San Francisco: Quince

Our last dinner in San Francisco was at Quince. Quince first got on my radar when I saw a tweet by Ruth Reichl referencing a great seafood meal she had had there. We got the tasting menu, naturally.

For the amuse, there was some tender grilled octopus. It was a delicious sample of what was to come. Light, delicate, delicious.

The first course of the tasting was nantucket bay scallops with lunga di napoli squash, white truffle, and aceto balsamico tradizionale. Never before had I thought about pairing scallops and squash. This was a delicious dish. The scallops were so tender and flavorful. And who could go wrong with white truffles?

Next up: spaghetti "alla chitarra" with mendocino sea urchin, stridoli, and hot peppers. I did not find this dish to be spicy at all, but it's delicateness was divine. The pasta was incredibly thin and luxurious. The sea urchin was allowed to shine on its own. This is a dish I could eat over and over and over again.

It's hard to follow the divinity of the last course, but the cappelletti filled with a luxuriously textured sunchoke puree topped with burgundy truffles did it. Again the pasta was so light and thin, the sunchoke filling was perfectly flavored and silky. This was a fantastic dish.

Moving on, we had the dover sole with black trumpet mushrooms, cauliflower, and prosecco sauce. The fish was perfectly cooked. They actually brought out the raw sole to see before they cooked it, but I missed it. The cauliflower puree was delicious. Another wonderful dish.

It was about this time that our server asked if we wanted to add a cheese course. It was like he read my mind! We were one of the first of the night to get cheese, and heads turned as the cheese cart was rolled out for us to peruse.

Our server did a great job of walking through the cheeses and explaining which were his favorites. We finally settled on the brillat savarin from Normandy which was triple creme luxuriousness as usual. Then we got a fleur de maquis from Corsica which was covered with a rosemary, juniper, chile mixture. When you balance the cheese with the spices, the cheese is quite balanced, but I have to admit that I'm less of a fan of random stuff in my cheese. Lastly, we got the cusie en folie di tobacco from the Piedmont in Italy. Our server told us that this cheese is impossible to find outside the restaurant and that some people come to Quince just to have this cheese. It's wrapped in tobacco leaves, and the nuttiness of the cheese blends with the taste of the tobacco leaves, and it gets more intense as you get closer to the rind.

Dessert was buckwheat crespelle with huckleberry ice cream with hudson ranch pear, caramle, and sage brown butter. If I had to say there was one misstep in the meal, it would be this, and it was barely a misstep, though a surprise after the meal we had had. Typically, I feel like restaurants look at and compare two plates together when they are going to the same table to make sure that they are equal and balanced. In this case, Josh got three crespelles and I got two. He got four slices of pear and I got two. That's all understandable. The part that disappointed me was that his pear was perfectly poached and good and mine was hard and bland. But Josh shared, and things were better.

With coffee, received these petit fours. Some spiced marcona almonds, a gelee, and a financier.

All in all, an excellent meal. The best we had on our trip, which is saying something. I look forward to going to Quince again.