THE ABUNDANCE ISSUE edible san francisco FALL 2025 KEN FULK FOREIGN CINEMA FEAR THE FEAST BAR SPREZZATURA
A FAMILY RAISED BUSINESS EST 1981 5 LOCATIONS TO SERVE YOU 1530 HAIGHT ST. PHONE: 415.255.0643 3701 NORIEGA ST. PHONE: 415.564.0370 2111 HARRISON ST. PHONE: 415.431.9300 1101 4TH ST. PHONE: 415.943.8464 2815 DIAMOND ST. PHONE: 415.943.8464 DELIVERY BY By locals for locals. Our family has been serving the best ourarea has to o er to the best people in the area for almost four decades. We know what folks like, and it’s pretty simple – fresh groceries, great selection and neighborly service. C M Y CM MY CY CMY K Every Sunday 9:30am-1:30pm Fort mason center Farmers’ Market Locally grown fresh fruits, vegetables, flowers, artisan breads & pastries, gourmet food purveyors and much more! cafarmersmkts.com your sunday neighborhood market @fortmasonfarmersmkt 1 800.806.farm Year Round Rain or Shine
2 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025
ediblesf.com | 3 is a network of magazines across the U.S. and Canada fall 2021 1 edible BOZEMAN Telling the Stories of Local Food & Drink Issue No. 10 • Fall 2021 edible BOZEMAN Issue No. 10 Fall 2021 Member of Edible Communities FALL 2023 WOLDY REYES ARRIVES No. 80 / SPRING 2024 Celebrating the Abundance of Local Foods, Season by Season edible CAPECOD® MEMBER OF EDIBLE COMMUNITIES edibleeastbay.com | Fall 2024 1 edibleEAST BAY® Views on food and farming from east of the San Francisco Bay ² Since 2005 No. 76 ² Fall 2024 Member of Edible Communities SUMMER 2024 57 The Land • Berry Bright Summer • Wild Game A member of Edible Communities Celebrating the Abundance of Local Foods in Southern Wisconsin edible MAINE MEMBER OF EDIBLE COMMUNITIES WHY MAINE IS THE BEST / OUR FOOD TASTES BETTER / SAILING AND LOBSTER, WHAT’S BETTER? MAINE SPRING PEARS THE WAY FOOD SHOULD BE... HOLIDAY 2023 PLUS: HIP-HOP + CANNABIS DASHEEDA DAWSON THE WIDE WORLD OF WEED ISSUE ROMILLY NEWMAN PARTY THE EdibleNEFlorida.com 1 Eat . Drink . Think . Explore . | Season by Season Member of Edible Communities ISSUE FORTY EIGHT | September/October 2023 FOOD & ART Master Iss48.indd 1 8/25/23 1:34 PM SPRING 2024 Number 37 ediblePHILLY FOOD & COMMUNITY IN PHILADELPHIA AND BEYOND LOCAL HEROES Rhubarb Recipes The Perks of Fermentation A Very Cheesy Goodbye PLUS ISSUE 45 • SUMMER/FALL 2020 LOYAL TO LOCAL edible Santa Barbara & Wine Country Cuyama Lamb, Stewards for the Land God’s Country Provisions Life in Balance How to Write a Food Blog During a Pandemic and National Crisis ® ISSUE 30 • NOVT/DEC 2024 edible VANCOUVER ISLAND Celebrating Local Food Stories of Vancouver Island & The Gulf Islands Member of Edible Communities ISSUE 30 • NOV/DEC 2024 Gift Boxes • Orange Wine • Santa Snacks edible VANCOUVER & WINE COUNTRY FROZEN BERRIES . BETTER BUTTER . VEGAN BREAD Member of Edible Communities NO. 93 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2024 NO.12 | SUMMER 2023 | MEMBER OF EDIBLE COMMUNITIES the land ~ the sea ~ the people ~ the food NEW BRUNSWICK - PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND - NOVA SCOTIA Proud Member of Edible Communities edible Maritimes edible MENDOCINO & LAKE COUNTIES Celebrating Local Food and Drink, Season by Season Volume 1, Issue 1 Fall 2023 Mushroom Recipes to Fall ‘Inn’ Love With Meet the New Executive Chef at the Inn at Newport Ranch Rex Pickett, Author of Sideways, Returns to the Anderson Valley Tall Guy Brewery, Fort Bragg’s Newest Taproom Member of Edible Communities NO. 1 SUMMER 2023 Wild Finds edible newfoundland & labrador the land ~ the sea ~ the people ~ the food We are part of something bigger! Scan to learn more SERVING NORTHEAST WISCONSIN A member of Edible Communities Premier Issue SPRING/SUMMER2024 • 1 Summer 2021 Summer 2021 Summer 2021 FALL 2024 • ISSUE No. 35 edible silicon valley BAY AREA PENINSULA & SOUTH BAY Eat Drink Local: Los Gatos • San Mateo Silicon Valley’s Wine Families • Revival of the Gut • Cultivating Cacao In Praise of Dirt • Broccoli Rabe US $7.95 OR Local Patron Copy EAT • DRINK • GROW • THINK Member of Edible Communities Celebrating local farms food and vineyards of Prescott, Flagstaff, Sedona and the Verde Valley Proud Member of Edible Communities edible CENTRAL ARIZONA THE STORIES AND CELEBRATION OF FOOD AND DRINK OCTOBER 2024 WE’RE BACK! Staff Picks / Holiday Menus / Hoosier Distilleries / World Food Championships MEMBER OF EDIBLE COMMUNITIES in this issue: Finding Flavor in the Heartland MOCKTAILS: MUCH MORE THAN JUICE
4 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 CONTENTS On the cover: 'Peach Melba', oil painting by Laura Rokas. Courtesy of artist and Rebecca Camacho Presents Photographers: Jason Leung, Carter Hiyama, Francesca Soo, Melody Saradpon ON THE COVER 14 PAINTING THE TENSION Laura Rokas transforms vintage recipe cards into art ON EXCESS 16 ONE MORE SLICE A study in mindful excess 20 PARADOX ON OUR PLATES In San Francisco, extreme wealth and food insecurity share the same streets 22 MY BIRTHDAY CAKE MANTRA On processed food, access, and the right to choose ON RECIPROCITY 24 TOO GOOD TO WASTE How surprise bags are feeding San Francisco—and fighting food waste 26 ALLIED TABLES San Francisco's successful kitchens and bars are discovering true success means opening their doors to each other 30 GILT COMPLEX Ken Fulk knows when too much is just enough 32 THE GENEROSITY PRINCIPLE How Foreign Cinema thrives by never cutting back 36 BAROQUE MINIMALISM Bar Sprezzatura's ornate approach to using everything ON DISCOVERY 38 HOT RESTAURANTS These six openings prove that when SF restaurants take risks, we all eat better 40 CULTURE CALENDAR No better time than this fall to be outside Bar Iris Block Party, p40 Creativity unbound, p14 Buoy Bar's kampachi yuzu, p38 A cappelletti collab, p26 Cake excess, p16
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6 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 Vote for a local San Francisco farmers market to be recognized in America’s Farmers Market Celebration™ (AFMC)! AFMC raises awareness of the essential markets like those listed here making a difference for farmers, ranchers, and communities. From August 1 – September 30 you can vote for your favorite market to help them earn national recognition and prizes! Learn more at markets.farmland.org. Scan to vote for your favorite market
