I love Delfina. It is, quite probably, my favorite San Francisco restaurant. And that’s saying a lot. I’d really rather go there than nearly anywhere else. It’s fancy, but not stuffy; it’s gourmet but not uber-pricey; the waitstaff are friendly and warm and they’ve done some sort of super-secret dance to make the dining room pleasantly chatty without ever being loud. You can always hear your date speak.
For someone coming from New Orleans and 20 years of listening to far-too-loud music, that’s important.
So the pizzeria opened. And I almost went. And I almost went again. I just kept thinking “It’s in the ‘hood, I’ll get there eventually.”
Somehow, a year went by without my going in. KT and Trails and absolutely everyone kept telling me how good it is, and still, I just didn’t go.
So finally Trails calls me and says “It’s been raining and I’m craving red wine and pizza,” which sounded pretty damned good to me.
Now, I’ll be honest: It could have been the company. It could have been the warm olives. It could have been the tricolor salad. It could have been the unbelievable anchovies (look, if you don’t like them, that’s fine. More for me. Just understand that it signifies that they’ve chosen very carefully their ingredients, k?). It could have been the toasty crunchy rich flavorful crust. It could have been the Italian wine list, nothing of which I’d ever heard of. It could have been the waiter who knew enough to suggest three out of four excellent glasses of wine to accompany our meal (the fourth was fine, but the third was better). It could have been a lot of things that made up the whole dining experience, but as it was, everything was great.
Let’s just start with the crust: Delfina Pizzeria’s taken San Francisco Pizza to a new level. They’ve figured out how to make a decent crust in large quantities, and then improved on it. And improved on it again. this is a thin-crust pizza. Want deep dish? Go to Zachary’s. This crust is thin and subtle and tastes… It’s crisp on the outside and chewy on the inside. It doesn’t quite have that New York raw-in-the-middle thing, but that’s really just a nostalgia thing anyway. You could put Prego on this crust and you might not notice it’s Prego. Fortunately, Delfina’s as careful with the rest of their pizza as their crust.
We started with a plate of mixed olives ($2.75)– these had been tossed in the oven for a few minutes, and were a delectable blend. The oil-cured olives plumped up in the warmth and stood out clearly.
Second we split the Insalata Tricolore ($7.50). Fresh (even in rainy 2006 April) arugula, radicchio and endive were all crispy and delectable under extra virgin olive oil with lemon and shavings of Grana Padano. The special cheese where Parmesan would not only do, but would be quite tasty, just goes to show to what lengths the owners are willing to go. This salad was fantastic. Everything was fresh and delicious.
Trails and I aren’t so great with Italian wine. I know I like a Frascati, a good solid Barbera, and I can swill down chianti with the best of them, but I’d heard of nothing on their list except the Moscato. And I hadn’t even heard of this one. This was a dry Moscato (Moscato de Terracine “Oppidium”, 25/6.5). It was very fruit-forward, bold up front, a nice big middle, and a strong if short finish. I’ve had a number of random Italian whites that are similar. You get all the nose of a sweet dessert wine, but the wine isn’t actually all that sweet. They’re doing something right here. I’d love to go up that ladder. Our waiter recommended the Fiano de Avellino (33/8.25), and this wine was something pretty special. It had a crisp start, a bunch of subtle and slightly floral notes through the middle, and it finished about six years later. It was definitely a good thing.
One off-the-menu pizza: The Margherita ($11). Doing something simple like this can be deceptively difficult. The sauce was tangy but sweet. The crust… I’ve touched on that. The basil was fresh and then had toasted down in the oven, revealing sweet and savory touches. We had a plate of fresh-grated Parmesan, freshly chopped (with a knife!) red pepper, and oregano on the stem that’d been dried in the oven to crumble over your pizzas by hand. Little touches make all the difference. They offer salt-cured anchovies ($2.75, and worth every penny). These anchovies are packed in salt without oil, preserving so much flavor it’s unbelievable. They come thinly spread on the pizza, which we were worried about at first– Trails and I are just nuts over Anchovies– but their pungent persistent flavor made it all balance well.
One daily special pizza: Hen of the Woods mushrooms with Fontal cheese ($14). The cheese and the mushrooms here set each other off so well. I don’t really know what to say, except yum. It stood up to repeated tastings the following day.
We again deferred to our waiter’s recommendations for reds with the meal. He suggested two Aglianicos, which was good, as we could then get a sense of the grape. The Aglianico del Vulture “Il Viola” (24/6.25) wasn’t bad. Not a lot going on in the nose, nor, really the wine, but it was perfectly serviceable. This is what I expect the Italians are drinking from jelly jars when you see them in old movies. It’s fine, but kind of thin. It didn’t really stand up to the anchovies or the subtle notes in the mushrooms, but the other, the Aglianico dell’Iripina “Tari” (30/7.75) was great. It had some strong flavors in it which stood up to the anchovies and tomatoes as well as fleshing out with the subtler flavors in the other pizza. It did a particularly good job with the Fontal cheese, bringing out the nutty flavors inherent in it.
We had to skip dessert, despite the unbelievable-looking Rhubarb tart. Our neighbor was eating the tart and insisted we get it, but we had to get a move on before our minds and bellies and taste buds exploded.
Besides, something sweet may have made us melt in the rain.

Delfina Pizzeria

3611 18th St, San Francisco, CA