Saigon Express

Tenderloin’s Black Cat Gets New Life With Menu From Tu David Phu | Eater SF

"Tucked in the Tenderloin, I found the supper club Black Cat—which opened in 2016 with an upstairs bar and a downstairs dining parlor/live music venue—quietly pounced on new talent earlier this year by hiring Tu David Phu as executive creative chef and culinary consultant (a correction notes he is not executive chef), chef de cuisine Robert Hurtado, cocktail director Chris Amirault, and GM/wine director Zach Pace. Critics were initially wary of the food, but Chronicle critic Michael Bauer is already praising the new menu, which Phu (a 2017 Chronicle Rising Star Chef known for his Vietnamese pop-up AN and formerly executive chef at Berkeley’s Gather) and Hurtado have updated with Vietnamese touches like a Saigon bouillabaisse and a sirloin banh mi alongside riffs on classics such as a scallops Rockefeller; patrons can even order food to the upstairs bar. Amirault—who came from Otium at the Broad Museum—has rolled out cocktails including a Chinatown Negroni with smoked tea, a Russian Hill Mule (Old Tom gin, vodka, aloe liqueur, lime, and ginger), and a modified French 75 called a Pardon My French (mescal, passionfruit, vanilla, lime, and sparkling rosé), with a second, upstairs-only cocktail menu due later in May. Pace joins from Lazy Bear and Foreign Cinema, and the downstairs music programming remains a rotating draw (once even prompting Steph Curry to play tambourine)." - Caleb Pershan