I ate out for most meals when I was a student at Cal.
It started because I really did not appreciate the cuisine offered at Cal Dining, then continued on because I did not have enough time to cook. I reasoned that since I was a flexible hourly student employee (and a student of Economics), my time spent working an additional hour was more financially beneficial than prepping, cooking, eating, and cleaning up — only to end up with something mediocre that a restaurant would’ve done much better at. (Comparative advantage, anyone?)
Enjoying a nice dinner was something I looked forward to after a grueling day, and often the fuel into a long night of work. Visiting restaurants was the motivation to the weekends, when I would try to make a solo trip to SF to eat. Perhaps my first ‘serious venture’ into food was during Freshman year, when I BART’ed into the city every weekend to find the best ramen in the Bay Area (at the time the answer was Marufuku, but now there’s Mensho Tokyo).
Looking back, my time in college were my ‘formative years’ in dining. I remember going to my first Michelin-starred restaurant during Sophomore year for my birthday at Kin Khao, and frankly was quite underwhelmed with the experience (Nari is much better, FWIW). I enjoyed reading Eater SF articles to stay up-to-date on the Bay Area dining scene. It’s weird to say, but eating out became my hobby; my favorite ice breaker question as a TA was “what is your favorite restaurant or dish in Berkeley”, which was surprisingly telling about someone’s background, and doubled as a way to collect recommendations.
I reckon I ended up visiting most of the restaurants in Berkeley over the span of 5 years, with a focus on those walkable from campus. Some I frequented weekly, others just to try once and check off a non-existent list. I saw many great restaurants open up during this time and others close, for better or for worse (RIP Jayakarta). By graduation, I had mastered my go-to Chipotle order, and was calling drinks “boba” even if they that did not have boba, nor for that matter, tea.
It’s now been three and a half years since I graduated from Cal, and it’s been about the same amount of time that this article has sat in my drafts folder, deep in Evernote, collecting dust. I had started writing excerpts in April 2021 when I began to realize that I was really going to miss all the food at Berkeley, but never got around to finishing it. This summer I went back for a few days to refresh my memory and finish the article. For the most part things haven’t changed, but there have been a couple of closures. I had started this piece more as an article for food recommendations in Berkeley, but three years down it’s molded slightly into a memoir of my time there. Turns out I made a lot of my memories at Cal through food.
Breakfast
The single business I visited the most at Cal was Sheng Kee. Every morning on the way to campus, I’d stop by to grab a piece of bread. Sheng Kee’s pastries was a constant for me transitioning from life in China to Berkeley, where I ate similar pastries for breakfast. The pastries are uniquely Asian with influences from the West — a brioche covering sausage and with spring onion, Macanese egg tarts based on the Portuguese Pasteis de Nata, or a flaky puff pastry containing char siu.
More often than not, I’d get the the pork floss bun. I never got sick of it over the 5 years I was at Cal. I’d skip breakfast and eat the bread around lunch time, then it’d last me until dinner.
Pre-COVID, my body weight would routinely decrease by up to 15–20 pounds over the course of each semester. It was attributable to not eating breakfast and having a singular piece of bread from Sheng Kee for lunch. I also always hit 10000 steps a day, especially with all the hills I had to traverse around campus. Then during summer or winter break, I’d gain it all back.
During Sophomore year, I went through a phase of drinking Soylent for lunch. This was also perhaps the most stressful time of my life, taking CS61B and CS70 together in order to declare the CS major. I was a machine that semester — I studied all day, and wanted to be efficient when it came to sustenance. I didn’t like the taste at all, and only barely tolerated the chocolate flavor. I consumed Soylent strictly out of convenience; it was very portable, could be ingested anywhere (including during lecture or on the go), and was very easy to pack away after a few sips. It tasted so aggressively mediocre that I’d only finish half the bottle before I got to dinner, so no wonder that I lost weight.
After Soylent I had a Clif Bar phase, for the same reasons as Soylent, but it tasted much better. The white chocolate macadamia flavor was the only one I liked.
Boba
I averaged 3 cups of boba a week at Cal. Looking back, it’s kind of incredible I did that; I rarely get it now.
There may be nowhere else in the United States with a greater density of boba shops than the area surrounding UC Berkeley. They surround campus on the south side, downtown, north side, and even on campus. All in all, I reckon there are some 15–20 shops. I think at one point in late 2017 RareTea had 4 locations around campus alone. Drinking boba at Berkeley is, without exaggeration, integral to the culture and identity of a Cal student. I didn’t even drink this much boba in China, which had better quality and way more options.
In Sophomore year, I bought a $100 gift card from RareTea with a $20 bonus as a promo offer. I loved their fruit teas that didn’t really contain tea — really just a fruit slushy. I was about halfway through the card balance before Yi Fang opened on Bancroft. It marked a turning point in the boba scene at Berkeley — the beginning of the Asian boba brands, which elevated the game and also the prices.
