crowd (Richard Hell is all the rage again, haven’t you heard?) and dance floor maniacs as well as indie kids. I expect you’ll hear them burning down discos near you soon.

(Next month a Trans Am, Sat May 3, features SF native cuties Ex-Boyfriends — should be rocking’.)

Cork that krunk juice, Lil Jon

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By Justin Juul

liljonwine.jpg

Call me crazy, but I’m a beer man. Liquor’s okay too, but wine? Wine has got to go. I absolutely cannot stand the stuff. In fact, there’s only one thing I hate more than wine and that’s wine snobs. Now, this may sound funny coming from a man who serves expensive wine every night at a fancy boutique in North Beach, but come on! Get over it rich dudes. Wine is rotten grape juice and that’s it. There are no hints of currant or raspberry in there. There is no bouquet. Oh, sir, you want me to tell you what the Captain’s Reserve 02 Pinot tastes like? It fucking tastes like wine! And it smells like wine. From Two-Buck Chuck to the fanciest merlot, wine is sour, bitter, and fucking stupid. It’s certainly no match for a nice pint of Hoegarden or even a Beam&Coke, for that matter. But there’s a new wine coming out this week that has me rethinking my stance on the matter. Are you ready for this?!

Crunk (or krunk, or qronk?) purveying rapper Lil Jon just went public with his own wine label. Hu-What?! Hu-What?!! Yeeeeeeaaaaahhhh!!!

I can’t freakin’ wait to describe “Little Jonathan Cabernet, ’06” to a table of over-privileged yupsters. “Well, you see, sirs,” I’ll say. “This particular vintage features a very special blend of petit syrah, cab, and malbec grapes – which are originally from Argentina, but are now being grown in Napa as well. It’s earthy, toasty, and a bit jammy for a California blend and if you just let it linger on your tongue long enough, you’ll be able to taste THE SWEAT FROM MY BALLZ, BITCHES! SKEET SKEET SKEET!”

Or maybe I’ll just describe the wine in Lil Jon’s own words. Here’s how he responded to a journalist who asked him about his wine:

“This is not no ghetto Boone’s Farm; this is some real wine.” To which he added, “I’m not like an expert, so don’t ask me no questions.”

Lil Jon, you are my hero.

Metal Mania: Just keep Walken

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› duncan@sfbg.com

How would you feel? Your band has been together since 1999, struggling through lineup changes, two US tours, hundreds of shows, an album and two EPs, without so much as a write-up in the local weekly. Finally, after dropping your most recent CD last year — an untitled, self-released disc of skull-crushing riffs — you get a review in the bible of modern metal, Metal Maniacs, and the photo that runs with it is of another band.

In the case of the San Francisco four-piece Walken, it was a photo of a three-piece party-rock outfit from Sioux City, Iowa, whose MySpace "sounds like" reads: "Rush meets Metallica meets Blink 182 meets Nickelback meets Matchbox 20 meets Live meets Red Hot Chili Peppers." With all due respect to Neil Peart and pre-Load era Metallica — seriously?

"They’re total dicks," Shane Bergman, 25, vocalist and bassist for the Original Walken — otherwise known as Vintage Walken or Walken Classic — says during an interview at the Western Addition Victorian he shares with roommate and guitar player Sean Kohler, 27. It’s the crack of noon and the guys are posted up on the couch, drinking coffee, and eating toast and jam in their finest sweatpants. "I’d written the guy a long time ago," he continues. "’Hey, this isn’t cool. We’ve had this name for seven or eight years. We’ve actually put out stuff and toured the US. It’s not cool.’ And they were like, ‘Oh, it doesn’t really matter — we’re in different states.’ I just let it slide. And then I pick up that" — he points to the magazine — "and I’m, like, ‘Well, now it’s gone too far.’ You look through and see a picture of those tools … "

There have been more Walkens, including a band from Melbourne that played weddings and broke up in 2004. The reason for the popularity, most likely, is Christopher Walken’s 2000 "more cowbell" skit on Saturday Night Live. While this settles the name game with pretenders enamored with the sketch, it raises the question: if not for "more cowbell," then why "Walken"?

Like the actor, dancer, and celebrity beer-can-chicken chef, Walken is hard to pin down. When walking in on Walken’s live set and hearing the crushing, dual-guitar assault "Bitch Wizard," from their untitled, self-released 2007 EP, all pummeling drums and clean backing vocals contrasting with deathly, oven-throat howls, it’s difficult to characterize the group — which includes guitarist Max Doyle, 26, and drummer Zack Farwell, 29 — as anything but metal. Perhaps "fuckin’ metal" might be more apt. But it hasn’t always been so clear-cut. "Our Unstoppable record, it was just a weird record," Kohler says of the self-released 2004 full-length. "We thought we were being all revolutionary having these funny rock songs, with funk songs and blues songs … "

"And math rock," Bergman interjects. Unstoppable was Walken’s version, to steal a phrase from Lou Reed, of ‘growing up in public.’"

"Most people sit in their garage when they’re coming up with their sound, but we were actually out there playing it, trying to figure it out in front of people," Bergman says. The band’s music has coalesced into a pointed metal attack. It couldn’t have happened at a more opportune time. While the bottom has fallen out of the housing market, and spending $3 trillion bucks on blowing up Iraqis has wreaked havoc on the economy, stock in metal is clearly on the rise.

"That’s one thing that’s changed about metal," Kohler says. "All of the sudden it’s getting cool again. You can be big and be in a metal band, with Mastodon and High on Fire and bands like that." I’m sworn to (semi-)secrecy, but there’s something on the horizon for Walken, something that Kohler demanded I euphemistically term a "great opportunity," which will put the days of touring cross-country with Hightower on their own dime, playing a couple dozen shows, and coming home dog-dick broke, behind them.

But are the vanguard of 21st-century metal warriors and their burgeoning audience really anything new? While it’s no doubt refreshing to see metal — true metal, not the Hollywood hair-farmer crap that lined record company coffers in a pre-Nirvana world — crawl out from the underground, it seems that it’s still largely aimed at the dudes in black hoodies. Which leads us to simultaneously discuss two major concerns about the future of heavy music: is anything really new, truly revolutionary, or is it all just a remix of old ideas? And just what will it take to woo a crop of hot new metal women away from the evils of floppy-haired emo boys in so-called chick pants?

