LA Woman

A Louisiana native captures the soulful food of New Orleans.

There are a few rules to follow if you’re trying to re-create a Big Easy mood in a city with nary a Southern bone—specifically, San Francisco. To start, do not go for SoMa-high-ceiling-brick-wall chic. And skip the stunning hilltop views (or any views at all, for that matter).

Flat and funky is preferable—maybe a wonky but cozy space located in a part of town with grungy sidewalks populated by some good characters. Inside, lacquer-black wainscoting and ceiling fans swirling nonchalantly are ideal (don’t mind the fog blowing in), as well as a length of mirror advertising the specials, such as jambalaya or red beans and rice, handwritten in wax pencil. Crucial: The kitchen should always be frying up something —oysters or, say, cayenne-dusted, crawfish-stuffed beignets—at all times. And whatever you do, don’t dress the po’ boys with mesclun mix. Please don’t.

We’re happy to say that one place in SF has managed to do all of this. Squeezed into a 750-square-foot former Korean-Japanese greasy spoon (greasy enough that the walls needed a week of serious scrubbing), Brenda’s French Soul Food opened in September, without even a walk-in refrigerator (meaning everything is fresh from the Heart of the City Farmers Market). Since then, lines of people have queued up to sit down to a perfect fried-shrimp po’ boy, and chicken-and-sausage gumbo thickened with okra and a deep roux.

Owner and chef Brenda Buenviaje, 40, is three-quarters Filipino and one-quarter Creole. She grew up in a small suburb of New Orleans called Harvey, alternating between dinners of pancit and her grandma’s gumbo. Today, she lives in the TenderNob, five blocks from her casual breakfast-and-lunch spot, where she’s admirably resisted the desire to string Mardi Gras beads everywhere, and already has regulars who crave her cream biscuits. “I have a bunch of guys who come in with their Saints caps on,” she says of her Louisianan patrons, many of whom work in the nearby Civic Center.

Buenviaje, who began her career 15 years ago, at Mike’s on the Avenue in New Orleans, made it out here in 1997 to launch the now-closed Mike’s on Post. In SF, she’s worked the gamut, from heading the kitchen at the former Oritalia to her last gig, as the executive chef at Delessio Market and Bakery. To allow her time to spend with her six-year-old son, dinner service isn’t in the plans for now. That might come in a few years, though, once she gets the hang of running her own place. “When you’re stupid enough to put your name on the door, you’re suddenly like, ‘Oh my god, I have to show up!’” she laughs. But, as she says, “It’s all me. I just wanted to do food that felt the most natural to me. Soulful cooking is what I love.”

Brenda's French Soul Food 652 Polk St., 415-345-8100.

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