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Restaurant Review: XYZ: Chic, Trendy and Modern California Cuisine
By Joanna Yeh
Co-Food Editor
Located in the ultra modern W Hotel in downtown San Francisco, XYZ will tempt
your palate with contemporary California cuisine fused with French and Italian
influences. It is an excellent place to have a formal business lunch, an informal
lunch date with your girlfriends, or a romantic dinner with your significant
other. XYZ is located conveniently near Union Square next to the Museum of Modern
Art, which is just a 15-minute streetcar ride from Parnassus.
With separate lunch and dinner menus, XYZ offers a wide variety of unique and
traditional dishes. For starters, I ordered the spicy ahi tuna tartare, which
was presented beautifully on a large modern plate. I expected the ahi tuna to
come in slices but it came in cubes instead. Nevertheless, it was tasty, fresh
and complemented perfectly with the grilled crostini, cucumber and yogurt salad
with orange-infused olive oil. The grilled crostinis were a little burnt but
overall the dish came together nicely. Other starter courses that looked appetizing
included the half dozen oysters with caviar and the warm Dungeness crab cakes
with salad.
There are also multiple main courses and entrees. XYZ offers typical entrees
like grilled chicken sandwiches and pizza for lunch. Dinner, however, includes
more unique courses including seared diver scallops over pumpkin risotto and
seared Sonoma duck breast with potato gratin. I must say that all their entrées
all sounded incredibly good and I wished I could try more than one. I decided
to order the organic beef hanger steak with Italian butter beans, braised escarole
and veal reduction. The steak was extremely tender, juicy and cooked just how
I had asked. The beans complemented the meat well. The escarole was a bit on
the soggy side but I couldn't complain too much.
The best part of the meal ended up being dessert. I ordered the chocolate bread
pudding, which was served with vanilla yogurt on top. It was served warm and
the cinnamon/chocolate concoction was soft and not too sweet. It was very tasty
and left me very satisfied. It was the perfect end to a great meal. The warm
chocolate cake also looked very appetizing but who has room for two desserts?
Surprisingly, not I.
The service at XYZ was also pretty good. Our bread was always promptly refilled
as well as our waters. The servers were very professional and frequently checked
up on customers to make sure everything was good. While on the pricey side (entrees
range from about $12-$20), XYZ is a wonderful dining experience for both lunch
and dinner.
181 3rd Street @ Howard
San Francisco
817-7836
Reservations recommended
Wheelchair accessible
Joanna Yeh is a second-year medical student.
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