The last supper in San Francisco – Frances and Bar Agricole

Frances---black-cod-2
Before waving goodbye to San Francisco, we managed to fit in one last meal.  Having heard very good things about Frances, we turned up as it opened at half five hoping to nab a spot at the bar.  

Luckily our punctuality was rewarded and we had a delicious early supper, once again with a farm-to-table approach.  

I started with a baby kale salad with roasted baby carrots, sesame, black olive, mint and grated ricotta.  This was delicious. The still crunchy carrots provided the perfect contrasting texture to rest of the dish. After a few days of excess I was very excited to have so many greens on my plate!

Frances-salad

The boy had some divine squid ink chilli pasta.

Frances-squid-ink-pasta

For the main course we both had the black cod with salsa verde and haricot beans.  There were a few too many beans and too little sauce but the fish itself was expertly cooked – the flesh practically melting into my mouth.

Frances-black-cod

We shared a poppy seed cake with blood orange and crème fraîche for pudding – sadly the sponge was a little dry but the combination and balance of flavours was excellent. 

Frances---dessert

As we had had supper so early we weren’t quite ready to call it a night.  Following a recommendation from our favourite bartender in Tokyo, we headed to Bar Agricole.  With a heavy emphasis on whisky based cocktails, the menu was more tailored to the boy, but meant I was forced to be a little more inventive in my ordering than my usual go-to variations on a martini.  Probably a good thing!  In tribute to the Mexican leg of our trip to come, the first drink I tried from the menu was the tequila fix.  This was delicious – not too sweet and with a spicy kick from the home-made hellfire bitters that I loved.  The planters punch, using agricole (a rum distilled from sugar cane juice, rather than molasses) was also a fruity concoction that didn’t leave too sugary-a coating on my tongue (a pet peeve that I associate with poor quality cocktails).  This is definitely a bar to add to your list if visiting San Francisco.

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