ediblesf.com | 7 SF Farmers Market Guide TUESDAYS SATURDAYS THURSDAYS WEDNESDAYS SUNDAYS Ferry Plaza Farmers Market 10am-2pm Market Street on Embarcadero Alemany Farmers Market 6am-2:30pm 100 Alemany Blvd. Noe Valley Farmers Market 8am-1pm 3861 24th St. (Sanchez and Vicksburg) Fillmore Farmers Market 9am-1pm O'Farrell at Fillmore Ferry Plaza Farmers Market 10am-2pm Market Street on Embarcadero San Francisco State Farmers Market 10am-3pm 19th Ave. and Holloway Ferry Plaza Farmers Market 10am-2pm Market Street on the Embarcadero Heart of the City Farmers Market (Civic Center) 7am-5pm Fulton and Larkin Market Street on Embarcadero Pamassus Farmers Market (UCSC) 10am-3pm 505 Pamassus Ave. (Arguello Blvd. and 3rd Ave.) Mission Bay Farmers Market (UCSF) 10am-2pm 550 Gene Friend Way (between 3rd and 4th St.) Kaiser Permanente Farmers Market 10am-2pm Geary at St. Joseph's St. VA Farmers Market (Outer Richmond) 10am-2pm 42nd Ave. and Clement Castro Farmers Market 4pm-8pm Noe at Market St. Fort Mason Farmers Market 9:30am-1:30pm Fort Mason Center, Marina Blvd. Inner Sunset Farmers Market 9am-1pm 1315 8th Ave. (between 8th and 9th Ave.) Clement Farmers Market (Inner Richmond) 9am-2pm 200 Clement (between 3rd and 4th Ave.) Stonestown Farmers Market 9am-1pm 3251 20th Ave. Heart of the City Farmers Market 7am-5pm 1182 Market St. (McAllister and 7th St.) Divisadero Farmers Market 10am-2pm Grove and Divisadero Outer Sunset Farmers Market & Mercantile 9am-1pm 1994 27th Ave. between Ortega and Quintara) Sponsored by American Farmland Trust
8 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 edible san francisco PUBLISHER & EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Melody Saradpon PUBLISHER Tony Garnicki DIRECTOR OF BRAND STRATEGY & PARTNERSHIPS Heather Hartle ART DIRECTOR Melody Saradpon DESIGNERS Melody Saradpon Chloe Kam CONTRIBUTORS Daisy Barringer Heather Hartle Maggie Spicer Adrian Spinelli Francesca Soo Katie Sweeney Larissa Zimberoff ADVERTISING SALES info@ediblesf.com CONTACT US 584 Castro Street, Suite #508 San Francisco, CA 94114 Edible San Francisco is published four times a year and distributed throughout San Francisco. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be used or reproduced without written permission from the publisher. Every effort has been made to avoid errors, misspellings, and omissions. If an error comes to your attention, please accept our sincere apologies and notify us. Member of Edible Communities @ediblesf omnivore BOOKS ON FOOD a a new antiquarian collectible 3885a cesar chavez street (at church st.) san francisco, ca 94131 phone: 415.282.4712 omnivorebooks.com a
ediblesf.com | 9 WHY WE EAT? Learn how economics, psychology and tradition shape our everyday food choices Bite into our courses! @unisg @unisg_official
10 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 EDITOR'S LETTER Melody Saradpon Editor-in-Chief & Publisher San Francisco has 3,000 restaurants and 130,000 food-insecure residents. This mathematics of abundance defines our city. In this issue, we examine what it means to have too much and not enough, often simultaneously. Francesca Soo bakes her thousandth cake while wrestling with waste. Larissa Zimberoff volunteers at a food pantry, torn between gratitude and dismay at processed donations. The city's top kitchens collaborate rather than compete, finding abundance in generosity. We explore solutions: apps that turn surplus into $6 meals, entrepreneurs who see excess as opportunity, chefs who transform leftovers into community. Ken Fulk shows us how to gather generously. Foreign Cinema and Bar Sprezzatura remind us that hospitality, at its core, is about sharing and using all that we have. Laura Rokas's cover art—vintage recipe cards rendered in paint—captures our central paradox: how too much can make you feel empty. Her work asks what we've always wondered: What does it mean to feast while others hunger? Welcome to the table. Bon appétit,
ediblesf.com | 11 CONTRIBUTORS We got curious about the creative minds who shaped this edition of Edible San Francisco. So we asked them our favorite question: What do you have too much of (and like it that way)? Their answers? As deliciously excessive as you'd expect. Katie Sweeney Larissa Zimberoff Cheese! There are always at least five different kinds in my fridge. Sharp cheddar and parmesan are my staples, but I also like to have a sliced and melty option. Katie Sweeney is a Bay Areabased tastemaker who loves everything about food and all the deliciousness that goes along with cooking, entertaining, and dining out. Follow her adventures on Instagram @sweenkat. Potting soil. I am a big time plant enthusiast. Larissa Zimberoff is a freelance journalist and author covering the intersection of food and technology. Her book, "Technically Food: Inside Silicon Valley's Mission to Change What We Eat," covers how what we eat is rapidly changing and the startups behind it. Find her on Instagram @Technically.Food. Maggie Spicer I have an ever-evolving salt, honey, herbal tonics, and bar soap collection. And yuzu kosho for good measure. Essentials. Maggie Spicer is a brand experience and on-brand bathroom designer, trend forecaster, lifestyle curator, and philanthropic advisor based between San Francisco and France who's passionate about farmers markets, ceremonial matcha, and polar ocean plunges. Follow her at whisksf.com, maggiespicer.com, and @maggiefspicer. Daisy Barringer Heather Hartle Books—though, honestly, can one really have too many? Daisy Barringer is a journalist covering food, travel, and culture. She grew up in San Francisco and has an MFA from UNC Wilmington—or, as she prefers to say, a three-year stint at creative writing summer camp. Find her on Instagram @daisysf. Untold stories — best told over a martini. Heather Hartle has spent her career shaping lifestyle magazines—7x7 among them—but her true obsession is sharing stories over food, friends, and a glass of bubbles. For this issue, she turned the tables on her friend Ken Fulk to write about his take on abundance. Adrian Spinelli Bottles of whiskey. There really is one for every mood! Adrian Spinelli is a Brazilian-born, San Francisco-based arts & culture writer who has lived in the city for over 15 years. His work focuses on the intersection of music, food, drinks and travel and he also leads food tours through the city. Find him on Instagram /X: @agspinelli Francesca Soo My freezer is chock-full of frozen cake scraps — they come in handy when we're craving a quick sweet treat. One day, I'll Frankenstein together a mega-cake to clear out my freezer, it'll be a mishmash of flavors and textures, but I refuse to throw any away! Francesca is a maker of cakes and other sweet things, operating under the name @fearthefeast. They work in food and beverage public relations, drawing upon past experiences in food waste recovery, cookbook publishing, food systems education, and content creation.
