Category Archives: Great Finds

Maria Isabel Hits It Right Out of the Gate

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Duck carnitas enmolada with four different moles at Maria Isabel.
Duck carnitas enmolada with four different moles at Maria Isabel.

Husband-and-wife chefs, Sayat and Laura Ozyilmaz, may have opened their first restaurant, Dalida in San Francisco’s Presidio, three years ago, but you’d never know it from how tough it remains to land a table there.

So, it’s no surprise that this spring when the couple opened their follow-up, Maria Isabel, it immediately became one of the most sought-after reservations around.

Naturally, it also garnered widespread praise, including landing last month on Bon Appetit’s list of “Best New Restaurants” of 2026.

To say that San Francisco has been hungering for a restaurant like this is an understatement.

The city has no shortage of burrito joints, taco trucks, and homey mom-and-pop Mexican restaurants. It even boasts the only Michelin three-starred Mexican restaurant in the world: Californios.

The entrance.
The entrance.
The mural across from the host stand.
The mural across from the host stand.

But what was in short supply was a Mexican restaurant that was more upscale than those family-owned neighborhood stalwarts, yet more dressed-down than the ultra glam, highly finessed, special-occasion Californios.

Enter Maria Isabel, named for Laura’s sister, Maria, and her mother, Isabel.

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The Best Kind of Picnic

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This bright and sunny cake is unusual in that it's actually made with saltine crackers.
This bright and sunny cake is unusual in that it’s actually made with saltine crackers.

Charcuterie and wine may be the usual mainstays of picnics.

But a picnic all about cake and nothing but cake?

Now, that’s the stuff of dreams — and surely worth the sugar high and food coma to follow.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock or eschewing all carbs (say what?), then you know all about the phenomenon known as Cake Picnic.

It is the fantastical creation of the Bay Area’s Elisa Sunga, who dove head-first into baking during the pandemic and chronicled her exploits along the way online.

As a devoted gathering of followers ensued, she got the idea in April 2004 to invite those willing to a cake picnic in San Francisco. All they had to do is show up at the park with a whole cake to share.

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Yutori Brings A Certain Specific and Beloved Taste of Japan

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Aburi don bento from Yutori in Palo Alto.
Aburi don bento from Yutori in Palo Alto.

If you’ve ever traveled to Japan, then you know full well the much-deserved affection for konbini culture.

Be it 7-Eleven, FamilyMart or Lawson, Japanese convenience stores seem stocked with most anything and everything needed in life, including an astonishing array of snacks and prepared foods that are not only fresh and delicious, but jaw-droppingly cheap. Talk to anyone who’s ever shopped at them and you’ll get an earful of wistful longing for those cushiony egg salad sandos, seaweed-wrapped rice balls, wasabi potato chips, assorted bentos, and so much more.

Yutori, which opened in Palo Alto this spring, brings a modern taste of that to the Bay Area.

Named for the Japanese word for “spaciousness” or “room to breathe,” this 5,000-square-foot space comprises a coffee bar, small marketplace selling Japanese home goods, and a takeout deli. Before the year ends, it will also add a sit-down restaurant.

Located on El Camino Real.
Located on El Camino Real.

I paid a visit a few days ago, specifically to check out the konbini-like offerings in the refrigerator cases. The array of bentos, onigiri, and sandos will definitely remind you of Japan.

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Great Finds, Part II: The Dumpling Class

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Pork-Wagyu beef dumplings, cooked and ready to eat, that my friend Charlen and I made in Eddie Lo's class.
Pork-Wagyu beef dumplings, cooked and ready to eat, that my friend Charlen and I made in Eddie Lo’s class.

For a dozen years, Eddie Lo was on the tech fast track in Silicon Valley.

After graduating with a bachelor’s in industrial engineering degree from the University of California at Berkeley, followed by a master’s in operations research and information engineering from Cornell University, he worked at such heavy weights as Cisco, YouTube, Google and Coinbase.

Then, he made a major pivot.

He traded project management of cryptocurrency and data for pleating Chinese dumplings instead.

Lo launched “Eating with Edmund,” hands-on dumpling classes at his San Francisco home, four and a half years ago. Since then, he’s taught more than 5,000 people.

His 3-hour classes, limited to a maximum of eight people at a time, consistently sell out, too. They are priced at $129 per person.

Eddie Lo in his home kitchen.
Eddie Lo in his home kitchen.

“Tech was a lot of yelling and a lot of stress,” he says. “It wasn’t my happy place. The happiest I am is when I’m cooking.”

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Great Finds, Part I: The Soy Sauce

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LivCookEat Finishing Soy Sauce drizzled on dumplings from Dumpling City in Palo Alto.
LivCookEat Finishing Soy Sauce drizzled on dumplings from Dumpling City in Palo Alto.

When tasting a product that’s billed as superior to another, sometimes you end up going back and forth and back and forth, concentrating with all your might to discern whether truly significant differences do exist.

Other times, all it takes is one taste to know that one completely outshines the other.

Such was the case when I tried a sample of LivCookEat Soy Sauce against my usual Kikkoman Less Sodium Soy Sauce.

Granted, I did not do my tasting blind. However, when I had my husband try the soy sauces, I didn’t tell him which was which. Even so, he immediately guessed which one was the LivCookEat Soy Sauce because it tasted far smoother.

What sets it apart?

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