Gastronomique: Miscellaneous
Check out that cute logo: the Assocation of Food Journalists just handed out its awards this past weekend, so we would like to congratulate all our San Francisco winners: Bonnie Wach, the excellent contributor of the San Francisco Weekly, which thus gets a step ahead in the hotly contested weekly of the week competition. Who ever said the Weekly food critics were underperforming?
Awards also went to Julie Kaufmann, of the Merc, for best food section, and to the Chron’s Miriam Morgan, Linda Murphy, Carol Ness, Michael Bauer, Craig Lee for best food section, best photography, best feature writing, best news reporting, etc. The Chron sure racked them awards. Congratulations to all of them.
How about SFist, where is our plaque and our check? Ok, they don’t have blogging awards, so we will forgive them for forgetting us, but not for not sending an invitation to the convention where they were presented, right here in SF! We too wanted to eat food from Michael Mina, A16, Myth or the Ritz-Carlton dining room, converse with French Laundry’s chef Thomas Keller or goat cheese wunderkid Laura Chenel. And there was a panel on food blogging and its impact on traditional journalism that was so for us. We so could have explained to them how to do for free what they are getting paid to do, and how smart that is.
Talking about fancy pantsy food and Michael Bauer, he has updated his list of 4 stars restaurants in the Bay Area just in time for the convention. The out-of-town food journalists needed the guidance. There are now seven super duper restaurants: the French Laundry in Yountville; Manresa in Los Gatos; Chez Panisse in Berkeley; and Fleur de Lys, La Folie, the Dining Room at the Ritz-Carlton, and Campton Place, in San Francisco. We admit having visited four of these, but it took us a couple years. Maybe we could start a pledge week or something to get us back there. But silly us, we thought these restaurants were expensive until Bauer explained it to us: a meal of about 16 courses and a dozen wines at Campton Place costs around $200 [Ed. note: per person]. An 85-minute wrap, facial and massage treatment at the high-end spa Bliss is $215, tip not included. Let us do the math here...$200 is cheaper than $215... Yes, he’s right, that is a pretty good deal.. Quite a bargain.
We were shocked last week to find in our market Safeway a huge promotional display for Cheetos. We understand Cheetos has a right to advertise, but the theme of the advertisement was positively obscene: Cheetos. Bring FUN back to school, with happy kids eating junk food on the bus, and on the seat ahead of them a supposedly cool cartoon tiger. That tiger looked designed by the evil genius behind Joe Camel. Junk food advertisement always aim at the easiest target -- just look at McDonald’s. But right here? In an area which prides itself in its food consciousness? Of course, if you go out of the Safeway and look at the billboards in the city, you will find advertisement with a doctor warning of the dangers of child obesity. Who will sue Cheetos for endangering their health as a child? Someone, we hope, soon.