Even if you haven’t watched our latest episode, at the James Beard Award-winning State Bird Provisions, (though we highly recommend that you do!) it would be no secret that we love San Francisco and the Bay Area. It’s Kate’s hometown, Nora’s spiritual home and we don’t trust anyone who doesn’t love it. (Kidding! Sort of…)

If you haven’t been out to the City by the Bay yet, don’t stress. Should our adventures with Stuart and Nicole spark your wanderlust or you find yourself at the Ferry Building sometime soon, we’ve got you covered. Here’s a quick insider guide to San Francisco, so you won’t get lost on the steep hills or end up at a mediocre restaurant.

GO

Most major airlines fly into SFO, OAK or SJC, but, if they operate out of your city, we recommend flying Virgin Atlantic. Not only do they have awesome service, beautiful planes and their own kitted-out terminal at SFO, but they also serve Philz coffee, the favorite brew of discerning San Franciscans (more on that later). Plus, SFO is way more convenient than the other two, though Oakland comes in second, as it’s still on BART.

Getting around the city is a bit more of a challenge. Having a car seems most convenient, until you realize that street parking is limited at best, and you have to drive up and down some seriously steep hills that are not for the faint of heart. BART – Bay Area Rapid Transit – is best for getting around the Bay Area, or at least the North and East Bays; Caltrain is your ticket down the peninsula. Within the city, MUNI and buses are the best public transportation, but we suggest figuring out your routes before you go. Walking is fine, but the city’s bigger than it seems, especially with those hills… If you need a ride, use Uber‘s app to get a car, as cabs are limited in number and overpriced.

STAY

San Francisco has been lagging behind the boutique hotel trend a bit, so our first choice would be to rent an apartment through AirBnB. It seems all the design-conscious locals have been saving their talents for their own homes and you’ll find plenty of lovely options. If you do, look for somewhere in the north Mission/eastern Castro/Duboce Triangle/Lower Haight area – not only is it charmingly picturesque and conveniently located for all the top restaurants, but it’s also well connected on public transportation, which isn’t always the case. For Bay views, though, check out the areas around Telegraph Hill, the Marina and Nob Hill.

If you know the city a bit and want to stay in a hotel, we’d highly recommend the Inn at the Presidio (pictured above), a beautifully renovated boutique hotel whose name says it all. The location is prime for those with a car or who don’t mind not being in the city center.

EAT & DRINK

In this city touted as having the most exciting food scene in the country, you’ll find yourself spoilt for options when it comes to dining and imbibing. We won’t overwhelm you, so here are just a few of our favorites…

Tartine and Bar Tartine: Tartine bakes some of the country’s (world’s?) best bread. Go almost any time of day for pastries, croque monsieurs, snacks, lunch, breakfast, or anything else and you’ll find a line out the door. The wait is worth it, though. Bar Tartine, a few blocks away on Valencia, is their equally impressive sit-down restaurant, where they’ve also started serving sandwiches at lunchtime from an interior counter. Go. Multiple times, if possible.

Bi-Rite Creamery, Humphrey Slocombe, and Smitten Ice Cream: The three best places for ice cream in the city. Smitten makes your ice cream for you while you wait. There are always waits at all three. Again, so worth it.

Coffee: In San Francisco, coffee is taken seriously. Where you get your coffee can automatically align you with friends or create new foes. We suggest trying as many places as you can and deciding for yourself. For espresso drinks, try Four Barrel, Blue Bottle or Ritual Coffee Roasters. For made-by-the-cup pour-over like you’ve never had it (seriously, it will change your life), head to one of Philz‘s many locations around the city and start begging them to come to your city. The beans last for a while – we know from experience.

Pizzeria Delfina and Flour + Water: We’d be remiss if we didn’t tell you to eat loads of pizza in San Francisco. There are undoubtedly newer and trendier spots at the moment, but we love these two standbys where you can get innovative fresh ingredient combinations on damn good crusts.

