A Mission Staple

As usual, RDN was just Eugi and me this week. Once again, we were trying to go to Emmy's, but since it was Manu's pick, we are tabling it for hopefully next week. After like 5 more picks from the hat to find a non-Manu entry, we ended up with Pizzeria Delfina.

I was very excited to FINALLY be going to Delfina. I feel like it's one of those places in the Mission that you pretty much have to have been to in order to be considered local. Delfina is split in to two sections, a fancy sit-down Italian side, and then the pizzeria. I've never been to the fancy side either, but it's pretty pricey and seems similar to Farina where I have been.

asparagus & rice soup

The pizzeria side always gets long lines and has no reservations, so it's best to get there on an off time. Even when we showed up at 8:00 on a Monday, it was packed with a long waiting list. It does have some outside seating, but it was wayyyy too freezing this week to go for it. Plus there is always a giant crowd of like 20 people waiting for their table looming around you. Eugi and I had nowhere to be, so we put our name down and waited for like... 40 mins-ish before we were finally seated.

4 cheese pizza

I've seen some awesome pictures on Yelp about specialty pizzas they have with things like eggs and corn. Unfortunately, they didn't seem to have any of those that night. We were both kind of boring and he got a margherita, and I got a 4 cheese pizza. While you wait, they give you bottomless long, thin & crispy breadsticks to eat. They were ok, but I wish they had either had some flavoring, or there would have been some type of dipping sauce to spice them up.

Eugi also got an asparagus and rice soup as an appetizer. I only tried a bite, but I actually didn't like it too much. It had too much asparagus and pepper flavoring for me.... but, I think that was on purpose due to the type of soup :P.

The pizzas arrived really quickly. Due to the constant traffic flow, the place seems very ready to turn customers in and out. There is a full kitchen in view in the tiny restaurant, and you can see 4-5 chefs busy at work preparing the pizzas.

1 cheese pizza haha

Both of them were tasty! The crust was thing and soft with yummy sauce. I really liked the cheeses on mine, you could clearly taste the different types. Eugi seemed to enjoy his a lot too. I haven't tried enough of the staple SF pizza places to determine where this ranks, but it's definitely a great thin crust contender. wish we had gotten some other varieties of toppings, but I guess there is always next time. It seemed like you could get take out pretty easily, so I might try that since my house isn't too far.

My favorite part of the shop was a giant mural of SF painted on the wall. It was really neat because it used bright colors and a very stylized art type to depict the city. On one side was bright oranges and reds to represent daytime, and on the other were darker night colors. My only beef was that the sections were split by the TransAmerica tower and not the Sutro >: | that totally would have made more sense. 

half of the amazing SF mural

It didn't quite meet the expectations from all the hype I'd heard... but a good local spot to check out! Then go down 3 shops and wait in line forever at Bi-Rite ;p

Pies: the Cupcakes of 2011

At least according to Yelp! And we all know that the social collective-conscious does not lie. Either way, I'm all about jumping on board with the bizarrely flavored baked good trends. So I started my pie experience at the highly appealing looking Mission Pie.

sign is a lot cuter in the sun

pie counter

Jess and I arrived around 4pm on a chilly yet clear Sunday, and I was amazed at the crowd! It's a small, cute, homey atmosphere with mismatched wooden tables and chairs. Every seat was taken, many by people idling away on their laptops and drinking coffee. I was really excited at the counter because of the plethora of savory and sweet pies. I wasn't too hungry, so I settled on the "blueberry custard" slice. I was super tempted by the potato, nettle and leek quiche, but just didn't have room today.

We ended up having to sit at kind of a group table, squashed in between noisey friends and some dude trying to browse the news (Facebook) on his tablet-esque device. Not sure if it was a small iPad clone or a large smart phone... but he was definitely taking up more this his share of the table. Luckily the group left so the poor guy didn't have to be subjected to a full 30 mins of our guy gossiping (although it was quite entertaining ;D).

SNAIL ART!

The pie itself was sadly not that exciting. It was alright... but nothing to write home about. What confused me was the consistency and flavor of the custard. In my book, custard is like thick pudding, but this pie was almost like omelet texture with a sweet egg taste. At the bottom was some canned blueberry paste. It wasn't bad, it just was not what I was hoping for or expecting. The crust was amazing though :) so I will try to give this place another chance with a diff flavor of pie. 

 Mission Pie? More like Epic Pie! (had to blow this up for full-on chiaroscuroed awesome)

It was definitely pleasant, but not something I'd repeat ASAP

Empanada Barn

i had my first foray in to the exciting world of (non home-cooked :) ) Chilean cuisine today. it was AWESOME!!!

adorable store front with fun, historically culturally relevant pictures

Among the 5 million delicious and exciting ethnic stops in the Mission lies a mini storefront of amazing: Chile Lindo Empanadas . It's on 16th street (like everything else) between Capp & Van Ness and easy to miss. The shop (and by shop I mean small window) is run by a cute Chilean woman and has a very simple menu of 4 different types of empanadas with a few extras (like authentic alfajores). they are $5 (cash only) and really filling

mmm uber quesidilla. so cheesy. so awesome.

 We picked up two types: queso & jalapeno and pino (onions, olive, egg, meat, sauce, etc) and apparently (according to a highly knowledgeable source) they are extremely authentic to the street foods of Chile :). They were so delcious! The attendant cooks them fresh for you meaning you walk away with steaming little meals of portable yumminess.

Chile in a crust

Despite the pouring rain, lack of shower, makeup, and appropriate clothing... this lunch endeavor was an :D experience and i can't wait to go back again and try more flavors. :)

highly highly recommend!