[Pink Pig Time Machine by Wilfrid: May 5, 2008]
Still in San Francisco, then, I headed south of Market and took a long walk around the Mission, noting above all the astonishing number of small hotels in various states of utter collapse. After taking in a Joseph Cornell show and room bright with Clyfford Still's paintings at MOMA, I repaired to a rather grander hotel, The Palace, for lunch.
It was the reputation of the room which brought me, the spectacular belle époque Conservatory
where lunch was served among vast bursts of fresh flowers. The food
was plated in keeping with its surroundings: sea bass with chipotle
sauce came with a salad of edible flower petals.
I headed back through the Tenderloin, which even for an inner city lover like myself was a depressing experience. People fallen in the street, and bars even I wouldn't agitate to save.
A martini in the Compass Rose bar at the St Francis braced me for a formal dinner at Masa's, that stalwart of classic French dining. It has since been re-designed (web-site here ), but in 1998 was dark, clubby, heavy with curtains and tapestry.
A boudin of lobster, shrimp and scallop was served on two sauce, the identities of which my notes do not divulge, and further garnished with grilled shrimp. Foie was seared and served with black truffles and a Madeira sauce. The main course was roast pheasant with crisp potatoes and baby asparagus. Such a meal could only be followed by cheese: Roquefort,Pont l'Eveque, Manchego and some kind of local "Brie". A bottle of Volnay, a glass of Malmsey, and to bed.
There followed a very long day, during which I seem to have toured both Napa Valley and Sonoma, although only the latter is vivid in my memory. A long list of wineries were viewed, and several visited, and all I can tell you was that some of the vineyards were very pretty. Sustenance came with a BBQ pork sandwich at the Smokehouse Café in Calistoga. A charming return to the city, though, gliding over the Golden Gate bridge as a late mist gathered.
Somehow I summoned my energies for dinner at Wolfgang Puck's San Francisco venture, Postrio. Hamachi came with a guacamole sauce and shards of grapefruit. Red snapper was roast and served with a fava-sweetcorn salsa. Cheeses again, to conclude, and a fitting wine for a West Coast dinner, a Far Niente chardonnay.
My last day in town, and since we have flashed back to the days before everything you want is available at a click, I descended on the City Lights bookstore and put together a large package of poetry books to be mailed back to New York. After a final stroll around Chinatown and North Beach, I took supper at the Cypress Club, a casual Barbary Coast jazz joint. A lobster salad was followed by an ambitious rabbit plate - roast saddle, little chops, braised leg and wild mushroom ravioli. I drank a Pernand-Verglesses with this, and with the inevitable cheese plate, a nursed a goblet of Tokaji while contemplating the flight east.
Next week: back to the apple.
