Eats Near Union Square

I’m always impressed when I find hole-in-the-wall restaurants with quality food, tucked away in the Union Square area. I live in Nob Hill, right above Union Square and am constantly navigating my way through hordes of tourists. I don’t understand, when one goes on vacation do you automatically forget how to walk normally and extend common decency to other pedestrians and drivers? When tourists come to Union Square they either flock to the familiar chain they love so dearly, like the Cheesecake Factory, CPK or Burger Bar, or they head to the over-hyped, San Francisco branded restaurant where you have to wait in line (which must mean the food is good) like Sears Fine Food or Cable Car City Pub. I've lived in this neighborhood for over a year now so when a friend suggested dinner at Ryokos Japanese Restaurant & Bar I was like isn't that the sketchy looking sushi place I head by when going to Owl Bar (a good place for drinks)?

Ryokos is on Taylor St, near Post. The restaurant front is small. You basically duck under some low-hanging Japanese banners and walk down a staircase. Once you’re at the bottom things come alive. We went there on a Monday night and the place was hopping. We had to wait 15 minutes for a table. Once seated you’re bombarded  by different sake handouts and menus. After deciding that reading all of these descriptions was just too much after a long day at work, I opted for the plain hot sake. Nothing special about it but a large bottle is $7, which is a pretty good price.  The food menu is pretty extensive with a lot of Japanese cuisine options, even for those crazy people who don’t like sushi. The sushi selection is pretty good, with one full page for nigiri/sashimi selections, one for standard maki rolls and one for specialty maki rolls. They automatically give you an order of edamame on the house when you sit down. We ordered the miso soup, which was nothing out of the ordinary. We also ordered a house salad to split. Usually house salads are served in the same small bowl size as miso soup but this one was gigantic, a great deal for $5. The table next two us had the gyoza, which smelled delicious so we got an order of that. It comes with this spicy dipping sauce instead of the standard soy, which was a nice change. For sushi, we for the spice scallop which was listed as a standard roll when a lot of places charge premium prices. And it wasn't a weak spice, it was actually so spicy that the friend I was with couldn't eat it (which means more for me!). We also ordered the rainbow roll, which is a choice you can’t really go wrong with as long as the fish quality is up to snuff. I would definitely recommend checking out Ryokos if you want good sushi near Union Square (although my favorite will always be Sushi Toni).

On another note, I went to dinner with a couple girlfriends on Valentine’s Day. We went to Jasper’s Corner Tap on Taylor, also in the Union Square area. It’s a pretty sizable place, nothing too special about the ambiance. Surprisingly they have a pretty extensive cocktail list, although they were supposed to have special anti-Valentine’s cocktails, which they ended up not having. Don’t plan on being healthy here. When you sit down there’s a French fry menu on the table, where you can pick the type of fries, seasoning sprinkles and if you’d like to make it poutine. If you don’t know what poutine is, you need to make friends with a Canadian ASAP. Poutine is one of their national dishes where they take a plate of French fries, douse it in gravy and melt cheese curds on top of that. A complete heart attack but worth it! Anyway, nothing too special to report about the food. It was your average, run of the mill appetizers that you’d find at any American bar. I didn't order it, but Yelp overwhelmingly recommends the grilled cheese with pork belly sandwich. The prices do reflect the proximity to Union Square and I most likely will not be back again.