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Restaurant Cuisine

Restaurant Cuisine

Koi Palace Dublin Restaurant Review

Koi Garden Dublin Exterior Decor

Why did we dine here? – Koi Garden also known as Koi Palace at Dublin is the East Bay outpost for Koi Palace, arguably the best Chinese restaurant in the San Francisco Bay Area. We were in the area and had to give this Chinese restaurant a try. This restaurant is located in an Asian-focused strip mall. They also run Just Koi downstairs, a casual Chinese noodle restaurant.

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Newport Tan Cang Restaurant Review, San Gabriel

Newport Tan Cang San Gabriel exterior decor

Why did we dine here? – Newport Tan Cang is a Vietnamese-Chinese restaurant located in San Gabriel. This restaurant is highly rated on Yelp and is listed on the top Chinese restaurant of the USA list. We were recently in southern California and wanted to try some of the better restaurants and had this place on our short list.

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Bar Tartine Restaurant Review, San Francisco

Bar Tartine San Francisco exterior decor

Why did we dine here? – Bar Tartine has been on our hit list ever since Mr. Bauer extolled the virtues of this restaurant a couple weeks back. We are big fans of the sister location, Tartine Bakery. There haven’t been many new Hungarian, Eastern European restaurants lately, so this was a refreshing change of pace from another California cuisine restaurant. Chef Nicolaus Balla took over in January 2011 and has moved Bar Tartine forward. The restaurant is loud and interior decor rough, but the food is exciting.

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Mitsunobu Restaurant Review, Menlo Park

Why did we dine here? – Restaurant Mitsunobu is a new restaurant from Owner Chef Mitsunobu and Executive Chef Aoki. They serve “traditional Japanese cuisine inspired by California.” Kaygetsu was located here previously. This restaurant focuses on local and seasonal ingredients.

Insider Tip – Lunch is cheaper.

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Aziza Restaurant Review, San Francisco

Aziza San Francisco exterior decor

Aziza is a one Michelin star restaurant in San Francisco’s sleepy Richmond district run by executive chef Mourad Lahlou. They focus on organic, local, and sustainable ingredients. His modern reinventions of traditional Moroccan dishes has garnered him much acclaim. Pastry chef Melissa Chou is also legendary.

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Atelier Crenn Restaurant Review, San Francisco

Atelier Crenn San Francisco Exterior Decor

Atelier Crenn is a one Michelin star French restaurant from Dominique Crenn (Formerly of Luce) located in San Francisco’s Marina District. (Atelier means workshop in French.) As she puts it, “An expression of taste, scent, and vision.”  Seasonal and sustainable cuisine. We have been debating whether to dine here for a while. Our worries were whether this place was more style or substance. Some of the pictures of the dishes here looked too beautiful to eat!

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Shenzhen Citizen Center Restaurant Review, Shenzhen, China – 深圳市民中心礼堂

Shenzhen Citizen Center Restaurant Shenzhen China Interior Decor

Shenzhen Citizen Center Restaurant is a restaurant located underneath the ultra modern Shenzhen Citizen Center. This restaurant caters to Government officials and may not be open to the public. We were lucky enough to be invited by a friend and dined in a private VIP room. The food here was extra-ordinary when compared to Chinese food back in the San Francisco Bay Area. The service was very good as a waitress was assigned to our private room. Be sure to check out our review of Fu Gow in Shenzhen.

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Hoshi Restaurant Review, Santa Clara

Hoshi Santa Clara Exterior Decor

Why did we dine here? – Hoshi is a small Japanese restaurant next to Lucky’s supermarket in Santa Clara. We were in the area and decided to eat here or Yuki Sushi. This restaurant is fairly informal and is run by a couple.
They have an extensive menu making it a cross between a general Japanese restaurant (IE Chicken Teriyaki) and a Izakaya restaurant. The kitchen is small, so food takes a while to arrive. The waitress also wants you to order everything at one time to prevent long pauses in your meal.

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Shanghai Restaurant Review, Cupertino

Shanghai Restaurant Cupertino exterior decor

Shanghai Restaurant is a Shanghainese Chinese Restaurant in the Cupertino village shopping center, replacing the popular HC Dumpling restaurant. They have the usual Chinese dishes along with a fair amount of Traditional Shanghai dishes not served in most restaurants. Our last visit was December 2012.

