SF

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST LAING IN THE ‘LOIN

Andrew Lam
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BEST LAING IN THE ‘LOIN

Foodies know: if you want sit-down Filipino cuisine, head to Daly City for the densest concentration of deliciousness. Yet there’s an outlier — a humble little Tenderloin hole-in-the-wall steadily serving the real deal. Family-run Kusina Ni Tess dishes out kare-kare, a peanut sauce-based Filipino stew; picadillo, a savory mélange of ground pork, carrot, potato, and green peas; and fish in tangy, sweet-sour broth. For breakfast, savor garlic fried rice with egg and your choice of meat: try Filipino corned beef or daing na bangus (butterflied, skin-on milkfish). The staff will offer tastes to help you choose from the hearty, ultra-cheap menu — all dishes under $9 — but don’t miss the laing: taro leaves cooked in coconut milk and shrimp paste, tinged with subtle chile heat. Finish it all off with egg pie or young coconut pie.

237 Ellis, SF. (415) 351-1169

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST LOCAL UNION, PINT DIVISION

Andrew Lam
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BEST LOCAL UNION, PINT DIVISION

Visitors to the SF Beer Week opening gala might have been surprised to find that a sizable portion of the Concourse Exhibition Center was dedicated to beer brewed right here in the Bay Area. Our beloved Anchor Steam and 21st Amendment breweries are no longer the only sudsers in town — no, not by a long shot. This expansion in local brew is part of a national trend, but local leaps may be due, in part, to the efforts of the SF Brewers Guild — an association, born in 2004, of 10 of the city’s best-loved new breweries, including Magnolia Pub and Brewery and Thirsty Bear Brewing Company. In addition to Beer Week, the group organizes a “meet the brewers” event every month, an easy entry point for those who want to take their local beer boosting past six-pack status.

www.sfbrewersguild.org

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST ONE-UP ON INSTAGRAM

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Best of the Bay 2012: BEST ONE-UP ON INSTAGRAM

The square aspect ratio and grainy filters of everyone’s favorite $1 billion photography app turn perfectly good shots crappy-cool with the swipe of a finger, allowing smart phone users everywhere to take photos way back. But to take photos way, way back, you have to be in the Mission for a tintype portrait at Photobooth. These old-timey sheet-steel images were once popular at carnivals and fairs; even after wet plate photography became obsolete, tintypes were deemed charmingly nostalgic — a sort of prescient irony that pre-dated hipsterism yet neatly anticipated it. Perhaps that same appreciative irony applied to the tintype’s tendency — due to long exposure time — to make subjects look vaguely, yet somehow quaintly, sociopathic. Or, as the Photobooth website delicately puts it, “Traditionally, tintypes recorded the intensity of the individual personality.”

1193 Valencia, SF. (415) 824-1248, www.photoboothsf.com

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST NEIGHBORHOOD FIXTURES

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Best of the Bay 2012: BEST NEIGHBORHOOD FIXTURES

Hey, you with the dreams of a better bathroom! There’s no need to put up any longer with that cracked toilet bowl, that faulty faucet, that perma-grody bathtub, or that shower head that suddenly switches into “destroy” mode at the worst possible moment (i.e. right in the middle of herbal-rinsing your long, lustrous hair). Head down — or direct your responsible landlord down — to the cluster of independent home supply stores at the intersection of Bayshore Avenue and Industrial Street in Bayview-Hunter’s Point. There you’ll find K H Plumbing Supplies, a huge family-owned and operated bathroom and kitchen store with everything you need to fulfill your new fixture fantasies. The staff is extra-friendly and can gently guide you toward affordable options in better-known name brands. Even if you have only a vague idea as to which of the thousand bath spouts will reflect your unique personality, they’ll find something for you to gush over.

2272 Shafter, SF. (415) 970-9718

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST BUSHELS OF BUDS

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Best of the Bay 2012: BEST BUSHELS OF BUDS

Ever rolled your eyes at the endless articles on flower arranging found in home magazines — as if you had the money or the time? Then you might be due for a visit to the San Francisco Flower Mart. The SoMa gem sells cut flowers of every description at wholesale prices, making it the perfect playground for those looking to get plenty of practice, per-penny, poking stems into vases. And if your Martha Stewart moment doesn’t seem imminent, there are plenty of other fixin’s — giant glass balls, decorative podiums, fish tanks, driftwood, grosgrain ribbons, flamingo-themed party supplies — to rifle through. It’s the perfect place to while away your lunch break: it smells great, and it even has a perky little cafe to caffeinate your midday visit.

