Best bite
Soba Ichi, Oken, Brazen Head, Restaurant Naides, Hayes Valley dining, MORE
WORK • Wednesday Routine
Power flower
MAY SETO WASEM • owner • Grand Lake Kitchen
Neighborhood you live in: Oakland Hills
It’s Wednesday morning. What’s the scene at your workplace?
After I drop off my son at school, I head over to OVRHL in Old Oakland. This place has been my sanctuary for over a year. Officially, it’s hot pilates, but it’s so much more. I’m rarely private about anything, but find myself being shy to talk about it. It’s that good. Next up, I head over to the Oakland Flower Market two blocks away. I do the flowers for all three restaurants and always keep one arrangement for the house to monitor how they’re holding up.
What’s on the agenda for today?
All three of the restaurants are so different from each other. Our restaurant in the Dimond location is a private events and wedding venue, commissary kitchen for catering, hub for our offsite cocktail concessions/hospitality business, and the once home of our pandemic pivot project Carbona Pizza. Today, I’m working on preparing for our next event, SF Art Fair at Fort Mason. It will be the seventh year that we’ll provide our craft cocktail concessions for their VIP reception and the whole fair. It’s my favorite offsite event of the year. Shortly after that wraps, we have a wedding for neighborhood regulars on location in Dimond. We’re working on incorporating the hora into the dining room space, and I can tell the wedding will be so much fun to work.
Any restaurant plans today, tonight, this weekend?
We just went to Soba Ichi in Oakland for the first time — I’m not sure what took us so long. Besides soba, there are so many great dishes that blend Japanese flavors and local produce. It’s a perfect world where the kids can romp around, but the parents don’t have to sacrifice having quality food. Our favorite spot lately is Oken. We were big fans of their cooking when they opened OK’s Deli. Their menu keeps getting better and better with each visit. Last time, we had a short rib ssam set with the most thoughtful panchan and gorgeous little lettuces.
In SF, we keep finding ourselves at old haunts like Brazen Head. Back in our prime, it was the only place that stayed open late enough where we could eat after we served others. The menu, decor, and sensibilities have not changed one bit! Nostalgia is definitely in, and it’s hard to get a table there anymore.
How about a little leisure or culture?
Oakland’s sports teams are so full of life. The Roots soccer and the Ballers baseball games are the best thing we have going. Attending those games is so patriotic, in an incredibly Oakland way. And the weather always seems to be perfect.
Any weekend getaways?
We go to Port Costa every chance we get. Bull Valley Roadhouse is still one of the best meals around. Our son loves the crystal shop and I love the antique store.
When we have more time, we head out to Calaveras County. We have a small contingent of friends who live out there, so we’re always crashing. Our favorite hangout is the Lube Room Saloon in Dorrington. It’s a kid-friendly bar with live music, Big Buck Hunter, and great burgers.
What was your last great vacation?
Last winter, we met up with my high school friend and her family at Nozawaonsen just outside of Nagano for the most idyllic ski vacation. You can walk right up to the lifts from the small village, which is full of natural hot springs in little wooden houses on every corner. At night, there are so many things to eat and drink — small specialty taprooms, a gin distillery, humble speakeasies, a natural wine record bar. The town mascot is a pickled mustard green! Our favorite spot was Tsukushinbo for the tako and a life-changing jacket potato with Hokkaido butter. We’re already planning our next trip back.
Top photo: Remy Anthes
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RESTAURANTS • The Nines
Dining, Hayes Valley
FOUND’s 9 favorite restaurants in the neighborhood. See also: Marina, Chinatown, Castro, Inner Sunset, Noe Valley, Inner Richmond, Outer Richmond.
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