Thankfully, Kohler’s got some insight: "Everything that’s new is just a reinvention of something else. The only way that I really believe that there can be a new beginning is after most of the human population is annihilated. And then it starts over, just as creative expression is part of life. It slowly becomes a community thing. It starts organically, that’s the point."

"So basically, you blow up the world, and more chicks will come to metal shows," Bergman quips.

Walken is already well into writing a new full-length, but I’ve got to advise them: scrap those songs and work on the concept album. Imagine this: the year is the year is 3052. Global warming and perpetual war have taken their toll. The ice caps have melted and a tribe of mutant metal warrior women of Amazonian stature have arisen from the rubble, repurposing military technology found in underground bunkers into hybrid instrument-weapons, with which they can both rock out and kill you. They rock you to death. Everything metal is new again.

WALKEN

With Hightower, Three Weeks Clean, and Soulbroker

May 1, 9 p.m., $8

Cafe Du Nord

2170 Market, SF

(415) 861-5016

www.cafedunord.com

CAV Wine Bar & Kitchen

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› paulr@sfbg.com

You could, if you were inclined, step into CAV Wine Bar & Kitchen and do nothing but drink wine. The establishment opened on mid-Market in 2005 as a wine bar, after all, and the wine list is so extensive that it’s actually presented as a bound volume. I’ve seen less impressive Bibles. But you could also, if you were inclined, step into CAV and eat food while not drinking wine, and you wouldn’t necessarily think you were missing out. Of course, the people at CAV don’t want you to sunder food and wine, since the whole point of the restaurant is to bring them together — with wine first among equals, for once. But it’s a tribute to chef Michael Lamina’s kitchen that the wine-friendly food can stand on its own. This is a nice corollary to one of my own cherished postulates: that many food-friendly wines are quite good on their own.

The name suggests a certain Iberian romance. It falls just one letter short of cava, the Spanish word for Spanish sparkling wines made in the méthode champenoise and also for "dig," with an implication of caves and candlelight. There is no dinner quite so atmospheric as one held in a candlelit underground chamber at a winery — and unfortunately CAV isn’t underground. It is narrow and deep, though, with a zigzag floorplan and a large multilight window at the very back of the rear dining room. The view through that window is of the famous alley where Zuni Café (which is next door) used to do its charcoal grilling nearly 30 years ago.

And the food does have its Spanish touches. The wine-friendly cuisines tend to come from the wine-producing parts of the globe, and this means, heavily, the Mediterranean basin and its California cousin. But we mustn’t forget Germany, which produces many lovely, if floral, white wines and some reds too — not to mention spaetzle, the butter-fried noodle squiggles that, in CAV’s rendition ($6) are so delicious that we actually asked for seconds, long after we’d run out of other dishes we might have spooned the spaetzle alongside. Spaetzle would go very nicely with some grilled bratwurst, but at CAV it also makes a fine starter or share plate or just a little something extra to fill in the corners.

As for Spanish accents: we noted them in baby octopi ($13) expertly braised (meaning neither mushy nor tough) in a smoked-paprika broth littered with shavings of fennel root and fried chickpeas. Smoked paprika is possibly the most distinctive of the Spanish flavorings, whether in the cured pork sausage called chorizo or in a seafood dish, as here.

There was also a Castilian note in a salad of arugula leaves ($9), tossed with sections of satsuma mandarin oranges, almonds, shavings of Zamorano cheese (a hard, Parmesan-like sheep’s-milk cheese produced on Spain’s central plateau), and saba, a balsamic vinegar–like dressing. (Bear in mind that Italy and Spain spent centuries ruling parts of each other.)

In keeping with CAV’s wine-bar roots, portions are not huge, and even the big plates, such as beef tenderloin ($25), are on the modest size. But for any number of reasons, this is fine; it helps restrain both expense and gluttony, it encourages exploration and sharing, and it tends to keep food and wine in balance. The tenderloin, a boneless but juicy piece of meat, had been pan-roasted to the rare side of medium rare, plated in a pool of jus-like marrow foam (foam! reports of its death have been greatly exaggerated) beside little heaps of blanched haricots verts and black trumpet mushrooms, then topped with a purée of caramelized onion. Earthy would be a succinct description of this dish; also autumnal — perfect in a city of eternal autumn.

Not all the culinary influences are Mediterranean-derived nor otherwise associated with the lands of wine. We came across a plate of sashimi ($9) made from tai snapper (a sea bream from New Zealand), arranged atop a set of kohlrabi-stuffed spring rolls that looked like Tiparillos, and, for some color, slivers of kumquat and squirts of arugula puree. Beer would have been fine here, but so was a small glass of Schmelz grüner veltliner. (As is the case at several other wine-intensive spots around town, wines by the glass are available as 2.5 ounce tastes or 5 ounce glasses. Two cheers for sobriety.)

Desserts were startlingly good and not pricey by recent standards. There was a sniff of disdain from across the table at the prospect of a butterscotch tartlet ($7.50), since there are those who don’t care for butterscotch. I’m not one of them; I’ve always responded to what seems to me to be a simple and irresistible blending of vanilla into caramel. The creamy butterscotch filling of the tartlet was that, yes, but it also had … liquor breath! Someone had discreetly spiked it with Scotch whisky, and eating it was like giving a peck on the cheek to a boozy but lovable old aunt on Christmas Eve.

The chocolate–peanut butter cookies ($5 for three) arrived on the wings of higher expectations, and they did not disappoint. They resembled Oreos, except with an intense peanut-butter mousse as a filling rather than the sugary white stuff in the commercial kind. And as if that weren’t enough, the kitchen threw in a bonus: a scattering of candied peanuts, like peanut brittle without the brittle. We dug that.

CAV WINE BAR & KITCHEN

Dinner: Mon.–Thurs., 5:30–11 p.m.