640 Brannan, SF. (415) 392-7944, www.sfflmart.com

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST PRAYER FOR UNITY

Andrew Lam
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BEST PRAYER FOR UNITY

A sanctuary that offers religion to some and is open to all, St. Cyprian’s Episcopal Church genuinely lives by JC’s should-be truism, “there are no outcasts and all are welcome.” Volunteers from the church’s congregation manage the Cyprian’s Arc community center, which opens its doors wide as a music venue and meeting space for neighbors of every age, belief system, and background. Local activists, like those from the sustainability-driven Wigg Party, organize workshops and events within the St. Cyprian’s public areas. And the 89-year-old church’s efforts at community building, such as a recent oral history project, remind Panhandle neighbors that even — perhaps especially — in a rapidly changing community, they are connected at the roots of the ‘hood.

2097 Turk, SF. (415) 567-1855, www.saintcyprianssf.org

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST FUTURE OF THE PRESS

Andrew Lam
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BEST FUTURE OF THE PRESS

This might get a little meta, so pull up a bar stool, grab a stiff drink, and bear with us. Better yet, let’s go down to Local Edition bar, where the walls are adorned with perfectly preserved newspapers from the great days of print journalism (ahem, not yet over by the way) and the cocktail menu, designed by Ian Scalzo of Bourbon and Branch, offers playful twists on classics any fedora-sporting muckraker worth her salt would be more than familiar with. Yes, in the plush, Art Deco-ish space you’ll find displayed a copy of the Guardian’s first issue from October 1966 and other legendary artifacts of historic Bay Area journalistic output, yellow or otherwise, plus a vintage typewriter or two. It’s a dreamy wayback machine for romance-addled Lois Lanes and Clark Kents — and it all takes place in the basement that once housed the Examiner’s (and The Call’s) printing press. There is nary an emoticon, comments section, or LOLcat in sight. If the future of print is leading to this sort of thing, we’ll stick with ink and drink.

691 Market, SF. (415) 795-1375, www.localeditionsf.com

best of the bay 2012: BEST DIY PANDA BAIT

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best of the bay 2012: BEST DIY PANDA BAIT

“If just owning a bamboo bike was the end goal, we’d just build them for you,” said Justin Aguinaldo in a Guardian interview back in February. “For us, it’s about empowering more people and providing them with the value of creating your own thing.” Aguinaldo’s Tenderloin DIY cycling hub Bamboo Bike Studio doesn’t just produce two-wheeled steeds whose frames are made of easily-regenerated natural materials — it teaches you useful bike-making skills so that you can be the master of your own self-powered transportation destiny. Buy your bike parts (kits start at $459), and then get yourself to tinkering. After a weekend-long session with Bamboo Bike Studio’s expert bike makers, you’ll have a ride that’s ready for the hurly-burly city streets.

982 Post, SF. www.bamboobikestudio.com

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST AU NATUREL FOR OENOPHILES

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Best of the Bay 2012: BEST AU NATUREL FOR OENOPHILES

Much of the wine we drink is stuffed full of chemical preservatives. Purists like wine critic Alice Feiring have raised a hue and cry over the industry’s reluctance to force producers to label these ingredients. We have to give it up to a little shop off of Polk Street for supporting the so-called “natural wine” movement which encourages additive-free imbibement. Biondivino is charming enough in its own right: library-style shelves full of luscious Italian pours, among which proprietor Ceri Smith has made sure to include many natural wines. And because these bottles tend to be produced by small scale vineyards, Biodivino helps support the little guys, too. Sure, sometimes all you can spring for is a bottle of three-buck Chuck (natural wines can be pricey) — but props to Smith for giving consumers the choice.

1415 Green, SF. (415) 673-2320, www.biondivino.com

 

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST FOUND IN TRANSLATION

Andrew Lam
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BEST FOUND IN TRANSLATION

Though that old cautionary tale of the Chevy Nova selling badly in Spanish-speaking countries (Get it? No va?) is apocryphal, there is still plenty of research each year dedicated to the economic impacts associated with poor or culturally-insensitive translation. But who is watching out for the less tangible art of translation of, well, art — and its potential for cultural cross-pollination? In fact, that would be the Center for the Art of Translation. The non-profit organization won’t help your company make overseas business deals, but it will help broaden our cultural understanding through outreach, education, and public events. By helping to support translators, giving children tools for literacy and critical thinking, and hosting public talks, the Center makes our world a little smaller and a whole lot richer.

