Outta Sight Pizza expands to Chinatown, Bettola gets set for opening in the Inner Richmond, and Chronicle critic MacKenzie Chung Fegan pans Tadich Grill but says 60-year-old Scoma's on Fisherman's Wharf is still keeping quality high.
Outta Sight Pizza, which grew from a pop-up in Hayes Valley in recent years to a brick-and-mortar shop on Larkin Street in the Tenderloin, is opening a second slice shop in Chinatown. Eater had the news this week that chef-owner Eric Ehler, who used to work in the kitchen at Mister Jiu's, is opening his new location at 643 Clay Street in Chinatown, and he promises in an Instagram post "This will be a Chinatown pizza shop through and through." Ehler is aiming for a fall opening.
Bettola (343 Clement Street), the new Inner Richmond restaurant from Montesacro Pinseria owner Gianluca Legrottaglie, is set to open May 31, as the Chronicle reports. We first heard about the project back in March, and it's a casual Italian tavola calda, serving ready-made meals like rotisserie chicken, baked pastas, and sheet-pan pizza. The restaurant will have a deli case with meals for takeout as well, and a retail section selling olive oils, vinegars and more. But we get one new added detail: In the dining room, black-and-white Italian films will be projected each night.
ICYMI, there was some big news this week about North Beach's shuttered Park Tavern, which is that former partner in the restaurant James Nicholas is planning to reopen it later this year, with original chef Jen Puccio at the helm, and consulting help from famed New York chef Jonathan Waxman. Nicholas and Puccio continue to operate Marlowe and The Cavalier together, but both had left Park Tavern when it was part of the restaurant portfolio that was divided by Nicholas and ex-wife Anna Weinberg.
Over in the Mission, Bar Agricole is getting ready for a June 4 reopening in its new digs next door to Osito (2875 18th Street). Bar Agricole is shifting to become more of a bar, and it's not clear what kind of food will be offered once it's opened. Osito just announced the launch party, which you can attend if you buy a ticket on Tock — the $45 gets you in and gets you bites made by Osito, but it's still a cash bar for cocktails. As we learned back in March, after Bar Agricole gets rolling again, owner Thad Vogler and chef Will Napoli, who had been the chef at the former Bar Agricole, will be focused on getting their next project open, Bispo, a retooled version of Vogler's former rum bar Obispo, which serve Brazilian-inspired food at the former Lucca Ravioli space on Valencia.
Longtime scenic date-night spot Presidio Social Club, which had operated out of a former barracks on the former military base for 18 years, shut its doors for good to weeks ago. As the Chronicle reports, owner Ray Tang says that operating a restaurant of that size was "no longer tenable" in the city, and he he hopes to perhaps open something smaller in a different location at some point.
We're just learning that the founders of Sightglass Coffee, one of SF's most respected small roasteries, stepped down from their roles at the business earlier this year. SFGate picked up the news from coffee publication Sprudge that brothers Jerad and Justin Morrison have moved on to "pursue other endeavors," and Sharon Healy, a former national account executive at Starbucks, has taken over as CEO.
Chronicle critic MacKenzie Chung Fegan filed a Thursday review this week of the 175-year-old Tadich Grill, on the occasion of the restaurant's 175th birthday — but her opinion of the place was less than celebratory. She balks at a server referring to another, poor-tipping patron as a "fat slob," and balks at the cafeteria-like steamed vegetables and sometimes uncooked steak fries that come with most of the seafood entrees. She has nothing to say about the famed cioppino, but she'd go back for the retro shrimp and crab bake "a la Monza." Also, unforgiveably she says, the Martinis don't come especially cold.
Chung Fegan had better things to say about Scoma's at the Wharf, which is not as old as Tadich by a century and change, but is nonetheless just as nostalgic and has seasoned waitstaff who wear white jackets. The martinis here are perfectly chilled, she says, and all the seafood dishes are thoughtfully prepared, with complementary and seasonally appropriate sides. "While it may not be the most groundbreaking food in town, it’s notable that a restaurant with this amount of history doesn’t phone it in," Chung Fegan writes.
Top image: Scoma's, via Instagram