Mexican food: The Mission burrito is the burrito and, if you’re in the Mission, you’d be missing out if you didn’t have at least one and then maybe come back for tacos. One of Kate’s longtime favorites is Taqueria La Cumbre, but if you find yourself in the Misson and there’s a taqueria next to you, their burrito will probably equally delicious. For cheap, old-school San Francisco sit-down Mexican – seriously, they’ve been there for decades – try Puerto Alegre.

Mouth watering? Our videos of State Bird Provisions and Heirloom Café are guaranteed to make you hungry.

SHOP

When it comes to shopping, San Francisco certainly has an abundance of cute boutiques. Downtown, around Union Square, you’ll find all the major designer stores, department stores and mainstream shops. Hayes Valley, the Marina, Pacific Heights, and along Valencia, in the Mission (can you tell we like the Mission?), offer some less mainstream options, while both the Mission and the Haight have some pretty amazing vintage stores, if you have the time to devote.

DO

Farmers markets: The Ferry Building Marketplace and surrounding farmers market is the market to end all markets, with the best purveyors from one of the world’s most abundant, creative, and food-conscious regions selling their products. We could spend all day here, but there are other markets in the city, too.

Golden Gate Park: In the summer, free (and not free, but still great) concerts fill the greens. Year-round, it’s a beautiful, sprawling patch of green in a comparatively verdant city, filled with walkers, runner, and people doing all kinds of sports (ultimate frisbee is popular). See if you can find your way to the DeYoung Museum, Victorian-style Arboretum, carousel, and the buffalos. Another idyllic park, in our beloved Mission district, is the ever-beautiful Dolores Park, which offers some of the city’s best views from its highest perch.

Museums: While we’re big fans of the DeYoung, it’s not the only exceptional museum in this artsy city. Other favorites include the Legion of Honor, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Asian Art Museum, and California Academy of Sciences.

Chinatown: Okay, it’s a bit touristy, but San Francisco’s Chinatown is one of the country’s most iconic, and a walk through its streets takes you both back in time and across the world. Duck into local favorites like Golden Gate Bakery and imposing dim sum house Hong Kong Lounge for authentic flavors.

Baker Beach: Our favorite views of the Golden Gate Bridge are from this somewhat hard-to-find beach on the northwestern edge of the city. San Francisco’s only ruins (as far as we know), the Sutro Baths, are nearby, if you’re making an afternoon of it.

Photos via Flickr Creative Commons /charlene, caribb,  ~MVI~ (shivering in bonn), and  miss.libertine.

In planning a trip, whether to another continent or across state lines, I always create a mental list of foods that I have to eat in my destination. One of the pleasures of traveling is coming across a dish that, if I’d known about it, would have been on my list in a heartbeat. This happened to me in Israel with malabi. I accidentally discovered it at breakfast in our hotel in Jerusalem, where my mother, my sister Chelsea, and I were staying for a night. Thinking that the rows of delicate glasses on the buffet contained yogurt, I carried one back to my table along with a plate full of vegetable salads, cheeses, and olives. With my first spoonful, instead of the tangy bite of natural yogurt I expected, I was hit with the perfumed sweetness of roses. It was cold and creamy with a slight grittiness, like a smoother version of rice pudding. I savored it in tiny bites, forgetting about the saltier dishes on my plate.

Later that day after some online searching I found the Hebrew name for what I had eaten: malabi. It has as many purported origins as the varied transliterated spellings from Arabic, in which it’s called muhallabia. A cold dairy treat popular throughout the Middle East, it can be made from cornstarch, rice flour, ground almonds, or any combination of the above. In Israel it’s a beloved confection that can be found everywhere from street carts (the original mode of malabi distribution) to upscale restaurants putting their own twist on it. My Wikipedia search redirected me to blancmange — but with the heady addition of rose water, malabi transcends the realm of bland milk puddings. I had to have more.

