At one time were UK foods better represented in the Bay Area, and do any restaurants here serve more contemporary UK foods (whatever that may be—- the Guardian has one of the best food sections I can think of, definitely so for vegetarian friendly food)
There are strains of UK foods available—- some tea rooms might be noteworthy. Other than that, it’s pub foods, mostly common stuff—— shepherds pie, fish and chips, pot pie, bangers and mash, or foods integrated into American cuisine. Are there any UK restaurants or bakeries that expats are fond of? (If we’re talking British Isles, I think there are enough Irish bakeries and pubs to exceed the 6 location maximum for inclusion in this list).
Considering how many British descendants and British influence of this country, British Isle foods are simply “underrepresented” compared to Italian, French, Japanese, Chinese…etc.
Greetings from a New Yorker! Love this post, don’t mind me adding. Several more up my sleeve (esp. regarding regional Indian cuisine), so hmu if anyone’s down to grab dinner sometime.
Armenia - La Mediteranee
Argentina - el Porteño
Australia - Australian products Co
Bhutan - Himalayan Flavors (berkeley, has Ema Datsi)
Bolivia - Pena pachamama (raw/live food, vegan)
Cambodia - Braised + Bread has num pang
Fiji - Fiji Sweets (Hayward)
Hungary - paprika, crixa cakes, 20th century cafe
Iceland - Katy’s Kreek
Saudi - Dish-dash, San Jose
Moldova - New World Market has Vertuta
Uk - crown & crumpet, you say tomato
Uruguay - lolinda has chivito
Welcome to HO! An epic first post! Do you live here for good now?
I had thought Dish Dash (at least the one in Sunnyvale) was run by Lebanese. Are they actually Saudis?
Oh, We should talk about regional Indian. At some point I was thinking about pulling a @Hyperbowler and do a Regional Indian discussion
But never got around to it. But I must say there is a wealth of regional Indian, especially in the South Bay. So please feel free to start such a discussion! Separately I still need to get around to posting about Annachikadai, the thali on banana leaf place in Mountain View.
These are great, thank you! Have you found anything here that you haven’t found in New York?
I will try to check out Fiji sweets soon.
How is the food at Paprika?
How did I miss Armenia? I believe Royal Market is Armenian owned too. Considering our proximity to Fresno, it’s surprising to have so few Armenian restaurants.
I was surprised to find more than six Argentina and Cambodia restaurants, which is why I hadn’t included those in the original post.
I’m definitely grabbing for straws here, but they also have Icelandic pancakes and ale I believe. You may have better luck with Icelandic groceries at Nordic House in Berkeley perhaps.
Yeah, I’d say Pacific Islander food is much tougher to come by in NYC. I haven’t tried Paprika yet to be honest - just had Hungarian from Cafe Europa which was frankly just ok.
Mea culpa! I was going by their main posted menu and didn’t drill far enough down into the specials menus and submenus. I did find gravlax and something indentified as “Swedish Pancakes (Icelandic, of course)” (which was on the same submenu as Joe’s Special and Huevos Rancheros}.
A truly eclectic menu
[edit to add] There appears to be a sister restaurant in San Ramon, Katy’s Korner, with a similar menu. So now we have two putative Icelandic restaurants.
Chilicali Chef Siska Silitonga occasionally presents a traditional North Sumatra feast called a “lontong.” It consisted of a series of entrees served family style two sauces to spoon over the food. I enjoyed one such banquet at one of her popups. It was a highly informative experience with Chef Siska explaining each dish as brought out and solicited reactions and questions during the meal. I highly recommend it.
