The duck is all that. But don’t sleep on the seaweed noodles, either.
Not at Michelin-starred The Progress.
It’s hard to believe that it’s now a dozen years since this restaurant opened in the Fillmore district, the follow-up to its game-changing big sister, Michelin-starred State Bird Provisions (right next door) that dared to take the idea of dim sum-style carts and apply it to global, tapas-style share plates.
Husband-and-wife chefs Stuart Brioza and Nicole Krasinski then added The Anchovy Bar around the corner six years ago.
If the Fillmore has turned into their kingdom, then there’s no shortage of loyal subjects. When I arrived a few minutes before 5:30 p.m. on a Saturday at The Progress, there was already a lively crowd dining at The Anchovy Bar; and sizeable lines outside both State Bird Provisions and The Progress, filled with folks like myself who had a reservation and others hoping to snag a walk-in seat.
With Bay Area diners always flocking to the hot new thing, it says a lot that these places still command such eagerness and excitement.
With their eclectic dishes that spotlight local ingredients and are just plain fun to share, Brioza and Krasinski have definitely hit on a winning formula.
A century-old building that was once a movie theater, The Progress boasts a soaring lath ceiling done up with narrow strips of light wood. On the main floor, there’s seating in the bar area, as well as the main dining room, along with upstairs tables in the mezzanine. If you’re a party of two, just know that the two-tops are barely a couple inches from one another, so this might not be the ideal place if you’re hoping to have a private conversations.
But if you’re in the mood for a good and lively time, you’ve hit the jackpot.
Who can resist something called “Caviar Potato Cloud” ($14)? Out comes a bowl with a foamy head that hides caviar along with crispy little potato chips. The creamy foam tastes like potatoes, too, giving you the salty taste of chips & dip that hits you full throttle but then disappears like mist in the night.
If you’re already familiar with Josey Baker Bread, then you’ll be happy to see his Seed Feast bread ($14) on the menu that comes with soft honey herb butter. You’ll definitely want to order it — not only because his whole wheat sourdough loaf adorned with toasted sunflower, pumpkin seeds, and flax seeds is so wonderfully crusty-chewy, but to support Baker, who is still rebounding from a fire at his San Francisco bakery in June.
More of his fabulous bread forms the foundation of Smoked Tuna Belly Toast ($17). Slices of the rustic bread get draped with the meaty tuna that’s as smoky as pastrami, and slices of pickled Turkish peppers. Talk about perfect picnic food.
A salad of chunky cucumbers ($19) is quenching and crunchy, but also filled with umami from seaweed and salinity from smoked roe. Beech mushrooms add more tender texture, and a touch of Half Moon Bay Wasabi a floral note with a quickly-dissipating hint of sharpness.
More mushrooms — this time fruity chanterelles ($28) — star with smoked poblano, gooey wood-fired cheese and unexpected Concord grapes. The mushrooms are at once smoky and even juicy with melted cheese always making everything better.
Sorpresine ($31) are small tortellino shaped a little like fortune cookies and with a silky texture akin to wonton wrappers. They’re filled with ricotta and zucchini, then gently tossed with what looks at first like orange cherry tomatoes but are actually husk cherries that have a bright, tangy taste like tomato crossed with pineapple.
My favorite dish of the night? You’ve probably already guessed that it’s those brown butter seaweed noodles ($30). Green and slippery, the long noodles get tossed with oyster mushrooms, all in a tomato-kale dashi, before being blanketed in large shavings of bonito. This is an uamai lover’s dream with a wellspring of smoky seafood-y savoriness.
The Asian-style fried whole McFarland Springs trout ($74) gets quite the presentation. It’s carried to the table on a long wooden board with lettuce leaves and a nectarine-chile fish sauce. The fish is crisp all over, with its body already scored to make picking up neat pieces easy. Plop one in a lettuce wrap and roll up with some sauce. Then, dig into the collar to extract the meat there, as well as the prized cheeks.
Then comes the famed barbecue Liberty Farms half duck ($82), with its thin, rosy slices of meat fanned out on a large round platter. The wing and drumstick are at 12 o’clock. In the center is crispy fried rice made even better with crunchy peanuts. The duck is so tender and so smoky that you savor every slice slowly and deliberately.
For dessert, there are cocoa old-fashioned donut holes ($16) that are fluffy like cake donuts with a crisp sugar coating. They arrive with luscious butter pecan ice cream.
The apple-blackberry mille-feuille ($16) feature buttery, flaky palmier-like pastry with sesame seeds that sandwiches the pieces of fruit along with thyme diplomat cream. I loved the minty, woodsy herb taste that permeated.
Of course, you can’t leave without ordering the dessert made famous from day one at State Bird Provisions and is fortunately featured here, as well. Of course, I’m talking about “World Peace” Peanut Milk ($4).
It’s cold, creamy and rich — and tastes spectacularly like a liquid Snickers bar, thanks to the interplay of Spanish peanuts, milk, cream, vanilla bean, muscovado sugar and brown rice syrup.
Moreover, there’s no denying we could all do with a little more “World Peace” these days.