582 Market, SF. (415) 512-8824, www.catranslation.org

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST MOTHERBOARD MOTHERSHIP

Andrew Lam
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BEST MOTHERBOARD MOTHERSHIP

Started by partners Azam Khan and Oliver Maddox last winter as part of the duo’s quest to offer fair rates on Apple and high-end PC repair, Love Haight Computers deals in new machines, plus customization, refurbishment, diagnostic services, accessories — and rotating art displays? One of the shop’s goals is to support its community, so it makes perfect sense to showcase the artwork of deserving friends for the tech-needy to peruse. If Best Buy makes you squirm and Geek Squad’s orange-and-blue offends your delicate aesthetic sensibilities, head to this Lower Haight comp store-art show. Bonus point: Khan is easily one of the most charismatic tech geeks we’ve met in ages, and he promises “not to rip you off.”

437A Haight, SF. (415) 799-4600, www.lovehaightcomputers.com

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST INDIE KITCHEN MENAGERIE

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Best of the Bay 2012: BEST INDIE KITCHEN MENAGERIE

It can be hard to beat the sheer variety offered by your Ikeas and Bed Bath & Beyonds when it comes to fresh new flatware or an upgrade on your trusty college-era rice cooker. Lucky for local business fans (which we assume you are if you’re this deep into our Best of the Bay issue), there’s a little-guy alternative: Clement Street’s Kamei Restaurant Supply. Kamei has dishes for every occasion: light blue earthenware plates with fetching designs of cherry blossom trees, coffee mugs shaped like barn owls and kitty cats, tea sets, sake sets, and every cooking utensil a chef could desire — plus paper umbrellas with koi fish prints and flip-flops. Maybe ‘cuz with all the savings you’ll spot in Kamei, you’ll be able to afford more beach trips.

525 Clement, SF. (415) 666-3699

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST LABORATORY FOR MOLE-DING YOUNG MINDS

Andrew Lam
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There’s a frozen fox in the fridge, an assortment of snakes on the sideboard, and a hedgehog hunkered down in a little pen. There are gadgets whirring and vibrating, measuring the cacophony from a caboodle of broken-down instruments. There are pulleys and levers and bells and whistles and plenty of chemicals that make a good bang. And at the Mission Science Workshop, there’s no slab coat required — just a healthy dose of curiosity. Founder Dan Sudran encourages kids of diverse backgrounds to squish, mold, spin, and explore — whether it’s making giant cardboard strands of DNA; playing with vacuums and electromagnets; or assembling your very own vermin from individual containers filled with teeny-tiny pelvises, scapulae, and spines at the Build-a-Mole station — batteries not included.

3750 18th St., SF. (415) 621-1240, www.missionscienceworkshop.org

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST LABORATORY FOR MOLE-DING YOUNG MINDS

Andrew Lam
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0

There’s a frozen fox in the fridge, an assortment of snakes on the sideboard, and a hedgehog hunkered down in a little pen. There are gadgets whirring and vibrating, measuring the cacophony from a caboodle of broken-down instruments. There are pulleys and levers and bells and whistles and plenty of chemicals that make a good bang. And at the Mission Science Workshop, there’s no slab coat required — just a healthy dose of curiosity. Founder Dan Sudran encourages kids of diverse backgrounds to squish, mold, spin, and explore — whether it’s making giant cardboard strands of DNA; playing with vacuums and electromagnets; or assembling your very own vermin from individual containers filled with teeny-tiny pelvises, scapulae, and spines at the Build-a-Mole station — batteries not included.

3750 18th St., SF. (415) 621-1240, www.missionscienceworkshop.org

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST PLACE TO FLIP OUT

Andrew Lam
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Best of the Bay 2012: BEST PLACE TO FLIP OUT

BEST PLACE TO FLIP OUT

It sits, waiting for the next young bendy soul: a vast, matted wonderland of balance beams, pommel horses, uneven bars, and gargantuan trampolines ready to be bounced upon and jackknifed off of. American Gymnastics Club has been molding San Francisco’s Kylie Ross hopefuls into competitors for decades. Though simple somersault class is available for preschoolers, those with thighs of steel and grace to boot can sign up for the competitive program, where they can vie for college athletic scholarships and test their nerves at state championships. Visit its Judah location — an institution — or the newer Bayshore facility. Both offer ample classes for the little one, or, if you wanna hit the mat as well, tykes from 18 months to three years can bring in the ‘rents for parent participation-friendly classes.

