Results tagged “sfistmary”

Alder at Vinography is in the process of reviewing every darned wine bar in town -- 14 of the 26 have been reviewed so far. What surprised us a little -- we hadn't realized that noted head-to-tail restaurant Incanto is also a wine bar. Well, duh, turns out it's in the proper name ("Incanto Restaurant and Wine Bar"). Our own SFist Mary's piece from a few months ago can give you an idea about the food. We really enjoyed Vinography's expert and entertaining take on the wine bar aspect.

Number of heartfelt thank yous from us!: One! Thanks, SFist Mary, for covering for us last week! We're bummed we missed the Vanessa Prada turban, though.

Total number of people pictured in this week's Swells society column: 56.

Chronicle book review editor (and proud member of the SFist Gentlemen's Auxiliary) Oscar Villalon is the reigning three-time thumb-wrestling champ at 826 Valencia. In his honor, the fey letterpressers who bring you McSweeney's publications have released his "The Way Of The Thumb," a slim 16-page how-to manual which demonstrates yet another reason why opposable digits separate us from the animals.

We like what we saw and heard from Fog City News owner Adam Smith and suave Chocolatier Michael Mischer today on our lunch break. Fog City News is a nice, clean space on Market Street offering high quality chocolates and confections with a vast assortment of worldly magazines. Today's event was the first in a series of Friday afternoon visits (12 noon to 2 p.m.) from well known chocolatiers, and happens again on December 8 (Lindy Martin) and 15th (John Scharffenberger, coincidentally on our birthday [] should draw a lot of folks).

We had our excuses (Hangar One Thai Boxer cocktails, delectable nibbles, interesting gossip opps, and supreme people watching) for staying for the entire CHOW launch party at Bix. It was fascinating and delish, which is always a wonderful combo!

Please excuse us. We need to take issue with an article, "French roast brews, sip for sip" in today's Los Angeles Times.

SFist Krissy's weekly music review column's not only indispensable for the latest indie rock goings-on around town and those must-hear .mp3s, but also hosts some cool-looking art too. Ratatat!

Taquerias can be fun to discuss and debate but watch out! Everyone has their own opinion. Our wallets especially love them, and we live in the Mission, where we are able to do our own "trial by taqueria" tasting and experimenting. However, we feel it's best to take Burritoeater's approach of alternating days (up to three, if possible) between taqueria visits.

Although we usually fancy ourselves seasonal eaters, we feel there is really no one marked season for chicken wings ($7.50 for 12 pieces) at San Tung in the Inner Sunset. It's juicy, tasty, and filling eating any time of the year. There is other food at San Tung, but it's really all about the chicken.

Look how cute these penguins are!

We can't think of a better way to spend a birthday (our husband's) than eating an entire animal with seventeen fellow carnivores at Incanto Restaurant's private room, in Noe Valley. This is a bit of Laura Ingalls Wilder in the City, for sure. Not only are the food and wine superb at Incanto, it's where we ate offal (Prather Ranch veal testicles, anyone?) with Culinary Bad Boy Anthony Bourdain earlier this year.

It was both thrilling and sad to watch potential crime unfold on our block. Sure, there are constant construction and work crews: SBC, PG&E, you name it, within a one block radius. Big difference, because that work always takes place during the day, never at 10 p.m. at night.

Thanks, everyone, for making our second birthday party such a blast! (and sorry to do this to you, Chris Daly, after you were nice enough to come to our party and sign all the bingo card squares offered to you, in the space labeled "Political Candidate" -- but we couldn't resist!) An extra big thank you to Varnish Bar and IODA for all their help putting the party together, and to DJ Ted for the just-right tunes.

Are you on the hunt for a local slice of Burning Man? You're in luck. Tomorrow, the Duck Pond Crew is offering up Burn-style fun in Dolores Park.

As our summer weather continues to wear us down, beaches, parks, and other SFist open spaces beckon. We’re especially pining for the pictured Avalanche Picnic Cooler on wheels, but our trusty Coleman cooler will do.

Special Noise Pop 2006 edition

Our broker is E.F. Wednesday, and he says.... Tonight: Intersection for the Arts is sponsoring "Battle From The Margins," a short film and video festival featuring works by queer women of color. $5-15 sliding scale, show starts at 7 at 446 Valencia (between 15th and 16th). Thursday: Remember when SFist Mary-Lynn profiled the Princess Project, a group that provides free prom dresses and accessories to teenage girls who can't otherwise afford them? They're having their annual silent auction benefit at Dolce SF. Auction items include items from the Giants, the Gap, Plumpjack (maybe it's a date with Gavin!), and 24 Hour Fitness, among others. Also, a raffle! 6:30-9:39, $5 suggested entry fee, $5 for a raffle ticket, at 440 Broadway (between Montgomery and Kearny). and Friday: You've got your choice of hip-hop events tonight -- the SF Public Library, Colored Ink, and the Brava Theater are sponsoring "The Streets Have Spoken," a hip-hop theater piece inspired by the number of unsolved murders in San Francisco at the Bayview Opera House on 4705 3rd Street (near Oakdale) at 7 p.m. Or you can check out Asian-American hip-hop performers courtesy of Locus Arts at Space 180 (180 Capp Street, between 16th and 17th), 9:30-12.

