Birdbox's fried chicken sandwiches are making a comeback at a pop-up, Quince's sister wine bar Verjus is finally reopening, and Oakland's Burdell makes a splash on the national stage, all in this week's food news.

Maybe the biggest food-news item this week was Oakland's barely one-year-old Burdell being named Food & Wine's restaurant of the year. The magazine's editors praised chef-owner Geoff Davis, saying his soul food, inspired by his grandmother's, is "grounded in the past, forward-looking, and brain-meltingly delicious." And they call out the restaurant's 70s-inspired design and overall "grandma energy."

Quince and Cotogna's sister wine bar Verjus (550 Washington Street), which got loads of good press when it opened, just before the pandemic shut everything down, is finally reopening. As the Chronicle reports, it will reopen in October with a food menu "in keeping with" the original, but it will no longer have a retail wine component. Co-owner Lindsay Tusk tells the paper, "We’re optimistic that the neighborhood is ready for the comeback," and in addition to running their new event space nearby, Officina, the team is also still opening a gelato and espresso bar down the block from the restaurants.

The Chronicle also reports that the Mission's Tadaima, which is serving those trendy Japanese milk-bread sandwiches, has been drawing lines and lots of fans in its first few weeks of business at 3515 20th Street. They'll be open 11 am to 5 pm this weekend.

A new bar and nightclub in the Marina called Rick & Roxy’s has just debuted in what was, at least half of it anyway, formerly the Tiki-esque Del Mar at 2131 Lombard Street. As the SF Standard reports, it's a double-barrelled space with two distinct sides — the disco-ish Roxy's, only openly on weekends, with a "kaleidoscopic checkerboard of a dance floor," and the more chill cocktail bar side Rick's. And the cocktail menu includes some riffs on standards like a pickle-brined dirty vodka martini called the Kind of Big Dill.

Pandemic-era fans of Birdsong / Birdbox's takeout, foot-intact, fried chicken sandwich dubbed Claude the Claw, which Birdbox was serving on Second Street until it temporarily closed, can get the sandwich again at a pop-up this weekend. Birdbox is popping back up, with sandwich and other fried chicken parts, at Square Pie Guys' SoMa location (1077 Mission Street) on Sunday, September 8. They'll be open from 11:30 am until they sell out.

Photo via Yelp