Broadway Dim Sum / Liguria Bakery / Mara's Italian Pastries / Victoria Pastry
San Francisco, CA
What a chilly morning...and lookie lookie!
Unmelted hail!!! Chilly mornings call for my favorite comfort food - jook, or rice porridge. My mom, aunt, mom's friend, and I headed to Chinatown since we didn't want to go far in case it started storming. After parking at the Golden Gateway parking lot and taking the Park n' Ride Chinatown shuttle to Stockton and Pacific, we popped into Broadway Dim Sum for some breakfast. ($3 validated parking...look for the red flyers in the storefronts)
It's not the fanciest of spots, but it's relatively clean and the grub is cheap and pretty tasty. The four of us shared a preserved duck egg and pork jook (bottom), a chow fun-type dish with thinner noodles (upper left), stir-fried rice noodles (upper right), and 2 bowls of shui jiao (water dumplings, not shown). This set us back a whopping ~$12-13 for the four of us. The jook really really hit the spot, but both stir-fried noodles got cold quickly. The chili sauce served on the tables is goooooood...I love adding tons of it to the noodles. The shui jiao were pretty good - approximately 8 per bowl ($2.75 each) but they came in a broth with a load of oil floating on the surface.
_________________________________________________________________________
Liguria Bakery
Full, but not stuffed, my mom parted ways with my aunt and my mom's friend. We headed off towards North Beach when we passed by Liguria Bakery. Ever since I saw a special on TV on this establishment, I've wanted to try their famous fresh-baked focaccia. Just a note, once they sell out of focaccia for the day, they close shop. We got there around 11:00am and they had everything left except plain focaccia. Though I really was hankering for their pizza focaccia, mom wanted the mushroom so we ordered the fungus-y one. Mom was dismayed at how nicely they wrapped the focaccia in wax tissue paper, paper, and twine - she wanted a sample then and there! After struggling a bit with the paper, we had ripped up huge chunks of the fresh bread.
Yes, we're savages...shown is approximately 1/3 left. *blush* This was delicious...but then again, I love mushrooms. I really liked the nice sheen of olive oil and slightly buttery-tasting bread. Of course, with more mushrooms, it'd even be more fabulous.
_________________________________________________________________________
Mara's Italian Pastries
Heading up Columbus from Washington Square, we noticed another bakery - Mara's. Mom noticed the cookies and napoleons immediately and decided to have a look. Was this the North Beach outlet of Dianda's before? Some of the napoleons had the wax paper circles with Dianda's name. I ordered a custard napoleon with chocolate shavings on top and some profiteroles. Ouch...$3.95 for each?! Pretty darned pricey...
I didn't have a bite of the napoleon but the cream puffs were stuffed with rum-tinged custardy goodness. Each puff was at least 95% custard and 5% puff. Still, kinda pricey and out of the way...I SO did not expect an $8 order. I think a similar order at Dianda's in San Mateo set me back $6-ish. Sadly, can't say I'll be heading back.
_________________________________________________________________________
Victoria Pastry Co.
Trekking back towards Chinatown and stopping at various produce stands, we stopped off at Victoria Pastry to take a look at the goodies. I love Victoria - it's been a favorite ever since I had their St. Honore cake for my 1st (and 2nd and 4th and 6th) birthday. Haha, I started cream puffing young! Since we already had the Mara's pastries in tow, I just ordered a slice of their princess cake.
This would be #3 in my Swedish Princess Cake tasting.
Decoration: 7/10 - Plain and simple, and the icing didn't make it back home but I didn't ding that. Haha...
Gold/White Cake: 9/10 - Looked dry and I was worried about the browner edges - but I was wrong! So mooooist!
Whipped Cream: 9/10 - Perfect amount.
Custard: 8.5/10 - Good custard...kinda funnily translucent but tasty. Detected a hint of coconut.
Raspberry Jam: 8/10 - Okay...nice bit of jammy flavor but not enough.
Marzipan: 7.5/10 - Too chewy marizpan, though it helped the cake retain its shape through it's bashings through Chinatown. Not terribly sweet, decent almond flavor, pretty smooth.
Overall: 8.2/10 - Good showing but still, it's #2 in my princess cake tastings.