Fri.–Sat., 5:30 p.m.–midnight

1666 Market, SF

(415) 437-1770

www.cavwinebar.com

Wine and beer

MC/V

Noisy

Wheelchair accessible

Poetry

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CHEAP EATS We took the board outside and, like any other civilized wine-country people, we ate our cheese and our bread. We sipped our wine out of jelly jars, and it was cheap shit. Birds. Frogs. Crickets. The redwood trees catch fire in the sunset, and the pink peach blossoms and the white cherry ones glow a little after like phosphorescent stars on a teenager’s bedroom ceiling.

The Jungle told a childhood story about worms, gathering them for his uncle, who, for show, would grill them on the barbecue. There were three of us: him, me, and this visiting friend of his from Bumfuck, Wash.

"So I get how it is that we return to the soil," I said. "But how exactly is it that we come from the soil?"

They looked at me. It was almost dark. In private, I had been wondering this since I was six. Geologically, biologically, ill-logically, I had wondered. Becoming worm shit seems pretty easy. The reverse blows all sorts of fuses for me. Not to quote myself, but I put it best 20 years ago, in a song: "I can make a dead cow into steaks but how can I make a live one out of stew?" People danced. Nobody answered the question.

Now seemed like as good a time as any to ask again. The Jungle is one of my go-to conversationalists and thinkers. We’ve spent many hours together, in vans, trying to wrap our verse-chorus-verse-chorus brains around just such concertos, and worse, like where to eat in Nebraska.

His friend had gleaming eyes, bushy eyebrows, and a long beard. Not quite white, his hair was nevertheless Einsteinian in length and spirit. And, turns out, his brother-in-law is a physicist. Thus was he able to explain to me, in lay-chicken-farmer terms, the law of conservation of energy: there’s only so much stuff, it says, he said, and stuff can turn into other stuff, but nothing new gets created.

"Are you trying to give me writer’s block?" I said.

He said he was not. He said something turns into something, but nothing does not. He might as well have been dancing.

Behind me, in the coop, my chickens were unwinding toward sleep, which is an audible process, like a car engine ticking as it cools. They kind of buzz, and whir. Then nothing. After a day of scratching, pecking, and bathing in dirt, eating bugs, stones, grass, and oyster shell, they deserve the few feet of elevation the roost provides for the night.

In the morning they will lay their eggs. Which kind of answers my question right there. For chickens. For humans, we will need to add poetry. My mom and dad, to the best of my knowledge, did not eat bugs or grit or take dust baths. In fact they were pretty annoyingly hygienic. At least at the time. Always changing my diapers and sloshing me in the tub, baptizing me, making me go to church and shit. As if to say: You are not dirt! You are not dirt! And other such poems and prayers. Maybe what’s needed is not the addition of poetry, so much as the subtraction of it.

Yes! You know how I know? Because after the chickens were eaten — the ones on the grill, not the roost — we wiped our mouths and went inside, drank more wine, and Einstein said, "OK, I have heard both of you perform before. How about if I read you my poetry?"

This, for someone who’s been through Catholic school and, worse, graduate school, for someone steeped in prayer then poetry, poetry workshops, and poetry readings … this should have been a horror-movie moment, the Jungle and I looking at each other with wide, terrified eyes, the music chopping, screeching, swelling. May I read you my poems? Life had honed me to cut my wrists, or his, at the thought of it.

Instead I was thrilled, delighted, honestly honored that my slanty, woodsy, slightly witchy shack should hostess an impromptu after-dinner poetry reading. And that was when I knew that the transformation, this me-in-the-making, was finally, impossibly, complete: I really am a fucking chicken farmer, ain’t I?

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My new favorite restaurant is Green Chile Kitchen, and my new favorite thing is pozole, or posole. No matter how you spell it, it’s hominy, it’s chicken, it’s onions and cilantro, it’s soup, and it’s spicy. And that all adds up to I’m drooling all over the keyboard, just to type it. This is New Mexican style stuff, with an emphasis on red or green chiles, or "Christmas," which is both. Check it out: cheap, and damn good!


GREEN CHILE KITCHEN

601 Baker, SF

(415) 614-9411

Mon.–Fri., 8 a.m.–9 p.m.

Sat.–Sun., 9 a.m.–9 p.m.

Beer and wine

MC/V

Careers & Ed: Photo pro

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› culture@sfbg.com

A line snakes down Fell Street on a Friday evening in front of the Rickshaw Stop, where Meleksah Jurgenson cradles a large camera and surveys the over- and underdressed revelers in Hayes Valley. A man in bright sneakers and slouchy jeans calls her over: "Dude, Meleksah! You gotta take a photo of this!" He gleefully points to a poor shlub on the curb resting a weary head on his knees. The guy’s been there, immobile, for at least 20 minutes.

Jurgenson smiles apologetically. With her long brown hair pulled back and bangs cut straight across her forehead, her face is girl-next-door lovely: sweet, a little sly, and essentially nonthreatening. Like the sidewalk lush, her camera remains fixed in her hands. She doesn’t shoot.

"I want everyone to look back at the pictures and be just as excited [to see them] as I was to take them," she explains later. A native of Washington, DC — her mother is a photographer at the White House — Jurgenson is now a resident cameraperson at Mezzanine, as well as at the weekly Frisco Disco and Blow Up parties cohosted by her husband, Jeffrey Fare, at the Transfer and the Rickshaw Stop. (Fare, a former member of postpunk dance purveyors the Rapture, DJs at these parties under the names DJ Jefrodisiac and Jeffrey Paradise.)

A rigorously spontaneous career track — "I never make plans for the future," she says — found Jurgenson working as both a model and a party planner. "So it was a natural progression to move from booking and throwing parties to [hosting] nightclubs," she says. "And to move from shooting fashion editorials to being on the other side of the camera. I just fell into it."

As she walks around the Rickshaw Stop, the regular disco kids light up. Hugs and air kisses are exchanged; everyone poses, happily and extravagantly. The photos, tagged with a hot-pink stripe signed "Lady Meleksah," then pop up on the various outlets where she serves as contributor or founder: Blow Up’s official Web site, Jurgenson’s makeshift party-photo outlet friscodiscofever.blogspot.com, and electro-music blog Missingtoof.com, in addition to her personal MySpace and Flickr accounts.

