Regular Rose’s Café – San Francisco

If I’ve learned anything about SF, it’s that their food is in a league of its own. The food is SF moves along the same scale the weather. There’s comfortable, there’s warm, and there’s warmer. There’s good, there’s better, and there’s awesome. Good will always be good and great will always be great, and it’s the unremarkably good places like Rose’s Café that serve up a whole new definition of mediocre.

I couldn’t stomach anything heavier than the Beets and Arugula. The goat cheese was whiter than the snow that promises to bury Boston by this time tomorrow, and everything tasted impossibly fresh. You know it’s a good day when your mediocre salad is perfect.

You play poker to win the main pot, but it’s the side bets that bring  in the money and glory. Zoe’s thick-cut and crispy Smoked Bacon was money and makes for a decent breakfast with the Fried Potatoes. I don’t know who Zoe is, but I can’t think of a single flattering reason to have bacon as a namesake. The potatoes were a little undercooked for my liking. Put those sides aside and bite into dense, savory-sweet chunks of Butternut Squash drizzled with sage and parmesan. Lesson learned: make two out of three winning side bets, and you’ve earned yourself a meal.

Rose’s is basic at best, but the basics are pretty much at their best there. And who can really refuse a series of stellar ingredients on pretty little chintz plates? Who can really refuse any food in SF? Bottom line? With so much better brunch all around SF, I don’t see any reason to recommend it or go back, but I also can’t think of a single reason discourage you from trying it at least once.