Fondue Cowboy - Fondue Deliciousness in San Francisco's SOMA

I'd heard about Fondue Cowboy opening up in the city, and as soon as the word fondue was mentioned I knew I'd have to eat there.  I just can't understand why it took me so long.  (I do know, it's because sometimes when you want to go eat and that place isn't far away you still think it is because you live on huge hill in SF and don't want to walk home after a giant meal of cheese.)  Anyway, I finally made it to Fondue Cowboy and I'm pleased to announce it was everything I hoped for and more.

Now, before you "Melting Pot" lovers jump out of your seats and head to Fondue Cowboy let me first tell you that their menu is limited.  This to me is not necessarily a bad thing.  I see a limited menu as a way to show patrons the restaurant is focusing on making a few items awesome rather than many items okay.  There are five cheesy fondue choices and three chocolatey delicious dessert choices.  There are not hot oil, boiling meat choices - go for shabu shabu if you want that.  The other issue I'd like to go ahead and nip in the bud, is the complaint I saw on Yelp about how the portions are small.  Do you really need to be eating more than 5oz of cheese in one meal?  I thought not.

Okay, onto my awesome evening...

I made reservations on OpenTable just in case the place was super hoppin' on a Wednesday night.  Bob and I met up with Jay and Staci for a long-time-no-see dinner, so of course we ended up order two bottles of cabernet throughout dinner, delish.  We ordered two cheese fondues for the table: The Outlaw (Aged Cheddar, Beer, Slow Roasted Tomatoes, Roasted Garlic, Roasted Jalapeno, Cilantro) and The Rawhide (Italian Dolce Gorgonzola, Emmenthaler, White Wine, Bacon, Roasted Garlic).  Both fondues were good, but the Rawhide definitely stood out in my mind because of how rich and creamy it was, plus there was bacon.  Each cheese fondue arrives with dippers like: bread, potatoes, broccoli, olives, granny smith apples and gherkins.  We went all out and also ordered the cured meats plate (comes with honeydew and cantaloupe), the tenderloin plate, and the sausage plate.  It was a meat and cheese extravaganza at our table. 

I thought all the dippers for the cheese fondue were great, but I was especially glad we ordered the sausage plate because that night it was Louisiana Hot Links.  The combination of the hot links with the Rawhide was heavenly, the perfect complements.  

After we'd devoured all our food, and painstakingly scrapped the bottom of the fondue pots to soak up every last bit of cheese, it was time for dessert.  We went with the Happy Trails (Dark Chocolate with Cayenne).  The dessert fondues come with strawberries, kiwi, banana, pineapple, brownie chunks, marshmallows, and spongy-bready-cookie things.  The one dessert pot was perfect for us, and a couple of us enjoyed a nice French Press coffee to go with our dessert.  

Total came out to about $200, and about $100 of it was the wine, so really we're looking at about $25 a person for delicious cheesy, meaty, chocolatey fondue.  The place is cute and intimate, and the service was great.  I had an overall wonderful evening and can hardly wait to return!

Say giddy-up cowboy and gallop over now!

:)Margaret

Oegadgib (Don't ask me how to say it) Korean BBQ

On Saturday, I was terribly hung over and in need of something substantial to cure what ailed me. I convinced a friend to let me introduce him to Korean food so we drove out to Annandale for lunch. Annandale is basically the Koreatown here in the DC metro area and there are Korean restaurants, groceries, noraebangs (karaoke rooms), and shops. I love Korean food but it's a bit of a drive for me and I loathe the Virginia suburbs, so seldom do I get out there. Anyway, when you arrive at Oegadgib, don't be deterred by the surroundings. An observant person might notice that there's a veterinary clinic right next door and a meat market in front of the restaurant. I'm just saying...

Well, once you enter the restaurant, you are greeted by the smell of grilling meat, garlic, and chilis. Here comes the first challenge. I'm not convinced the waitstaff speak English. If you've never had Korean food, you might have a challenge here, but if you are up for an adventure you'll be fine. The menu is in English and Korean, but sometimes it doesn't really explain what you are ordering. We did the point and nod thing and made sure to smile and be polite and everything worked out. Your best bet is to order the all-you-can-eat bbq. For $16.99 you get a plate with three meats--two cuts of beef and pork belly. In addition to the meat, you get an endless supply of banchan, which are the various side dishes commonly served in Korean restaurants. There was the typical cabbage kimchee, bean sprouts, spinach, sliced radishes, some chewy little things that looked like translucent crinkle cut fries but were probably made with seaweed, and of course we had two soups.

The doenjjang jigae, or fermented soy bean stew, was perfect. Pungent, spicy, piping hot and filled with big chunks of tofu and a hearty serving of potatoes and zucchini. My friend was scared of the egg soufflé but his fears were quickly allayed after he had a taste. Well, first he burned himself on the steaming fluffy egg mixture, but then he fell in love. What do they put in there? It seems like only egg but there’s got to be something else to make it taste so good.

On to the meats…. I’m a big fan of samgyupsal, or pork belly. But this time it seemed like the cut was too thick. The meat took forever to cook and was tough and chewy. We left a few slices of that on the plate. The best had to be the thinly sliced beef. Dip it in a little bit of the pepper sauce for a sweet and spicy kick or the sesame oil dip if you like salty and earthy flavors. For me, it was all about the gochujjang (pepper sauce). Although this place is all you can eat, with only two of us we were struggling to get through the original plate they served us. But we are troopers, and southern to boot, so there would be no wasted food! We polished off the meat, most of the soup and egg soufflé, and the better part of all the side dishes. It seemed like such a good idea at the time, but 10 hours later when the taste of garlic still lingered in every breath I took and I couldn’t even think of having dinner, I realized maybe I shouldn’t have eaten a pound of meat and several raw garlic cloves. It did, however, go a long way to curing my hangover.