Bohemian San Francisco Part 7

But in San Francisco they do things differently. There are a number of paste factories, all good and all clean. Take that of P. Fiorini, for instance, at a point a short distance above Costa Brothers. You cannot miss it for it has a picture of Fiorini himself as a sign, and on it he tells you that if you eat his paste you will get to be as fat as he is.

Go inside and you will find that Fiorini can talk just enough English to make himself understood, while his good wife, his sole a.s.sistant, can neither speak nor understand any but her native Italian. But that does not bother her in the least, for she can make signs, and you can understand them even better than you understand the English of her husband.

Here you will see the making of raviolis by the hundred at a time.

Tagliarini, tortilini, macaroni, spaghetti, capellini, percatelli, tagliatelli, and all the seventy and two other varieties. The number of kinds of paste is most astonishing, and one wonders why there are so many kinds and what is done with them. Fiorini will tell you that each kind has its distinctive use. Some are for soups, some for sauces, and all for special edibility. There are hundreds of recipes for cooking the various pastes and each one is said to be a little better than the others, if you can imagine such a thing.

Turn another corner after leaving Fiorini's and look down into a bas.e.m.e.nt. You do not have to go to the country to see wine making. Here is one of the primitive wine presses of Italy, and if you want to know why some irreverent people call the red wine of the Italians "Chateau la Feet," you have but to watch the process of its making in these Telegraph Hill wine houses. The grapes are poured into a big tub and a burly man takes off his shoes and socks and emulates the oxen of Biblical times when it treaded out the grain. Of course he washes his feet before he gets into the wine tub. But, at that, it is not a pleasant thing to contemplate. Now you look around with wider and more comprehensive eyes, and now you begin to understand something about these strange foreign quarters in San Francisco. As you look around you note another thing. Italian fecundity is apparent everywhere, and the farther up the steep slope of the Hill you go the more children you see.

They are everywhere, and of all sizes and ages, in such reckless profusion that you no longer wonder if the world is to be depopulated through the coming of the fad of Eugenics. The Italian mother has but two thoughts--her G.o.d and her children, and it is to care for her children that she has brought from her native land the knowledge of cookery, and of those things that help to put life and strength in their bodies.

An Italian girl said to us one day:

"Mama knows nothing but cooking and going to church. She cooks from daylight until dark, and stops cooking only when she is at church."

It was evident that her domestic and religious duties dominated her life, and she knew but two things--to please her G.o.d and to care for her family, and without question if occasion demanded the pleasure of her family took precedence.

San Francisco's Latin quarter is appealing, enticing and hypnotizing. Go there and you will learn why San Francisco is a bohemian city. You will find out that so many things you have thought important are really not at all worth while. Go there and you will find the root of Bohemian restaurants. These people have studied gastronomy as a science, and they have imparted their knowledge to San Francisco, with the result that the Bohemian spirit enters into our very lives, and our minds are broadened, and our views of life and our ideas have a wider scope. It is because of this condition, born on the slopes of Telegraph Hill, that we are drawn out of depressing influences, out of the spirit of self-consciousness, and find a world of pleasure, innocent and educational, the inspiration for which has been handed down through generations of Latina since the days of early Roman empire, which inspiration is still a power for good because it takes people out of themselves and places them where they can look with understanding and speak the language of perception. Little Italy's charm has long been recognized by artists and writers, and many of them began their careers which led to fame and fortune in little cheap rooms on Telegraph Hill. Here have lived many whose names are now known to fame, and to name them would be almost like a directory of world renowned artists and writers. Here is still the memory of Bret Harte and Mark Twain. Here is where Keith had his early studio.

Cadena.s.so, Martinez, and many others know these slopes and love them.

To all these and many more the Latin Quarter of San Francisco possessed a charm they could find nowhere else, and if one desire to bring a saddened look to the faces of many now living elsewhere it is but necessary to talk of the good old days when Bohemia was on Telegraph Hill in San Francisco. Here they had their domicile, and here they foregathered in the little restaurants, whose claims to merit lay chiefly in the fact that they were rarely visited by other than the Italians of the quarter and these Bohemians who lived there.

