Iberico ham, legally procured & butchered in US
I kept hearing about this place that just opened 5 weeks ago, and had to attack it. A nice dinner out with Trudy Muller, another kickass PR chica, was way overdue, and I needed something that would wow her. And a setting that promoted deep chat.
Lafitte delivered! The space is open, rustic & modern along an otherwise cheezy food strip on The Embarcadero.
The handcrafted cocktails are totally inventive (think tarragon) but a bit to sappy sweet for my taste.
The wine list was muscular and not obsessed with California wines, so that was good.
The food blew our heads off. I went for the jamon Iberico (natch) and Trudy had the beef dish. The dessert pastry situation is a little crazy. I had the most powerfully zesty Key Lime Pie slice ever– and I have had me lots of this stuff in my life.
The Tweet from @laffitesf that lured me in.
“Just tasted the Iberico pork rack with braised globe artichoke and Meyer lemon…. And. Fuck. Lucky I brought a change of undies today..”..5:33 PM May 5th via TweetDeck
But can we talk about the ham? Rimmed with a thick, juicy artery-clogging layer of fat.
You have to go.
I mean, get a closer look.
Clos up image of Lafitte's pork dish-- see the globe artichoke and meyer lemon?
It was just a dreamy night. Trudy and I had a nice corner table and watched the bustling scene, next to a window that looked right out onto the Bay. We had lots to catch up on, and it was a great way to do it.
I actually got to meet The Dissident Chef– Russell Jackson— who is definitely a badass. I slathered him with animated praise, due to our shared passion for the ham. He was absolutely receptive and polite and wonderful to interact with for sure. I told him I was friends with the Ghetto Gourmet folks, a group which really pushed the underground dining scene first in the Bayeria– in 2004 — and he immediately told me to tell Jeremy, “Hi!”–so doing that now. Russell shares the whole pirate chef aesthetic that the GG folks had for sure and kicked off Subculture Dining in SF in 2006.
I dig the whole underground food scene quite a bit. We even hosted one of the GG dinners when our friend SIN, or Cynthia Washburn, was doing the dinners for Jeremy. Current TV needed a place to film it, and we were happy to oblige. SIN is now doing more cool, large scale artworks for big companies with her boyfriend Patrick Shearn as their current business, called Poetic Kinetics.
Wow, what cool people, all!
Two more: Eva Destruction, who is also starting up her own underground dinner scene in Oaktown called The Secret Kitchen. Find her @Eva_D_Edibles. I went to her special dinner recently and was blown away! She does carmelised vegetables like nobody.
Molly Ditmore, who has two blogs and recently made a vow to just write for two hours each morning and focus on her amazing skills. She is one of the tighest, most rad girl writers I know. Go Molly!
And she is inspiring me to keep this damn blog updated. Obviously– I need to do this after such a blathering post as this one! Ha!
Candy Crimes 