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Gialina Pizzeria San Francisco Restaurant Review

Gialina San Francisco Exterior Decor

Gialina Pizzeria is a small pizzeria named after the chef-owner’s grandmother. It is opened in January 2007 and is located in San Francisco’s Glen Park neighborhood right near BART. Chef Sharon Ardiana has help positions at well respected places including Lime, Dine, Garibaldis, Slow Club, and Boulevard. Her next restaurant, Ragazza in the Metro Kathmandu space on Divisadero, is their sister restaurant.

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Buck’s Restaurant Woodside Restaurant Review, Woodside

Bucks Woodside Exterior

Buck’s is a quirky restaurant nestled in the small town of Woodside. The interior is full of off the wall models, toys, posters, and more. Even the front of the seasonal menu has a lecture on different topics. Their website is pretty crazy. Our last visit was in 2014. They have a separate lunch special menu that changes from time to time. They serve breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We came for lunch.

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Nanling Restaurant, Shanghai, China – 南伶酒家

Nanling Restaurant in the French Concession is a restaurant in Shanghai, China serving Huaiyang cuisine, famous for its carving techniques using specialty knives. Nanling also serves Yangzhou specialties, including lots of fresh seafood dishes and the signature dish, roast duck. Interesting Asian art hugs the walls. Our excellent US$50 meal could feed six people or more. After dinner, hit one of the many bars down the block.

Subway: Hengshan Road Station

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La Costanera Restaurant Review, Montara

La Costanera Montara exterior decor

Why did we dine here? – La Costanera received One Michelin Star for 2012, raising the restaurant’s profile and putting it on our hit list. They focus on Peruvian cuisine and are located above the beach in Montara in a nice multi level building that housed The Chart House.

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Ike’s Place Restaurant Review, San Francisco

Ikes Place San Francisco Exterior Decor

Ike’s Place has been serving sandwiches since 2007 with lines out the door almost all the time. Ike Shehadeh’s believes that sandwiches should only be made with the finest ingredients and the utmost quality control. They added a Redwood City location (Ikes Lair of Redwood City) in July, 2009 and a Stanford location. Ike’s has 9 locations now! Our last visit was in April 2013 to Redwood City.

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é by José Andrés Restaurant Review, Las Vegas

e by Jose Andres Las Vegas Interior Decor

Wow, one of the top molecular gastronomy restaurants in the USA… é by José Andrés is a mysterious restaurant in the Cosmopolitan Hotel, Las Vegas that doesn’t even have a phone number. They take reservations by email ([email protected]) 30 days in advance for one of the 8 spots of counter seating. Seating are at 5:30PM and 8:30PM, meals typically last 2 hours. After you make a successful reservation they will send you a Golden Ticket in the mail.

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Manzanita Lake Tahoe Restaurant Review, Lake Tahoe

Manzanita Lake Tahoe Exterior

Manzanita Lake Tahoe is the new restaurant by Traci Des Jardins in the posh Ritz Carlton Highlands at Northstar Lake Tahoe. It opened in Decemeber 2009. Rooms here start at $350 a night. She is best known for Jardinière and Mijita Cocina Mexicana in San Francisco. Manzanita serves French inspired California cuisine with a focus on organic, sustainable, seasonal ingredients. Free valet parking for dinner guests. Our last visit was in early 2012 where we found prices had increased significantly.

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Poggio Restaurant Review, Sausalito

Poggio Restaurant Sausalito Exterior Decor

Poggio is an Italian trattoria Restaurant situated in the Casa Madrona Hotel, right on the main touristy street of Sausalito. They serve breakfast, lunch, and dinner. They focus on Northern Italian cuisine using local ingredients, sustainable products, and property-grown organic herbs and vegetables. The founder Larry Mindel has a long history with restaurants including Ciao, Prego, and Il Fornaio. Peter McNee is the executive chef. Our last visit was at the beginning of 2012.

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Seiya Restaurant Review, San Carlos

Seiya San Carlos exterior decor

Why did we dine here? – Seiya is a small plates oriented Japanese restaurant in sleepy San Carlos. It is situated in a location that once housed Hamon Japanese Restaurant.
This restaurant is highly rated on Yelp, with 4.5 stars when we dined here. Chef/owner Kuo Hwa Chuang, from Domo and Blowfish in San Francisco runs Seiya.