Here was the inspiration of many a good book and many a famous picture whose inception came from thoughts that crystallized amid these surroundings, and here many a needy Bohemian struggled through the lean days with the help of these kind-hearted Latina. Here they, even as we, were taught something of the art of cooking.

Of course, if one desire to learn various methods of preparing food, it is necessary to keep both eyes open and to ask many questions, seeking the information that sometimes comes from unlooked for sources. Even at that it is not always a good idea to take everything for granted or to accept every suggestion, for you may meet with the Italian vegetable dealer who is so eager to please his customers that he pretends a knowledge he does not possess. We discovered him one day when he had on display a vegetable that was strange to us.

"How do you cook it?" was our question.

"Fry it."

Then his partner shouted his laughter and derision.

"Oh, he's one fine cook. All the time he say 'fry it.' One day a lady she come into da store an' she see da big bucket of ripe olives. Da lady she from the East and she never see olives like dat before. 'How you cook it?' say da lady. 'Fry it,' say my partner. Everything he say fry it."

In another vegetable stand we found an Italian girl, whose soft lisping accent p.r.o.nounced her a Genoese, and she, diffidently suggested "a fine Italian dessert."

A Fine Desert

"You take macaroons and strawberries. Put a layer of macaroons in a dish and then a layer of strawberries, cover these with sugar, and then another layer of macaroons and strawberries and sugar until you have all you want. Over these pour some rum and set fire to it. After it is burned out you have a fine dessert."

We bought the macaroons and strawberries on the way home and did not even wait for dinner time to try it. We p.r.o.nounce it good.

It was made the right way and we advise you to try it, for it is simple and leaves a most delicious memory.

Where Fish Come In

It was very early one morning. So early that one of us strenuously pretended sleep while the other gave urgent reminder that this was the day we were to go to Fishermen's Wharf. Daylight came early and it was just four o'clock when we began preparations. A cup of hot coffee while dressing served to get us wide-awake, and we were off to see the fish come in.

Fishermen's Wharf lies over at North Beach, at the end of Meiggs's Wharf, where the Customs Officers have their station, and to reach it one takes either the Powell and North Beach cars, or the Kearny and North Beach cars, and at the end of either walks two blocks. When you get that far anybody you see can tell you where to go.

Fog mist was stealing along the Marin sh.o.r.e, and hiding Golden Gate when we arrived, and the rays of the sun took some time to make a clear path out to sea. Out of the bank of white came gliding the heavy power boats of the Sicilian and Corsican fishermen, while from off sh.o.r.e were the ghostly lateen rigged boats of those who had been fishing up the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers, their yards aslant to catch the faint morning breeze. As they slipped through the leaden water to their mooring at the wharf we could see the decks and holds piled with fish and crabs.

Roosting on piles, and lining the water's edge on everything that served to give foothold, were countless seagulls, all waiting for the breakfast they knew was coming from the discarded fish, and fit companions were the women with shawls over their heads irreverently called mud hens, and old men in dilapidated clothing, who sat along the stringers of the wharf, some with baskets, some with buckets and others with little paper bags, in which to put the fish which they could get so cheaply it meant a meal for them when otherwise they would have to go without. The earlier boats were moored and on the decks fires were burning in charcoal braziers, on which the fishermen cooked their breakfasts of fish and coffee, with the heavy black loaves of bread for which they seem to have special fancy. As the odor of the cooking fish came up from the water the waiting gulls and men and women moved a little closer.

Breakfast over the fishermen turned to the expectant crowd and began taking notice of the pitiful offerings of coin. Tin buckets, newspapers, bags, rags and even scooped hands were held down, each containing such coin as the owner possessed, and in return came bountiful supply of fish. A fine, fat crab for which your market man would charge you forty cents was sold for ten. Beautiful, fresh sand-dabs, but an hour or two out of the water, were five cents a pound, while sea ba.s.s, fresh cod, mackerel, and similar fish went at the same price. Small fish, or white bait, went by quant.i.ty, ten cents securing about half a gallon. Smelt, herring, flounder, sole, all went at equally low prices, and as each buyer secured his allotment he went hurrying off through the mist, as silently as the floating gulls. When these were all supplied the rest of the fish and crabs were taken up to the wharf and put on the counters of the free market, where they were sold at prices most tempting.

