Where to eat while you drink in San Francisco

I got a question by email tonight from someone coming in to SF from out of town, who wanted to know where to get dinner while he was here.  My go-to suggestion for these occasions is usually Magnolia, but this question came with a twist.  He’d already been to all the brewpubs/microbreweries in town.  Where else is there to go? 

Luckily, I have lots of thoughts on this.  I’m posting the 3 suggestions I gave him here, for all to debate.  This could have been a much longer list, but I wanted to avoid places that are really about their food and just happen to have good beer.  I wanted to focus on places that are very much about their beer (and in The Alembic’s case, all drinks) and just happen to have good food as well.  

So here they are, in alphabetical, not rank, order (because I just can’t choose between them, they have such different strengths and weaknesses):

The Alembic is owned by Dave McLean, the owner of Magnolia, and is just a couple blocks further up Haight Street, at Cole Street. 

 

 

• Beer: They have great beers, with a limited selection on tap (5 - 10 if I remember correctly), always including at least one Magnolia brew and at least one Moonlight brew, and a bunch more in bottles.
• Other drinks: They also have arguably the best cocktails in San Francisco, including traditional ones and inventive ones, so your non-drinking pal will be very happy. They make almost all their own syrups and bitters, etc., that go into the cocktails.
• Food: The food is very in the hard to define good “new American” sort of style. It is also small plates style and almost all local, organic, etc. If you get 2 small plates a piece, that’s about $18 - $20 per person on food.
• Ambiance: It’s dark and has an upscale ambiance, that gets somewhat overcrowded in the front of the restaurant by the bar, but is much better at the back where the tables are.
• Service: (1) it gets crowded on weekends, so go early if at all possible or you could find yourself on an hour long waitlist, (2) the bartenders get rude every time they get busy, so this is one more reason to go early.

La Trappe just opened in the last year, on the same block in North Beach that I moved away from a year ago.  I am so jealous of the new inhabitants of my old apartment!  It is a Belgian restaurant serving authentic Belgian food and all Belgian beers. 

 

• Beer: They have just about every potential Belgian beer you could imagine available. I’d love to list them for you, but their website has no information on it. I’ve had St. Bernardus Abt 12, Kwak, Duchesse de Bourgogne, and others there.
• Other drinks: I have no idea if they have hard alcohol, you may want to call to find out.
• Food: Ilovedthe chicken stew I had the one time I ate there (I usually just drink there), and the frites are great as well. I’d say entrees would be $14 - $24-ish, but I’m just guessing at my memory.
• Ambiance: The ambiance at La Trappe is probably the nicest of the 3 suggested here. It is all underground and designed to look like a monastery, with exposed brick walls, wrought iron lanterns handing from the ceiling, and rough hewn wooden furniture.
• Service: I’m not sure how busy it gets on weekends, since I’ve only been on weekdays, but I bet they’ll let you make reservations. It is much more a restaurant than the other two, which are as much bars as they are restaurants. When the owner is there, which is every time I have been, he loves to give beer suggestions, and once (only after he talked to us and realized we were beer people who would appreciate this) even sent over a different beer than I had ordered, offering to replace it with the original beer I had ordered if I didn’t think this one was better. Of course, it was better, so I kept it and drank it all down.

Monk’s Kettle is in the upper Mission, and it also just opened recently, in just the last six months or so. 

 

 

• Beer: They have a large beer list, about 20 - 25 beers on tap, and a six page long list of bottles. They have some great stuff bothin the tap and bottle lists, including Moonlight Working for Tips on tap, Gouden Carolus Tripel on tap, Ola Dubh 12 Year reserve in bottles, Aventinus Eisbock in bottles, andMountain Meadows Mead in bottles.
• Other drinks: They have some wines, but I don’t think there are any cocktails or hard alcohols of any kind available.
• Food: The food can be very good or just ok, depending on what you get. It is a mixture of upscale pub food & some Belgian items. My friends and I love their burgers, especially the blue cheese burger, but thought the pulled pork sandwich was pretty boring. They don’t have their prices on their menu online, but I can tell you that an entree will run you something in the teens.
• Ambiance: It’s pretty small, but did not seem too loud to me. Most of the tables are sheltered from the crowd by big booths and the bar has a chalkboard in front of where you sit so people can write notes or suggestions to the next customers, which I loved.
• Service: They also get very crowded, and do not take reservations. I’ve waited hours on weekdays before. However, their bartenders are really extra nice, and love to talk beer and chat, and they’ll make you think they are your best friend even if you’ve just met them. Sitting at the bar to eat can save you some waiting time, but not much, you still need show up early.