Before that point, UCha was unanimously the best in town, and other places like Boba Ninja or Purple Kow just competed on value or convenience. I went to Yifang very frequently; their brown sugar boba was decadently good compared to its competition, and their fruit teas were ideal when I didn’t want something as heavy.
About a year later, TP Tea opened on Telegraph. I reckon they still have the best boba in Berkeley, if you were to define boba strictly. The pearls are chewy and squishy, and the drink uses a strong and decent quality tea that is balanced by milk.
During COVID, Adeena came to stay with me during their Freshman year and worked at Feng Cha over the summer. I had never really been a fan of the place; I visited the day they first opened, and found the signature creme brulee drink to be mostly style without substance — it was kind of disappointingly watery. During Adeena’s tenure, new owners took over the place and brought in a bunch of ‘family’ from their home country to cut down on labor costs. It was also around this time that someone’s hair got set on fire by a homeless person while they were waiting in line at Feng Cha.
Asha Teahouse downtown has the best tea. They also have the best crema tea, in fact one of my favorite cremas I’ve had in the US (and crema is my go to order). On the other hand, Gong Cha serves one of the worst cremas I’ve had.
I never finished that RareTea gift card. It’s probably still sitting somewhere in my drawer at home in NYC. I wonder if it expires.
Pizza
During my internship hunts over junior and senior years, I’d diligently attend company info sessions a couple times a week. They’d always serve dinner to attract attendance, and more often than not it was Sliver. Specifically, 2 slices of lukewarm Sliver pizza and maybe, if the company was generous, a slice of the ‘cookie pizza’ as dessert. I very quickly got sick of Sliver; now when I eat it I feel transported to a full Wozniak Lounge, listening to an eBay tech-talk on Hadoop File Systems.
Sliver (and Cheeseboard) serves a uniquely Berkeleyan pizza. It’s vegetarian, with funky toppings that no other pizza shop has even dreamed of, and there’s only one flavor a day. Everything tastes better with their magical Peruvian-esque green sauce headlined by cilantro, garlic, jalapeno peppers, and lime.
In hindsight, every company probably thought it was a slam dunk idea to order Sliver — it’s cheap, portable in large quantities, easy to eat, requires no decision making, and is accommodating of most dietary restrictions because it’s vegetarian.
Pollara pizzeria was my favorite pizza in Berkeley (RIP). It served pizza al taglio, a style of Roman pizza made in long rectangular pans that goes through a lengthy cold ferment process to create an airier dough. The result was a lovely crust that is fluffy at the top yet satisfyingly crispy at the bottom. The meal was not heavy; their sauces are light, and the focus is really on the crust. Every time I was in the 4th street area — so like every time my mac broke or I lost my airpods, both of which were abnormally often — I stopped by for a slice. My go to order was the margherita, but the house made sausage was pretty good too.
For Neapolitan pizza, Lucia’s does a solid and authentic pie. I like their Lips on Fire pizza, which inherits a couple more quirks on top of a Margherita: some soppressata salami and a sweet yet spicy ghost pepper maple syrup that adds depth to the the flavorful tomato sauce.
People say that Arinell has the best NY slice in the Bay Area, and now as a 3-year NYC resident I feel I’m qualified to comment. The crust is thin and very crispy, with a hint of char. The tomato sauce is on point, and the cheese is plentiful with a good chew. There’s not much more you can ask for in a plain NY slice.
Thai
I went to Imm Thai Street Food a lot as a Freshman — it was my go to restaurant when I wanted to treat myself. The first time I was there, I got the Khao Kha Moo off the special menu, a braised pork trotter dish with rice that’s influenced by Chinese cuisine. The flavors reminded me of the night markets in Chiang Mai, and from then on I kept going back. But after having Imm so frequently over the years, I began getting tired of it. The Khao Kha Moo no longer evoked memories of Thailand, while the Pad Kee Mao was a flavor I began to become sick of. Regardless, Imm still holds a high place in my heart. It’s the authority on Thai food in Berkeley. My go-to’s are items that aren’t necessarily your American-Thai restaurant classics: the duck noodle soup featuring a sweet and herbal broth, the aforementioned Khao Kha Moo, and a crispy fried pumpkin that’s really nothing more than the name, yet it pairs with a delicious sweet peanut sauce. Don’t get the Pad Thai, it’s remarkably disappointing; go to Funky Elephant for that.
“Italian”
I think Gypsy’s is the restaurant that every Cal student ends up having at least once. It’s synonymous with hearty, greasy, Italian food; the tastier the later in the evening it gets.