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Parallel 37 Restaurant Review, San Francisco

Parallel 37 San Francisco exterior decor

Why did we dine here? – Parallel 37 is the new restaurant from Chef Ron Siegel in the Ritz Carlton San Francisco. This restaurant replaces the fine dining establishment known as the “Dining Room”. This new more casual eatery should attract a more mainstream audience.
We were fans of the chef and came for a visit shortly after they opened. Parallel 37 focuses on contemporary American cuisine utilizing the freshest, local ingredients available.
Parallel 37 is a hotel restaurant, so you’ll see families in addition to the regular fine-dining crowd.

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Manresa Restaurant Review, Los Gatos

Manresa Los Gatos Exterior Decor

Manresa is a legendary 2 Michelin Star restaurant from David Kinch. We were last here about five years ago, so it was time for a re-visit. They recently remodeled and the entire restaurant looks far more modern and classy than in the past.
They focus on local and sustainable ingredients, including many items from Love Apple Farms in the nearby Santa Cruz Mountains. Manresa is famous for their multi-course tasting menu where only ingredients are listed on the menu.
A meal can take up to 4 hours, but we asked for a shorter time span of about 2 hours.

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Six Peaks Grille Restaurant Review, Squaw Valley

Six Peaks Grille Squaw Valley Interior

Why did we dine here? – Six Peaks Grille is located at the Resort at Squaw Creek In Squaw Valley and focuses on sustainable, biodynamic produce and seafood. We were skiing nearby and decided to give this restaurant a try.
Plump Jack Café and this restaurant seemed to be the best bets around here. (Unless you want to drive to Moody’s in Truckee) The Squaw Valley Village was extremely crowded for the Fourth of July holiday, with most restaurants packed full.

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Bistro Jeanty Restaurant Review, Yountville

Bistro Jeanty Yountville exterior decor

Why did we dine here? – Bistro Jeanty was one of the last major restaurants in Yountville that we have not reviewed. Has any foodie knows, this town is an eaters paradise. As good a reason as any to give it a try! They lost their Michelin star a couple years back, so we did not have high expectations. Would this place make up for not going to Redd?

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Morimoto Restaurant Review, Napa

Morimoto Napa exterior decor

Morimoto Napa is a Japanese restaurant run by world famous television Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto. This celebrity chef, who also worked at Nobu, is known for his whimsical twists on Japanese cuisine. The restaurant has gotten lukewarm reviews from the major San Francisco food critics, so we came expecting a lot of flash and little substance. He has outposts around the world including in India and Hawaii. We had lunch at Morimoto Napa.

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Shi Qi Lao Restaurant Review, Zhongsan, China

Shi Qi Lao Zhongsan China Exterior

We recently finished up our latest culinary tour of China in the Summer of 2011. Cantonese Chinese cuisine originated from this area, making it a must visit for those serious about Chinese food.
Here are some quick mini reviews of places we ate at. We feel this will be useful as more people visit this up-and-coming area. We found few reviews on Trip Advisor and Dianping.

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Tony’s Coal-Fired Pizza and Slice House Restaurant Review, San Francisco

Tonys Coal Fired Pizza and Slice House San Francisco exterior decor

Tony’s Coal-Fired Pizza and Slice House is a new San Francisco North Beach takeout place from Tony Gemignani, 9 time Champion Pizza Tosser, certified pizziaolo. He also runs Tony’s Pizza Napoletana next door. This location serves a wide range of food; New York-style pizza, Roman-style pizza, Chicago-style Italian Beef Sandwiches, and New York deli sandwiches. Our last visit was in September 2012.

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Harbourside Buffet Restaurant Review, Hong Kong

Harbourside Buffet Intercontinential Hong Kong Interior

Best buffet in Hong Kong? Best buffet in the world? Harbourside is a restaurant in the InterContinental Hong Kong hotel that specializes in Buffets for lunch, dinner, and Sunday Brunch. They serve Asian, American, and other international dishes. Our last visit was in the summer of 2011 for Sunday brunch.

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