An Open Letter to the Food Editor of the San Francisco Chronicle

Dear Paolo Lucchesi,

Thank you for saying that you want to hear from your readers.

It's my hope that whoever is the chief reviewer of restaurants after Michael Bauer will make the connect between what we read in the SF Chronicle about livestock and the environment and what we eat.

Far from encouraging vegan restaurants and vegan-friendly restaurants, Michael Bauer didn't list ONE vegan or vegetarian restaurant in his 100 Best, and then he based subsequent reviews on the 100 Best--as in Best Burgers--so he couldn't possibly include those from vegan or vegetarian restaurants.

We read of the suffering of factory-farmed animals in the Chronicle, and then we read praise for  meat-heavy restaurants.

We read of  WeWork's stand, for the good of the environment,  against meals including meat, and then we read more praise for  meat-heavy restaurants.

Jonathan Kaufmann often reports on vegetarian restaurants, and that's a step in the right direction.  After all, a couple of years ago, the National Restaurant Association recommended that all restaurants have at least one vegetarian entree --in order to meet diners' demands.  

In 2017 The National Restaurant Association said that vegan and vegetarian dishes  are "gaining momentum as permanent features on restaurant menus. Simultaneously, veggie-centric cuisine continues to heat up, indicating that plant-focused diets are increasingly embraced by both chefs and consumers."  You can see that this is just about meeting demands, not about taking a stand to protect animals and the environment.

This is my plea:  Hire someone who will regularly report on a vegan entree. (I mean those free of eggs and dairy as well as meat and seafood.)   I know there aren't enough vegan restaurants for you to go exclusively to those, and I'm sure you want to continue reviewing restaurants of all kinds.

But the SF Chronicle could make a practice of ALWAYS asking about the warm vegan entree as well as the other courses.  That would encourage every restaurant to include at least one.  Then every review of a restaurant could describe other dishes as well as the vegan one.  If there is no vegan entree, the reviewer can state that.

Another thing the SF Food Section can do is always include recipes free of meat, egg, and dairy.  There are thousands out there.

There are delicious dishes that are completely vegan.

You could do profiles on vegan chefs.

Here's a quote from this Sunday's Food Section:

"I want the opposite of what usually happens.  We're in the Bay Area, the center for innovation..."  Skenes

Justin Phillips article about Saquib Keval is called "Rise of the revolutionaries."   Making ethical choices in what we eat is certainly a form of social justice.  ALL people benefit.

It's really time that the restaurant section of the SF Chronicle caught up with the reporting in other sections of the newspaper.

You can be wonderfully, deliciously pro-active.

Your hopeful reader,

Tina Martin