If I get together with my friend in his crappy apartment kitchen, we drink beer. If I’m on another friend’s patio watching the sunset as the lights of the city come up, we drink wine. Beer is like a comfortable old sweatshirt that’s been washed a hundred times. Wine is like a velvet dinner jacket that fits you to a tee. Beer is your favorite football team on TV. Wine is a Monet exhibit at the museum.
I used to live around the corner from Aub Zam Zam, a neighborhood bar on Haight near Belvedere that’s been around as long as anyone can remember. But every time I tried to go, it was closed, its unpredictable hours never coinciding with mine.
Bruno Mooshei, the owner/bartender who took over the place from his father (who opened it in 1941), had developed something of a reputation over the years, and I wanted to see if it were true. Continue reading Aub Zam Zam: story of an Upper Haight original→
San Francisco is a good sports town. The Giants and 49ers consistently sell out, even during disappointing seasons, and most any bar or restaurant in the city is sure to have a TV or three with a game on. But when you absolutely positively have to watch your team, a sports bar is where you need to be.
In my perfect world, all bookstores would serve beer. Buy a copy of Ulysses, get a free pint of Guinness. Mark Twain’s Autobiography would come with discounts on Anchor Steam. William Faulkner? bottles of Dixie beer. If so much great literature was written under the influence of alcohol, shouldn’t it be read the same way?
Fortunately, there are a number of establishments throughout San Francisco and beyond that offer good, unpretentious reading environments while serving up a variety of excellent brews. Following are five favorites. Continue reading Books and beer: five top places for both→
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