Dining in the Dark

For Carlos's bday date, I wanted to go somewhere super special. Ok... actually let me be honest. I wanted to go to a certain super special restaurant, and inserted his bday date as an excuse to splurge the $$$$ per person ;D

Last Wednesday I checked out the famous Opaque in the highly ghetto Western Addition portion of Hayes Valley. Opaque is an entirely pitch black restaurant. It is designed to simulate what it's like to be blind and having all of your other senses heightened. So freaking cool. I was very happy when Carlos was as excited as me about the surprise experience. 

You enter and immediately walk down stairs to a dimmed corridor. There you look at menus and pick your 3 course meal. After you decide, you are escorted in to the darkness by a legally blind waiter. I thought the route to the table was one of the coolest sensations of the evening. It's really crazy to just hold on to the waiter's shoulder and put full trust in his navigational skillz. We were very lucky and seated at a booth in the corner (or I assume it was a corner). When they say dark, they really mean it. You can't see ANYTHING at all. 

We had an amazing time just hanging out waiting for our various courses. You are started off with drinks and bread. I was happily surprised by how easily I was able to bring the food to my mouth. Being in the dark is fun because no one can see what you do... :) it makes it quite easy to prank your tablemate and move around the condiments. 

After the bread course, you are delivered a plate of 3 veggies & 3 sauces and given the challenge of guessing. It's actually surprisingly hard, and we got all of the sauces wrong. It's odd how much visuals play in to remembering what day-to-day tastes are. The meals were pretty good as well. I had a salmon curry dish w/ potatos, and Carlos got chicken w/ rice.The weirdest part about the entree was trying to use the fork in the dark. I think they delibrately put your food on a giant plate so that you keep missing. It's a bit unnerving because I kept putting the fork down, feeling resistance, and then bringing it to my mouth empty. So weird. 

I'm really glad we went on a Wednesday because it let us savor our meal more. Our waiter kept returning ready for our next course while we were only half way through the previous. Every time he walked up he would whistle or hum to warn you. During some of the breaks, I'd imagine how easily someone could approach you in silence... super creepy but I love freaking myself out.

The desserts were ok, but I wasn't a big fan of either choice. It was mocha pudding or chocolate cake. Both kinda gross :P. I was so excited about the experience in general that I didn't even care about the food though. It was just so neat to have an entire meal essentially blinded. It's crazy because you can hear other patrons in the distance, but it's hard to determine how far they are from you or how the restaurant is positioned. 

We milked the experience for as long as we could and didn't end up leaving until almost 11. I'm so so so happy we went. Although it was pricey, it was totally something I think everyone should do once with a date. It was a very intimate and fun experience that I'm very glad I got to be a part of. 

Highly recommend :D. Although! If you go in SF, be careful where you park. I grabbed a spot on McAllister (less than a block away), and when we came out we found the car behind us had its windows smashed in :S. Eeks.

Tots, Funnel Cake, and a Burger on a Krispy Kreme Bun :D

wwf @ the coffee shop

Sometimes I scare myself because I tend to build restaurants and their ridiculous food items up so much in advance that when I actually get there,they aren't that great... especially yesterday. I could barely work because I  was so busy planning for the most potentially epic Roommate Dinner Night ever! So epic that I even did the unspeakable and opened it up to non-SF roomy friends! I was finally going to Straw, the brand new carnival themed restaurant in Hayes Valley that's been getting insane Yelp buzz.

salt + macchiato

Straw is a totally weird-trendy-hipster hole-in-the-wall place on Octavia right off of 101. I had read some reviews that crowds could get bad, so I planned ahead and arrived about 15 mins early for a Monday 8:00pm dining session. It was totally packed!! I spoke to Ari (the crazy nice owner) and he was extremely helpful about my situation. He was very honest in telling me it would be like 1.5 hours before we could seat my party of 7 no matter what permutations we split in to. I was kind of depressed and waited outside for the rest of the group. As people started to arrive (and sadly some dropped out <3 eugi & manu), we determined it was worth it. Cutting our group to 5 helped lower the wait to 45ish mins, and after a quick pit stop at my trunk for emergency granola bar rations, we settled at an adjacent coffee shop.

tilt-a-whirl booth!!

