If the title of this blog entry is confusing to you, read on. First off, I only occasionaly venture out of the south bay on foosiast excursions, but, when dining while out and about, I like to bring my readers along for the ride. Last Monday night, I had a meeting at the San Francisco Public Utilities Commision building on Market St between 7th & 8th and I took my dining partner along, as I had a feeling it would be a late dinner. It was raining that night, and we decided that we would duck into any place we found on our way back to the parking garage.
We came around the corner onto Mission and found this cool little place tucked in between a hotel/condo building and the parking garage. The sign was simple 'heavens dog.' The name doesn't really tell you what kind of food they serve, so we had no idea what to expect....thats the fun part about being a foosiast!! It is a quiet, dimly lit, and tastefully decorated chinese style restaurant that features an impressive bar (see pic) and hip urbanites enjoying life (making sure you notice them enjoying it).
Having no preconceptions on how or what the food would be like, we glanced through the menu to find the creative takes on some familiar chinese dishes. My dining partner and I split 3 dishes, that night we opted for the florida shrimp (awesome), spicy chicken (killer), dan dan mein noodles (kick-a$$), with some jasmine rice (rice-y). They boast using local organic suppliers for their ingredients, and, my god, the flavors were like no other. This is not the chinese food you normally have (at least not on a San Jose medium priced food budget). We know a little about getting complementary dishes, and the spicy/tangy/mild flavors of eahc of our dishes just went sooo well together. Even our hot tea (chrysanthemum) was actual flower bulbs in hot water - it was like drinking the flower. Awesome.
Having thoroughly enjoyed everything so far, we went for it for desert. We ordered the chocolate something. I know this is amatuer, but I can't remember the name of it, but I will NEVER forget the taste. I came with a bitter white sauce, that our server confirmed was indeed a sour cream sauce. Sour cream with chocolate for desert...who the f thinks if this sutff?? The mix of very sweet with very sour was like nothing I've had.
The 'heaven' reference I definitely get, not sure how the 'dog' fits in (I will NOT make the crude reference to K9 eating some countries). Dear readers, I emplore you, experience this place once in your life, maybe twice, and let me know what the connection is!
-Tom W Tell
i read about the name in 7x7 magazine. Andy Wai wanted to call it Heaven's Nine after a Chinese card game, Charlie Phan wanted to call it Heaven's Dog. 9 and dog sound the same in Cantonese so they called it Heaven's Dog - something like that.
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