Gourmet de l'Ouest: PPQ Dungeness Island
We're tempted to change the title of this week's column to Gourmand de l'Ouest, as this week's featured restaurant, PPQ Dungeness Island, is not just great food prepared very simply, but a definite call to gluttony.
We'd heard a lot of good things about PPQ, so we skipped lunch in training for the evening's anticipated feast, which meant we were wasting away to almost nothing when we arrived at 25th and Clement. We slumped, near death, into our seat and ordered the Shrimp Roll appetizers ($5.25) and a couple of 33 Lagers (charmingly nicknamed "Tiger Piss" in some circles, we chose to order it by its given name). The shrimp rolls were fine, nothing too exciting, just those cold rolls with noodles and shrimp in a transparent rice-paper wrapper served with a peanutty dipping sauce. It's hard to screw those up, and equally hard to make them terribly interesting. However, they took off our edge of hunger and enabled us to concentrate on the menu.
PPQ offers a number of prix fixe family meals, that you might enjoy. We're just the kind of bitches that all of them contained an item we didn't want, and we stuck to ordering ala carte, which meant that we ended up with way too much food, and we spent way too much money. But it's so easy to blow your wad at PPQ, because everything there looks so good!
Made magnamious by the 33, we decided to just order a ton of stuff and to share it all. It's times like this that we're happy to be in a relationship, when purely by chosing to share your life with someone you also get to try twice as much food as you might otherwise. Ah, love.
All photos by Tim Ehhalt
Not unlike certain less reputable summer camps, at PPQ it's a foregone conclusion that you're going to get crabs. With Peppercorn, Roasted, Drunken, Curry, or Spicy Crab options on the menu, we went with Roasted (seasonally priced, $31 as of 3/19/05). In addition, we ordered the House Garlic Noodles ($6.25), the Lemongrass Prawns ($12.95), and the Asparagus with Oyster sauce and Garlic ($7.95). If that sounds like a lot of food, you're right, and would like to emphasize that it's in no way necessary to get this much food for just two people.
However, nous ne regrettons rien when it came to this meal, as we enjoyed every dish.
Our companion noted "I'm not a big crab fan, but this is some of the best crab I've ever had", and we (admitted big crab fans ourselves) had to agree. The roasted crab came to our table hot and juicy, encrusted in a garlicky salty juicy sauce. Every single sliver of meat we were able to glean from the crab was tender and succulent, without that disturbing mealiness we sometimes see in a roasted crab. It's such a simple thing, a roasted crab, and when it's done well it's just heaven -- and this was done very well.
The house garlic noodles are similarly simple and tasty, thick noodles fried in a garlic sauce. Since we're gormands this week, we'll confess that we started dumping the crab sauce over our noodles (which provided us with a flashback to one of the more awkward moments at out 30th birthday party), provoking our companion to remark "putting the crab sauce on EVERYTHING is key". Given the greasy, demented glint in his eyes, we didn't pursue the conversation, but agree that the crabby dregs were a great compliment to already very tasty noodles.
The Asparagus with Oyster Sauce and Garlic followed the simple theme when presented. Thick stalks steamed to perfection and drizzled with a sauce redolent of garlic and smoke, it wsa a great compliment to our heavier dishes.
The most complex dish was also the least pleasing. The Lemongrass prawns were described on the menu as "Prawns sauteed with lemongrass, red onions, and basil in ginger soy sauce." To us, there were a little too spicy-hot without the depth that makes spiciness interesting, and the dish was way heavier on the red onion than on the prawn.
Since we're such dedicated food journalists, we forced down the Mango Pudding ($2.95) dessert, which was the perfect finish to the meal. Velvety smooth, rich and fruity, we want to eat this for dessert every night.
We spent way more money that we usually do on dinner, with a check that came to over 90 bucks after tip. While we cringe at the expenditure (and eagerly await our SFist Gourment de l'Ouest expense account), it was totally worth it, as we had great food, fun and friendly service (they were totally cool about our mini-photo-shoot), and a generally teriffic night.
There are still so many things on the menu we can't wait to try, a whole world of great looking soups, many other fascinating-sounding prawn dishes and other Crabs to crush. With a pleasant atmosphere, wonderfully prepared food, and a pretty reasonable price point if you have any sort of impulse control, PPQ Dungeness Island is a Westside must.
PPQ Dungeness Island
2332Clement Street, at 25th Ave
Phone: 415.386.8266
11AM-10 PM daily, closed Tuesdays
Parking moderately difficult, but not impossible