2520 Judah, SF. (415) 731-1400; 390 Bayshore, SF. (415) 920-1704, www.americangymnasticsclub.com

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST MUSHROOMING POPULARITY

Andrew Lam
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BEST MUSHROOMING POPULARITY

Enough tripping over yourself at music festivals — the best kind of festive fungi has to be that which is found at the ever-growing SF Mycological Society’s Fungus Fair. Each December, Bay Area mycophiles meet up for a weekend (usually in Berkeley’s Lawrence Hall of Science) to enjoy lectures, vendors selling mushroom-dyed sweaters, and entire rooms full of specimens hand-picked by members of the Society. Attendees can also take advantage of copious class offerings: ever wondered, for instance, about the best way to serve a black chanterelle? Take the mushroom cooking class. Best of all, you can find out what SFMS gets up to during the rest of the year: San Francisco is home to the country’s longest-running mycology programs (at SF State), and the Society hosts beginners’ foraging hikes all throughout the year for the budding, mushroom-loving spore.

www.mssf.org

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST PRIDE ON WHEELS

Andrew Lam
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Best of the Bay 2012: BEST PRIDE ON WHEELS

BEST PRIDE ON WHEELS

Though some may quibble with the presence of lowriders at Sunday Streets in the Mission — you can often find the hydraulic-enabled, candy-painted whips parked off 24th Street as they prepare to roll out in high-gloss fashion — the cars actually recall an important chapter of the neighborhood’s history that doesn’t get enough play. According to Roberto Hernandez of the SF Lowrider Council, lowriding the Mission’s main drags was so popular in the 1980s that tourist buses would come to check out the cars, causing traffic that led to police intervention and brutality. The Council was formed in response to the harassment, and is experiencing a rebirth these days as lowriding comes back into fashion. Nowadays, member clubs have five to 30 members of all genders and races. The only requirement to join, says Hernandez, is a “finished, tight, ready-to-roll lowrider.”

(415) 206-0577

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST TM4M TRAINING

Andrew Lam
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BEST TM4M TRAINING

Blood is rushing to your first chakra, you’re incredibly horny, and you’re desperate to get off. But the complexities of your body have you feeling a bit insecure about where to go to have that full-body, no-commitment release you’re craving. No fear! San Francisco is a city saturated in sex, and Eros — a safe-sex-on-premises site — hosts casual sexual forays between all kinds of men, regardless of what they have going on below the belt. Eros’ Transmen for Men (TM4M) is a unique program held every second Thursday developed to foster a dialogue between transmen and cis-men on how to have hot and steamy casual encounters with each other. There’s more: Eros is open seven days a week, and is always committed to celebrating the queer masculine spectrum.

2051 Market, SF. (415) 255-3921, www.erossf.com

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST EPL IN THE AM

Andrew Lam
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BEST EPL IN THE AM

You know you’re in the presence of hardcore devotion when all available seats at the pub are snagged ahead of a pre-dawn English Premiere League match. Such is the reality at Danny Coyle’s. The bar’s biggest team draws are Liverpool (which lured visiting movie star Clive Owen, spotted rooting for the Reds in April), Arsenal, Manchester City, Manchester United, Chelsea, and Tottenham Hotspur. Friendly bartenders are skilled at passing pints through a crowd and ample TV screens offer good vantage points from every corner. Danny’s and nearby neighbor Mad Dog in the Fog — a larger and often even more-crowded joint — are the reason you’ll hear gasps, taunting rhymes, anguished cries, and goalllll celebrations echoing through the Lower Haight’s early a.m. mists.

