The baseball appetites
Take me out to the ballpark – for jerk chicken, Sheboygan brats, fry bread, and more.

By Kevin Hunsanger

AS FOOD TOWNS go, San Francisco is one of the finest, so it should come as no surprise that SBC Park, home of our San Francisco Giants, is widely regarded as the ball yard with the best dining in the major leagues. Now that another fresh season is upon us, and last year's World Series title means less than a can of beans, new fans and old are bringing their appetites to the expanding China Basin district and SBC Park. And with the debut of the Padres' brand-new PetCo Park in San Diego, the Giants, with their storied northern California home-field advantage, find themselves with much to defend in 2004. What follows, then, is a rough guide to "The Miracle on Third Street," where for the price of a $10 standing-room-only ticket everyone gains access to Bay Area delights – some of which may involve witnessing another Barry Bonds milestone, but all of which will feed your love of the game.

If you were lucky enough to be on the opening-day roster of the 2004 Giants, your pregame dining options would have included roast chicken with mashed potatoes (a team favorite) and grilled sirloin steak, both provided by Acme Chophouse, chef Traci des Jardins's dazzling sophomore effort. Acme, located in Willie Mays Plaza and with its ballpark mailing address (24 Willie Mays Plaza, S.F. 415-644-0240), has been catering for the team since 2001. It's a service Acme director of operations Larry Bain feels privileged to provide. "These are health-conscious athletes who need the finest and freshest ingredients," says Bain, who then confides, "Of course, we don't tell the trainers how much butter is in the mashed potatoes, otherwise they would never let them into the clubhouse again." The rotisserie chicken with chanterelles ($18) and decadent mashed potatoes ($6) can be enjoyed without reservations by all at Acme; in fact, you don't even need to have a ticket to the game. This is a don't-miss-it pregame ritual for many, however, so get there early for the best seats. Acme opens two and a half hours before every home game and serves until well into the night.

Bain upholds exacting standards for all of Acme's food, not just that served to professional athletes. The restaurant's fish are local, the beef grass-fed and hormone free. Local sustainability is key at Acme, and Bain even extends this philosophy to include a patch of herbs growing in a slender garden in the shadow of the Willie Mays statue and its accompanying 24 palm trees. Customers enjoying a pregame cocktail (and you should – a fantastic martini at Acme will set you back the same price as a generic draft beer will once you go inside) in the plaza beer garden can peek over the railing at sprigs of rosemary and dozens of other blooming edibles that will soon grace indoor dinner plates. "Now," Bain says, "the Giants can say they have a truly edible ballpark – no one else has the same." Take that, New York! In fact, Acme, with its swanky, old-school charm, gives steak houses on this coast, or any other, a serious run for their money. And as far as ballpark dining goes, there's simply no contest.

Another bonus to the Acme experience is a private entrance to the park, which can cut waiting-in-line time down to nothing (although don't tell anyone else I told you about it). But maybe you saved your appetite for peanuts and Cracker Jack (or at SBC, sugar-coated roasted Diamond walnuts and Gordon Biersch garlic fries). Or maybe instead of a martini, you're all about having a beer in the bleachers (SBC offers 30 beers, including standout pints of Guinness at Murphy's Irish Pub near the famous "SplashCam" of Section 302). So come on, then: get your ticket punched, find your seats before the first pitch, and see if the classic words of Humphrey Bogart ("A hot dog at the ballgame beats a steak at the Ritz") still ring true. However, you might consider leaving the hot dogs for the kiddies and stepping up to the plate at the original Sheboygan Bratwurst stand in Section 135.

Sold from the same stand at the same spot since SBC's first opening day, in 2000, the Sheboygan bratwurst (known henceforth as "the Brat") is ballpark fare at its finest and an absolute bargain to boot. For $5.75 you get a grilled-to-order sausage that extends well beyond a generous fresh French roll. Load it up with grilled sauerkraut or grilled onions, top the whole mess with spicy mustard, and you'll be enjoying one of the best deals in town. (Mustard, people; putting ketchup on one of these babies is like chatting on your cell phone from your seat during the game. It's just wrong.) The Brat is still done up exactly as you want it, by a friendly staff who sometimes offer free samples and always make the inevitable long lines somehow bearable. No wonder the left-field bleachers are home to the giddiest fans around. Eric Roya has managed the stand since day one, when it was the only place to get a brat at SBC. Over the years, the lines swelled, forcing Sheboygan and the Giants to swiftly expand. Now there are seven Sheboygan Bratwurst stands; they can be found at every ticket level. But both Roya and I believe that those at his stand are still the best: "We were the first ones doing this, and we've been doing it all the longest."

While the Brat is certainly the official food down the left-field line, center and right belong to Orlando's Caribbean BBQ. Owned by San Francisco's resident Dominican dandy, Orlando Cepeda, Orlando's Caribbean BBQ is a tropical paradise located just behind the center-field scoreboard. Cepeda was a member of the original Giants team of 1958 and even hit a home run on the first-ever San Francisco opening day. A legendary crowd favorite, Cepeda had a nine-year career with the Giants that included six All-Star game appearances. In addition to winning a Most Valuable Player award in 1968 and being inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1999, he earned many nicknames, two of which are still bellowed with gusto at every home game: "Baby Bull" and "Cha Cha." Only today, when you call for the Baby Bull at Orlando's, you get a heaping tri-tip sandwich with garlic caramelized onions ($7.50). But as good as the Baby Bull is, the hands-down favorite of those in the know (including the Giants broadcast team of former players Mike Krukow and Duane Kuiper) is the ChaCha Bowl.

Based on an old family recipe (I kid you not), Orlando's ChaCha Bowl is a glorious concoction of jerk chicken breast and black beans, served atop rice, with a zesty pineapple relish. It's just the thing on a hot summer's day. And while the ChaCha Bowl may be the most popular specialty dish at the park (with sales averaging between 900 and 1,250 per game), Cepeda and his staff believe that high quality should always be priority number one. "You know, the ChaCha Bowl comes from my wife's family," Cepeda says, "and she was out there today, checking everything, tasting everything, making sure things were just right." At $8.75 the ChaCha Bowl may seem like a bit of a splurge, but I can't think of many restaurants where a portion this size, of a dish this satisfying, could be had for less than $10. And who knows, if you time it just right, you might get yours served up by a Hall of Famer's wife.

I hope you saved room for desert ...

In what can best be described as San Francisco's slant on New Orleans' classic beignet, Norman's Fabulous Fry Bread is a destination concession if ever there was one. After pitching one idea after another to the Giants' front office, transplanted East Coaster Norman Simpson finally hit on a winner and got his own booth in the park, although its location just inside the Marina Gate in center field wasn't exactly what he had in mind. "They stuck me in the worst location in the park," Simpson says in good humor, "but that didn't slow me down a bit. The crowds have been so big that we opened another location on the View Level (Section 314), and they want at least one more to open up during this year." Norman's fry bread is a mini-pizza-size portion of hand-stretched baked dough, buttered fresh from the oven and adorned with your choice of six toppings. You can't go wrong with a simple cinnamon-sugar dusting for a paltry $5, but according to Simspon, most folks plunk down an extra dollar for whipped cream and fresh strawberries, a combination that outsells the others by a grand margin.

San Francisco takes its food seriously, and whether our hometown heroes win or lose, another year of Giants baseball at SBC Park will satisfy all appetites. Dinner and a ballgame in our town means local merchants who use fresh ingredients in specialty dishes. As Cepeda says, "Cooking ... it's about pride," and one thing is certain at SBC Park: everyone is proud of the food they serve.