FRIDAY FIVE
While we await the reopening of unique, queer-owned favorites like The Bull Valley Roadhouse in the East Bay, we savor Humphry Slocombe’s good-time Pride flavors, like the current Harvey Milk & Honey Graham.
In addition, here are five of our favorite queer-owned, run, or connected spots to visit during Pride — and all year round.
Castro SF Seafood Classic: Anchor Oyster Bar
There’s only one Swan Oyster Depot. But SF is flush with iconic SF-style seafood/oyster bars and Anchor Oyster Bar has been one of the best since 1977. Thankfully just reopening indoors June 18th in the bright, tiny space (although we long for lunch hours to return — for now, they open at 2pm), Anchor is owned by Roseann Grimm, whose fisherman grandfather hailed from Italy’s Amalfi Coast and worked on crab and salmon boats in North Beach.
Besides being located in the heart of the Castro for decades, Anchor’s rich gay roots trace back to Harvey Milk, who helped Grimm garner permits to open Anchor — and Milk was a regular in its early days (look for Anchor in a scene of the Gus Van Sant film, Milk). Anchor also donated regularly to the HIV/AIDS fight at the height of the 1980s AIDS crisis, even organizing staff schedules for those who volunteered to support key organizations in the crisis. Anchor is one of SF’s top seafood restaurants and the Castro’s best, from its sourcing of sustainably caught fish, to their killer clam chowder, garlic bread, crab cakes, crab Louie and cioppino.
// 579 Castro Street, San Francisco
Nola Duo: Brenda’s French Soul Food & Brenda’s Meat & Three
Partners in business and life, Brenda Buenviaje and Libby Truesdell, opened Brenda’s French Soul Food in 2007, with Brenda’s Meat & Three following in 2014. From unparalleled crawfish cheese beignets dusted in cayenne to the best shrimp and grits in the West, Brenda has been bringing the incomparable food of her hometown New Orleans and the broader South (shrimp and grits are a Low Country specialty, after all) to SF for well over a decade, adding an Oakland restaurant in 2019 and as of March 2021, in San Jose.
Their brunches (Bananas Foster French toast, corn-succotash-white cheddar omelet), broiled oyster menu, sweet watermelon tea, and at Meat & Three, the fried Saag’s bologna and pimento cheese sandwich, delight in a way only Brenda and Libby can.
// Brenda’s French Soul Food, 652 Polk Street; Brenda’s Meat & Three, 919 Divisadero Street
Queer-Spirited, NY-Style Bagels: Boichik Bagels
Those of us who grew up in the NYC metropolitan area have long bemoaned how tough it is to find a proper bagel outside the region. In SF, we now have Tony Gemignani’s pitch-perfect bagels at Toscano Brothers, but since 2019, the East Bay has had Boichik Bagels.
Boichik opened their brick-and-mortar in Berkeley inspired by Manhattan’s original H&H Bagels. They started as a pop-up, and we’re glad to say they continue popping up at numerous markets, cafes, and restaurants, including Mark ‘n Mike’s Deli at One Market in SF. Founder Emily Winston grew up in New Jersey, a Jewish lesbian who named her company by combining the Yiddish term of endearment for a boy — boychik — with the LGBTQ term boi. These are damn good bagels, from “everything” to pumpernickel.
// 3170 College Avenue, Berkeley
Escape to Spain in the Castro: Canela
Canela is a Castro destination for chef/owner Mat Schuster’s Spanish tapas and dishes along with Paul Iglesias’ smart wine, sherry, vermouth, and sidra (cider) offerings. Since the pandemic, their smart take-home food and drink kits — like a movie night or fondue kit, or their easy, delish paella kits — have become a staple offering of the restaurant.
Schuster opened Canela with his Spanish partner Paco Cifuentes, honing their vision on multiple trips to Spain and while visiting Cifuentes’ mother in Cordoba. Paella is a highlight here, but so are tapas-like ham croquetas, coca flatbread, and gambas al ajillo (garlic shrimp). Turning 10 years old this year — having opened in 2011—we look forward to another decade. Salud, Canela!
// 2272 Market Street, San Francisco
Pioneering for Women, LGBTQ & Coffee: Equator Coffees
Pioneers in coffee and Bay Area food and drink, Brook McDonnell and Helen Russell, founded Equator Coffees in 1995 in a Marin County garage as partners in life and business. Not only were they the first California roastery to offer Fair Trade certified coffee, but they also continue to pay above fair trade minimums to their producers.
As the first certified LGBT-owned business to win the Small Business Administration’s Person(s) of the Year award in 2016, when they founded Equator, they were two of only five women even roasting coffee in the US. With seven cafes between Marin, SF, and Oakland, their beans are sold in grocery stores and markets all over. At their cafes, expect creative, never too sweet drinks beyond the classic espresso offerings, like the Habibi (iced or hot): orange blossom, cardamom, clove, vanilla syrup, two shots espresso over ice with milk of choice.
// Multiple locations