Shrimps, alive and active, crayfish, clams, squid and similar sea food was in profusion and sold at prices on a parity with that of the fish.

As the day wore on the early buyers were replaced by those who knew of the free fish market and came to get good supplies for their money. Here were boarding-house keepers, unmistakable anywhere, Bohemians in hard luck who remembered that they could get good food here at a minimum of price, and came now while on the down turn of the wheel. As a human interest study it was better than a study of fish. Fishermen's Wharf is where the independent fishermen bring their catches to San Francisco, but it is not where the city's great supply comes in. To see that we had to go along the docks until we came to the Broadway wharf where Paladini, the head of the fish trust, unloads his tugs of their tons and tons of fish. It is not nearly so interesting to look at, but it gives a good idea of what comes out of the sea every day to supply the needs of San Francisco and the surrounding country. These tugs bring in the catches of dozens of smaller boats manned by fishermen who are toiling out beyond the heads, and up the two great rivers. From far out around the Farallones, from up around the Potato Patch with its mournful fog bell constantly tolling, from down the coast as far as Monterey Bay where fish are in such abundance that it is said they have to give a signal when they want to turn around, from up the rivers, come fish to the man who has grown from the owner of a small sail boat to be the power who controls prices of all the fish that go to the markets of the city.

By the time we finished with Paladini's fish we felt ready for breakfast and took a car down to Davis and Pacific street where we found Bazzuro's serving breakfast to dozens of market gardeners who had finished their unloading, and there, while partaking of the fresh fish we had brought from Fishermen's Wharf, we saw another phase of San Francisco's early morning life. Here were gardeners who came in the darkness of early morning to supply hucksters, small traders and a few thrifty people who knew of the cheapness, and in Columbo market they drove their great wagons and discharged their day's gathering of vegetables of all kinds.

But a few steps away is the great fruit market of the early morning and here tons of the finest fruits are distributed to the hundreds of wagons that crowd the street to such an extent that it takes all the ingenuity of experienced policemen to keep clearway for traffic. Threading their way in and out between the wheels and the heels of horses, were men and women, all looking for bargains in food. Amid a din almost deafening business was transacted with such celerity that in three hours the streets were cleared, fruits and vegetables sold and on their way to distant stands, and the tired policemen leaning against friendly walls, recuperating after the strenuous work of keeping order in chaos.

It is when one goes to these places in the morning and sees the cheapness of these foods that he can understand in a small way why it is that so many Italian restaurants can give such good meals for so little money. One wonders at a table d'hote dinner of six or seven courses for twenty-five cents, or even for half a dollar, and one accustomed to buying meats, fish, vegetables and fruits at the exorbitant prices charged at most of the markets and fruit and vegetable stands now sees why the thrifty foreigner can make and save money while the average American can hardly keep more than two jumps ahead of the sheriff.

Fish in Their Variety

Probably the most frequent question asked us by those who come to San Francisco is: "Where can we get the best fish?" With San Francisco's wonderful natural advantages as a fish market one is sometimes surprised that more attention is not given to preparing fish as a specialty. But one restaurant in the city deals exclusively with sea food, and even there one is astonished at an overlooked opportunity.

Darbee & Immel have catered to San Francisco in oysters for many years and after the fire they opened the Sh.e.l.l Fish Grotto, in O'Farrell street, between Powell and Mason streets, and this is one of the very few distinctive fish restaurants of the country. It is when one considers the possibilities that a shock comes from the environing decorations. White and gold pillars, with twining ivy reaching to the old gold and rose mural and ceiling embellishments seem out of place in a restaurant that is devoted entirely to catering to lovers of fish.

Nothing in the place indicates its character except the big lobster in front of the building. Not even so much as a picture to bring a sentiment of the ocean to the mind.

We are going to take a liberty, and possibly Darbee & Immel may call it an impertinence, and give them a bit of advice. It costs them nothing consequently they can act on it or not and it will make no difference.

This is our suggestion:

Change the interior of the place entirely by having around the walls a series of large gla.s.s aquaria, with as many different kinds of fish swimming about as it is possible to get; something on the order of the interior of the aquarium in Battery Park in New York. Paint the ceiling to represent the surface of the water as seen from below. Have seaweed and kelp in place of ivy, and a fish net or two caught up in the corners of the room, with here and there a starfish or a crab--not too many, for profuseness in this sort of decoration is an abomination. Then you will have a restaurant that will be talked about wherever people sit at meat.