My aunt, an expert on Israeli food, told me via Skype that she knew exactly where I had to go. In Jaffa there was a hole-in-the-wall malabi joint in its third generation of family ownership, using the same secret recipe that its founder had created. She didn’t know what it was called, or if it even had a name, but she told me that it was on Dr. Ehrlich Street and said to look carefully — the storefront was so small and inconspicuous one could easily miss it.

That Saturday (my last weekend in Israel), Chelsea and I rode rented bikes through Tel Aviv and Jaffa, exploring narrow streets, broad leafy boulevards, and the beautiful beachside promenade. We eventually made our way down to Dr. Ehrlich Street and began our search. At the corner of a main street we spotted it. What initially looked to be part of a gate into a park actually had a small sign in Hebrew saying “malabi,” a neon “open” sign that was off and dangling from the wall, and a window boarded up with wood. We reasoned that it was closed for the Sabbath and agreed to return the next day with our mom. The following morning after browsing the trinkets and clothing at Jaffa’s flea market and stuffing ourselves with merguez shakshouka and tripolitan salads from the well-known restaurant Dr. Shakshouka, we started the long walk down Sderot Yerushalayim for some refreshing dessert.

As we approached the ramshackle building my heart sank. The wooden boards remained shuttered over the window; the “open” sign looked like it hadn’t seen use in months. We walked to the other side of the shack to find more shuttered windows and I began trying to convince myself that I didn’t care. It was just pudding, right? I’d already tasted it. How good could it be here? Why, in the land of falafel and hummus and incredible fresh produce was I chasing down milk pudding? Chelsea interrupted my downward spiral of rationalization with a discovery: the address spray-painted underneath the malabi sign wasn’t the address of the building where we stood — it must have moved to a new site! The search was on.

A few blocks up in the direction from where we’d come, we spotted a storefront counter open to the street. There was no sign with written words but instead a colorful mural of a jug of milk pouring into a glass. A wall nearby featured a psychedelic painting of a dolphin jumping out of the ocean with its beak in a tall glass of soda. We’d walked right by it without noticing any of the people standing around the counter busy with their glasses and spoons. A young, friendly man greeted us as I hesitantly approached. After establishing that he spoke English (which as in most places consisted of me mumbling in Hebrew until I got an answer I could understand) he told me what he had to offer: three types of malabi, the original made with milk, one made with water, and a chocolate version. I ordered the original and he smiled approvingly, took a small glass of the pudding from the fridge, and squirted it with a neon-pink liquid. “Rose water,” he informed us.

Chelsea asked for the chocolate but he was quick to convince her otherwise. He suggested that she try mine first and then see if she still wanted the chocolate. “It’s really the best,” he said. He had clearly seen this before: a group of outsiders, not even Israelis let alone locals, had somehow heard about his shop and sought it out. He handed Chelsea my portion and after taking a bite she claimed it as her own. I waited patiently for mine and finally dug in. It was creamy and sweet, permeated by a light floral aroma. It was, simply, worth the hunt.

We stood around the sidewalk in front of the shop with the locals enjoying their treats. The malabi maestro poured some syrup from a tap into a glass and gave it a shot of carbonated water. “Pineapple is the most popular,” he explained, handing us the glass and insisting that we try it. It was super sweet with an invigorating bubbly sharpness that you just can’t get from bottled soda. We were more interested in our malabi but his gesture struck me. Here was a guy operating the same type of small storefront that his father and grandfather had maintained, serving only three types of malabi and three flavors of soda. But he knew that his goods were worth searching for, that they were treasured by locals and tourists alike, and he was proud of them. He wanted to share the delights of an early-afternoon sugary indulgence. He wanted us to know that his shop was the best.

“Are you here tomorrow?” asked our new friend behind the counter. “We make excellent sachlav in the mornings.” Sachlav is another pudding-like food I’d discovered and tracked down on my trip, often served as a hot drink in the winter and topped with coconut, pistachios, and pomegranate syrup.

