Dottie's True Blue

522 Jones Street
San Francisco, CA 94102-2008

(415) 885-2767

We were home from Exuma for one full day before we set off to Sonoma, California for a wedding. Initially, I had mapped out all the places I wanted to eat. French Laundry, Slanted Door, Ad Hoc and a trip to the farmer’s market and mushroom store at the Ferry Building. The wedding information arrived and my food adventures shrunk. Still, we had our anniversary dinner at Madrona Manor on Friday night and a quick stop in San Francisco after we landed at Dottie’s True Blue.

Dottie’s was non-negotiable. At one point, I was planning to trek in from Sonoma on Friday morning while Jack played golf with all of the guys. Thankfully, he offered to go with me for lunch on Thursday. The line outside the door made him question his judgment but I was unconcerned.

This was my second visit to the Tenderloin-neighborhood’s diner-of-goodness. The first was two years ago when I worked for a wine marketing company. We were in San Francisco to produce a large-scale tasting event and one of our co-consultants insisted that we HAD to go to Dottie’s. I could not believe that my boss waited in a line of any kind for grubby food but once we were inside, it was worth it. Every baked good found in the place (except the English muffins) are made in-house. Even the toast that comes automatically with your eggs is buttermilk-dill bread toasted and buttered.

This time was no different.

We waited for about 45 minutes with some very funny and impatient people. Once inside, we sat at the counter and watched as the cook, with one helper and a prep guy or two in the back, cooked with six burners, one griddle and two ovens. He ran the entire place from there!

We had the Butterscotch Muffin (sweet and moist and big enough to take more than half with us), and Bourbon-Pear Coffee Cake (Also huge with a large dollop of house-whipped cream on top. It was so dense that it had not lost moisture after two days). Jack had the Black Bean Cakes with Corn Bread, Potatoes, Poached Eggs and Salsa and seemed to be in utter bliss when he mixed it all up into one flavorful mess. My own eggs over easy with potatoes and toast sound sad and normal to you. But no, the home fries are great! (They let you choose between hash browns or home fries for those who care) Those potatoes are so good in fact, that Jack found himself exactly where I’d been two years before; staring at the last few bites of potatoes, knowing that if he ate them, he couldn’t finish the freshly baked corn bread and trying to decide which was more worth it.

After all of the waiting in line, they do not rush you out the door, which is really nice. The coffee keeps coming and the staff is incredibly friendly.

Next time I’m in San Francisco, I’ll wait in the line again. I will wait in it, in the rain, I will wait in it, if I’m in pain. I will wait with a mouse, in a house. Sam I Am, I will wait.

Books- The Man Who Ate Everything

I feel like The Man Who Ate Everything (1998)book has been on my “Currently Reading” gadget for years. I’m not far off; it has been almost a year. While Jeffrey Steingarten’s collection of story and essays is incredibly funny, it is also incredibly long. At first, all of those months ago, I started off in complete and total heaven. Not only do his pieces allude to marital strife that can easily occur around the food-obsessed no matter how patient their spouse might be, but is also painted detailed pictures of Mr. Steingarten barely surviving the trials of his endeavors.

There is a wonderful story that begins with him standing in his kitchen after hours of attempting to perfectly slice slab bacon into sliver-thin strips that were not only uneven from slice to slice, but also spread over every surface of the kitchen, beginning to warm and ooze fat everywhere. It took me back to an afternoon when Jack and I lived in Staten Island. I had taken it upon myself to hand-create all of the candy for that year’s Easter. He came home from work and saw tray tables leading from the condo-complex sidewalk up into our apartment covered with hundreds of chocolate truffle centers (five different flavors) and me, standing in the center of my kitchen, sweating over two double boilers and sobbing because I could not keep the chocolate temperature consistent enough to enrobe the thousands of truffles I had so ambitiously made. (When my brother asked why there was no egg hunt that year, I was tempted to remove his toe nails for daring to think of my majestic truffles being put outside and possibly never found)

Other great ones include the search for the perfect and fool-proof French-fry recipe, eating in Japan, dieting at a French spa, and a really amusing story about eating meals made from 1950’s style packaged and canned foods recipes.

To be honest, almost all of them were fun. But I cannot concentrate on books that skip and jump from essay to article. There has to be some sort of flow and continuity for me. The great news is: I can still say “Read this book!” as long as you are someone who does not mind collections. If you are someone who does mind, then stay the heck away from this book. There are 500+ thin pages with tiny margins and so many essays that I started to wonder if a book had finally beaten me.

But it didn’t. And Steingarten is REALLY funny!

Exuma: Scary Dude Snapper, Lobster Rolls & Key Lime Margarita

The final night of our glorious trip, we sat at the horrid glass table for one more dinner. I chopped the remaining lobster tails into medium sized pieces, tossed them with mayo and finely chopped outer stalks of celery (my inner stalks were looking on the rotten side). I seasoned the lobster salad, toasted hot dog buns with de-molded butter, and put them all together with some left over calypso sauce…have you noticed how there is always leftover calypso sauce?

The chirpy microwave assisted in the revival of the yellow rice which was much the same as a few nights before, slightly mushy but fine.

Meanwhile, Dad went to work on the fresh snappers he and Mom had bought from a roadside guy. Actually, we saw the hand painted sign for days “Fresh Snappers” and for whatever reason, I knew that it was a perfect project for Dad; not me. When they returned from the guy’s house, Mom said that these were “seriously scary dudes,” and that she was glad I hadn’t taken the initiative to go alone.

The snapper were frozen in a shopping bag, their eyes staring clearly up at me as I thawed the giant rock that was their bodies. Dad marinated them in Houseman’s suggested seasoning, chopped fresh red pepper and salt with a bit of lime. They sat eyeballing anyone who went to the fridge for a Kalik until it was time to cook.

