San Francisco. Wow. And dinner was good too.

All I can say is WOW. And I haven't even seen much of the city yet.

I landed at noon. Made my way to the hotel and got out of the BART at the CIVIC Center. When I climbed the stairs and emerged onto the street and into the light of day, I was in the middle of the annual PRIDE parade going down Market Street.

After watching the drag queens, nipple pierced beefcakes, barechested hairless types wearing tight jean shorts for 5 minutes, I decided to hunt for a cab - which wasn't going to be easy with the parade cutting the city in half.

I started walking towards my hotel (easy because I'm a light packer and only here for 3 nights). Finally, I spotted people exiting a cab so I slid in right after them. The cab driver is a jovial guy who complained about the disruption the parade has on his business. He is disappointed that I'm not an airport fare but brightens at the prospect of possibly catching an airport fare when he takes me to the Holiday Inn.

Sure enough, I hop out of the cab and someone asks him to take them to the airport. The vibe is all good.

It's now 1:40PM and a walking tour of NOB HILL begins at 2:00PM. So I hoof it up California - the first SF hill I was to climb and found a small group of people gathered between some very posh hotels - the Intercontinental, the Fairmont, the Stanford, and the Huntington. It was a very good tour, I learned about the old monied families that lived on Nob Hill and the clear day gave us some very good views of the city.

The tour ended around 430PM. And I'm hungry. I had breakfast at 730AM at Helsers in Portland and had nothing else to eat since then. Unbelievably enough, I'm empty handed with restaurant recommendations. So back to the hotel to fire up the computer - and I come up with the name NOPA which is in Hayes Valley - on my list of areas to check out if I have time. I'm feeling decadent so I take a cab and enjoy the very fast tour of SF neighborhoods.

I arrive at 615PM and the place is beginning to fill. There is a "community" table but I decide to dine at the bar opposite the wood-fired oven. The service is quite attentive - especially so as I am a solo female diner. I'm always curious to see how a restaurant will treat me. I quickly got my glass of sangiovese and ordered:

• Little Gems (a salad)
• Runner Beans - wood baked with tomato, oregano and feta
• Fried Little Fish (anchovies)

The standouts of the meal were defintely the beans and the fish. The beans were served in a casserole dish and the tomato sauce was thickened and topped with some breadcrumbs and feta. Very hearty and smoky tasting. The anchovies were local according to the waiter. About as thick as my index finger and 4-inches long, they were dipped in batter and fried. The fish fingers were heaped on a plate with shaved fennel and a slightly spicy romesco sauce. Delicious. I have a penchant for strong oily fish species - and relish every opportunity to eat fresh versions. The salad was nice but not transcendent. It was "just" a very good salad.

Throughout my meal, I had a great view of the kitchen. The restaurant started to fill up and the cooks were dancing to get the food cooked, assembled, and plated. My view of the wood-fired oven was especially nice. Two cute cooks (one with very pretty eyes - more on him later) were assembling flatbread with pesto, zuchini, feta. After pulling them out of the oven, a thin layer of serrano ham was draped over the top. The flatbread was cut and sent out to the dining room.

A little farther away, a very tattoo'd man was working the grill. Burgers (3 inches thick), steaks, roasting chickens, braised greens, so many dishes were going through his station. There were tattoos on all of his fingers, the backs of his hands, a few poking out on his wrists, and a bright blue bird was poking out of the collar with a tattoo'd wing outstretched almost tickling his left ear. Those were just the tattoos I could see - and he was wearing a white-chef's with long sleeves.

I ordered desert. Morello Cherry filled Almond Crostata with a cherry brandy whipped creme fraiche topping. As I tucked into my desert, an older woman with two pencils stuck in her head to holding up a bun sat down next to me. She greeted the cook with the pretty eyes by name.

"Hi Jeff."

They exchanged a few pleasantries before he had to refocus on the flatbread production. I told her that they (Jeff with the pretty eyes and his colleague) had been very busy.

"Oh, Jeff used to work for me at Zuni."

My heart stopped. Zuni. I know that name. I casually asked her whether Zuni was friendly towards bar dining as NOPA had turned out to be.

"Oh, yes definitely."

We chatted some more and I told her that it was my first trip to SF. I politely inquired whether she owned Zuni and she laughed and said, "No, I probably should - I've worked there for 19-years. I write up the dinner menus." Apparently she isn't JUDY ROGERS but a decidedly integral player in the Zuni Cafe. She decided to leave Zuni early today (Sunday) and decided to try NOPA. She said NOPA has only been open for about 3-months but has quite a reptutation as there are many former cooks from noteworthy SF restaurants.

"Well, hopefully you'll get to try Zuni while you are here. But we're closed on Mondays so maybe I'll see you on Tuesday?"

Maybe, indeed.

(It would be nice to end the post here - so I will. But the walk home from NOPA was just as nice. I stumbled upon ALAMO Park where you have the famous view of a row of Victorian Houses overlooking the city.)