This Ultra-Popular Arab Bakery is Opening in the Ferry Building

Though Cowgirl Creamery has sliced its last cheese at San Francisco’s historic Ferry Building (and in Point Reyes Station) the space left by the cheesemongers will not go to waste. Reem Assil, James Beard-nominated restaurant owner, is taking her mana’eesh and pastries into the vacant space, one of many smaller kiosks the entrepreneur hopes to open in the near future. New dishes exclusive to the Ferry Building will be on the menu, too. The San Francisco Chronicle reports Assil is inspired by street corner shops in Syria and Lebanon with the new venture.

Fans can expect the outpost to open in late September, another win in a season of plenty for Assil. Recently she wrote a new cookbook, “Arabiyya,” and was nominated for a James Beard award once again in 2022. Through it all, the owner is interested in accessibility for her staff (as she looks to make Reem’s a worker-owned business) and diners. “What do little outposts of Reem’s look like, that can be accessible to a wider scope of people without a heavier lift?” Assil asked in her conversation with the Chronicle.

“Foul play” involved in fire at this Italian restaurant

San Francisco Police told SFGATE the fire that spread at Baia earlier this week was due to foul play. The police further said the fire was seemingly not related to any other recent fires, but a spokesperson for the restaurant told SFGATE the restaurant’s motion alarms caught the person who set the restaurant’s garbage ablaze before the flames spread to a nearby tree, ultimately impacting the restaurant itself. SFGATE says Mission Local counts $350,000 worth of damages and the restaurant will close for one or two months.

Oakland art and food pop-up pays homage to rice dishes

The South, Southwest Asia, and North Africa (SSWANA) region has many riffs and iterations on spiced rice dishes, and Jeweled Rice, a pop-up art show, is happy to showcase many of such dishes. KQED reports the installation lasts until the end of August at North Oakland’s Crisis Club Gallery.

Extending bar hours until 4 a.m. squashed in the senate

Axios SF noted the Los Angeles Times’ coverage of the ongoing attempt by Senator Scott Wiener and other assembly members to extend a number of California counties’ hours to serve alcohol. Alas, the efforts are futile as opponents argued longer hours could mean more deaths on the road from drunk driving-related incidents. (Matt Haney, new to the assembly, pointed out there’s no correlation between areas with extended drinking hours and higher incidents of drunk driving.)

Fort Point unveils new seafood-focused menu

San Francisco brewery Fort Point shuttered its Lower Haight outpost earlier this summer to concentrate its efforts on wholesale and other locations. Now the Mission District and Ferry Building locations have launched a new menu with items like a Dungeness crab roll; Cup-o-Cioppino; halibut sashimi; and Rice-a-Roni arancini, a vegetarian option.

Catch Burdell’s Sunday Supper at Sequoia Diner

This Sunday at 8 p.m. is the last instance of Geoff Davis’ pop-up series (before a farm dinner at Tierra Vegetables on September 10) featuring meals built around Davis’s family history and the Great Migration. The menu centers around oven-baked ribs from Klingeman Family Farms with a K&J Orchards smoked plum barbecue sauce and mac and cheese with aged cheddar and Strauss milk. It’ll cost $85 per person and reservations can be made on Tock.