SFist Mary-Lynn's on vacation, but we're sure she'll be thrilled to hear that the white knights of Menlo Park may actually be coming to the rescue of beloved independent bookstore Kepler's! A group of about 15 investors has come together to work on reopening the store, which could no longer make their rent payments in their prime real estate space on El Camino Real. The store had been forced to renegotiate its lease in 1999, when, as we all know, real estate was so cheap and plentiful down in the Valley -- and Kepler's landlord, the Tan Group, has been unwilling to renegotiate now that the dot-com boom has ended. The Tan Group will not respond to media requests for comment, but owner Clark Kepler is "optimistic" that something might be worked out. "I don't think any other attitude than optimism is appropriate," Kepler told the Merc News. "It's just an incredible outpouring, and I want to do everybody right by making it work." Follow the news on SaveKeplers.com, and/or write a letter about why you love Kepler's to the Tan Group at 3630 El Camino Real, Palo Alto, CA 94306. Picture by SFist Mary-Lynn

Save Kepler's! The Menlo Park community is rallying around the storied independent bookseller, who recently announced that it would have to shut down due to increasing rents. SFist Mary-Lynn was one of the two-hundred plus bibliophiles in attendance, and reports "TONS" of kids and signs, and that the car horns of support from El Camino were sometimes so loud that you couldn't always hear what people were saying. After the rally (at which owner Clark Kepler himself, along with good neighbor Mr. Baronne from Cafe Baronne next door to Kepler's, spoke), business types went into City Hall for a brainstorming session. Ten to fifteen investors have already been lined up, and other people have suggested that they work with Menlo Park neighboring town's Stanford Business School for help. Check out more of Mary-Lynn's awesome photos on Flickr or after the jump.

How do you decide what to read? We admit that we sit down each week with the and the SFPL's online reserve system. In addition, we get a lot of referrals from friends (especially our fellow SFist, who always seem to be reading something interesting), and we do a lot of browsing at our fine local independent bookstores. How about you?

SFist Mary-Lynn gives us all the lowdown on Blogher, and SFist Rain gets the 'get' with Paula Kamen.

We always try to have something for everyone at SFist, and last week we feel we really hit it out of the park. Some examples:

SFist's online reserve queue from the SF Public is at a standstill these days, as we haven't heard about any books intrugoing enough to reserve. Please make some suggestions in the comments, so we can reserve or buy some new or used books from one of our local independent bookstores. We need MUNI reading! Help!

SFist Cares is a great, great feature, profiling various ways you can volunteer or give back to the Bay Area community. Plus, SFist Mary-Lynn's funny as all get out. Political Junkie, by contrast, is filled only with low-quality writing and schadenfreude. But darn it, just because we snicker doesn't mean we don't have a heart as well! So we urge you to give, give, give -- to Kevin Shelley's legal defense fund. Kevin Shelley is California's beleaguered secretary of state, who's beloved by millions, especially his staff. So how strange that the legal defense fund he started back in November 2004 should only have collected $250, from one donor. The one donor is Tony Miller, the Shelley employee who was in charge of running the program that's under attack for misusing federal funds (and was sent to testify before the State Senate in Shelley's stead a few weeks ago). Dude, that's like making your little brother buy your quota of stained-glass ornaments for the school band's sale drive out of his own allowance. Shelley claims he hasn't been able to raise money because he "hasn't had time during the past half-year to call people and ask for their assistance." Funny, that never seemed to have stopped him before. The Kevin Shelley Legal Defense Fund doesn't seem to have an online donation site, so no, we suppose they don't take Paypal. So send those checks, wadded-up five dollar bills, Safeway coupons, and free AOL CD-ROMs straight to Sacramento -- remember, every cent counts -- and every political junkie cares.

We reckon a good percentage of San Franciso music-lovers will be at Great American Music Hall this week, whether it's at one of the three sold out Arcade Fire shows or Saturday's sold out X show. We commend you, SF, your taste is impeccable. While you're down at Great American, SFist Emily recommends stopping by the box office to purchase your ticket for the Tsunami Relief Benefit on January 28th. A $20 donation gets you in to see performances by Ben Gibbard (Death Cab For Cutie), Mark Kozelek (Red House Painters) and Eric Bachman (Archers of Loaf). We smell another sold out show coming on.

Shortly after the terrible tsunami in the Indian Ocean, SFist Mary-Lynn put together a great SFist Cares feature. But as the extent of suffering has begun to become fully apparent, we felt that we weren't necessarily doing enough. The scale of this tragedy will probably not be matched in our lifetimes. At least we sure hope not.

SFist was geting a manicure last night, and found herself explaining how to reserve books online from the SF Public Library to a group of raptly listening fashionistas. We also threw in a plug for our local independent bookstore. Bookishness validated by the cool crowd? Priceless.