But Jurgenson isn’t on the typical photographer career track. These days, young arts professionals are pushed to consolidate their work online, have extensive multimedia experience at their fingertips, and create profiles on sites such as LinkedIn to attract employers. So there’s something old school about what Jurgenson does: take photos, make friends, and get hired. The ease of social-networking sites comes along with random and uneven exposure, so she figures if you’re not being seen around town having a legitimately good time, then maybe you’re not the right person for the job.

In fact, Jurgenson, who only began shooting professionally two years ago, doesn’t even — gasp! — have an online portfolio. Despite this, she’s done some band shoots and magazine work. But her bread and butter is the nightclub scene. "I love the people, I love the music, I love the sex. I love the dancing. I love everything about it," she says. "Having the camera is almost secondary. I come home after these parties with bruises and beer spilled all over me, and I wouldn’t have it any other way." And the parties keep getting bigger: she shot the Winter Music Conference in Miami last month and will shoot at Coachella.

Perhaps one reason Jurgenson is so successful is that she has a slightly different take on club photography from the norm. For example, sites such as Los Angeles’s Cobra Snake or New York’s Last Night’s Party often court controversy for their photographers, who are criticized for taking advantage of the subjects’ inebriated states as much as for their photos. Visually, the images feature the short-range flash that briefly illuminates bleary-eyed faces and exposed bodies. Every so often, these bodies are shown lying next to a pool of their own vomit. But Jurgenson wants to capture people looking good and having a great time.

She also manages to get more intimate photos of people — and receives less criticism about her photos exploiting women — than most photographers (typically male) can get.

"I’m not an imposing guy shoving a camera in somebody’s face," she says. "I don’t think people are as threatened by me."

The people in her nightclub work appear as radiant as they must have felt at that very moment. Instead of featuring closed house parties and backstage antics with celebrities, her photos, laced with dazzling lights and brilliant colors, mostly take place on the open dance floor. Rather than exploiting blotto hipsters, Jurgenson shoots buoyant clubhoppers and exhibitionists unlikely to regret the posturing. "I don’t particularly like Cobra Snake or any of the other party photographers out there," she says. "I don’t want to capture pictures of a girl standing there making a silly face."

Jurgenson doesn’t bother photographing the aftereffects of the parties — the three-day hangover or the sore throat and lungs. Her work puts the most exuberant parts of the night on display — the parts that evoke carefree and careless times. It’s gloriously unapologetic and unabashedly playful. "Look, stop worrying about the ‘misspent youth,’" the faces seem to shout. "Just dance with us!"

"I think that’s what separates me from a lot of photographers," Jurgenson says. "I immerse myself in the festivities and shoot. To capture a party like I do, you have to be a part of it, not a photographer."

But when you’re a consummate hostess connecting and socializing with everyone around you, there’s no doubt that observing and participating in the environment changes it. But Jurgenson isn’t concerned with keeping photojournalistic distance. She likes to shake things up.

Other photographers are "sort of like birdwatchers," Jurgenson says. "But I’m on safari."

Superlist: Dives with karaoke

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› superlists@sfbg.com

Here’s why dive bar karaoke is better than what you’ll find at the established venues: (1) you’re less likely to get shamed by karaoke "professionals" who hog the mic and collude with the KJ to play nothing but show tunes and ballads; (2) wait times tend to be shorter, giving you more chances to shine; and (3) the song repertoire tends to be a bit wackier, which — if you’re lucky — means finding such rare gems as Danzig’s "Mother" or your favorite Paula Abdul B-side. Now go forth and rock that mic.

With its lush red velvet glow and fine wine and Belgian beer selection, Amnesia (853 Valencia, SF; 415-970-0012) hardly feels like a dive bar, which is what makes its free Tuesday night karaoke so special. Plus, the fact that it’s hosted by Glenny Kravitz, one of the most prolific KJs in the dive bar circuit, means there will be a huge selection of music and props — à la cowbell and toy sax.

If you want a dimly lit, dive-classy karaoke spot with a great beer selection and a hipster crowd that will actually hit the dance floor while you croon Usher, then come to the Attic (3336 24th St., SF) for its once-a-month karaoke night on second Mondays.

Not only does Annie’s Social Club (917 Folsom, SF; 415-974-1585, www.anniessocialclub.com) offer the rare opportunity to sing Iron Maiden and Judas Priest at its "punk and schlock" karaoke nights, but its also pours drinks stiff enough to make you think you can actually pull off a high-pitched heavy-metal wail. Monday nights are free with karaoke on the main stage; Fridays and Saturdays you’ll pay cover for the band but can slip into the tucked-away karaoke room that holds a mercifully small crowd. Come prepared by previewing their song list online.

There’s no better way to take a Friday after-work happy hour (6–9:30 p.m.) with your coworkers to a whole new level of embarrassment than with karaoke at the Beale Street Bar & Grill (133 Beale, SF; 415-543-1961). Running 22 years strong, this Financial District spot draws a hugely mixed crowd, ranging from suits to bike messengers and construction workers.

It’s hard to name the best thing about Bow Bow Cocktail Lounge (1155 Grant, SF; 415-421-6730) — whether it’s the bartender known for getting wasted, throwing firecrackers, and forgetting to charge you for drinks; the opportunity to sing your karaoke selection in either English or one of several East Asian languages; or some of the strangest background graphics you’ve ever seen. But once you’ve been, there’ll be no mystery why it’s heralded as one of the best karaoke spots in the city. Sing until closing on Friday and Saturday nights.

Neighborhood folks and young Mission transplant types rub elbows at Thursday-night karaoke at Jack’s Club (2545 24th St., SF; 415-641-5371). Jack’s keeps it real with cheap beer, an energetic crowd, and classic karaoke tunes including hip-hop and old-school jams.

