Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Another Mel's is located near the
Civic Center (3355 Geary Blvd., at Van Ness;
%
415/292
-
6358).
$$
Sushi restaurants are treacherous territory. If you're like me, you can easily
turn an affordable meal into a blowout with the merest slips of willpower. That's
why it's only with trepidation that I include
Isobune
5
9
(1737 Post St., at
Buchanan;
%
415/563
-
1030; daily 11:30am-10pm; AE, MC, V),
a rotary sushi
restaurant in the ever-unordinary Japan Center where many dishes are $2 to $4.
Many Americans may not be familiar with conveyor-belt sushi, in which cus-
tomers sit along a bar and dishes cruise past them; if they want something, they
grab it, and the value of the plates are calculated at the end of your meal. This
place opened in 1982, when the notion was completely new to America. I person-
ally love the style, because it's casual and it tempts me into trying more than the
usual salmon and tuna—if I don't know something's name as it glides by looking
appetizing, I'm more likely to try it. The twist here, one that kids will love, is that
instead of a belt, the delivery method is little linked boats in a flowing stream.
Like many of its forebears that feed salarymen in Tokyo or Nagoya, this restau-
rant is more of a joint—of average decor and not much space (so go in the late
afternoon before there's a wait). My advice is to sit at the end of the long part of
the bar where you can see the fish coming for a while, because, that way, you can
think everything through and avoid the trap of making expensive snap decisions
about what to grab.
$$
While you're in Japantown, see if you can squeeze into the contemporary all-
you-can-eat shabu-shabu restaurant a block away at
Mums
9
(1800 Sutter St.,
at Buchanan;
%
415/931
-
6986; www.mumssf.com; daily 7am-10pm; AE, MC, V)
in the Hotel Tomo. Just $40 will get you limitless food, beer, and sake, and if you
don't want the booze, $24, including dessert, is the magic number. And, boy, do
people give the staff, which isn't stingy about seconds and thirds and fifths, a run
for its money—crowds are thick on weekend nights, so have a reservation ready.
Shabu-shabu,
or family-style hot pot, is simply a lot of fun and ideal for spending
a couple of hours as a family or a group of friends: Broth cooks in the middle of
your table (kids, who pay $13, should be old enough to keep away) while you're
served plates of thin-sliced meats and vegetables to dip in the soup yourself. It's a
social dining style that's popular across East Asia, sharing space with the
McDonald's and KFCs. Meats are a twitch fatty, but that gives them more flavor.
A la carte mains are also served for about $14, and the place is even open for
breakfast, when it serves the budget-mod Hotel Tomo (p. 46) upstairs.
$$
German classics in a rustic, jolly, beer-hall setting: That's
Suppenküche
(525
Laguna St., at Hayes;
%
415/252
-
9289
;
www.suppenkuche.com; daily 5-10pm;
MC, V).
You'd better like meat, because once you leave the realm of the appetizers
(like a velvety potato soup [$5]), you'll be partaking of the kind of peasant food
(priced in the mid-teens) that grannies everywhere have been cooking up for gen-
erations, including wiener schnitzel, bratwurst with sauerkraut, and good old
sautéed trout. The place gets jammed, partly because a host of unusual European
beers attract aficionados.
