Bauer Gives Three Stars To Hopscotch In Oakland

This week, East Bay Bauer files on Hopscotch, the "ambitious" Uptown Oakland restaurant from chef Kyle Itani and Jenny Schwarz. Bauer commends the "focus and care" that go into each dish on their American regional menu with "subtle Japanese influence:"

"The must-order seafood dish is the Yonsei Oyster ($5) topped with sea urchin, salmon roe and a citrus soy sauce...The care taken to preserve the integrity of the ingredients is evident in a salad ($9) that at first seems as if too much is going on - butternut squash, cauliflower, frise, endive, Little Gem lettuce and pomegranate seeds. But it's all brought together by a bold mustard vinaigrette that would have overpowered anything less...

[For dessert] My favorite choice at this time of year is the ginger spice cake nestled next to a pumpkin mousse that tastes like butterscotch and is dotted with candied pistachios. It adds up to an experience that's both familiar and exciting. Hopscotch deserves a huge following.

Although not every dish is perfect, the service and the cocktails excel, and Bauer is charmed enough to award Hopscotch three stars. This rating means a very likely inclusion in Chron's Top 100, come spring of next year.

· Hopscotch an ambitious Oakland place [Chron]
[Photo: Flickr/Berkeleyside Community]