12 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 ON EXCESS
ediblesf.com | 13 WELCOME TO THE FEAST FALL ISSUE
14 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 Growing up in rural Quebec, Laura Rokas’s family never ate out. Her mother cooked everything from scratch while young Laura watched Jacques Pépin and Julia Child on television, mesmerized by the simple transformation of ingredients into meals. There was no excess, no waste, just the honest work of feeding a family. Everything changed when she moved to San Francisco to study at the Art Institute in 2014. Working across oil painting, sculptural ceramics, and photography, Rokas discovered vintage 1970s recipe cards—artifacts from when convenience promised freedom but delivered exhaustion. “Abundance doesn’t mean when something is unlimited, it’s positive,” Rokas explains. “There’s a range within what is actually good for you. Abundance can be over the top.” Her paintings excavate a uniquely American paradox: when having too much became its own form of deprivation. These recipe cards document an era when women could make anything from convenience foods, but still had to make everything to prove their worth. The tension is built into her source material: Betty Crocker promised indulgence; Weight Watchers preached restriction. Rokas paints the precise moment when abundance becomes anxiety, which is why her work commands our cover. She’s captured the tension of our theme: how plenty can become a prison, and how having everything can mean having nothing at all. Here, Rokas tells us about painting the feast that eats itself. The Weight Of Excess In the following pages we explore how abundance (in food, in choice, and in access) can become its own form of deprivation. From Rokas’ painted warnings to San Francisco’s restaurant paradoxes, these stories reveal what happens when plenty becomes pressure. PAINTING the TENSION Laura Rokas transforms vintage recipe cards into art that questions what abundance really means Writer—Melody Saradpon Photos—Melody Saradpon/Christopher Grunder ON THE COVER 2 1 3 2
ediblesf.com | 15 Replicating vintage recipe cards from Betty Crocker and Weight Watchers is symbolic. The Weight Watchers philosophy is restraint/restriction, and Betty Crocker is baking, abundance, and excessive... You can even tell the difference with the cards—all the Weight Watchers have artificial sweetener. There’s a section for calorie counting…they don’t directly say it’s for losing weight, but we all know what it stands for. How do you find the duality within these selections [to paint] in terms of what they represent? It’s nice to have a mix of something appealing juxtaposed with something definitely more off-putting. As long as there’s tension in the assortment of images…abundance doesn’t mean when something is unlimited, it’s positive. There’s a range within what is actually good for you. Abundance can be over the top. Your collection ‘A Meal In Itself’ speaks to this. Which painting captures the complexities of abundance? The one that comes to mind is ‘Serves You Right’. It’s the one with the eggs and orange JELL-O. It’s very beautiful—the light just bounces through these stained glass JELL-O eggs—but it’s extremely gross. It has anchovies on top and an olive. And the way it’s presented, it’s like you’re serving your guests. The title is cheeky, like, “Yeah, serves you right, you ordered this disgusting shit,”…it’s this gross meal that I’m serving to you as a gift. When you’re painting these salmon aspics and jellies, what goes through your mind? Humor and horror. I love horror movies. I’m very attracted to repulsive things. Within context [laughs]. Practical illusions in old Cronenberg movies, all the body horror. Really love that, which also has a lot to do with the sculptural aspects of things. How do you feel the abundance trap has evolved in 2025? The [biggest] change is the luxury aspect of abundance. Now people have access to seeing people having access to luxury— we’re seeing abundance as luxury. Ignorance is bliss. If I can’t see a billionaire eating a $1K can of caviar, then it can't hurt me. But now that people are seeing that, people are aiming for that versus just being satisfied. San Francisco has over 3,000 restaurants and more than 130,000 food-insecure residents. How do you feel this mirrors the abundance paradox of your paintings? San Francisco is such an interesting place to be. There’s so much here. So many resources. California is such a fantastic place for food and agriculture, but there’s an aspect of that that’s off-putting: there are so many rich people here and so many inaccessible things…There’s so much food. There’s so much waste. We can make do with what we have. 1 A painting process 2 Sculpture work 3 In studio 4 Rokas' new line-up of sculptures 5 'Serves You Right' by Laura Rokas, courtesy of Rebecca Camacho Presents 6 'Double Your Pleasure' by Laura Rokas, courtesy of Rebecca Camacho Presents 7 'Mother's Little Helper' by Laura Rokas, courtesy of Rebecca Camacho Presents 6 5 4 7 5 6 7
16 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 ON EXCESS ONE MORE SLICE A study in mindful excess Photographer/Writer—Francesca Soo
