If you want to learn how to cook, there are any number of ways to go about it.
Find a cookbook, for one. Pore over videos on the internet, for another. Or you could pop over to Hayes Valley, grab a seat at the bar at Bosque, order a glass of bubbly—Champagne Michel Dervin's lychee-inflected Blanc de Noirs is particularly nice—and watch José Moreno and Mike Sánchez do their thing.
You'll observe, for instance, that when Moreno, who hails from Yucatán, prepares your picanha steak, it's a play in three acts. First, he lays the entire cut fat-side down on the grill producing a surge of flame and a profusion of one of the most exciting aromas known to humanity, while giving the fat—which cooks more slowly than lean meat—a critical head start.
José Moreno searing the picanha (coulotte in French) while Mike Sánchez prepares roasted potatoes(Nick Czap)
Hoisting the picanha onto the butcher block, Moreno deftly carves off a steak, seasons it generously, then returns it to the grill for a swift sear and another round of wonderfully aromatic fireworks.
Finally, he sets the steak in a flame-blackened pie pan, which he may give a last lick of fire from the grill or a moment or two on the adjacent griddle, before taking it off the heat entirely for a rest that brings the steak to a state of perfection. Moreno goes about it all with an effortless cool and confidence honed in the kitchens of some of San Francisco's most esteemed restaurants, including Quince and Cotogna.
Watching the show is thirst-making, so perhaps you've moved on to another refreshment. Leptir from the Slovenian winery Sanctum, is an intriguing character. Tawny gold in color, its nose conjures a bone-dry Madeira or Marsala, perhaps—a taste that’s hard to put a finger on, reminding me only of a strange night in Vienna some years ago that involved quantities of a similarly sui generis orange wine, made just a stone's throw from the Slovenian border, in Austria's Steiermark region.
But focus, again, as Sánchez dispatches an almost salmon-pink filet of Idaho-farmed trout, which co-stars with kanpachi in Bosque's crudo. The speed with which he skins it—in about as much time as it takes the average person to blink—might lead you to think he was born gripping a filet knife. Sánchez, originally from Veracruz, has been a professional cook for more than 17 years, most of which he spent working at the nearby (but no longer extant) sushi restaurant, Domo.
Crudo of trout and kanpachi with tarragon oil, green onion, chive and dill(Nick Czap)
Bosque (Spanish for “forest”) opened, or rather, was born anew, late last summer. Its owner, Eric Lin, had opened Kis Cafe in the same space that May with his previous business partner, restaurateur Luke Sung, who exited the partnership after an exchange with an influencer went pear-shaped. The subsequent closure—during which Lin kept his staff on the payroll while contemplating whether to forge ahead—was an ordeal, financially and otherwise. Understandably, he doesn't care to revisit the subject.
Lin, who describes himself as "a little bit addicted to eating," grew up in Taipei, where, he says, "eating is, like, the thing. If you're drinking, there's food. If you're gambling, there's food. If you're spending time with family, there's food." In his early 20s, he “spent a good amount of time traveling, in almost every continent, and got to experience a lot of different flavors and learn about a lot of different cuisines."
This interest led him to work at a Japanese fusion restaurant, where he “learned how to do salads, use a meat slicer, all kinds of useful information." He also alludes to "making noodles in different places," furthering his skills by cooking for friends in college and taking on private dining jobs during the pandemic. At Bosque, he conceives the new dishes, while Moreno and Sánchez fine-tune operational aspects like quantities, how to store the ingredients, and plating.
"At the end of the day," Lin says, "they have more experience running a kitchen. Inevitably, it's a collaboration."
Lin's enthusiasm for wine, likewise, began at an early age. "I had aunts and uncles and extended family who were into wine," he says. "They had great taste, and they would always bring great wine to family events. I was at single-digit ages when I got introduced to it."
Bosque's owner, Eric Lin, and his dog, Forest. The restaurant's name is Spanish for forest.(Nick Czap)
The interplay between wine and food fascinated him. "It wasn't the wine that was the most interesting thing, it was the food that went with it,” Lin explains. “Wine is inevitably, to me, a food beverage."
He has a special fondness for French wine and jokes that he found it "really hard not to just serve what I like, which would be just white and red Burgundies." He overcame his predilection to a degree: The bottle list is roughly half French, while the other half is an eclectic and frequently-changing assortment from appellations in Italy, Spain, and elsewhere in Europe, as well as California, Oregon, and Washington.
On a recent evening I took a seat shortly after opening, and in no time, the airy dining room had begun to fill with a convivial murmur. Feeling nostalgic for Emilia-Romagna, I ordered a glass of Lambrusco Grasparossa di Castelvetro from Zanasi, a family-owned winery near Modena. Inky purple, its dusty, black and red berry bouquet projects sweetness. The taste, though just as fruity, is quite dry.
The crudo appeared, gleaming slivers of that audaciously pink trout and ever so barely pink kanpachi, arranged just so in an enticing pool of luminously green olive oil seasoned with tarragon, and finished with an artful scattering of green onion, chives, and dill. The trout was rich, almost buttery; the kanpachi meatier and somewhat leaner—both were exquisitely fresh with just enough alliums for a hint of pungency without obscuring the subtle flavors of the fish.
Bosque's rendition of California asparagus is a quiet wonder: fat, green spears, parboiled then grilled and garnished with a mushroom-and-black truffle concoction, an olive-anchovy tapenade, and shards of Parmigiano-Reggiano. Bosque calls itself a wine bar, but between the asparagus' soft crunch, the intertwining shades of umami, and a heady sip of Domaine Saumaize-Michelin's white Burgundy (which, for the uninitiated, will forever alter your conception of chardonnay), it reads more like a restaurant, and a high-end restaurant at that—albeit one where the most expensive dish is a mere $22.
Locally foraged mushrooms with chevre, frisée and endive, radish greens and balsamic vinegar(Nick Czap)
A mushroom dish arrived, constructed with a little cloud of Cypress Grove chevre, topped with a mix of frisée and endive, which, in turn, is topped with a mound of sautéed yellowfoot chanterelles, black trumpet, and hedgehog mushrooms, and embellished with some tiny, purplish radish greens and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar. The interplay of flavors was captivating, the chevre's ever so ethereal, goaty funk mingling with the bitter lettuces, the mushrooms' savory earthiness, the slight pepperiness of the radish greens and the balsamic vinegar's sweet-sour acidity.
And then the picanha steak, which, thanks to the earlier pyrotechnics, carried a certain air of expectation, which it neatly exceeded. Moreno took the liberty of carving it up in such a way that each beautifully browned, yet succulent, Maldon-salted slice is capped with a little knob of that exquisitely caramelized fat. When it melts in your mouth, it is a glimpse of Nirvana.
Chase it with a tasty Piedmontese red—G. D. Vajra's jauntily tannic Langhe Nebbiolo is a good match—and you'll quickly realize the benefits of life as a Bosque regular. I certainly have, and it's almost comical how often I find myself sauntering down their way. Perhaps I'll see you at the bar.
// Bosque is open Monday through Thursday from 5pm to 10pm, Friday and Saturday from 5pm to 11pm; the kitchen closes between 9pm and 9:30pm; 609 Hayes St. (Hayes Valley), bosquewinebar.com
Local black cod with piquillo peppers, aioli, and parsley potatoes(Nick Czap)