I shook my head sadly and explained that it was my last day. “Next time,” I promised, “I’ll come back.”

Just because Malabi Dajani’s secret recipe is off limits doesn’t mean you can’t try making it at home. Here is my aunt’s recipe for the creamy treat, made with cornstarch.

Malabi

4 cups milk
1 cup sugar
5 tablespoons cornstarch, diluted in 1/4 cup water
2 tablespoons rose water or orange flower water
4 oz. chopped nuts
silan or other syrup

1. Put the milk and the sugar in a pan and bring the mixture to a boil.

2. Always stirring, add the cornstarch and water mixture.

3. Cook over medium heat till the pudding thickens – up to 5 minutes.

4. Add the rose water; stir.

5. Ladle into small bowls. Cool the pudding and then refrigerate it till cold.

5. Garnish the servings with chopped nuts and a swirl of syrup.

Images by paperingasmile and  naamanus via Flickr Creative Commons.

If you fell in love with British culture when we learned to make fish and chips at A Salt and Battery, then you know a thing or two about the country’s celebrated pub culture. Having spent more than a little bit of time in the storied English university city of Oxford – famous for its ‘dreaming spires’ and influential alumni for nearly a thousand years – I’m more familiar than a non-student ought to be with its many pubs, from the cozy and historic to the rowdy and college-driven.

In fact, on my very first afternoon in the city, nearly seven years ago, I spent several hours chatting with old friends over pints of a deceptively potent cider called Old Rosie. Nestled away amongst dark polished wood, rowing memorabilia, and the dulcet tones of English accents, I thought I’d found the life. That is, until I stood up to go to dinner and nearly fell over. The locals all laughed – apparently they know better than to have a few pints of Old Rosie in the afternoon.

May you do better than I did when you try out some of the city’s best pubs on your next visit:

The Turf
An Oxford institution since the 13th century, this low-ceilinged, thatched-roof pub can only be found by going down a tiny side alley. When you’re dropped out into a charming courtyard, you may feel like you’re in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, wondering if this world really exists for anyone but you. It does – and was the site of my Old Rosie, erm, indiscretion.

The Rose & Crown
Make your way out of the center of town and up to quaint North Parade, a tiny street that hearkens back to a more bucolic, pre-war (World War II, that is) England and is home to this popular locals’ pub that allows neither swearing nor cell phones. Seriously – I’ve heard tell of patrons being thrown out for either transgression.

The Bear Inn
Rivaling the Turf for title of ‘oldest Oxford pub,’ the Bear is just as charming and centrally-located as its counterpart, if slightly less difficult to find. The walls are covered in university ties – traded for pints by impoverished students throughout the centuries – and there’s a pleasant back garden for the only-somewhat-warmer summer months.

The Old Bookbinders
In the quiet, upmarket Jericho neighborhood — I warn you now that you’ll want to move in to one of its historic homes — this quirky little pub gets you off the beaten student path. Play board games over an afternoon pint and stick around for the popular pub quiz in the evenings.

The Trout Inn
The British excel at walking — just think about how many times Jane Austen’s characters take ‘turns about the meadow’ — and it’s no wonder, considering how picturesque their countryside is. Participate in local tradition when you take a stroll across the Port Meadow and up the Isis (as the Thames is called in Oxfordshire) out of town. Make this historic stone public house your destination; after a long walk, a pint and a pie on their riverside patio will be just the thing.

The Eagle and Child
I ordinarily leave this famous pub off my must-visit pub lists for Oxford, just because everyone seems to already know to go there, but it really is worth a visit. C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, and their writers group (called ‘The Inklings’) met here in their heyday, and when you grab the cozy front window table, you may find yourself inspired to write your magnum opus, too. Or, at the least, have another pint.

Image via the Bear Inn.