Dad laid out some dredging flower and a tray and proceeded to cover the fish in flour, pat them till it was only the thinnest possible coat remaining, and then to sauté them in oil.

When finished, the fish did not turn out as beautifully as they began. But they tasted perfect! The meat was cooked till it was barely done which meant it was incredibly moist and had just the faintest bit of spice and citrus. Watch out for bones, but other than that…heaven.

Houseman and my parents spotted a Key Lime tree on one of their island excursions. Since I am the maker of key lime pie magic in our family, they filled their pockets. The super market did not have a whole lot to make key lime pie with, so instead, Jack and I made me one, single, Key Lime Margarita. It was no easy task.

Our friend at the liquor store only sold large bottles of triple sec so we begged some off of the bartender at our hotel bar (some triple sec and a huge banana daiquiri followed by golf ball hunting off the 15^th hole), tequila was easy to come by but not in a bottle appropriate for the final night of our trip. We made due with a few tiny ones. Limes were gently and lovingly squeezed and the resulting margarita was delicious but very tart, just the tiniest bit of simple syrup would have saved the day.

Dinner was a success. Our wine turned out better than previous bottles, the lobster rolls were a success, the rice was fine, and the snapper was great. it was a wonderful end to a truly restful and delicious trip.

Exuma: Stocking Island Pig Roast

Golf can amuse Jack seemingly for a lifetime, I have yet to see him tire of it. But he does get exhausted if he plays with the same people for four straight days. I start to get tired of not seeing him. We decided, for our friend Seth’s last day in Exuma, to go to Stocking Island. I had never been, Dad says it’s amazing, and the front desk lady told us that it was not to be missed. The final straw was that the guide booklet I found listed Pig Roasts on Sundays. Hello! Bahamian Pig Roast!? Sign me up.

We drove around the island for a while, just to go up roads we had never driven before and visit new towns. There are always more beautiful beaches to explore in Exuma and I now have about three more on my list. When it was just about time, we turned around, and made our way to Georgetown to catch the ferry (we were told it leaves every half hour from the dock and that if you ever don’t see it, someone will call. Someone who? I have no idea but thoroughly ensconced in my Exuman nonchalance, I didn’t think about it much).

At the dock, we saw a few tourists from our hotel, and a few that had to be from Sandals (newly opened in the old Four Season’s property and apparently our mortal enemy). The boat came eventually, it was old and yellow (called a “taxi” from here on. Forget that ferry crap) and the prices were painted on a board. The two men operating it were cheery as if they were sitting at a bar all day talking to their best buddy. Instead, they drive a boat back and forth to what I was about to learn was the least Bahamian part of Exuma (outside of Sandals of course).

Once on Stocking Island, the first thing to greet us was a sign indicating the presence of a Conch

Shack. It wasn’t open yet, but a mental note was made to get over there before we left.

I immediately noticed the abundance of tourists. Even the bartender at the Chat n Chill was non-Bahamian. Still, the island was beautiful and laid back. Jack went straight to get a drink. He was clearly wondering if it might not have been worth it to just keep golfing with my family. Not that it wasn’t cool and fun to be on a new adventure, he just seemed to feel the tug of the course on his heart-strings.

There we sat with our rum drinks, hoping the pig roast would start soon. There are some beautiful shallows to lounge in and a volley ball net if that is something that interests you.

Once the pig was ready, I paid for my tickets in the Chat n Chill and got on line with a bunch of guys who were fetching plates for their wives. One guy was staying on Stocking Island, just across the small bay. He told us stories about how the who’s-who of Exuma had been at a bar there the night before to discuss island business. Island business entailed rowdy poker apparently. So that is the bar we need to get to next time. The other guy told us how he was staying at Sandals (of course) and how he just LOVED the island (his first visit) and would be looking at property the next day (great).

Slowly we made our way down the four-person line to the lady who served up dirty rice, mac n’ cheese, spiced cole slaw, candied carrots (veggies!), and pork with optional curry sauce. I fixed one plate with sauce and one without and meandered back to our table. The pig was out of site in a giant oven behind a brick wall permanently manned by a guy who would pass trays of the meat over the wall to the server-woman.

None of the three of us were terribly hungry but as soon as we started shoveling food in our mouths, we entirely forgot. It was delicious! The meat was soft and juicy with the “curry” sauce adding a bit of kick, although it was not entirely necessary. The carrots were sweet, but not too much so. The rice was firm and with the perfect amount of tasty-flavored oil to bring out the pigeon peas. The spiced cole slaw was good, Jack really liked it. And then, the mac and cheese; it was exactly the same stuff we had at Houseman’s, so therefore utterly and bafflingly great!

I splashed around the back cove where, just off the beach, there was a clear 15 foot drop that was so steep boats could throw their anchors on the shore and just float there. We realized that the ferry was not coming at any reliable interval (although without watches, we were just guessing) so when we saw one, we shuffled along to make it back. I did not try the Conch Salad from the shack. Next time.

And there will be a next time. For a few simple hours, Jack separated from the golf course and reveled in the sweetness of a roast pig on an island that you can only reach by boat with unfathomably good mac and cheese.

The Taxi back was empty. Just us and the guys. So I asked them about swimming in Emerald Bay. Some of my work-outs had included rough waters or low visibility and when I looked up to check on Mom, there were points when she felt particularly far away. The guys said that Emerald Bay was great for swimming.

When I specified “across Emerald Bay. Like from one end to the other.” They freaked. Two men, saying exactly the same thing at the same time in different words. The gist was “don’t do it. There are all kinds of fish in there, especially when it’s warm. Since there is no coral or much life in the bay, the only thing for them to eat, would be you.” So that was it for my swimming workouts.