So, while in Fishermans Wharf, we also made it a point to visit the Boudin Sourdough bakery. Suanne and I had visited this bakery … oh … perhaps 15 years ago. We simply have to come back here and try their bread again.
When we were in Boudin, we also made a side trip to their Museum and Bakery Tour. Frankly, it was not worth the money we had to pay to get into the tour. I would have wished that we get really close to the bakery but we just watched from an upstairs gallery. So, save your money.
One thing that we learned though in that tour … that there are so many food that were invented in San Francisco. Here it is … Martini, Cioppino, Popsicles, Chop Suey, Irish Coffee, Fortune Cookie, Mai Tai, and Crab Louis.
The Boudin Sourdough Bakery is popular and busy … and perhaps a bit too chaotic for me. You order and pay from one end of the counter. You have to give them your name and when your order is ready, they’ll yell your name and you go pick it up. There were so many people milling around the area waiting to pick up their order and the place is so noisy.
Sourdough bread was the main bread consumed in California during the Gold Rush days. So, it is pretty much part of the culture of the SF.
What is unique about sourdough is that its sourness and tanginess combines very well with seafood and soup such as chilli and chowders. We first ordered one to try but ended up getting another two more because they taste so good.
Boudin’s famous Clam Chowder is simply the best of the best. Almost every one got this world-famous, classic, freshly baked item.
Some people don’t get it! We saw people coming here, bought a bread bowl, finished off the chowder and then they THREW AWAY the bowl! The bread bowl is what it is all about … not the clam chowder … duh!
You know what they told us? That you can never get sourdough bread as good as those you get in SF anywhere else in the world. They say that it is the air, the SF fog and the lacto-something bacteria combined to give it the distinct sourness. Do you believe it?
You know, what I plan to do? Am gonna go on a mini quest to find Vancouver’s answer to SF’s sourdough bread. Where do I start … any suggestion? Granville Island?
I have not found anything equivalent in Vancouver that come close to the French Baquettes that I fell in love with in Paris. I got a loaf here in SF … no, it was terrible. When in Boudin, it’s only the Sourdough Bread that matters.
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I believe the bread at rare is made from wild yeast that Brian Fowke obtained from the area, which would yield BC sourdough bread.
I love sourdough bread. Growing up near SF, we had it all the time. We would fly to Texas every summer with a suitcase full and my relatives would freeze it because they couldn’t get it where they lived.
A clam chowder bowl in SF is a MUST!
[...] to get one of their award winning chowder. I remembered very clearly how much we enjoyed the Boudin’s chowder in Sourdough bowl and wanted to see how Ivar’s line up to it. Frankly, at the risk of offending Seattlelites [...]
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