ediblesf.com | 17 I wanted the Easy-Bake oven. As a child, I grew starry-eyed at the EasyBake ads interrupting my morning Nickelodeon. It wasn’t the glow of the teal plastic that drew me in, but the alchemy unfolding in fuzzy RGB. Butter, flour, and sugar entered a whirring plastic box and came out whole: a frosted chocolate cake, tucked into by the onscreen child actors who smeared chocolate around their mouths in glutinous bliss. I was sold. A couple of decades later, I’ve likely baked over 1000 cakes in standard oven ranges—just around 500 in the past year alone as a full-time baker. While I expand my daily technical baking knowledge (understanding the protein structure of flour and the Maillard reaction of browning butter), the juvenile shock of turning multiple ingredients into one item remains. But baking isn’t the magic disappearing act that the Easy-Bake oven made it out to be. Much to my chagrin, baking often produces more excess, more waste. Butter wrappers and single-use plastic piping bags fill my kitchen trash, eggshells overrun the compost bin, and lightly used cake boxes render sustainable sorting attempts moot due to their plastic coatings. I carry deep-rooted shame about food waste, from my upbringing and former professional experiences. I worked at a food waste recovery nonprofit in Alameda for a short stint, just shy of a year. We recovered thousands of pounds of food from the San Francisco and Oakland wholesale produce markets daily, alongside loads of ready-made meals and pantry items from local grocery stores in Temescal and Alameda. We’d sort through the haul, elbows deep in mushy produce, before allocating food to partner orgs who top up town fridges, curate and distribute grocery bags, and cook free hot meals. What we distributed each day was at the whim of the wholesale markets, depending on excess production, forgotten orders, or price gouging that left pallets of produce on loading docks to ripen and rot. One day, when the nonprofit’s Ford F-250 wouldn’t start, I tested the limits of my Volkswagen Golf hatchback, cramming ~30 boxes of ripe-smelling yellow zucchini over the Bay Bridge, ready to be sorted by the daily crew of volunteers. That same week, I delivered an $800 wedding order to a venue that cost half my annual salary to rent for the weekend’s festivities. The cakes I make are excessive. Sometimes loud in design and bogged down by muddled flavors, cakes marrying saffron-soaked chiffons with sage-infused custards, candied ginger and verbena frostings, and dandelion or beetroot dust to top. Blobby and brightly colored with fake dyes that certainly can’t have a nutritionist’s stamp of approval. Three-foot-wide sprawling monstrosities covered in flats on flats of organic strawberries, spending nearly $100 on decoration alone. So what’s a baker to do when egg prices skyrocket and rent is due? Ingredient costs drive prices, and trends impact commission requests. Excessiveness is almost inescapable, especially when it’s coated in buttercream and served on a plate. I’ll never be able to edit waste away like in a television ad or sell a slice that doesn’t come with a hidden cost—at least six waxed butter wrappers, three plastic piping bags, and one non-recyclable box for each cake. What I can do, however small, is value the produce and ingredients I’m handling and transform them into something that will be enjoyed, down to the last bite. I embrace the instinct from my produce-sorting days in my kitchen, thinking of delicious ways to upcycle neglected fruit and vegetables. The following recipe set is a come-as-you-are, or rather, bake-what-you-have guide, suggesting ways to turn excess ingredients or produce into sweet things to be savored and shared. “The cakes I make are excessive.” 1
18 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 Fig Leaf Cake Ingredients: 4-6 large fig leaves — found in SF from May - November Any oil-based cake recipe — olive oil cake, chocolate cake, etc. Butter or oil, for greasing Fig leaf brown butter Ingredients: 4 large fig leaves 4 sticks of salted butter Fruit scrap syrup Ingredients: 1 cup fruit scraps — strawberry tops, pear cores, apple cores (take out the seeds first), peach skins ½ cup water 1 tbsp sugar Infused custard Ingredients: Stale bread scraps or corn husks 2 cups of milk 4 egg yolks ½ cup sugar ¼ cup butter 1 tsp vanilla extract (optional) Caramel cereal crisp Ingredients: 2.5 cups stale cereal — cornflakes, branflakes, puffed rice ¼ cup milk powder (optional) 1 tbsp sugar ½ tsp kosher salt 4 tbsp melted butter Roasted fruit filling Ingredients: 2 cups of fruit, past its prime — soft strawberries, bruised peaches 2-4 tsp of sweetener (optional, think fruit scrap syrup, maple syrup, honey, white sugar) To make the fig-leaf cake: Inspired by Natasha Pickowicz’s More Than Cake: 100 Baking Recipes Built for Pleasure and Community (Workman, 2023) Wash the fig leaves and dry them completely. Prepare a cake recipe, preferably an oil-based sponge cake (as opposed to a chiffon cake, which needs to cling to ungreased tins). Brush a cake tin lightly with oil or butter paper, before layering the leaves to cover the cake tin completely. This will act as parchment paper for the cake while baking. 2
ediblesf.com | 19 Pour the cake batter into the pan, and fold any leaf edges over the top of the cake. Add extra leaves, if desired, to the top of the cake. Bake according to the recipe. Let it cool before running a butter knife along the edges of the pan, being gentle enough not to rip the leaves. Turn out onto a wire rack and serve or frost once cooled. To make the fig leaf oil: Wash the fig leaves and dry them completely. This is important so it doesn’t splatter in the oil. Place the fig leaves in the oil in a small saucepan over low heat, and stir occasionally for ~30 minutes. Take the pan off the heat, steeping the leaves in the oil for a couple of hours before use. For a deeper infusion, blend the cooled oil with the leaves, and strain with a cheesecloth or fine-mesh sieve. Fold the oil into buttercream, or use it over sweet or savory dishes. To make the fruit scrap syrup: Put everything in a small saucepan and place it over a low heat. Bring to a simmer, and then let steep with a lid on for ~30 minutes. Strain the fruit scraps out, and use or store when cooled down. This syrup can be used for sweetening jams, creams, teas, cocktails, etc. To make the infused custard: Put everything in a small saucepan and place over a low heat. Bring to a gentle simmer, and then keep the pan on low for 30 minutes. Turn off the heat, and let steep with a lid on for another 30 minutes, or until the milk is cold. Strain out the solids, and then pour into a heat-proof bowl. Add in egg yolks (reserve the egg whites for omelets, meringues, etc.), sugar, vanilla extract, and whisk together. Place the bowl over a saucepan of simmering water, whisking constantly to avoid scrambling the eggs, for about 10-15 minutes. To make the caramel cereal crisp: Crush up the cereal into smaller pieces. Add the salt, sugar, and milk powder if using, and toss together. Add the melted butter and toss to coat — creating clusters. Bake in a 275-degree oven on a baking tray for ~20 minutes. This can be used as a layer in a stacked cake, mixed into cookie dough, brownies, on top of ice cream, etc. To make the roasted