But to get back to our talk about fish, and where to get it prepared and cooked the best. We must say that the finest fish we have eaten in San Francisco was not in the high-priced restaurants at all, but in a little, dingy back room, down at Fishermen's Wharf, where there was sand on the floor and all the sounds of the kitchen were audible in the dining room. The place was patronized almost solely by the Italian fishermen who not only know how to catch a fish but how it ought to be cooked. One may always rest a.s.sured that when he gets a fish in one of the Italian restaurants it is perfectly fresh, for there are two things that an Italian demands in eating, and they are fresh fish and fresh vegetables.

At the Gianduja at Union and Stockton streets, one is certain to get fish cooked well and that it is perfectly fresh. The variety is not so good as at the Sh.e.l.l Fish Grotto, but otherwise it is just as good in every respect. At the Grotto there is a wonderful variety but the quant.i.ty is at the minimum because there, too, they will have no fish that has been twenty-four hours out of the water.

One wonders how a full course dinner entirely of fish can be prepared, but if you will go to the Sh.e.l.l Fish Grotto you will find that it is done, and done well at that. Here you can get a good dinner for one dollar, or if you prefer it they have a Fish Dinner de Luxe for which they charge two dollars. Both are good, the latter having additional wines and delicacies.

Down in Washington street, just off Columbus avenue, is the Vesuvius, an Italian restaurant of low price, but excellent cooking. A specialty there is fish which is always brought fresh from the nearby Clay street market as ordered, consequently is perfect. When you give your order a messenger is dispatched to the market and usually he brings the fish alive and the chef prepares it in one of his many ways, for he is said to have more secrets about the cooking of fish than one would think it possible for one brain to contain. The trouble about this restaurant is that the rest of the menu does not come up to the fish standard, but if you desire a simple luncheon of fish there is no better place to get it.

There are three things in which an Easterner will be disappointed in San Francisco, and these are oysters. Pacific Coast oysters fail in size, flavor and cooking, when compared with the luscious bivalve of the Atlantic, so far as the ordinary forms of preparation is concerned. Even fancy dishes, such as Oysters Kirkpatrick, would be better if made of the eastern oyster, not what they call the eastern oyster here, for that is a misnomer, but the oysters that grow in the Atlantic Ocean.

Of the Pacific oysters the best is the Toke Point, that comes from Oregon. They are similar in size to the Blue Point, but lack the flavor.

When, in a San Francisco restaurant, you are asked what sort of oyster you will have, and you see the familiar names on the menu card, remember that these are transplanted oysters, and have lost much of their flavor in the transplanting, or else they are oysters that have been shipped across the continent and have thereby lost their freshness.

The California oyster proper, is very small, and it has a peculiar coppery taste, which bon vivants declare adds to its piquancy. Instead of ordering these by the dozen you order them by the hundred, it being no difficult task to eat an hundred at a meal, especially when prepared in a pepper roast.

Everyone knows the staple ways of preparing oysters, and every chef looks upon the oyster as the source of new flavors in many dishes, but to our mind the best way we have found in San Francisco was at a little restaurant down in Washington street before the fire. It was the Buon Gusto. where they served fish and oysters better than anything else because the owners were the chefs, and they were from the island of Catalan, off the coast of Italy. Their specialty was called "Oysters a la Catalan," and their recipe, which is given, can be prepared excellently in a chafing dish:

Oysters a la Catalan

Take one tablespoonful of b.u.t.ter, two teaspoonfuls grated Edam or Parmesan cheese, four tablespoonfuls catsup, one-half teaspoonful Worcestershire sauce, two tablespoonfuls cream, meat of one good-sized crab cut fine and two dozen oysters. Put the cheese and b.u.t.ter into a double boiler and when melted smooth add the catsup and Worcestershire sauce. Mix well and add the cream and then the crab meat. When creamy and boiling hot drop in the oysters. As soon as the oysters are crinkled serve on hot b.u.t.tered toast on hot plates.