668 Haight, SF. (415) 558-8375, www.dannycoyles.com

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST INDOOR PERCH FOR INFINITE INSPIRATION

Andrew Lam
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BEST INDOOR PERCH FOR INFINITE INSPIRATION

Killer panoramas aren’t hard to find in San Francisco. But what if you want a bird’s eye view of beauty that’s unfettered by cold winds and within an arm’s reach from a good read? The Potrero Hill branch of the San Francisco Public Library is a modern two-story building awash in natural light. Its best spot is the row of squishy armchairs aligned inches from a wall of windows facing out over the northwestern horizon, with a clear view of the landmarks galore splayed beyond Potrero’s rooftops. Claim one of these chairs and you’ll be rewarded with an expansive landscape that’s at once geographical and intellectual, giving the contemplative bookworm both a superior vista of the peninsula and a clean, well-lighted place from which to explore the literary world.

1616 20th St., SF. (415) 355-2822, www.sfpl.org

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST BLEMISH-VANISHING BOTANICS

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Best of the Bay 2012: BEST BLEMISH-VANISHING BOTANICS

The charming, chatty cashiers at the Benedetta Skin Care kiosk in the Ferry Building have clear, shiny skin, but it’s not due to the local produce from the farmers market outside. Based in the Petaluma, Benedetta offers organic, botanics-based, sustainably packaged products that actually work. Take a tip from your freshly scrubbed lotion sellers: rather than loofah-ing your skin to a pulp with packaged peroxides that — let’s face it — sound kind of scary when you actually read the fine print, refresh with the line’s perfectly moist Crème Cleanser that leaves skin smelling like a mixture of rosemary and geranium. From anti-aging creams to deodorants and moisturizing mist sprays, this small company offers treats for all skin types — perfect for popping in next to your small-producer cheese wheels and grass-fed charcuterie.

1 Ferry Building, SF. (415) 263-8910, www.benedetta.com

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST USERS UNION

Andrew Lam
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BEST USERS UNION

“Nothing about us, without us.” That’s the mission statement of the San Francisco Drug Users’ Union, an innovative organization sponsored by the Drug Policy Alliance that meets regularly to discuss self-advocacy in politics. If human history — and nature — is any indicator, people are never going to stop using drugs. Accepting that, it’s an easy leap to imagine, then, that drug users are people. And since drug use takes up a lot of time, and most certainly comes with its own occupational preoccupations, it stands to reason that these people deserve to be able to organize to represent their own interests (especially when they run contrary to those of the self-propagating prison-industrial complex). The SFDUU makes this logic a reality. A recent project included a showcase of professionally designed models for safe injection sites. Safe places to shoot up? It seems so sensible!

General meetings first and third Mondays, 5:30 p.m., free. 149 Turk, SF. www.sfdrugusersunion.org

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST BAIT BLOG

Andrew Lam
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Best of the Bay 2012: BEST BAIT BLOG

BEST BAIT BLOG

The deep-sea-ded truth of fisherman Kirk Lombard’s angling blog the Monkeyface News is that you need never have hoisted a rod to partake in its charms. Lombard’s tales of shad runs and striped bass population numbers are interspersed with musings about German disco quartet Boney M., and complaints regarding weekday sobriety. Aiming to learn how to poke pole the blog’s titular monkeyface eels from a hands-on video, or find out whether you can use a jig to catch a rockfish? Find out here — or on Lombard’s almost-just-as-good tour site, Kirk Lombard’s Sea Forager. An ex-Department of Fish and Game surveyor, Lombard preaches sustainable fishing practices in his fishing seminars — which have included an urban fishing-foraging series conducted through Forage SF. Newbie eel hunters, you’ve come to the right place.

www.monkeyfacenews.com

Best of the Bay 2012: BEST FADES WITH FLAIR

Andrew Lam
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Best of the Bay 2012: BEST FADES WITH FLAIR

BEST FADES WITH FLAIR

Guys, it’s that time again: the moment your friends have ceased to be fooled by that hat you wear to cover up the fact that you desperately need a touch-up on your fade. Never fear, the New Chicago Barbershop #3 is a time-tested solution to your lackluster attention to grooming. Plus, the place has flair: step in the shop, and feel like you’ve stepped back into the an early-1970s Fillmore District business. With pictures of Dizzy Gillespie and Muhammad Ali on the walls, a shoe shine station, and never-ending barbershop banter, this is as authentic as it gets. For 45 years, the longest-standing shop on its block has cut local stars, visiting celebrities, and everyday neighborhood residents. Just don’t let the old-school vibe fool you — New Chicago’s haircuts will make you feel like a new man.

1551 Fillmore, SF. (415) 563-9793, www.newchicagobarbershop.net

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