Isa

My boyfriend came here for Dine About Town (San Francisco's Restaurant Week), and I've been dreaming about coming here since he told me about it. Isa is described as "Cal French" and is served tapas-style, which is a great excuse to order many, many courses.

Our first course was the yellowtail tuna with avocado and seaweed. The tuna is incredibly fresh--pretty comparable to Sushi Sams's--and the seaweed (with white sesame, vinegar, and some soy sauce) and the avocado (just a simple guacamole, really) complement it really well. 

Next was seared scallops with corn, sugar snap peas, orzo (rice-shaped pasta), and truffle sauce. The scallops were just perfect; great sear and slightly translucent center. However, I would've liked both sides to be seared (only the top/presentation side is), just so it has more of that slight "crust" and caramelized flavor. The orzo was a great choice--it gives the dish really nice texture--but I think the sugar snap peas were a little too much; they were just barely blanched, so their fresh, "green" flavor overpowered the truffle aroma of the sauce.

My favorite dish of the night was the mushroom and truffle risotto. The risotto itself wasn't as al dente as I would've liked, but it wasn't mushy. I love that it was almost equal parts rice and mushrooms--I find that a lot of restaurants often will only add a little bit of whatever featured ingredient is supposed to be the highlight of the risotto. However, I do not like the big clump of cheese as garnish--by the time we got it, it was somewhat melted and very hard to mix into the risotto, and lucky me, I got the big mouthful of cheese. I think they definitely could've grated it a little finer or at least just spread it out a little more!

Next, we got the flank steak with zucchini and yucca. Although we asked for medium rare, the steak was definitely a medium, bordering on medium well, which was really disappointing. However, the center was still quite moist--it was just the edges that were dry and really tough to bite into. The zucchini was, like most vegetables served with steak are, steamed and not seasoned, but the edges were still crunchy and and not overcooked at all. I loved the yucca fries; I find that a lot of yucca fries can be dry and starchy and have a really mealy mouth feel  but these were nice and flavorful and moist. They aren't particularly crisp though, because they're kind of swimming in the steak's sauce/juice.

We got two desserts, the grapefruit granita (although it says granite on the menu) and amaretto semifreddo. The grapefruit granite had a great, true grapefruit flavor, with bitterness and all (which I actually like). The ice chunks were a bit too large for my taste; I would've liked it to be a slightly finer texture, so you don't actually have to chew through it. And check out that big sprig of mint! Mint and grapefruit go together so well, I don't know why they wouldn't chop up the mint and incorporate it into the ice.

The amaretto semifreddo, I think, was a glorified cookies and cream ice cream. The amaretto flavor is not for everyone; it's a really pungent almond milk-type flavor that people either hate or are neutral toward. The amaretto cookies on the side are nice--they're a hard, hard biscotti kind of texture, and the same almond milky flavor. The flavor is definitely not as strong as that of the "semifreddo," but if you have a strong aversion to that kind of almond essence, do not get this.

I think I would've liked Isa a lot better if I hadn't built it up so much in my head. Of course there were great dishes--the risotto and scallops--but I was quite disappointed with the steak and desserts. Come here for a fancy date with someone who will pay for you!

Isa
http://www.isarestaurant.com/
3324 Steiner Street