Last week’s roundup covered quite a few places in the Mission: Pizzeria Delfina, the resurrected Window, the Thai-French fusion at Baku, dim-sum at Big Lantern, and Crazy Sushi. We thought it was a lot, but we were very far from being exhaustive: we snubbed -- for now -- the new Provence, on Guerrero, or the Annex, a budget French restaurant on Valencia. We ignored the new menu and new ownership at the Last Supper Club, or the new roof garden at Medjool. And looking ahead, the defunct Alma will re-open as a French bistro, and Tartine will open another outlet, we think it is in the short-lived Urban Forage locale on Valencia. This is way out of control, we can hardly keep track. But it is oh so convenient for us, as we can visit these places without leaving our neck of the woods.
We promised last week to focus more thoroughly on some of the new offerings in the Mission. We start with Maverick, an "American eatery & wine bar" which took over the old Limon space on 17th Street. We imagine the real-estate agent’s pitch for the space involved "ideal starter restaurant," and "a first step to get into this hot hospitality market," as Maverick is the first restaurant owned by its two partners, chef Scott Youkilis and General Manager Mike Pierce, and they seem ambitious enough to soon outgrow the tiny space. They were last working at Sociale, the affable Mike told us when we scouted the place. Maverick is American, as its name indicates: it is Tom Cruise’s character in Top Gun, who struggles to repress his obvious gayness, and ends up confused, frustrated and blowing shit up. But sexual repressiveness diverted into violence, as American as it is, is not the topic, so back to the restaurant. Its Web site provides another explanation for the name, but it’s kind of lame compared to ours.