The last time I visited San Francisco’s Californios, it was 2021, when I dined outside in its well-appointed patio as the world was still maneuvering its way out of a global pandemic.
When I returned earlier this month, it was to a table inside its splashy main dining room, with its patio now relegated to special events only.
Times may have changed, but one thing has remained constant: Californios remains the only Mexican restaurant in the country to hold two Michelin stars. Celebrating the restaurant’s 11th anniversary this year, Chef-Owner Val Cantu and his wife/co-owner Carolyn Cantu have held that honor for 8 years, too.
An evening here is every bit as exalted as that distinction demands.
I love introducing friends and family to this restaurant, because it’s a good bet that unless they’ve traveled to Mexico City, they will not have experienced modern Mexican cuisine as exhilarating as this.
The mood is set from the moment you step inside the artsy dining room. Painted the very darkest of grays, the walls get pops of brilliant color from bold, abstract paintings. It’s like dining inside the chicest art gallery.
The 13-course tasting menu is $325 that’s prepaid at the time you make your reservation. Wine pairing is $197; and a spirit-free pairing is $95.
On a Tuesday night for a dinner that is probably a 3-hour commitment at minimum, it was astonishing to see the dining room full. It speaks to what a draw this restaurant continues to be.
A booklet presented, which you’re encouraged to hold off on opening until the end, outlines the restaurant’s philosophy, and its menu, as well as names the farmers and purveyors from which it sources. Not only that, it also list the entire restaurant team, from the executive chef to the food runners and porters.
After being seated, you’re welcomed with your choice of aqua frescas: horchata infused with Marcona almonds and warm winter spices; tangy passion fruit-pomegranate with coconut water; and a concentrated Satsuma soda muddled with Makrut lime leaves grown on the patio that tastes like an entire citrus orchard in a glass.
A heavy volcanic stone is set before you. At its center is a bite-sized sope, made with corn from Californios’ partner farm in Santa Rosa, Tierra Vegetables that also grows many of the chiles used at the restaurant. It holds a creamy mixture made of three different beans: Anasazi, borlotti, and gigante. It’s topped with a mound of caviar that Tsar Nicoulai makes using Californios’ own smoked salt. The restaurant goes one step further by smoking the caviar again before using it. The result is a wonderfully chewy base full of deep corn flavor that is imbued with smokiness through and through.
Next up, the prettiest blue corn tostada topped with sweet local Dungeness crab, smoked trout roe, creamy serrano crema, and delicate shiso flowers The tiniest disks of paper-thin serrano chile ring its circumference adding a grassy note plus a big tickle of heat that lingers on the lips.
A ceramic sea urchin shell hints at what’s inside: a thick masa ball known as bocol that’s crunchy outside and creamy inside almost Japanese okonomiyaki-like that gets filled with a three-mushroom picadillo that has a dark chocolate note to it. Santa Barbara uni and shaved Alba white truffles top it off majestically.
The palate gets a reset with bracing, acidic, and spicy California spiny lobster finished in an aquachile rojo made with blood orange and cara cara oranges, and garnished with finger lime pearls and Fresno chile coins. A small spoon is provided so you can sip every bit of the liquid, and you should because it is that invigorating.
Ceviche of abalone from Monterey Bay gets served in its own iridescent shell with abalone gelee and an icy granita of fermented carrot juice. A nice touch is the garnish of succulents from the Garden at Meadowood in St. Helena.
For years, the most famous dish at this restaurant has been one that is daring, confounding, and shouldn’t work but somehow does. Of course, I’m speaking of the signature caramelized banana with dulce de leche and caviar, not a dessert but a savory course.
Chef de Cuisine Kaylin Lloyd thought the time had come to take that dish even further. The new incarnation still includes banana, but now it’s grilled and incorporated into a creamy flan made with jamon Serrano and date jus. The banana flavor gets upped with fried plantain chips arranged almost like scales on a fish. And there’s still plenty of Tsar Nicoulai caviar for that touch of buttery saltiness. It is a dish that makes you sit up and take notice. And it’s every bit as memorable as the original.
Next come a series of tacos, served with accompaniments of key lime wedges, lightly pickled Persian cucumber slices, lacto-fermented carrots and red onions, and roasted habanero salsa.
I am a sucker for fish tacos, and the fried black cod one on a sourdough tortilla is hands down the most gorgeous one I’ve ever had. Fried in a mezcal batter, it’s garnished with a grilled poblano and Anaheim pepper salsa, then adorned with precise dots of huitlacoche and corn crema. The fish is so crispy against the tender, yielding tortilla.
That’s followed by another fish taco done completely differently. Bodega Bay rockfish is cooked on an open-hearth so its scales puff up in the heat and become edible. Sitting atop a hickory corn tortilla, it’s garnished with tomatillo, kohlrabbi and chayote, and a charred lime salsa. The citrus taste really comes through against the contrast of this more rustic tasting corn tortilla.
The last taco is a fall-apart tender Flannery beef short rib atop a black masa tortilla with black trumpet mushroom salsa and wasabi crema. It is earthy, rich, and full of deep umami flavor.
Mole is one of the most complex sauces around, and that’s evident when a server presents a groaning basket that holds all the key ingredients for this particular mole, including Oaxacan coffee, black garlic, aged kombu, cashews, dates, chiles, and plantains. In fact, it takes three days to make this sauce from start to finish.
You can taste all that effort in the smoked Wolfe quail napped with the thick, dark mole that’s earthy, chocolate-y, and subtly fruity tasting. Use the accompanying sesame-flecked tortillas to mop up every bit of the delightful sauce.
Then pick up the wrapped quail leg that’s been smoked and dusted in dried chiles. The skin is crispy and the flesh so juicy that you only wish you could have another.
A bowl of exotic fruit is presented at the table to show the ingredients in the intermezzo that arrives next. It’s an icy, refreshing bowl of cherimoya semifreddo with pearls of Buddha’s Hand citrus that gets topped with nasturtium flowers and a drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil.
Chocolate lovers will rejoice at the Mexican dark chocolate bar that arrives next. It’s soft like ganache, and as smooth in texture as a fine silk stocking. Decorated with amaranth, persimmon, and preserved Meyer lemon, it gets a final flourish at the table when Marshall Farms honey that’s been frozen via liquid nitrogen gets spooned over the top in a wisp of fog.
The final wave of sweets follows, enough to cover the table and make a kid of any age grin from ear to ear. There are warm, sugar-crusted empanadas filled with Barlett pear; a riff on a choco taco, this one filled with orange sorbet and coffee ice cream; and scoops of intense Marcona almond ice cream flavored with pixtle, the toasted seed of the mamey sapote fruit, that heightens the nutty quality.
There are also spheres of lime cotton candy hiding a center of tamarindo and raspberry ice pop with chile morita tajin for a burst of tang and spice.
Lastly, there are mignardises of gold leaf-flecked caramels, white chocolate-covered marshmallows accented with preserved passion fruit; and candied mandarin segments dipped in chocolate that shatter like glass from being nixtamalized.
As a last token, you’re given a small bottle of house-made vanilla extract to take home.
It’s a sweet reminder of an evening not soon forgotten.