The first time I went to Gypsy’s I ordered the Gamberi e Capesante, a tomato cream sauce fettuccine with a generous amount of scallop and shrimp, not knowing any better. It immediately became my go-to order. Over the years I went to Gypsy’s way more times than I’d like to admit, but I’ve only gotten a handful of different pastas since (including once a Calzone, which is easily a 2 person meal). Compared to favorites like the Godfather’s Favorite or the Carbonara, the Gamberi is not as heavy. You don’t hate yourself as much after (key word here is as much). And for an honest seafood pasta, the prices are pretty good.
I don’t know if I’ve seen a similar creamy tomato seafood pasta in other Italian restaurants, and frankly I haven’t bothered to look. This flavor has been consecrated in my mind as Gypsy’s legacy, and a core flavor memory from college. I’m not proud to admit that I probably went there once a week for dinner while I was working out of Hearst Field Annex.
Chinese
Easterly serves remarkably authentic Hunanese cuisine, which makes it fairly standout in the US. Half of Easterly’s dishes taste pretty much the same: they’re spicy, oily, and feature some kind of meat along plenty of peppers (that’s Hunanese cuisine for you). They have an authentic selection of more exotic meats you don’t often find at many Chinese restaurants here: intestines, giblets, pork tripe, and frog to name a few, each presenting unique textures with some resilience. I craved this often, but it was a challenge to get my friends onboard, which was unfortunate since Chinese food is better in a group.
When Adeena lived in Berkeley, we would get Easterly more often, and then make fried rice with all the leftover ingredients the next day. Since all the dishes taste similar and there’s way too much oil, they went so well together all with some rice.
Back in the pre-pandemic days, I often would get Chengdu Style Restaurant’s lunch combo. It’s like a cafeteria where you grab a tray and tell the ‘lunch lady’ what dishes you want from the steam table, then get rung up at the register. The plates were good value — three cai (dishes) and a soup for less than 10 dollars. I’d always get my favorite childhood dish — tomatoes and eggs — as well as the cabbage because you need a vegetable in every meal. Judging by the clientele, I don’t think many non-Chinese people knew about it.
The other Chinese restaurant I recommend is Great China. It’s very different from Easterly; I think of it as a high-end Chinese-American restaurant with a solid Peking duck. In fact, you will likely see Peking duck on every table here. Peking duck was a good idea whenever there was a celebratory occasion — after all the dish was originally prepared for the emperor. I came here the night of graduation, and also for end-of-semester team events. The other dish I like is the double skin, a dish that I’ve never seen in China.
Lotus House doesn’t exist anymore, but I had a friend who would get the exact same dish there every day — chicken and broccoli with less oil and less salt. He had grown up in Singapore, and told me that he was not used to the overly seasoned and unhealthy food in the States. At Lotus House, I always went the opposite direction with a two cai order of Tomato and Eggs and Sichuan beef — pieces of fried beef that are then stir fried and coated in a layer of sweet chili sauce. After our meal, we’d return to campus to commence a long night of CS 170 homework, which was by far the hardest class I took at Cal. It made me doubt my ability and aptitude in a way that no other class did.
On the night before my friend moved out, I convinced him to try something else as a last meal in Berkeley. We got Gypsy’s, and he ordered the chicken and broccoli penne pasta. He did not finish it.
Health
During the summer of 2020, I developed a routine of getting sweetgreen for lunch. It’s located on the other side of Downtown Berkeley from my apartment, which made for a nice mid-day walk. It’s now a key quarantine memory for me — it’s sad to recount, but the brief 10 seconds I spoke to the server during pickup was perhaps the only in-person interaction I would have daily.
Sweetgreen’s loyalty program kept me returning after the summer. I needed to spend $1000 in a year to hit gold status, which was equivalent to 80 salads at the time (and don’t get me started on the $2500 per year black status). Sometimes I wonder why I was even so committed to sweetgreen; it’s frankly unnecessarily expensive and I only liked 3 salads on the menu.
In February 2021, I finally hit gold status in sweetgreen, after a summer and semester’s worth of hard work. The loyalty program was basically nonexistent — I think you had access to a concierge (why would you need a concierge for a salad shop!?), early access to new items, and a free salad on your birthday or something.
They shut down the loyalty program soon after and switched to a subscription model. I haven’t paid for sweetgreen since.
I didn’t realize what a gem Mezzo was until I left Berkeley. Back when I was a Junior, I thought it was just a good salad place to visit when I was feeling healthy, but now I’ve realized it’s one of a kind. Very few salad shops make their own dressings (poppy seed FTW), and most sandwich shops don’t bake their own bread. After all, most salad and sandwich shops are uniform and monotonic chains these days.
