The Food Diaries

A few favourite San Francisco food spots

For all your hipster coffee needs: Ritual Roasters 1026 Valencia, 2157 San Francisco, - The Mission

If you’ve never experienced Pork Happy Hour (drinks, custom cuts, snacks): Fatted Calf (Wed evenings), 320 Fell St, San Francisco - Hayes Valley

Watch foreign (and indie) movies in a large, outdoor courtyard, while sampling fab California food & cocktails: Foreign Cinema, 2534 Mission, San Francisco - The Mission

Sample the best in-the-world salted caramel & chocolate ice cream: Bi-Rite: 3692 18th St (at Dolores), San Francisco

FIX: An oasis of calm with decent coffee in Echo Park, LA

You’ll recognise this pattern in a city near you: a down-at-heels part of town slowly gets colonised by the hip/arty crowd. They get busy opening cool bars, decent cafes, vintage shops and art galleries. Soon the neighbourhood becomes gentrified beyond recognition, and when American Apparel finally opens a branch, you know it’s all over. Time for the hipsters to move onto to the next up-and-coming part of town. 

And so to LA, where Silverlake (the area east of Hollywood and west of downtown), was once the bastion of the edgy hipsters now taken over by nearby Echo Park in the coolness stakes. Goodbye to the weekend queues around the block at Intelligentsia. Hello instead to FIX, an oasis of calm and easy neighbourliness, where it is still possible to nab a table with ease on a sunny Saturday afternoon, and where the coffees are as good any you’ll find (the blends are actually provided by Intelligentsia).

A stroll through Viennese cafe society

Viennese cafes are fantastically versatile places which have been around for a very long time (i.e. pre-Starbucks). It’s a place to grab a quick coffee fix or maybe settle into a booth with the daily paper; great for satisfying a sweet tooth, or to eat a more traditional Viennese lunch with a glass of beer. Oh, and they ALL feature free wifi.

For a touristy must-visit, drop by the über-traditional Demel for one of the city’s best strudel. Stick to the lovely downstairs wood-paneled coffee bar rather than the more decorated (and touristy) rooms upstairs. Cafe Diglas, is another great option, but without the stuffiness of Demel. This place is very popular and busy through-out the day. Media types prefer to settle into the booths of Cafe Englander, a lovely Modernist cafe with particularly friendly service, and also one of the best Wiener Schnitzels in town (more on this in a future post). Cafe Leopold is a great option when visiting the many museums in the Museum Quarter. Cafe Hawelka is a classic literary society hangout. Finally, when browsing through the eclectic Naschmarkt (antiques, flea market, food market and cafes all bundled together) a pit stop at the Naschmarkt Deli (great for vegetarian food) is a must.