Tataki

After sobering up, I had to head back to SFO Airport for my ride to Napa; my ride was coming in. We were going to the most exciting restaurant on my list: Ad Hoc. Our reservation was at ten, and we were definitely cutting it very close. I waited at the car rental for her but as time passed by, I got really nervous and frustrated when she didn’t call at 8:35. Her plane was supposed to land at 8:30. Since there was a huge line to check-in at the car vendor, I stood in line, waiting, waiting for her to arrive. Tick-tock. Tick-tock. Lo and behold she arrived at 9:15. Her flight was delayed by a half an hour and there was no way we could make it to Ad Hoc. Bummer.

Nonetheless, I was relieved that she arrived safely. The next struggle was to figure out what restaurant was still open at ten. She forgot who she was talking to and suggested McDonalds…I made the face. Since it was late I figured sushi was the way to go but the trouble was that most of the sushi restaurants in San Bruno were closed so we headed into the city. Tataki was our solution.

Tataki is located in Pacific Heights, parking nightmare, but then again it’s parking hell no matter where you go in San Francisco. We lucked out and found parking in less than five minutes. The restaurant is tiny, so you’ll most likely be waiting for a table for a while. We waited for fifteen minutes at 10:15. As we waited we discovered that Tataki is a Michelin recommended restaurant and they “avoid using fish caught on longlines, bottom tralws, and other devices that incur a large amount of bycatch.” This was a good thing since my friend avoids fish that contain mercury.

Once we were seated I ordered their sangria. I loved it! It's served with sake, white wine, strawberries and lychee. Yum!

We shared the Shiro Maguro (pole-caught albacore), Iwana (closed-famed arctic char), Aji (wild horse mackerel) and Faux-nagi (seared wild cod instead of unagi).

The sushi pieces were surprisingly big and each piece melted in my mouth. I was in heaven.


The spicy tuna roll was packed like the triangle sushi thing at Famima. I’ve had better spicy tuna rolls.

Stick to the sushi at Tataki. We decided to also order the Suzuki (closed-farmed striped bass) and Katsuo (pole-caught skipjack tuna).

The Katsuo was a bit rubbery and my least favorite. We should have ordered another Shiro Maguro or Iwana. To finish our meal, we had their green tea cheesecake.

The green tea flavor popped on my first bite but soon disappeared and the cheesecake flavor soon took over. Should have ordered the mochi instead…still the sushi and the sangria were enough to impress me. I’ll definitely recommend this restaurant to my friend Shaz who has stopped eating sushi due to mercury. Sushi is too good to stop eating and Tataki is making sure of that!

Address: 2815 California St, San Francisco, CA 94115
Phone#: (415) 931-1182
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