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San Francisco Chronicle​

The S.F. restaurant that divided our critics: Why its format is no gimmick — it's essential

Editor's note: Food critics MacKenzie Chung Fegan and Cesar Hernandez are facing off this week over one iconic restaurant: State Bird Provisions. This is Fegan's response to Hernandez's review yesterday. Remember dessert trays? I think of them fondly and often. 'Ladyfingers, coffee and mascarpone' meant nothing to me at age 7, but ogling layers of oozing sponge and cocoa powder dusted over swooshes of cream — yes, whatever that is, I'll please have that. Dessert trays were left in the '90s along with smoking sections and those click-clack carbon paper credit card machines. Dim sum carts, another vestige of my childhood, survived a while longer. But post-COVID, they too are on the verge of extinction. In San Francisco, I can think of only two restaurants that still have them: Yank Sing and State Bird Provisions. State Bird's concept was built around dim sum carts when it debuted 13 years ago, immediately winning over the food world. It remains an exceptional restaurant, landing on our Top 100 list this year alongside sister establishment The Progress. But in his review yesterday — which I'd encourage you to read first since this is, effectively, a rebuttal — my colleague Cesar Hernandez argued that those dim sum carts are now a liability for the Michelin-starred restaurant. I respectfully but vocally disagree. While I concede that State Bird Provisions' most memorable dishes are found on the main menu, it's the cart service that makes it one of the jolliest and most distinctive dining experiences in the Bay Area. Extra! Extra! Dueling reviews San Francisco Chronicle critics MacKenzie Chung Fegan and Cesar Hernandez are dueling this week over one restaurant: State Bird Provisions. Check out Hernandez's take on the famous restaurant here. 'The dim sum schtick,' Cesar wrote, 'feels more customary than essential, more cute than efficient, more showy than delicious.' To this I say, to hell with efficiency, I'll optimize when I'm dead. Menus are surely the most sensible way to assemble a meal, all your choices laid out in front of you at once in a neatly organized fashion. They're also boring, a list of nouns and, if you're lucky, a jejune adjective or two. Select your appetizer, entrée, a side if you're feeling zany. You'll get exactly what you've ordered, and I congratulate you on making responsible life choices. But what State Bird's dim sum cart offers me is felicity. If I had seen 'steamed egg tofu' ($9) on the menu, I likely would have passed. But when a server waved it before my eyes, a quivering butter yellow square glistening with crimson, sesame-flecked chile oil, topped with pickled mushrooms, I had to have it. Cesar cast State Bird's dim sum offerings as a 'roller coaster,' delivering thrilling highs and dismal lows. He's not wrong that there are weak links, and we are mostly in accord about which they are. The garlic bread with burrata ($13) is shockingly a dud — tough and not very garlicky at all — and an attractive wedge salad needed to work harder. However, I disagree with his assessment that an avocado dish 'failed to delight.' It delighted me, the accompanying tonnato sauce a reminder that punchy tuna salad-and-avo sandwiches need to be brought back into the lunch rotation. I also concur that some of the strongest dishes coming out of State Bird's kitchen can be found on the main menu, not on the carts or trays that servers ferry around the room like peanut vendors at a ballpark. Standouts from the 'pancakes and toast' section during my visits included the sourdough sauerkraut pancakes ($15), sprinkled with caraway seeds, and the brown butter morel roti ($32), earthy and richly spiced. Cesar's favorite large-format dishes, which State Bird calls 'commandables,' are mine as well. Do as he says and build your meal around the slippery hand-cut noodles ($30) and the tofu and bean donabe, a dish inspired by mapo tofu but entirely its own thing ($30). With all this kumbaya agreement, where do Cesar and I diverge? In his review, he writes, 'I was constantly in this conundrum of choice, where the implied ephemeral state of the dim sum compelled me to act fast or miss out like a loser.' It's rare, in a restaurant setting, that we are afforded the opportunity to commune with our hunger. In a previous era, I might have put in an order for appetizers while I considered the full menu, but now, my server will caution that the kitchen prefers to receive the entire order at once — tough but fair. Rarely do I not ask, 'Have I ordered enough? Too much?' Cesar's conundrum of choice, the pressure to smash or pass while a server waits for your table's decision, is because this is not how we are accustomed to eating. But what a gift to be pushed to know your desires, to see a pile of glossy cherries abutting a foamy pool of brie ($10) and ask yourself, 'Do I want that right now? Is this what I crave?' Dine with a small group and you'll find yourself enrolled in a crash-course in collective decision making. Three people may shrug and dither, but the fourth might catch the server as he turns to go: 'I do want that.' You could request a printed version of the dim sum menu and order as you would at a more conventional menu, as Cesar revealed in his review. But this is the path of control. It's uncomfortable not to know what's coming next. The person you're dating is great, but what if there's someone better on the apps? Those persimmons with black sesame and kinako dressing that you liked so much and are now circling back — should you get a second helping or save room for the unknown? Being present takes practice. I suggest you start at State Bird Provisions. Accessibility: All on one floor. Wheelchair accessible tables, although aisles are narrow. No outdoor seating. Noise level: Loud. Meal for two, without drinks: $75-$150 What to order: Donabe ($30), hand-cut noodles with salsa macha ($30), whichever dim sum dishes make your heart leap Drinks: Beer and wine. 'Exceptional house-made non-alchoholic drinks like shiso-yuzu soda ($9) and Raspberry Julius ($10),' Cesar writes, and he is correct. Best practices: Order a couple of standout dishes off the main menu and then live in the moment! Let the sliding doors of fate direct your meal! And once again I agree with Cesar: Peanut milk ($4) is non-negotiable.