Beyond being so helpful/accomodating with taking names down, Ari was also super cool by personally coming and fetching each party when their table was ready. Ken, James, Carlos, Yee Cheng and I ended up having a lot of fun in the shop despite being starving :). Highlights include Ken mistaking sugar for salt and dousing his macchiato with it, and then completely slamming me down for being too bitchy sometimes :P. James also started pregraming with cinnamon french toast.

Then we were collected and seated :D!! Straw is super tiny but really cozy. Everything about the furniture and decor screams carnival. All of the wall hangings are pictures and signs from rides, the lamps are made of glass jars, there are hay bails in the background, and even one of the booths is made from a tilt-a-whirl cart. The menus were adorable and made individually using old hard book covers. We had pre-browsed the menu and were totally ready to go.

cute hand-made menus

For appetizers, we got: mac & cheese w/ apples & bacon, sweet potato tater tots with blackberry bbq sauce, cheesey corn fritters con fraiche, and mini-corn dogs! All were totally amazing. We shared and devoured them within minutes. The apples added a really great touch to the mac & cheese, I really want to try it at home. I also was really impressed by all of the sauces that came with the items. The corn fritters had a very spicy & awesome aoili that I ended up dipping pretty much everything in. Plus... freaking sweet potato tater tots?! That is inherently unprecedented win :D. I wish wish wish I wasn't still a bit sick so I could have tasted them in their full glory, but I really liked the juxtaposition between those and their blackberry sauce.

mac&cheese w/ apples, sweet potato tots

corn dogs

We all decided to get different "carny" sandwiches because they were too bizarre to pass up. Additionally, it looks like Straw has a monthly changing menu of more legit entrees. I had to go with the "ringmaster" sandwich- a hamburger with a freaking Krispy Kreme donut for a bun!! The rest of the table got: Waffle w/fried chicken, swiss & raspberry jam, "hot tamale" (buffalo chicken), "bearded lady" (pulled pork w/ blackberry coulis & gorgonzola cream), and "boxcar children" (pb&j w/ ham). I think I would have enjoyed the sandwiches regardless of the taste just because of the funny names and crazy ingredients.

corn fritters

I LOVED my burger on a donut <:D. It was actually a lot tastier than I was expecting and something every person should try once. I think it's the same concept as fries & ice cream, mmm. I ended up splitting half & half w/ Ken's waffle sandwich. I didn't like that quite as much because I'm anti chicken, but the waffle portion was delicious. I had small bites of the others and nothing disappointed.

BURGER ON A DONUT! + chicken waffle sandwich

Despite being totally stuffed, we HAD to get dessert. Carlos & I split some funnel cake!!! It came with 3 dipping sauces (choco, vanilla, strawberry) and was pretty awesome. Ken got this ridiculous "flying saucer" which was like.... chunks of chocolate covered in this peanut butter cream mass with things of bacon stuck on top. As I don't like any of those components I didn't really try it, but he seemed to enjoy. James got a big thing of orang-blossom cotton candy. I hate cotton candy, but this was AWESOME! Very melt-in-your-mouth flavorful fantastic. Finally, YC got a gelato medley... rosemary and pineapple-lavender I think? He had attempted to get an inverse root beer float (root beer gelato w/ cream soda), but sadly they were out.

We ended up splitting it all evenly, and with tip it was only $25 a person. This wasn't bad at all considering how much we ate, and how much fun we had at the place. Ken was super happy because they donate 10% to charities on Mondays (this month's is Spark). The bill was a lot of fun because our waitress was super cute, and so we liked getting to talk to her more. I think my favorite part was how down to earth the staff was, they seem to really really care that you are having a good time and treat you like you are friends.

funnel cake & "flying saucer" pb, choco, bacon

This was one of the most fun dining experiences I've had in the Bay Area. The food is great, but more than that, it's just a really enjoyable time to relax with friends and enjoy a very unique meal. I'd get there ASAP before their liquor license goes through and they get even more crowded!! Highly highly highlyyyyy recommend :)