There is no better way to mourn the beginning of another workweek than to make like an Outer Mission hipster and head to the Knockout (3223 Mission, SF; 415-550-6994) for its Monday night "Krazy for Karaoke Happy Hour" (6–9 p.m.). After a shot of karaoke-induced adrenaline and a few drinks from its quirky menu — which includes hot toddies, spiked root beers, and electric limeade — you’ll start to feel like Friday’s not looking quite so far away after all.

Lingba Restaurant & Lounge (1469 18th St., SF; 415-355-0001), a swanky Southeast Asian restaurant in Potrero Hill with an adjoining bar, hosts karaoke on Sunday nights with none other than the Karaoke Shark himself, Glenny Kravitz.

Who says the Mission is hopelessly overrun by hipsters and bridge-and-tunnelers on the weekends? The Napper Tandy (3200 24th, SF; 415-550-7510) has a warm, neighborhood-sports-bar kind of feel — the kind of place where you go to catch the game, shoot pool, eat fish and chips, and sing your favorite hits on a Saturday night.

On Friday and Saturday nights, Rick’s Restaurant and Bar (1940 Taraval, SF; 415-731-8900) draws an older crowd of Sunset regulars and neighborhood folk — and occasional San Francisco State University students — for crooners, classics, and pop.

Starting at 6 p.m. on Monday nights, El Rincon (2700 16th St., SF; 415-437-9240) serves up Cuban food and karaoke, featuring music ranging from Latin and reggae to ’80s punk, pop, and goth.

Shelter

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REVIEW To a certain extent, almost all surfing flicks carry undercurrents of homoeroticism — but rarely do those vibes take center stage. With Shelter, that’s not the case. Starring Trevor Wright (a TV vet making his big-screen debut) and Brad Rowe (Billy’s Hollywood Screen Kiss), the movie is about two young surfer dudes whose practice of spending endless hours together either half-naked in the water or bonding over neverending six-packs of beer leads to a passionate love affair. So don’t expect to see any radical wave-riding here. Instead, you should count on a sweet and tender rendering of innocent flirtation (and the awkwardness, playfulness, and silliness that come with it), and of the complex deeper emotional phases that a person falling in love goes through. Although Shelter doesn’t avoid being a bit sappy every now and then — and at times the acting feels a bit forced — the truly amazing chemistry between the two protagonists overshadows many of the film’s imperfections. The first movie to be produced under the here! Films Independent Film Initiative (which helps thematically edgy and thus noncommercial projects with all aspects of production), Shelter also marks director Jonah Markowitz’s first attempt at feature filmmaking. If you missed it at Frameline last summer, here’s a chance to make amends.

SHELTER opens Fri/28 in San Francisco.

SPQR

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› paulr@sfbg.com

If all roads lead to Rome — or once did — what does this tell us about the Eternal City? That it has terrible traffic? Yes, eternally — since ancient times. That the city was and is an international city? Yes, again, though more so in yesteryear, when the imperial Romans called the Mediterranean Sea mare nostrum and grain grown in Egypt was shipped more than a thousand miles by boat to feed the capital’s million or so citizens. In our locavore times, it is startling to think that a metropolis two millennia ago depended on such a sprawling foodshed.

At SPQR, a restaurant that opened late last year in the old Chez Nous space on Fillmore, the Roman feeling is more intimate — and maybe that means more modern, since today’s Italy no longer has its fingers in a host of imperial pies and Rome itself owes its international stature largely to its position as seat of the Catholic Church. Otherwise, the city is an Italian city, and its food is Italian food, with bits and influences taken from here and there across the peninsula. (The letters of the restaurant’s name, incidentally, stand for "Senatus Populusque Romanus," meaning "the Senate and people of Rome.")

SPQR’s powers that be, including executive chef Nate Appleman, have applied to the new restaurant the ethic they successfully introduced at their first one, A16 in the Marina. The ethic involves, in true European fashion, elements of preservation and innovation; A16 brought the flavors of Naples and Campania, including first-rate pizza, into the space once occupied by Zinzino, a creditable ristorante-pizzeria in its own right, and now SPQR succeeds Chez Nous, a pioneer in global tapas (with a slant toward Provence and the Maghrib), with a Roman-inflected menu that’s very heavy on fabulous small plates. They’re not called tapas, and since tapas fatigue set in some time ago around here, this is probably a wise choice.

These small courses are the heart of the menu and are arrayed under three rubrics: cold, hot, and fried. If ordered separately, they’re $7 each, but you get three for $18 and five for $28, and because they’re uniformly excellent, these bulk deals are good ones. (By small, by the way, I mean to imply "shareable," not "tiny.") The only small dish I found even slightly submemorable was a plate of crostini served with ricotta cheese and a pooling of peppery olio nuovo; the overall effect was gentle, with some crunch from the bread rounds and a hint of bite from the olive oil, like a teething puppy working a pinkie finger, and those little stimuli probably would have been enough if the other dishes hadn’t been so impressive.

Fried means, in several cases, "deep-fried," and this can be among the guiltier of pleasures if it gets out of hand. Deep-frying didn’t hurt bocconcini, gumball-sized blobs of mozzarella cheese, but it didn’t add much, either, beyond producing a likeness to the risotto fritters known as arancini; the spicy tomato sauce for dipping was more tomato than spicy, but it carried a sufficient voltage of tartness to help cut the fat.

Chicken livers, on the other hand, benefited from the same treatment. Deep-frying helped moderate their blood-iron gaminess. (The Romans are said to be organ-meat aficionados, but I would say this is true throughout Italy and the rest of Europe, where for centuries meat has been expensive and hard to come by, and all parts of a food animal were and are appreciated, honored, and used.)

While beans are most closely associated with Tuscany, they turn up throughout Italian cooking, and if it turns up somewhere in Italian cooking, sooner or later it will turn up in Roman cooking. SPQR offers cellini beans — a broad, white variety, similar to cannellini — topped with a reddish soffrito of ground pork that resembles a cross between (Mexican) chorizo and Bolognese sauce. The kitchen also handles a pair of problem children with considerable skill: black kale is sautéed to tenderness — but not mushiness — with broccolini, golden garlic slivers, and enough red chili flakes to make a real entrance, while Brussels sprouts are split like baby artichoke hearts and flash-fried with garlic, capers, parsley, and plenty of lemon to tame the cabbage beast.