Mezzo’s portions are huge. I remember ordering the Chef salad once and leaving with 2 additional meals of food to go. If you got a sandwich with their honey wheat bread, you’d see how thick their bread is, though the bite is not at all boring — it’s moist and airy, with a lovely hint of sweetness and flavor from the grains. Their croutons are also addictingly good.
I went to Tender Greens a lot when I moved to downtown at the end of Sophomore year. For a brief period when they had their katsu chicken special with sushi rice and miso mayo, I think I may have gone 4 times in a week. Looking back, I really liked Tender Greens for 3 reasons. The first was the illusion of health. The food feels pretty healthy but in reality is a bit more questionable; they’re brave enough to post the caloric count on the menu, and it regularly yet unexpectedly hits 4 digits. The second is the variety, in which one could build out a plate choosing from an assortment of proteins, greens, and starches. Lastly it was the location; they were a convenient walk away from my apartment, and had a nice back porch where I have fond memories working out of on a lazy summer afternoon, sipping their mint lemonade. The food is just alright, and it’s also kind of overpriced. The chicken is regularly overcooked, and the portion for steak is kind of sad for what you’re paying. But it was a consistent and decent meal if you found the right things.
Curry
I used to go to Muracci’s somewhat frequently in my underclassman years. It was one of those default ‘casual dinner with friends’ spots, but its curry honestly isn’t much better than the stuff you get from store-bought curry cubes. Their katsu was also so-so, often a little over-fried in my memory.
My favorite Japanese curry place is a toss-up between Fish & Bird Izakaya and Kiraku. Fish & Bird has a remarkably flavorful and sophisticated curry, probably one of the best Japanese curries I’ve had. It’s akin to a Mexican mole, featuring tens (if not hundreds) of ingredients — spices, herbs, fruits, you name it — all slowly cooked for days, to produce a complicated yet balanced flavor that’s hard to describe in nuance. I like to get it with an onsen egg and mix it in with the rice when there’s about 3 bites left for an added faint sweetness and richness. Kiraku’s curry is not as special, but its beef tongue that comes with the curry is particularly enjoyable. I love the tenderness that tongue affords; it’s also the same reason why I love lengua tacos.
Noodles
There were long lines when Ippudo opened up in downtown Berkeley, but it didn’t stop me from going often; after all, I no longer had to go to SF for decent ramen. Their ramen is textbook and not different from the Ippudo’s I knew in Shanghai — thin and firm Hakata style noodles, a porky and slightly sweet soup, soft and fatty chashu, and a thoroughly marinated ramen egg with a creamy yolk. During my internship over Sophomore summer, me and my housemate would get it every Friday when he came back for the weekend from the South Bay. We talked about our internships over bowls of ramen like 2 Japanese salarymen, before enjoying a nice walk back home at sunset.
One of my go-to dinners was the cumin lamb noodle at Famous Bao, made extra spicy. Unfortunately, all of their locations closed down around the start of the pandemic, but its flavor is imprinted into my memory that I tried making it at home recently in NYC to less success. I have fond memories of slurping down these noodles while watching a youtube video in Hearst Field Annex. Then I would go back to work for the night.
Marugame opened up later, and quickly became a frequented spot. I constantly over-ordered and felt guilty after finishing everything. The self-serve tempura was dangerous. I was always too ambitious with the shrimp, squid, and vegetable kakiage (you have to get a vegetable, right?). The noodles were already a heavy meal by itself; my favorite was the curry Nikutama udon with plenty of fatty beef, all in a thick and sweet curry soup. And all of this was before I dumped tempura flakes and spring onion on top for “texture”.
Brunch
I lived next to La Note for 3 years. Before the pandemic, we would put our names down on the waitlist on the weekend then go back home to sleep a bit longer. I ordered the same item every time: the omelette fromage et jambon. The emmental cheese is savory yet sweet, and it sets the flavor of the omelette. I always finished the grilled potatoes on the side, but my favorite was the accompanying garlic cloves. You can squeeze out the mushy garlic from its shell, yielding a sweet garlic taste that pairs well.
Honorable Mentions
- Cancun Sabor Mexicano: their salsa bar is the best — there’s so much variety going on. I am the man I am today from eating their X-treme salsa made with carolina reapers.
- Ippuku: very well done yakitori. The decor feels just like a Japanese Izakaya too.
- Bag O’Crab: me and Adeena’s favorite ‘treat meal’. Explosively flavorful, buttery, and spicy if you get the house sauce. I have a core COVID memory of watching Gordon Ramsay while sucking on shrimp heads.
- Agrodolce Osteria: a lovely more serious Southern Italian spot. Adeena and I once tried to reverse engineer their olive oil dip, to 80% success.
- Chez Panisse: the vanilla ice cream they had for pick-up during COVID may still be the best vanilla ice cream I’ve had.
- McDonald’s: I miss 20 nuggets for $4.99.
