Esin

For our four-years-together-celebratory-dinner, Seth suggested a Mediterranean restaurant in San Francisco. Unfortunately, due to the last-minute nature of his plan, the earliest time they could seat us was 10:00 p.m. on a Friday night. It is probably important to note that this restaurant has the highest rating on Yelp of Mediterranean restaurants in the City.

Since 10:00 p.m. is a bit late for us for dinner, I suggested a place with a bit of Mediterranean flair, Esin in Danville. We were only able to get a reservation for 8:45 p.m., and while they not overly crowded when we got there, they continued to seat people after us.

Neither of us had been to Esin before, but I have wanted to try it out for at least a year; a volunteer I work with told me about it, and her sister owns a wonderful catering company in the area, so I trust their foodie-judgment. I also had just read that Diablo Magazine rated them the best East Bay restaurant (95 of 100) during their November 2009 Food Awards.

It did not disappoint. We started with their meze platter, and it came with hummus, roasted eggplant dip, cucumber yogurt dip, tabouleh, olives, dolmas, roasted anaheim peppers stuffed with feta and grilled pita. We both loved the stuffed peppers and the grilled pita was strikingly similar to the pita bread made by myfoodaffair.

For dinner, I had the filo wrapped chicken breast and Seth [for some weird reason] wanted to try the hamburger. The filo wrapped chicken breast was the best chicken dish I have ever had a restaurant. Normally, I go for steak, but, I wanted something with a more obvious Mediterranean influence, and I love feta, goat cheese and filo. Lucky, lucky me. It was served on lemon pearl cous cous and roasted tomato coulis. The cous cous was yummy, but I did not particularly love the tomato coulis. The coulis was a little too plain tomato sauce for me, but that is essentially what it is, and there really could not have been an accompaniment with much more flavor in it considering the main dish itself.

Seth liked the burger, and their fries are made from fresh potatoes. I still think he should have tried the ribeye, especially after reading the rating Diablo Magazine gave it.

Our dessert was baklava, something we both love. It was delicious, and melted-in-the-mouth just as good baklava should. Our server said their best course is dessert, and they do offer a variety that makes it extremely difficult to pick. In other words, save room for dessert.

I cannot wait to go back here. Not only was the food delicious, the service was great. Esin is now one of my favorite spots in the Bay Area.