The signature Roman pasta sauce is amatriciana, which is typically a combination of onions, tomatoes, smoked pancetta, and a suggestion of chile heat, and it is usually tossed with fat, hollow string pasta, either bucatini or perciatelli. SPQR’s version ($12) uses red instead of yellow or white onion, substitutes guanciale (cured pork cheek) for the pancetta, and leaves you to choose either spaghetti or rigatoni (both housemade) as your pasta. Choose either: you will be happy. The sauce is intense but civilized. If you like your pasta sauces creamy, you’re also likely to be happy with the carbonara sauce ($12), made with guanciale, crushed black peppercorns, and pecorino cheese. Like gelato, it draws its richness from egg yolks.

Since Italian food isn’t known for its spiciness, I was struck by the heat of the kale and amatriciana dishes. But, duly struck, I was less surprised by the "spicy chocolate" dessert ($7.50), chocolate mousse studded with Calabrian chiles and presented in a hot-chocolate cup under a dapper cap of whipped cream. The chile effect was mild, not much more than a tingle, but it did enhance the chocolate — maybe just through simple stimulation.

A similar enhancement: the spooning of sugared bitter-orange zest over a thick slice of ricotta torte ($7.50) with crema fresca. The torte and its cream shawl were rich but a little shy, while the zest on its own would have been too sharp. But together, they are a simple symphony.

The restaurant doesn’t take reservations. So: expect big crowds, of friends and countrymen, if not Romans.

SPQR

Dinner: Sun.–Thurs., 5:30–10 p.m.; Fri.–Sat., 5:30–11 p.m.

Lunch: Mon.–Fri., 11:30 a.m.–2:30 p.m.

Brunch: Sat.–Sun., 10:30 a.m.–2:30 p.m.

1911 Fillmore, SF

(415) 771-7779

www.spqrsf.com

Beer and wine

AE/MC/V

Noisy

Wheelchair accessible

Ping pong

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› le_chicken_farmer@yahoo.com

CHEAP EATS It’s a swirly, soupy thing, life, and I would like to be less dizzy in it but there’s this furiously pointless Ping-Pong game, nonstop, between my head and my gut. Fortunately, I’m a fan of the sport. And of spin, and slams.

Cousin Choo-Choo Train says I am never quite satisfied unless my dinner guests go home a little nervous, on top of everything else. And it’s true that I like to err on the side of salmonella, that I have no respect whatsoever for trichinosis, and that E. coli could be the latest Internet gadgetry for all I care. Still, no one has ever puked because of my cooking.

And if that ain’t a claim to fame … if I’m misclaiming it — if I just don’t know — then please tell me so’s I can change my ways. I don’t mean to make anyone sick, just nervous. Just a little bit nervous, like, hmm, I wonder if I might wind up in the emergency room. But then you don’t. Like that.

A lot of people don’t like to eat with me. In many cases their reasons are valid, like they’re vegetarian, or don’t know me. Other people keep coming back, keep going home nervous, and keep coming back.

This is called a sense of adventure. I know you have one, dear reader, or you wouldn’t be reading Cheap Eats. You’d be hoping your parachute opens, or surfing where sharks are — something really really boring.

Speaking of boring, one of my oldest, meat-eatingest friends wrote to remind me, after I got soft a couple columns ago and accidentally wrote about a one-year-old client of mine who I love, and who loves flowers, that "there’s only one thing more boring than listening to cat-loving freaks talk about their freakin’ cats … "

The ellipses are his. I’m pretty sure he didn’t mean chickens, though, because I’ve been writing about chickens ever since I was a teenager, no lie, and we’ve been in writing workshops and bands together. Surely he’d have said something before now, like, "Whoa! Chickens are boring."

Besides which it just ain’t true. So he must have meant either babies or flowers. Probably both. Together. Cute little flower-loving babies. Boring — unless they’re yours (or your client) — according to people.

So, OK, so how am I going to make it up to my Cheap readership, this un-farmerly lapse of coolness? Why, it’s almost too easy! By treating you all to something so freakin’ fascinating, so exciting, so universally bacon that even the most jaded cynic will have to turn his NASCAR cap around afterward, read it again, shake his head, and go, "Whoa! Chickens are boring, compared to this."

The subject of which I speak, of course, is My First Mammogram. I thought I was going to say Food Poisoning. But everything changed when I went to the mailbox just now and there was a letter from the medics re: my March 3 breast imaging examination:

Blah blah blah, there’s something in there, yadee-yada, they believe it’s benign, but…. And these ellipses are mine because my brain by now was awhirl with horror and general aghastness at the thought that two weeks had passed since My First Mammogram without me writing about it!

Well: Everyone said it hurts like hell, especially for small-breasted women. They described mean-fingered, banjo-faced technicians leveraging practical white nursing shoes into your sternum, grabbing one nipple in both hands and yanking and flattening you out like pie crust, in some cases using marble rolling pins to coerce you into the picture.

"Are you currently pregnant?" my mammogrammer asked.

It was the kindest thing anyone ever said to me and I told her so, then realized that she probably had to ask, by law, even if you had a mustache. In any case, she was a dear, and it didn’t hurt one bit. I like pie.

And, no, I ain’t afraid of no probably benign notes in the mail. I know just what it was they saw in there: a ping-pong ball. I’m game. Next time they look, I know, it will be exactly the same size, only in a whole different place.

My new favorite restaurant is Roadside BBQ on Geary in the Richmond. Sockywonk’s been barking it up for a long time so I finally grabbed her and shook her and made her take me there. And pay. What I like, besides sweet tea, tangy no-mayo slaw, and great fries, is that it uses apple wood for smoke, in addition to the more common hickory and mesquite. Apple smoke is my favorite kind of smoke. Smoked chicken sandwich with avocado and cilantro, and you can get your ‘cue in a salad, which is something else I love.

ROADSIDE BBQ

Sun.–Thu., 11:30 a.m.–10 p.m.; Fri.–Sat., 11:30 a.m.–11 p.m.

