Last night, as part of the INFORUM series at the Commonwealth Club, chefs from Delfina, Hapa Ramen, Mission Street Food, Wild Kitchen, and Rice Paper Scissors gathered to discuss the San Francisco restaurant industry and their paths in it so far. Craig Stoll, now a restaurant magnate by San Francisco standards, talked about maxing out credit cards to open Delfina “back when Dolores Park was still pretty scary.” He recommends that aspiring restauranteurs try a Kickstarter instead.
Other highlights included MSF’s Anthony Myint reminding Stoll that he had once interviewed to be a cook at Delfina (which presumably didn’t work out) and Wild Kitchen’s Iso Rabins remembering knocking on the back doors of restaurants with boxes of wild mushrooms for sale (“The only people who were really mean to me were the people at Farina.”)
The most substantive part of the conversation was a debate over the value of formal experience when launching a restaurant or pop-up. Both sides made smart points, but Myint had the winning comment: “I think of it like The A Team. They were pros before they were renegades, so they knew their stuff.”
You can find out more about the INFORUM series here.
“Craig Stoll, now a restaurant magnate by San Francisco standards, talked about maxing out credit cards to open Delfina “back when Dolores Park was still pretty scary.”
Hahaha, you mean way back in 2005 10-years after all the Latino kids had already left? What a scurred lil’ bitch.
try 1998, he opened the resturant when Krim Krams junk store was next to him, and the pizza place was a hair salon…..that being said, Dolores Park was completely unscary in 1998, in some ways, 1997-2001 was the golden age of DP for those that lived around it as it hadn’t yet been “discovered”. We played actual sports on the busted soccer field back then
Will a recording of this INFORUM be available to view later? Or will a script be made available? I would love to see the whole session. Thank you!
FYI, Delifina website says 2005. Jus’ saying…But yeah, gentrification had already pushed out the drug dealers and gays by that time…
pizzeria opened next door in 2005, resturant had been there since 1998, Brazilian place that is now at market and franklin was in the delfina space before….
Which one? There are two Brazillian joints in that area and neither one is at Maket and Franklin.
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