fruit filling: Heat your oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Place the fruit on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet, and bake for 20-30 minutes, depending on the firmness of your fruit. Once slightly cooled, blend the fruit in a food processor or blender. Taste and adjust for sweetness, using a sweetener like the aforementioned fruit scrap syrup. To assemble the cake: Some steps are optional, depending on what elements you’ve created. Cut your cake horizontally, placing your palm on the top of the cake to steadily guide the knife and create even layers. Soak the cake layer evenly with a tablespoon of liquid (strawberry top syrup, fig leaf-infused milk, etc.). With a palette knife, spread a thin layer of buttercream on the cake, making sure to get to the edges. Drawing a small circle around the center of the cake, use the palette knife to make a round-shaped indentation, hollowing out excess buttercream to make room for the filling. Spoon in your fruit filling, whether roasted from pantry remnants or storebought. Gently place the other sliced cake layer on top, then run a small amount of buttercream along the sides, sealing the two layers together. Pop the “crumb-coated” cake into the freezer for 5 minutes to firm up, and then add another layer of buttercream to the exterior after, returning to the freezer again. To decorate with excess, fill a piping bag fitted with a stylized tip (I use a leaf-tip most frequently) with buttercream, colored with natural powders (turmeric, beet powder, spirulina) or spring for the last bottle of Red40 haunting grocery shelves. Gently squeeze the top of the bag with one hand, using the other to guide the piping tip. For tiered cakes, I like to run the bag from the top to the bottom, encasing the cake in a gentle cage. If I have excess filling, I like to drip it down the sides of the cake, collecting pools to add extra sour or sweet punches to the cake. For florals, I opt for ones that will expand past the cake’s frosted boundaries—check in with your florist about which blooms are cake-safe, and always wrap the stems. 3 1 Cake artist Francesca Soo 2 Soo's custom fig tree leaf cake 3 Frosting close-up
20 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 IN a city of 800,000—home to more restaurants per capita than almost anywhere else—San Francisco faces a troubling paradox: 130,000 residents experience food insecurity. From Michelinstarred kitchens to late-night taquerias, the Bay Area's culinary abundance stands in stark contrast to the one in six residents who struggle daily to put food on the table. This tension underscores a deeper failure of distribution, access, and political will: if food is plentiful, why do so many go hungry? Early efforts to bridge the gap are often improvised. Rintaro's executive chef and owner, Sylvan Mishima Brackett, recounts installing a shelf he built against the courtyard wall for leftover food in takeaway containers—only to remove it after break-ins from "people climbing over the front wall" made the gesture untenable, highlighting how even well-intentioned acts can founder. "This tension between food insecurity and restaurant abundance is real, but I see them as mutually exclusive rather than related," shares Dalton Thomas, chef-turnedstrategist. "Restaurants are created to serve the community; however, this is with the pressures of the capitalist systems. Income disparities, cost of rent, etc., are all working against the community in the Bay Area, so a restaurant is somewhat forced to serve the community that can support a restaurant in this environment." At several Bay Area farmers' markets, Foodwise provides lifelines for lowincome shoppers. "We have a decades-long partnership with ExtraFood (formerly Food Runners) where produce that would otherwise go to waste at the end of the market is sent to provide meals at food shelters and neighborhood programs for food-insecure San Franciscans," shares Executive Director Christine Farren. Through CalFresh EBT and Market Match, over $265,000 in benefits reached families last year, allowing them to "stretch their food assistance benefits while directly supporting small farms," she adds. Still, these programs reach only a fraction of the food-insecure and require ongoing private fundraising (about $60,000 annually) to survive amid looming budget cuts. In San Francisco, extreme wealth and food insecurity share the same streets PARADOX ON OUR PLATES Writer—Maggie Spicer Photography—Annamae Photo ON EXCESS 1 2 3 1 Breaking bread at Frances 2 Glasses at Valley (Sonoma) 3 Tiny toasts 4 Rintaro's courtyard shelf
ediblesf.com | 21 Grocery retailers have also stepped up. Bi-Rite Market's partnership with Food Runners—bolstered by California's SB 1383 food-waste law–rescues "market culls" and tracks both recovery and redistribution, showcasing how legislation can spur change. Partnerships with The Women's Building and Heart of the City Farmers Market help Bi-Rite extend its mission of "Creating Community Through Food," though even these alliances can only nibble at the scale of need. The citywide coalition FAACTS (Food & Agriculture Action Coalition Toward Sovereignty) has helped feed 70,000+ households since 2022. "Different people need to be fed differently. A food pantry doesn't necessarily help individuals who have limited or no kitchen access, nor does it help homebound seniors," shares Haley Nielsen, Deputy Director of Farming Hope. By preserving $75 million for community food programs and convening the first SF Food Action Summit, FAACTS illustrates what collective action can achieve—yet 130,000 still slip through the net. But practical barriers remain. Palo Alto resident Morgwn Rimel observes, "Our local homeless community mainly seems to rely on churches and other pantries offering meals, plus water from coffee shops, and then collecting money to purchase cheaper food from non-food shops like CVS. What strikes me is that there are few public facilities for preparing or heating food, so it's not even just about access to food, but also, where and how do you cook and eat?" Rimel also notes the disappearance of public drinking fountains and gathering spaces: "There is a level of basic public amenity (places to sit, gather, eat outside, and even toilets) that has been stripped away—everything is now private or has to be paid for." Underlying these fragmented efforts is a pervasive narrative: food insecurity is a