3751 Geary, SF

(415) 221-7427

Beer and wine

AE/D/MC/V

Piqueo’s

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› paulr@sfbg.com

When Carlos Altamirano opened his first restaurant, Mochica, on a drab block of Harrison Street in SoMa more than four years ago, I thought: well, Peruvian, that’s interesting, but how good could it be if he had to put it there? Then I went and found out how good it could be: way good, extraordinary, probably the best Peruvian food in the city. Few pleasures are as exquisite as that of finding one’s expectations exceeded.

And yet, in unlooked-for success, danger can lurk, too. If your first restaurant turns out to be marvelous, people will expect your other restaurants to be marvelous, maybe even more marvelous. The word, from two summers ago, that Altamirano would be taking over the original Moki’s space in Bernal Heights to open a Mochica sibling wasn’t surprising, but it did lead me to suppose that the new place would be at least as good as the older one and, at the same time, wonder if and how it could be. Would it be disappointing if Piqueo’s, the new restaurant, were only as good as Mochica, not better?

One way out of this gilded conundrum might be to serve a slightly different sort of food at each locale. Altamirano describes the menu at Piqueo’s as "contemporary" Peruvian cuisine — "traditional" Peruvian, "with a California twist." (Mochica, incidentally, serves "fusion Peruvian cuisine," according to the Web site.) The description is fair enough in that vague, diplomats-having-frank-discussions way, but it does not begin to capture the wonder of the sauces, which, in their variety, sophistication, and vividness, are so good we actually requested glasses to drink them from, once we’d run out of sopping and soaking material. If you associate sauces with a certain sort of snooty French cooking, you will find revelation at Piqueo’s.

The menu card itself is an unwieldy artifact. It’s oversized — it could pass as a modestly shrunken reproduction of the Declaration of Independence — and like that worthy document it’s filled with text, in small, difficult-to-read lettering. One evening we had to whip out our Peepers (those wallet-size magnifying glasses, so no, it’s not what you think) to be able to read the menu. Rarely do you see so many choices except at Chinese restaurants, and when a kitchen must turn out such a broad range of dishes, you wonder if it isn’t trying to spread too little butter over too much bread.

But you don’t get bread at Piqueo’s: You get little dishes of crispy, spicy chickpeas, tossed with scallion mince and some mild white vinegar. They’re no good for sauce reclamation, but they are addictive. You empty the dish and another soon appears, and by the time you’ve emptied that, you are presented with a platter of seviche, maybe the mixto version ($17), an embarrassment of peeled shrimp, sea scallops, mussels, yam chunks, kernels of Peruvian corn, and a few slivers of fresh ginger bathing in a glow-in-the-dark sauce of lime juice and two kinds of chili pepper, rocoto and aji limo. The sauce was almost like a distillate of V-8 juice, and when the seafood was gone, we poured the remnant into a cordial glass and made a small toast to the next course.

After such puckering heat, a bit of aromatic sweetness is indicated. How about a salad of quinoa ($9) — the grain of the Inca — perfumed with mint? I was expecting something like couscous, but the salad was a real salad: a bowlful of mixed greens, with the cooked quinoa scattered like cheese crumblings over the lettuces and a lively but well-mannered supporting cast of halved black olives, red bell pepper julienne, and more Peruvian corn kernels tossed into the mix. Vinaigrette: lush and balsamicky, a hint of caramel sweetness.

As familiar as Peruvian corn (a.k.a. cancha) may have become in recent years, at least to those who haunt Peruvian restaurants, its appearances have remained confined (in my experience) to off-the-cob bit parts. But Piqueo’s offers cancha steamed on skewered cobs ($9) in a fabulous, turmeric-yellow aji sauce. The corn itself was a little bland (though it doesn’t stick in your teeth the way the ordinary kind can), but the sauce was so good that we pleaded for, and were brought, a plate of toasted baguette rounds to clean it up with.

Bread recurred (in a kind of late-inning rally) as part of a fried-smelt sandwich ($9) enlivened by sprigs of fresh cilantro. Smelt is a fresh-water fish not often seen in restaurants around here — I associate it with the Great Lakes and early-spring fishing expeditions by night along Chicago’s lakefront — but there is a variety native to the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, so it’s not necessarily an exotic delicacy.

Also not exotic delicacies, but delicious all the same, are calamari tubes ($19), closed off at one end like pastry piping bags, filled with chorizo, and grilled. The tubes (which look like elongated dreidels) are plated with broad, flat white beans, a jumble of watercress, and yet another wondrous sauce, this one called chupe.

If there is a slight letdown, it has to do with the dessert menu. Many of the usual suspects can be found here, from alfajores (the little cookies) to suspiro to passion-fruit mousse. After some squabbling ("Gentlemen, draw your Peepers"), we settled on the chocolate cake ($10) with ice cream. The ice cream, made with lucuña, a tropical fruit native to Peru, was a pretty orange-pink color but disappointingly granular, which suggested it had melted and been refrozen. The cake, on the other hand, a disk held within a rim of crushed nuts, was outstanding: a mousse cake, smooth and dense as night. No sauce needed.

PIQUEO’S

Daily, 5:30–10:30 p.m.

830 Cortland, SF

(415) 282-8812

www.piqueos.com

Beer and wine

AE/DC/MC/V

Moderately noisy

Wheelchair accessible

Shitloads of Money

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› le_chicken_farmer@yahoo.com

CHEAP EATS Stirring constantly … I’m a troublemaker. For complicated reasons, my old pals, um, Ronnie "Zack" Pottery and his wife, Mrs. "Zack" Pottery, were running from the law. Understand that these are two of the sweetest, law-abidingest people you will ever meet. They live very cleanly, simply, and musically in subrural, um, Idaho, pay taxes, stay sober, write, work, and record at home, go to the doctor, and consume more tea than anyone I know. Their idea of a wild time is to stay up late (as in, like, 11 p.m.) and render jazz standards on melodica and banjo. Sometimes they throw in a little slide whistle, or toy piano … the sick, twisted deviants! Their closest friends, I swear, are nuns.

