Brunch at Epic Roasthouse

I'm back from my whirlwind trip to Dublin and London, and still eating away - albeit more locally. Yesterday, we met up with a little group for brunch at Epic Roasthouse in SF, on the Embarcadero.

Epic and its sister restaurant, Waterbar, are located on the waterfront and designed by Pat Kuleto. The location is stunning, just across the street from Gordon Biersch and Palomino. I'm glad my first experience was for brunch, which is a pretty mellow meal - as opposed to dinner, which I hear is packed and more of a zoo.

We had 8 of us so had the chance to thoroughly try out their brunch menu, which was a good combo of breakfasty and lunchy items. The bread service was very nice - a lovely cheesy mini popover (more like a gougere really), nice ciabatta and a cornbread served as a mini-madeleine. I like the little popover so much I had three!




The table salt presentation was also impressive (although we had to ask for the explanation) - a pink himalayan salt, a hand harvested sea salt and a Hawaiian black salt.




I started with a warm spinach salad served with smoked bacon and a poached egg. This was a lovely salad with lots of greens and a light dressing. Then I split the Ultimate 1/2 lb Roasthouse Burger, "ground daily with the trimmings and the accroutements". The burger was a little thick but very tasty. It was served with an anchovy-spiced ketchup (this tasted better than it sounded) and a bevy of toppings including grainy mustard, sauteed mushrooms, corn relish and a couple of others I cannot recall. The presentation was overly fussy for me, but since it was a $21 burger, I guess they had to beef it up (pun intended).

I also sampled the truffled scrambled eggs (this was really nice, although you really have to like truffles - the flavor is pretty bold), the summer corn soup (nice and creamy), the side of mac and cheese (definitely an adult version with a little kick - younger daughter was not impressed) and soft grits with homemade sausage, tomato sauce piquant and poached eggs (loved by my companions, I'm just not a fan of grits). The biscuits and gravy was pronounced by others as too sweet, the steak cut fries were more like a quarter of a potato each (really, really thick) and the crab cake benedict was just ok.

We moved on to a couple of desserts that we shared - the beignets with cafe au lait sauce gave us high hopes when presented very impressively, but those hopes were dashed. I would have prefered a chocolate-based dipping sauce and the beignets themselves were a little too big and dense.




We also had the cookie plate served with vanilla milk. This was a nice little dish - 6-7 types of cookies and a glass of cold milk with a vanilla bean ice cube floating in it.

To finish off, the tea and coffee service were very nice. The service was a little haphazard and we felt no need to add anything on top of the 18% gratuity on the bill. Interesting note, the restaurant also added a 4% health insurance surcharge for the staff.

All in all, the space was magnificient. The backdrop of the Bay Bridge soaring over us was lovely. The brunch prices were much more palatable than the expense account level prices at dinner, and we had a really nice walk on the waterfront afterwards. I'd go again and I'd also say this is a top choice for out-of-town visitors.

This whole cupcake craze is getting to be a bit much...

We've been eagerly awaiting the arrival of two gourmet cupcake places in my area for the past few months - Kara's Cupcakes from SF was opening in Town & Country Village and the famous Sprinkles from L.A. was opening up at the Stanford Shopping Center (replacing the much missed Long Life Noodle House).

Yes, we can get cupcakes from lots of local bakeries including our standby of Draeger's, the ever sweet ones from Safeway and the marginally lighter ones from Satura Cakes. But why buy cupcakes from a bakery when you can buy even more overpriced ones from a specialty cupcake bakery?!

Now I have to admit that I've fully partaken of the cupcake craze in the heartland where it all started - Magnolia Bakery in New York. And Buttercup Bake Shop. And the place next to Bryant Park where the cupcakes are almost the size of my hand. And Miette in SF. And the incomparable Sibby's in San Mateo (she only does special orders though, no storefront). But even I'm starting to choke on $3.25 for a little artery-clogging handful of cake and frosting ("but they're so cuuuute!!").

Nonetheless, I've been to Kara's three times since it opened - I blame it all on my kids! My youngest (the chocolate hater) loves the sweet vanilla (in the $2 mini size). My oldest (the chocolate inhaler) loves the very dark, very chocolatey fleur de sel (and thinks the mini size is for weenies). I enjoy both, as well as the banana caramel. The line at Kara's has never taken more than a few minutes.

We did make an attempt at the new Sprinkles on Sunday - the line was 30-40 people long and snaked down the sidewalk past quite a few other shops. I drove right on by - you want me to pay $3.25 for a cupcake AND wait 20 mins?! And we went right back to Kara's again. Sprinkles will just have to wait...

Sprinkles queue update - 6:20 pm on Wednesday night, there were still close to 20 people in line outside the store. I drove right on by. I'm willing to wait in absurd lines for an iPhone, but not for a paltry cupcake!!

OK - last Sprinkles update, I swear - a friend just gave me a box of 10 assorted Sprinkles cupcakes as a thank you gift. Score! And it was delicious. I would need to do a side-by-side tasting to assess whether I like Sprinkles or Kara's better - the kids say that Sprinkles is less sweet and has a more manageable amount of frosting.