siloed issue, easily dismissed by those insulated by abundance. Luc Sukolsky, a Bay Area native, sees a "push-pull dynamic" between the food haves and have-nots: "When you have food, you don't think about not having it. The number of restaurants per capita reflects the cosmopolitan lifestyles of the middle class and wealthier residents—emblematic of lifestyles defined by taste and shared experience through social media," he proposes. "These diners value the aestheticism and exclusivity of their experience, often sidelining mutual aid initiatives that might detract from the dining experience or stretch overstretched operators." "Generally speaking, it's a place where rich people expect the workers to serve them, and that has found its way to being broken," shares longtime resident Will Meeker. "Even with the wealthy getting paid more than they've ever been paid in the history of the world, they're not prioritizing dining out. Not only can those less advantaged not afford to eat, but now the middle is hurting." James Freeman, former SF resident and Blue Bottle Coffee founder, reflects, "I think about the performative worthiness of San Franciscans in general, and how most restaurateurs in SF can barely figure out how to pay their own bills, much less feed the 130,000 that face food insecurity. People are starving on the streets. Meanwhile, people are ordering $10,000 bottles of wine ... There's so much self-deception when those in food are working in an economic system that's so massively unfair. It's hard to be a restaurateur in SF, especially. Harder than most places. It's not the responsibility of the restaurateur to feed the 130,000. But no one else is taking responsibility." Looking ahead, many agree real progress demands both policy and paradigm shifts. San Francisco's culinary opulence alongside pervasive hunger underscores this truth: abundance does not guarantee equity. Only intentional distribution, durable partnerships, and political will that matches the city's gastronomic ambitions can resolve the tension between a surplus of restaurants and the 130,000 residents who still go hungry. 4
22 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 The Lunchables were already there when I arrived at 6:45 A.M. I circled the pallet, taking it in. Neurons in my brain spiked even though I’d yet to fill my coffee cup. Each shrink-wrapped package contained three pepperoni and three extra cheesy pizzas. The garish yellow boxes would be a big hit with our clients, who were primarily Guatemalan, Mexican, and Vietnamese, but they were a huge flop for me. The American food system is a superhighway of processed junk, and my food pantry is the last exit. It’s my weekly emotional toll. I love volunteering, saying hi to clients, and smiling at their adorable babies. “Hola, ¿cómo estás?” I say to everyone who walks by. I care deeply, and I hate knowing that some of what they receive isn’t “good.” Yes, I am judging, but I know too much about food: what all the weird ingredients are and the profits Big Food craves. According to Linda Nageotte, president and COO at Feeding America, 68% of folks who turn to pantries are both food insecure and have diet-related chronic diseases, like diabetes and high blood pressure. “We know and believe that providing people with whole foods is as good as medicine,” she said. I’m not food insecure, but I do have Type 1 diabetes, and it’s this condition that created my vigilance. I grew up eating “delicious” crap: Keebler Elves cookies, Ritz crackers, Lean Cuisine frozen dinners. My diet has evolved, and while I might occasionally devour a Ritz cracker—so buttery and crispy!—you won’t catch me buying them. Judy, another volunteer, handed the Lunchables out with a huge smile—”Pizza!” she yelled out in her deep Puerto Rican accent. She wasn’t horrified like I was. Emilie, another volunteer, joined me in calling it UUPF— ultra-ultra-processed food. A food pantry has one job. To give away food. The Canal Alliance, where I volunteer, feeds about 350 families weekly in San Rafael, California. We provide primarily whole food staples. Grains, beans, vegetables, and fruit that anyone could proudly turn into a meal. Me included. But we also get nutritionally suspect items. I want to reject them, but then I see people happily walking away, and I wonder: Must we only supply clean ingredients or is there a place on the table for factory-made foods? The Lunchables came courtesy of SF Marin Food Bank. The Bay Area nonprofit received the grab-and-go convenience foods from Feeding America, which rescues manufactured products destined for landfill. Since Lunchables’ launch in 1989, their acceptance is finally being questioned. The Center for Science in the Public Interest called having them in cafeterias “a highly questionable move for school nutrition.” Consumer Reports wrote, “We don’t think anybody should regularly eat these products, and they definitely shouldn’t be considered a healthy school lunch.” Kraft Heinz announced it would stop selling its “meals”— quotes for irony—to schools in November 2024. But they’re still produced, and when no one buys them, they’re farmed out to the food insecure. Feeding America reports that 47 million people in the US—1 in 7—are food insecure. Profits are questionable. Manufacturers like Kraft Heinz often have surplus when an expiration date is near. They take a larger deduction when they give back to qualified non-profits—it’s called an “extended tax deduction.” I can’t be wrong in assuming manufacturers hope these castoffs also create future customers. The state of California feeds 5 million people a week at roughly 230-plus food pantries. That we can still feed this many people despite cuts in important USDA programs by President Trump and massive shortfalls in the California state budget is only due to corporate and private donors. Every Tuesday, the clients who come to the Canal Alliance walk away with around 35 to 45 pounds of food. Most of it is excellent, but not all of it. Local retailers are wise to food pantries as a beard for their buying mistakes. Via Extra Food, another organization that saves food from being wasted, we get packaged items, fresh food, and an abundance of bakery items from Target, Grocery Outlet, and Safeway. We display the stuff from chain markets in our “bodega”—a set of rolling baker’s racks. The community loves it: Takis chips, Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal, and Terry Ho’s Yum Yum Sauce. After coffee and before we open at 8 o’clock, I wander the aisles taking photos of the worst offenders. Sometimes I post them to Instagram, hoping big brands will take note. I know I shouldn’t complain. Extra Food is a fantastic organization. Why waste resources making edible food only to toss it? Monica Ravizza, Extra Food’s director of programs, admits how “complicated” it is. “Everyone wants fresh, healthy food, but that isn’t the only thing that comes in. We try hard to make sure that our donors’ trash doesn’t become the recipient’s trash.” I brought up some of the offending items I’ve seen. “We’re not the food police, we’re not the nutritionists telling people what they can and can’t eat. We’re rescuing food. Everyone deserves birthday cake.” On processed food, access, and the right to choose MY BIRTHDAY CAKE MANTRA Writer—Larissa Zimberoff Photos—Larissa Zimberoff/Canal Alliance ON EXCESS 1