Everybody sing: The hills are alive with the sound of music. No. It’s Idaho, but it ain’t like that. And I’m not sure I quite know what I mean, but I have a gut feeling it might be funny, in an over-my-own-head kind of way, so let’s stay with it. Just in case.

Everybody sing again: The hills are alive with the sound of music.

Sorry. The reason I’m stalling is because I want so very badly to explain why my two most clean-living friends ever, anywhere, were fugitives from (in)justice for a week. It’s so exciting and ridiculous. Surely it will make great copy. And yet, I have to be careful, don’t I?

Suffice it to say, as vaguely as possible, that people with shitloads of money can do basically whatever they want to people without squat, or very little, at any rate — like maybe some musical instruments and herbal tea. Everybody knows this, right?

But it’s even more twisted than that. Woohoo!

To make a long story short, as Ronnie "Zack" himself is fond of saying, someone with shitloads of money takes someone else with shitloads of money to court over, say, shitloads of money, or custody of kids, or it could be anything, really. The point is that clever, ruthless lawyers with shitloads of money start playing shitloads-of-money hardball with each other over shitloads of money, and the next thing you know, nun-hugging, starving-artistical innocents with a fear of flying are about to be subpoenaed to appear in a courtroom many states away to testify against a third person with shitloads of money who is not even materially involved in the case of Shitloads of Money vs. Shitloads of Money.

So let’s say that this third person with shitloads of money would prefer not to see Shitloads of Money winning shitloads of money off of Shitloads of Money, if only because in the process his own good name, Shitloads of Money, stands to be destroyed and he may, for example, lose the respect of loved ones who may or may not already have lost respect for him years ago. In any case, it’s too much to risk for someone with shitloads of money, so he generously suggests to said nun huggers that they must certainly be under stress and could use a vacation.

Oh, it’s so convoluted and other-worldly. It’s enough to boggle a little chicken farmer’s tiny brain. Which is partly my fault, because as soon as I saw Mr. and Mrs. "Zack" Pottery in their his-and-hers false mustaches at a discreet little hotel in My Hometown, California, I asked them please not to tell me too much about what was going on, so that I might write about it more accurately.

As a result, you probably know more about this case right now than I do. All I know is that Shitloads of Money vs. Shitloads of Money + Shitloads of Money – False Mustache–Sporting Nun Huggers = Fun for Chicken Farmers.

Breakfast was on them. Lunch was on them. Dinner was on them. Gas was on them. And as it gradually dawned on me that "on them" likely didn’t really mean on them so much as on them, I started suggesting fancier and fancier places. Places that chicken farmers and musicians don’t generally get to eat at.

And in this way, in my own imagination at least — which counts! — I had the small satisfaction of sticking it to Shitloads of Money.

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My new favorite restaurant is the Willow Wood Market up here in Graton. It’s the kind of place where I would never be able to afford to go, myself. It ain’t cheap eats: in other words, you’ll spend $15-$25 on a dinner entrée. But on special occasions, like your birthday or surprise out-of-town visitors wearing false mustaches and picking up checks…. It serves pretty basic, unpretentious, comfortable, and great food like risotto with scallops, rock shrimp with polenta, and grilled flat iron steak.

WILLOW WOOD MARKET & CAFE

9020 Graton Road, Graton

(707) 823-0233

Mon.–Sat., 8 a.m.–9:30 p.m.; Sun., 9 a.m.–3 p.m.

Beer and wine

MC/V

A deadly Clinton legacy

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OPINION In her autobiography Living History (Simon and Schuster, 2003), Sen. Hillary Clinton portrays herself as an advocate for children, a defender of women and human rights. In fact, the Clintons have a long history of sacrificing the rights — and even the lives — of children for political expediency. It is time to set the record straight.

On Sept. 6, 2006, a Senate bill — a simple amendment to ban the use of cluster bombs in civilian areas — presented Sen. Clinton with a timely opportunity to protect the lives of children throughout the world.

The cluster bomb is one of the most hated and heinous weapons of modern warfare, and its primary victims are children.

Sen. Barack Obama voted for the amendment to ban cluster bombs. Clinton, however, voted with the Republicans to kill the humanitarian bill.

It’s hard to believe that Clinton was unaware of the humanitarian crisis when she voted to continue the use of cluster bombs in cities and populated areas. A United Nations weapons commission called cluster bombs "weapons of indiscriminate effect." For years the international press reported the horrific consequences of cluster bombs on civilians. On April 10, 2003, for example, Asia Times described the carnage in Baghdad hospitals: "The absolute majority of patients are women and children, victims of shrapnel, and most of all, fragments of cluster bombs."

Even after wars subside, after treaties are signed, and after belligerents return home, cluster bombs wreak havoc on civilian life. Up to 20 percent of the bomblets fail to detonate on impact, only to become landmines that later detonate on playgrounds and farmlands.

Children are drawn to cluster bomb canisters, the deadly duds that look like beer cans or toys before they explode.

Because Clinton is now taking credit for accomplishments during the White House years, when she was a partner in power, we should also look closely at Bill Clinton administration’s policy regarding landmines. The United States is the leading manufacturer of landmines. For families across the rest of the globe, landmines are buried terror. More than 100 million mines are deployed in more than 60 countries worldwide — 9 million in Angola, 10 million in Cambodia. About 20,000 M14 antipersonnel mines are buried in the mountain areas of Yong-do, South Korea. According to UN estimates, 26,000 people, mostly civilians in developing countries, are killed or mutilated by landmines every year.

The worldwide movement to ban landmines burgeoned during the Clinton years. In Dec. 1997, 137 nations — more than two-thirds of the world’s countries — signed the Ottawa treaty, an agreement to ban the use, production, stockpiling, and transfer of antipersonnel landmines. How did President Clinton respond?

Clinton flat-out refused to become party to the Ottawa convention. As he put it, "I could not sign in good conscience the treaty banning landmines."

In "good conscience"?!

Landmines are not good for children, Hillary.

Paul Rockwell

Paul Rockwell (rockyspad@hotmail.com) is a national columnist living in the Bay Area.

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