The Fast Casual Conversation on Repeat, and More A.M. Intel

Fifteenth Trick Dog mural added

OG Mission craft cocktail bar Trick Dog switches its menu concept up twice a year, with the ninth iteration debuting earlier this month. It’s essentially a curated art show with cocktail pairings, and Trick Dog gathered artists to create fourteen different public murals around San Francisco, with cocktails based on each mural. Now, artists Sam Flores and Ronnie Buders, who curated the art side of the project, have added a fifteenth mural in the parking lot next door to Lucky 13 in the Castro. The mural will appear on an upcoming cover of San Francisco magazine, Hoodline reports.

Intelligentsia has renovated and reopened its Potrero Hill roaster

To up this city’s already elite coffee game, Intelligentsia has renovated and reopened its roaster in Potrero Hill. New additions include state-of-the-art brewing equipment by La Marzocco, Mahlkönig, Fetco and Marco, an oak-wrapped espresso bar and marble cupping tables that anchor the Workstead's brass lighting, and a ten-foot steel and oak sliding door designed by Matt Bear of Berkeley-based Union Studio. In addition to being able to get Intelligentsia’s entire line-up of coffee, there are also now customized programs for wholesale customers on how to best make coffee.

More fast casual conversation, if you care

In case you’re not yet tired of the fast casual conversation, San Francisco magazine’s Rebecca Flint Marx has penned an excellent summary of the situation. It doesn’t necessarily add anything new to the conversation (and is in fact remarkably similar to last week’s story in Food Republic), but it certainly is relevant right now. TL;DR is that everyone loves Souvla, even if they can’t stand calling it fine casual.

Homegrown Sandwiches now has its own Bay Area farm

Homegrown Sustainable Sandwiches debuted in SF last week, and its entree into our market makes a lot of sense: It’s a chain so dedicated to the farm-to-table ethos that it has its own farm in Washington (as do several other restaurants in SF, such as Quince and Namu Gaji). Now, Homegrown has its own organic farm here, too, in Discovery Bay. It’s called Homegrown Sprouting Farms and will supply all three Homegrowns that open in the Bay Area (Danville and Lafayette are coming soon). It’s a two-acre farm run by First Generation Farmers, a non-profit community farm focusing on food access and sustainable agriculture education.

Epic Steak will have its 15 minutes of fame

TV series Ballers was filmed at Epic Steak on Friday. The Rock was not present, but Jay Glazer (Fox Sports NFL Analyst), Mark Schlereth (Former NFL player, 3 time SB winner, ESPN NFL Analyst), and Marcellus Wiley (Former NFL player, ESPN NFL Analyst) were, and will be appearing alongside the restaurant next season.