What a chilly morning...and lookie lookie!
Unmelted hail!!! Chilly mornings call for my favorite comfort food - jook, or rice porridge. My mom, aunt, mom's friend, and I headed to Chinatown since we didn't want to go far in case it started storming. After parking at the Golden Gateway parking lot and taking the Park n' Ride Chinatown shuttle to Stockton and Pacific, we popped into Broadway Dim Sum for some breakfast. ($3 validated parking...look for the red flyers in the storefronts)
It's not the fanciest of spots, but it's relatively clean and the grub is cheap and pretty tasty. The four of us shared a preserved duck egg and pork jook (bottom), a chow fun-type dish with thinner noodles (upper left), stir-fried rice noodles (upper right), and 2 bowls of shui jiao (water dumplings, not shown). This set us back a whopping ~$12-13 for the four of us. The jook really really hit the spot, but both stir-fried noodles got cold quickly. The chili sauce served on the tables is goooooood...I love adding tons of it to the noodles. The shui jiao were pretty good - approximately 8 per bowl ($2.75 each) but they came in a broth with a load of oil floating on the surface.
_________________________________________________________________________
Liguria Bakery
Full, but not stuffed, my mom parted ways with my aunt and my mom's friend. We headed off towards North Beach when we passed by Liguria Bakery. Ever since I saw a special on TV on this establishment, I've wanted to try their famous fresh-baked focaccia. Just a note, once they sell out of focaccia for the day, they close shop. We got there around 11:00am and they had everything left except plain focaccia. Though I really was hankering for their pizza focaccia, mom wanted the mushroom so we ordered the fungus-y one. Mom was dismayed at how nicely they wrapped the focaccia in wax tissue paper, paper, and twine - she wanted a sample then and there! After struggling a bit with the paper, we had ripped up huge chunks of the fresh bread.
Yes, we're savages...shown is approximately 1/3 left. *blush* This was delicious...but then again, I love mushrooms. I really liked the nice sheen of olive oil and slightly buttery-tasting bread. Of course, with more mushrooms, it'd even be more fabulous.
_________________________________________________________________________
Mara's Italian Pastries
Heading up Columbus from Washington Square, we noticed another bakery - Mara's. Mom noticed the cookies and napoleons immediately and decided to have a look. Was this the North Beach outlet of Dianda's before? Some of the napoleons had the wax paper circles with Dianda's name. I ordered a custard napoleon with chocolate shavings on top and some profiteroles. Ouch...$3.95 for each?! Pretty darned pricey...
I didn't have a bite of the napoleon but the cream puffs were stuffed with rum-tinged custardy goodness. Each puff was at least 95% custard and 5% puff. Still, kinda pricey and out of the way...I SO did not expect an $8 order. I think a similar order at Dianda's in San Mateo set me back $6-ish. Sadly, can't say I'll be heading back.
_________________________________________________________________________
Victoria Pastry Co.
Trekking back towards Chinatown and stopping at various produce stands, we stopped off at Victoria Pastry to take a look at the goodies. I love Victoria - it's been a favorite ever since I had their St. Honore cake for my 1st (and 2nd and 4th and 6th) birthday. Haha, I started cream puffing young! Since we already had the Mara's pastries in tow, I just ordered a slice of their princess cake.
This would be #3 in my Swedish Princess Cake tasting.
Decoration: 7/10 - Plain and simple, and the icing didn't make it back home but I didn't ding that. Haha...
Gold/White Cake: 9/10 - Looked dry and I was worried about the browner edges - but I was wrong! So mooooist!
Whipped Cream: 9/10 - Perfect amount.
Custard: 8.5/10 - Good custard...kinda funnily translucent but tasty. Detected a hint of coconut.
Raspberry Jam: 8/10 - Okay...nice bit of jammy flavor but not enough.
Marzipan: 7.5/10 - Too chewy marizpan, though it helped the cake retain its shape through it's bashings through Chinatown. Not terribly sweet, decent almond flavor, pretty smooth.
Overall: 8.2/10 - Good showing but still, it's #2 in my princess cake tastings.
posted by Manda at
3/11/2006 06:25:00 PM
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