Skip to main content

A Quick Review of G & Y Bakery Cafe

A new "tea restaurant" (even though it didn't call itself that) has opened at 881 Clay St, intersection of Stockton and Clay. It is called G&Y Bakery Cafe. 

They used a hard laminated menu with both sides crammed full of items, both Eastern and Western style breakfast so it's clearly a tea restaurant. Tables are quite clean as it is new. However, a sampling of their dish left the writer a bit wanting. 

Went in in the afternoon for a late lunch, and ordered something pretty simple: beef stew with seasonal vegetables over rice. The item arrived promptly, with plenty of gravy to soak in the rice. And the stuff is pretty flavorful. The vegetables, basically choy sum, is fine. However, the same can't be said of the beef. The beef is tough to the point of almost inedible. There are a lot of tripe and tendons, and they didn't seem to have been cooked long enough to soften properly. Took me a bit to chew each bit before they can be swallowed. 

The price is a bit on the high side considering the quality of the item. The rice dish, plus a can of soda, came out to be almost $15. 

All in all, this experience is at best, average. 

If you want a proper beef stew, I'd recommend you try one of the other restaurants in town. 

AMENDED JAN-10-2024

Went in again in the afternoon, this time I ordered "wet beef chow fun" 溼炒牛河. Again, beef was inedible. Would not go back. 

Comments

About the author

Kasey is a professional tour guide and amateur historian who specialized in Chinatown History and Tours. You will often find him guiding groups sampling delicious food and learning interesting historical tidbits about Chinatown most weekends.

Popular posts from this blog

Dragon Gate and its Surprising History

You can't come to SF Chinatown and leave out Dragon Gate, aka the Chinatown Gate, at the corner of Bush and Grant. But do you know its history?  Chinatown Gate, aka Dragon Gate, San Francisco Dragon Gate (aka Chinatown Gate, aka Dragon's Gate) was designed by Clayton Lee and others in 1967 in response to a mayoral competition, and his was the winning entry. Originally two gates were proposed, but the other gate leading to Barbary Coast was dropped due to lack of funds, and cost overrun.  The gate itself was designed after a Chinese "pailou 牌樓" or "paifang 牌坊", which were the "gates" that marked separate fang 坊, or "ward" within a city. However, later it evolved into a purely decorative element. As with tradition, the gate faces South, and is composed of a large gate with two smaller side gates.  The gate has a lot of its materials donated by Taiwan (Republic of China) including artisanal tiles, roofing, and the two guardian lions. Despite...

Waverly Place: more than just a Chinatown Alley with a Sordid History

Waverly Pl was far more than just an alley in San Francisco. During the earliest days of San Francisco, it was apparently known as "Pike Street", at least until the 1906 Earthquake. I cannot find any historical references on when the name was changed. Many references imply state "Waverly Pl, (formerly Pike St.) while other references imply stated Pike St. Even from the earliest days in Chinatown, it was known as a place of brothels, and allegedly both Bella Cora and Ah Toy, the two most famous madams of Chinatown, have brothels at or very close to Pike St. (later Waverly Pl). For a while, the brothels co-existed with barbers on the same street, where sailors and miners can get a haircut and a shave for 5 cents, and later, 10 cents. So the area was also known as Five Cent Street or Ten Cent Street for a while. But the street remained mired with vices.  A "crime map" prepared for SF City Supervisors in 1885, note the blue and red vices mapped.  courtesy Cornell U...

What Is the Origin of "Chop Suey" or "Wonton" Font, Often Associated with Chinese Food?

I am sure you have seen this font before, on Chinese takeout boxes, in Chinatowns, on Chinese restaurant signs or menus, or something that was supposed to be "Asian". It goes by a variety of names, such as Wonton, Chop Suey, Kung-fu, and so on.   But did you ever wonder HOW this font came to be? And how did it become the face of Chinatown?  The first appearance of this font family was registered in 1883 by Henry H Thorp of the Cleveland Type Foundry as "Chinese", though later it was changed to " Mandarin ". However, it is unknown if he personally designed it, as there are many design patents filed in his name even when he was unlikely to be directly involved.  This type of font was known in typography as an "ethnic font", trying to evoke a particular culture or ethnic group, and there are hundreds of them. Some are actually based somewhat on the language's original writing, like those pseudo-Greek or pseudo-Cyrillic fonts, then there are thes...