The Progress - New American, San Francisco

1525 Fillmore St, San Francisco CA 94115
Parking: street parking
Hours: Sun-Thurs 5:30pm-10pm, Fri-Sat 5:30pm-11pm
http://theprogress-sf.com/

Last Visited: April 6, 2016

Food: 3 to 4 stars
Atmosphere: 4 stars in the private area
Service: 3 to 4 stars
Price: $$$

While the dining experience may be significantly different in the main dining room, this review is focused on a prix fixe banquet meal that I enjoyed when we reserved the Balcony.

If you arrive early, the full bar offers options to enjoy some drinks and appetizers.
Just like in the main dining area, you are offered a few things for the table and all items are shared family style for $62 each person.  From a business plan standpoint, The Progress has done something unique in making small spaces like the Balcony (round table for up to 10 people) and Mezzanine (long table for up to 12 people) special by offering them as reservation only with a minimum headcount.  A Chinese restaurant would just use it for storage, but here, it's an exclusive spot which is perfect for larger dinner parties that want a bit of privacy.  We held a business dinner here and it enabled us to hear each other's conversation better and have our own space for the evening.

Another benefit of sitting in the balcony is that you get a birds-eye view of the kitchen and all that is happening during the plating.

A Few Things for the Table
These are super bite sized appetizers - one piece per person.

- Roasted kumquats with cardamom cream is sprinkled with black sesame, salt, and pepper.  This one came by so quickly that I completely missed the photo.

- Roasted baby carrots are served with curried yogurt and sprinkled with white sesame.  The carrots were nice and sweet.  It would be great to have more to enjoy the yogurt.

- Buttermilk biscuits with apple bourbon black butter - The buttermilk flavor could definitely be tasted in these rich little biscuits.  Large pieces of salt top the biscuits.  The apple bourbon black butter tasted like applesauce to me.  I wouldn't have minded a second helping of this.

- Lamb merguez is decorated with meyer lemon and scallion - While the lemon juice helped to brighten up these little sausage slices, the texture was too dense for me.

- Little gem hearts are served with green goddess dressing - The lettuce was really fresh, but I could have used a lot more dressing.  It was a bit dry for my taste - remember that the dressing shown in this photos is supposed to accommodate eight people. We needed more dressing on the side in a little pitcher.

Dinner

- Super Fresh Ricotta - Local citrus, hearts of palm, and rosemary almonds - The ricotta, located at the bottom of the plate, was creamy, fluffy, and needed to be scooped from the plate. The white slices shown in the photo are hearts of palm which gave a nice contrast in texture against the salad greens and creamy ricotta.  Considering the ricotta is supposed to be the star, it was strange that it was buried by all of the other items.

- Ceviche of Half Moon Bay Hirame - Avocado wedges, roasted yellow beets, and spicy serrano crema mexicana.  Mache decorates the dish and the tender leaves fit well with the fish.  If you like poke, you'll like this dish.  The fish tasted really fresh and the hint of spice from the crema was a nice addition. I also enjoyed the creaminess of the avocado.


- Grilled Spring Asparagus - Breakfast radish, smoked-cured egg and creamy pumpkin seed dressing. The egg made the asparagus taste even more meaty and I really liked this.  However, see my comment below about serving sizes.  More than one person took two pieces of asparagus, and that meant the last person served didn't get any asparagus.

- SoCal Swordfish - Pistachio 'crema' with fennel-blood orange relish and flowering kale.  This was an interesting concept with nuts being referred to as crema.  The flowering kale gave the dish a nice color and added extra flare.  The fennel relish had a good amount of salt and reminded me of olives.  I also appreciated how the swordfish was nicely done - not overcooked and still very juicy. The slices of blood orange made this dish taste more like a salad.

- BN Ranch Beef - Lightly smoked slightly smashed potatoes, anchovy butter, and seaweed salsa verde.  The meat was cooked until rare, pretty much perfect.  Mushrooms were lightly fried in a tempura batter which was a good accompaniment.

Dessert

- Rhubarb Sorbet Floating Island - elderflower gelatina, sheep's milk yogurt, bee pollen - I only tried one of the two desserts. Dessert comes out so that each person can try only one of the two options unless you share.  The rhubarb sorbet was light and this was a very refreshing dessert - not too sweet.

- Deluxe Vanilla Bean Ice Cream - chocolate ganache roasted dates, trufflebert hazelnuts, nocino.  People seemed to like each of the components - no complaints.

Service was non-intrusive, attentive, and friendly.  They changed plates, refilled water and drinks, and answered a lot of questions. There was a lot of plate changes and while we had people attending to us throughout the evening, they didn't stay the entire time, so we also felt that the area was sufficiently private.

Overall, I thought the food was flavorful, well-seasoned, and fun, but the limited number of bites per dish (one bite for the appetizers and two bites for things like the asparagus) made it difficult to try everything.  Not everyone knew how much they could take, and as a result, those whom were near the end of the lazy susan line up didn't always get to try everything.  Since some of our dining companions didn't like fish, there was a sufficient amount of meat, but otherwise, this was something I wish they would change just by communicating a little more.  If the intention is that there is a limit to what you can have, the server could be a better guide by just mentioning that there is one bite per person (more obvious for the appetizers) or two asparagus per person (completely not obvious).

The Progress was given one Michelin star in 2016 and the chefs won the James Beard Award in 2015. With those kind of credits, you can expect to continue to see delicious combinations here with lots of fresh ingredients.  I would definitely recommend booking the Balcony for groups.