ediblesf.com | 23 Tanis Crosby, executive director of SF Marin Food Bank, shared that “70% or more” of the food they collect is “fresh desired products.” In our interview, I asked about the other 30%, which might include brown rice, not a cultural fit at the Canal Alliance, or sugary, eye-catching juice boxes. “Participants can choose what they want and not take what they don’t want,” Crosby explained. “We have a hugely diverse community that we serve, with diverse perspectives and needs.” Crosby’s point is hard to argue with. I have the luxury of choosing what to eat every single day. Clients at my food pantry may only get to say “No” once a week. Nothing is new here. I’ve been volunteering at the Canal Alliance for over five years, and I’ve seen it all. So has Tia, another volunteer. She reminds me of something I forgot to shake my fist at. “What bums me out is when we get unhealthy versions of stuff in lieu of healthy versions. For example, the “cheese” that comes in white boxes is made with oil, rather than “real” cheese, or juice that has only a small percentage of fruit juice.” How right she is. Last week, we saw dried cherries. I wanted to take a bag home, only to read they had added sugar. Cherries are already sweet enough! A few weeks after the Lunchables incident, we received a pallet of Pepperidge Farms Goldfish crackers. UPF for our clients… again! My cortisol levels skyrocketed. I picked up a bag and read over the packaging. Anger ebbed quickly to mild acceptance. The ingredients weren’t terrible, and I was reminded of filling endless to-go containers for my niece and nephew. Wow, I thought. The product had even improved. What was once made red and blue with artificial coloring was now done with extracts from watermelon and beets. When the pantry opened at 8 A.M., I no longer minded that this was the last thing our clients picked up. While I remain vigilant, who am I to say no to “birthday cake”? 1 Larissa Zimberoff volunteering onsite 2 Food pantry distribution by Canal Alliance in San Rafael 3 Bags of brown and white rice 2 3 3
24 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 TOO GOOD to waste How surprise bags are feeding San Francisco—and fighting food waste. Writer—Daisy Barringer Visuals—Melody Saradpon ON RECIPROCITY
ediblesf.com | 25 IN San Francisco, there’s no shortage of excellent food. But abundance has a downside: surplus. At more than 3,000 restaurants and grocery stores citywide, that can mean leftover pastries after brunch, prepped curry that never left the kitchen, and produce nearing its sell-by date. Too Good To Go, a Denmark-based app that arrived in the U.S. in 2020, offers a clever solution: it connects food businesses with customers willing to buy unsold food at a discount, packaged as “surprise bags” sold at a fraction of their retail value. In a city obsessed with both food and innovation, the app has found a uniquely receptive audience. San Francisco is now its second-largest U.S. market after New York, leading the country in high ratings, low cancellation rates, and total meals saved. The Art of the Surprise Too Good To Go’s premise is simple: browse the app, reserve a bag, and pick it up during a designated window. These “surprise bags” are exactly that: mystery bundles that might include meals, groceries, pastries, ice cream, or whatever’s left at the end of service, bundled at a steep discount. While some vendors note what type of food to expect, most keep the details vague. That unpredictability is part of the draw. The contents vary, but the value is typically listed in the app and often runs three to five times the purchase price, with most bags costing around $6. For popular spots, timing matters. The app will often prompt users to “check back” at a specific time, but with only a handful available at a time, they can disappear in seconds. (We found that setting an alarm on our phone is the best way to ensure we don’t miss out.) At Burma Superstar, we picked up our bag mid-afternoon through the side window—no wait, no fuss. The bag included a generous portion of Burmesestyle beef curry and coconut rice, roughly $30 worth of food for $6. It’s the kind of dish we might normally skip for our usual chicken biryani, but it was rich, comforting, and worth ordering outright. Brenda’s Meat & Three, a soul food staple we love but don’t always get around to, had a mid-afternoon pickup at the host stand, just after the lunch rush. Inside: two pieces of crisp fried chicken, plus mashed potatoes and coleslaw, a solid, satisfying haul, and a gamble that definitely paid off. Not every bag is wildly different; many follow a familiar formula. But there’s always an unexpected element: a dish you wouldn’t normally order, a side you didn’t expect, a place you’ve walked past but never gone into. Some bags are more plentiful than others, but even the simpler ones offer value and a glimpse into a neighborhood spot you might not have tried otherwise. Users rate San Francisco vendors among the highest nationwide, and local staples like Arizmendi Bakery, Happy Donuts, Jane the Bakery, and Luke’s Local remain some of the most consistently sought-after on the app. From Surplus to Sustainability The scale of food waste is staggering: nearly 40% of all food produced globally goes uneaten. In the U.S., that’s an estimated 130 billion meals a year, along with the energy, water, and labor required to produce them. Food waste also contributes to climate change, accounting for up to 10% of global greenhouse gas emissions and 