Tommaso's Italian Restaurant, North Beach, San Francisco

A slice of Clam Pizza at Tommaso's in North Beach.

My old friend Ed Ward has been visiting San Francisco this week, in part to see the Robert Rauschenberg show at SFMOMA, but also to do research for book projects. We had some unfinished business, since last time he was in town, when we tried to check out Tommaso's on Easter Sunday, 2015, and most restaurants in North Beach were closed.

Ed used to write for Rolling Stone when it was based in San Francisco, and also wrote for Francis Ford Coppola's City Magazine in the early 1970s. I met Ed in the late 80s when he was working for the Austin Chronicle, and I did a few freelance pieces here & there over the years, including a few restaurant reviews. Ed happened to be in Berlin when the Wall fell, and he moved out there shortly afterwards. After more than a decade in united Germany, he moved to the south of France. We'd see each other off and on through the intervening years, usually during South By Southwest, and usually over a nice meal, typically Texas BBQ or Mexican food. 

Just as Ed was about to move back to Austin, someone here in the Bay Area made me an offer I couldn't refuse. I was here within a week. However, it took some time for me to get my bearings and get up to speed with the vast culinary scene in the Bay Area. Thankfully, I met my beloved Robin a few months after arriving, and since she's a native, she's quite a pro when it comes to the epicurean scene. However, there was this one piece of unfinished business. And last night, I found out why Ed's been singing the praises of Tommaso's for years.

Pictured above: Toasted Peppers with Olive Oil & Lemon. Below: Zucchini a la Vinaigrette. Both outstanding salad dishes, especially the superb Zucchini, with the firm texture and hit of herbs with the vinaigrette, just absolutely heavenly. I've never had a dish quite like it.

So anyway, back in the early 1970s, as Ed tells it, the Pizza scene on the West Coast was just OK, especially to New Yorkers like him who could easily discern between the dialed-in versions, and the truly outstanding purveyors of this classic Italian-American cuisine. Apparently this joint was the first  Pizza place on the west coast when it opened in 1935, called Lupo's. Fast forward to the early 1970s with new owners and the new name Tommaso's, by this time the place wasn't as popular as it was around World War II. City Magazine was looking for the best Pizza in San Francisco for a profile, but the results were for the most part dissapointing. Then one day, Coppola brought in a stack of Pizzas from Tommaso's ("right under our noses"), and the rest is history. Ed and others wrote glowing reviews, and next thing you know, there were lines going down the street. 

Part of the deal is the new owners kept many of the old recipes on the menu, including the utterly fantastic Baked Fresh Coo-Coo Clams, pictured above. These are so fresh, so I'd guess they have a local source, most likely a fisherman who harvests the clams from Tomales Bay. The sauce seems pretty simply--Ed says it's only five ingredients, and I'd guess those are white wine or white wine vinegar, lemon juice, dried basil, shallots and extra virgin olive oil. Probably a guarded secret, but, as Ed's suggesting, and I think he's right, that the real secret is the process of cooking the sauce. I wouldn't be surprised if it's similar to making Beurre Blanc: saute herbs and garlic/shallots with lemon, white wine, and or some other light acidic liquid (possibly vinegar or other spirit) until the alium component has softened, then add the butter once the liquids are boiling, but take the pan off the heat, and stir in the butter. I'm guessing they're doing that with adding the olive oil at the end. It's both Science and Art. Surely somebody figured it out a long time ago, and made a sauce that's quite unique. Needless to say, perhaps, I'm sure the liquid from the Clams themselves is an important flavor component to this dish. It wouldn't taste like this at all if these were previously frozen clams. Here's another dish I've never encountered before, though I have had some slightly similar ones, using Mussels.

Here's the best Pizza I've ever had, so satisfying. Pictured above, Clam Pizza, each slice with a Clam in the shell on it, and more chopped up on the slice. Below: Mushrooms and Sliced Italian Sausage Pizza. The Sausage is sourced especially from a local butcher for Tommaso's, as in you can't go there and buy it. Though I can assure you if it's Little City or Molinari's or one of the other great local traditional Italian butcher shops, they'll have Italian sausage they've made on the premises that's as good if not better than any you've had before. Great flavor to the meat itself, not overwhelmed by too much salt, fennels, chiles, pepper or anything else. Same thing about the tomato sauce on the pies--perfect balance.

Keep in mind Tommaso's is closed on Mondays, and I've heard the lines can get really long on Fridays & Saturdays, and they aren't open for lunch.

Check them out here:

http://www.tommasos.com/home.html