This weekend was a long weekend. It was Memorial Day weekend. We wanted to have something remarkable, because it was a 3-day weekend. Like any other weekend, we hit the 24-hour gym for a morning workout. We took 2 exercise classes in our gym, Boot Camp and Dance for 2 hours, broke a little sweat. We get home from working out, shower, relax, and then call the restaurant to make a reservation.
This restaurant is “Tanh Long”, in Sunset, San Francisco. We have known this famous crab restaurant. Since we both love crabs, we decided to go to this restaurant.
“Tanh Long” is the sister restaurant to a downtown San Francisco restaurant, “Crustacean”. “Crustaceo” is a high-class restaurant, business environment and relatively expensive. My office mates took us to “Crustaceans”. Crustacean’s master chef told us about the sister restaurant “Tanh Long”, which is a more family oriented restaurant with almost the same menu as Crustacean.
His recommendation is the same as ours, which is “Garlic Roasted Whole Crab.” They have a different style of crab cooking than what San Franciscans are familiar with. Crabs were simply boiled in seawater at Fisherman’s Wharf restaurants. This restaurant grills whole crab with lots of garlic and oils.
It’s so different and tastes great. That’s why people keep coming even though it was the highest priced item on the menu. The location of this restaurant is on the corner of Judah and 47th Street, in downtown San Francisco. From the outside it doesn’t look like a great restaurant, but inside it is smart and clean. This was the original restaurant of these 2 successful sister restaurants in San Francisco, opened by a Vietnamese gentleman. My recollection of dining in Vietnam tells me nothing similar was served in Vietnam. It may be Vietnamese food made in San Francisco. Benihana-style barbecue isn’t exactly made in Japan, it’s made in New York.
“Roasted crab”, “Tiger prawn” and “Fideos al ajillo” were our selection that day. When eating this crab, or any crab, you can’t help but keep eating until you finish the crab, as your hands and fingers will be full of oil, garlic, meats, and shells. You can’t even pick up silver or wine glasses. We spent there for two and a half hours. It was a long dinner, without much conversation. We don’t need a lot of conversation to enjoy delicious meals. Japanese vendors suggest that you would choose a crab restaurant if you need to dine with a difficult customer. Your difficult customer will be quiet during dinner, because he was busy eating the crab. How true it is!
The “Thanh Long” restaurant is located on the corner of Judah and 47th Street. The location of the “crustacean” is Polk and California. You can search for them on the Internet by name and location; “Thanh Long, San Francisco” and “Crestacean, San Francisco”.