25% of all freshwater resources. Every meal saved keeps about 2.7 kg of CO₂e out of the air, conserves 214 gallons of water, and avoids 2.8 square meters of land use per year. Too Good To Go frames its mission around this impact. In San Francisco, that mission has gained traction: around the time of its U.S. debut, the app had already helped save over 250,000 meals from more than 2,000 local partners. But this isn’t just environmental work; it’s practical for businesses. For small restaurants and grocers, surplus food represents a significant loss of revenue. Too Good To Go changes that. It transforms unsold items from loss into revenue and offers another way for businesses to connect with customers. Of course, selling surplus food isn’t the only way to keep it from going to waste. Nonprofits like ExtraFood take another route—collecting unsold food from grocery stores, caterers, and schools and delivering it directly to organizations serving people in need. Monica Revisita, ExtraFood’s Director of Programs, welcomes any effort to keep food out of the landfill, but she also sees the trade-offs. “Ultimately, it’s all about reducing food waste. That’s the most important thing,” she said. “But the sad part is that this food waste has become part of our social safety net. As we become more efficient at reducing food waste or figuring out other ways to make a profit off the excess, we’re taking the food away from our social safety net.” Luke’s Local: A Grocer That Gets It At Luke’s Local, a small-format grocery chain with four San Francisco locations, food waste reduction isn’t a marketing point; it’s a structural priority. According to COO Kayleigh Kahn, the company wastes just 2.5% of its inventory, compared to the industry average of around 10%. “Reducing waste has been a core part of our operation from day one,” said Kahn. “We order strategically, keep our footprint small, and move inventory quickly. Too Good To Go helps us minimize what’s left.” That partnership has been especially helpful as Luke’s expands. “For our newer stores, it’s a flexible way to handle unpredictability while we learn what people are actually buying,” she said. “We can have eight bags one day, two the next—it gives us a buffer while we figure out the flow.” And while the revenue helps, it’s not the main draw. “The fact that we’re able to sell it for a small price is kind of just gravy,” Kahn added. “Mostly, it helps us waste less and lets more people enjoy more of the food we already have.” A Smarter Way to Share the Surplus What does it say about a city when it needs an app to manage its leftovers? In San Francisco, where food luxury and food insecurity often exist side by side, Too Good To Go turns that imbalance into access, offering a quality meal for under $7 and a second life for food that might otherwise go to waste. Still, hunger-relief organizations like ExtraFood say the need for donated food far outpaces what’s available. Revisita believes that closing the gap will require investment beyond surplus recovery. “Unless we start putting more money into the social safety net, there will be less food available to those in need,” she said. It’s a reminder that food waste and hunger are connected but separate problems, and solving one doesn’t automatically fix the other. Too Good To Go may not address the systemic issues driving food insecurity, but it offers a real, immediate way to keep edible food from going to waste. In a city built on abundance, that matters—even if the bigger challenge remains making sure there’s enough for everyone.
26 | EDIBLE SF FALL 2025 ALLIED ON RECIPROCITY
ediblesf.com | 27 Writer—Adrian Spinelli Photography—Carter Hiyama/Crenn Dining Group San Francisco’s most celebrated kitchens and bars are discovering that true success means opening their doors to each other Dining out in San Francisco right now is a thrilling proposition. As the city grapples with the notion that it's been slow to recover from the supposed post-pandemic "doom loop" effect, the access to nationally renowned, list-topping, Michelin-rated, James Beard-winning, and downright fantastic restaurants and bars has never been better. Yet, at a time when one could reasonably expect bars and restaurants to have their heads down in their own spaces, furiously trying to meet margins in this vastly competitive and abundant environment of over 3,000 food establishments, they're hosting more one-night-only collaboration events than ever. But why would the restaurant that topped the SF Chronicle's list of Top 100 bars feel the need to ever cook outside of their own kitchen? Why are some of the busiest hospitality groups in town bringing chefs and bartenders from out of town into their space for one-night-only events? It's not just about sharing social media marketing exposure. In fact, the motivation behind these endeavors paints a picture of exactly why San Francisco's dining scene is nothing short of world-class. "Our team learns every day on the job, but after a while that learning curve starts to flatten," says Flour + Water co-executive chef and VP Ryan Pollnow, who admits that while he and co-chef/CEO Thomas McNaughton have played their share of "away games" as guest chefs in other kitchens, this was the first time they'd ever brought in another restaurant into Flour + Water's intimate cooking space. "To bring in a guest chef for a night, all of a sudden the week leading up to it and the week following, everyone's passion for food is ignited and we're all learning from that chef," Pollnow says, citing the importance of a fresh perspective. "This cross-pollination of ideas really helps spark future inspiration for both of our teams." For one of its three West Coast Summer Series collaborations, Flour + Water welcomed co-owners Louis Lin (Chef) and Jolyn Chen (GM) of Portland's standout Xiao Ye and the resulting presentations were sparkling: A khao soi sorprese married Xiao Ye's penchant for Asian flavors with Thai yellow curry and chicken nestled within F&W's carefully pinched pasta; very clearly a joint production. While Xiao Ye's signature masa + mochiko mini madeleines were presented ahead of F&W's noted ricotta of the day with seasonal Early Girl tomatoes and spicy taggiasca XO, a loosening of the grip of sorts by the hosts to showcase touches of what makes its guests shine and an exponential payoff for the evening's lucky diners. TABLES 1
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