His standout fried rice has the depth of flavor of a long-simmering broth, thanks to Portuguese sausage and a ginger-scallion sauce he learned from a Honolulu chef. Hua’s food is inspired less by the likes of Gary Danko and more by the humble mom-and-pop restaurants he frequented while living on Oahu. There, customers can order his smoked kalua pork sliders on squishy King’s Hawaiian rolls and mochiko chicken, breaded in glutinous rice flour for extra crunch, alongside glasses of natural wine and local beer. He’s now doing that with Unco Frank’s, which pops up at Inner Richmond wine bar High Treason. He later moved to front-of-house positions, but promised himself if he ever went back to cooking, “I would cook for myself.” Panko-crusted cod sandwiches with tartar sauce on King’s Hawaiian rolls from the Unco Frank’s pop-up Provided by Frank Huaįrank Hua spent years on the line at San Francisco fine dining restaurants like Gary Danko and the now-closed, Michelin-starred Ame. Check Instagram for updates on future pop-ups.Ģx4 bBox. 18, at Hayes Valley wine bar Fig & Thistle (429 Gough St., San Francisco) from 5:30 p.m. 2x4 bBox is popping up tonight, Monday, Oct. He’s hoping to find a semipermanent or permanent place to serve their food. Walsh, who was born and raised on Oahu, recently left Mister Jiu’s to focus on 2x4 bBox full time. Walsh and Teramoto met working at Alan Wong’s in Honolulu years ago, then in the Bay Area they were both on the opening team at Mister Jiu’s. She’s also responsible for the pop-up’s rotating desserts, from lilikoi (Hawaiian passion fruit) cheesecake to chocolate chip cookies topped with arare, soy sauce-flavored Japanese rice crackers, instead of salt. Teramoto, a pastry chef whose resume includes the acclaimed Mister Jiu’s, Mourad and Maison Nico, bakes the milk bread sandwich buns. They recreate Walsh’s childhood favorites from scratch, like filet of fish and chicken teriyaki sandwiches. This might look like a spicy salad of thin Japanese somen noodles or a vegetarian take on katsu curry, a breaded tofu sandwich dipped in a Japanese curry sauce served on the side. Provided by 2x4 bBoxĢx4 bBox is an ode to the food that co-owner Sean Walsh misses most from his native Hawaii, overlaid with California sensibilities and techniques he and co-owner Kelly Teramoto absorbed while working at Mister Jiu’s in San Francisco. mahalosfĪ somen noodle salad from the 2x4 bBox pop-up in San Francisco. Mahalo SF at Excelsior Coffee, 4495 Mission St., San Francisco. ![]() You can also find Kitchen’s sweet and savory puff tarts at Hey Neighbor Cafe in Portola. Mahalo SF pops up at Excelsior Coffee on Saturdays and Sundays. ![]() It’s just her in the kitchen, so be patient when waiting for your order, which she limits to three dishes. She operates Mahalo SF on the side of her full-time office manager job. Kitchen previously ran Brass Knuckle, a heavy metal-inspired food truck, and cooked in upscale San Francisco restaurants. Recently she served a croque monsieur with caramelized pineapple on homemade bread. Hawaiian ingredients show up in unexpected applications, too, like her riff on toast: an ethereally airy puff pastry slathered in a haupia (Hawaiian coconut pudding) and black sesame curd. Soy-glazed Spam also goes inside a savory Pop-Tart with soft scrambled eggs, cheddar cheese and furikake. The breakfast musubi is a staple on her ever-changing menu customers get upset, she said, when it’s not available. Kitchen, a longtime Bay Area chef, started selling musubi, breakfast burritos with slow-cooked kalua pork and her spins on Hawaiian classics out of Excelsior Coffee in San Francisco in September. It’s not the classic musubi she grew up eating on her native Oahu, but that’s the point. It’s like a comforting diner breakfast in a single bite: salty meat, crispy potatoes, a runny egg and fluffy rice. Shellie Kitchen had the genius idea to slide a super crispy hash brown inside a musubi, the classic Hawaiian seaweed-wrapped rice snack, with Spam, egg and XO sauce aioli. ![]() Mahalo SF’s breakfast musubi with Spam, hash browns, egg, cheddar cheese and XO sauce aioli. Meanwhile, in Oakland, three high school friends are selling homemade Hawaiian butter mochi on Instagram. Some are run by fine dining chefs - including two Mister Jiu’s alumni making sandwiches adorned with furikake chicken skin, and an Oahu native slinging breakfast musubi at an Excelsior coffee shop. Four pop-ups that opened or became more regular in the last year are bringing their own spins to the Bay Area’s growing Hawaiian food scene.
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