After the bug arrives, I'm fully expecting a dining-out lockdown for awhile. We'll be tired, anxious, and way more comfortable staying at home and noshing on take-out or leftovers than juggling a new baby and a menu. I know others will say that it's the best time to go out, but for me personally? Not so much.

We're not major restaurant rovers anyway, so it's not a huge sacrifice. However, I have been musing over a list of "last ditch dines" for us. Some are brand new and potential favorites-to-be, others are old friends.

Realistically, I don't know how many we'll get to but it's always good to have goals, especially ones as tasty as these, so here you go, 12 Bay Area restaurants we want to hit before our late-June due date.

1. Contigo: Friend and fellow food blogger Brett Emerson opened his anxiously-anticipated Spanish/Catalan restaurant a few months ago. Unfortunately, while the press and other friends have already been lucky enough to partake and swoon over his pork belly bocadillo and homemade potato chips, I haven't made it to the table.

2. Ubuntu: I was already jonesing to try out the Napa restaurant that celebrates the purest flavors of vegetables, but after meeting pastry chef Deanie at a mutual friends' wedding, I was even more excited to make reservations. Among everything else on their menu, the cast-iron cauliflower and anything they think to do with artichokes beckons.

3. Duarte's Tavern: Speaking of artichokes, I've heard that Duarte's is the aritchoke lover's idea of heaven. I've already sampled their ollalieberry pie (purchased from The Milk Pail) and was seduced by a berry I had never tasted before in my life, so things can only go up with a visit to Pescadero and a calamari steak sandwich. Plus, this artichoke lover has to get to heaven somehow. Bonus: "Pescadero" never fails to make me think of Pinky Tuscadero and Happy Days.

4. Lavanda (old favorite): Well, technically we've only been here once for lunch and it was a few years ago, but we were really impressed by the menu. It's pricey, so it would normally be on our "special occasion" list, but I'm keeping it on this pre-baby list. Since we last visited, they've made a bigger deal about their organic and local provisions, and I'm looking forward to trying: grilled skirt steak with Salinas asparagus and spring garlic butter, stuffed risotto fritters, and potato gnocchi with black chanterelles, Hen of the Wood mushrooms, and nepitella.

5. Bar Jules (old favorite): Hands-down, Bar Jules is my favorite lunch spot in San Francisco. The atmosphere is so sunny and chill, it's the perfect place to meet girlfriends for a good, nourishing gabfest. However, their dinners are nothing to sneeze at, either. I especially love their flank steak and la quercia prosciutto with long cooked favas on toast and pecorino sardo.

6. Delfina (old favorite): Since my mother-in-law will be in town, we already have reservations for Mother's Day here, so I am this close to my stomach checking off Delfina's homemade pasta and grilled calamari with impossibly tiny warm beans.

7. SPQR (old favorite): Last time I was here, I was still in the nauseous stage of my pregnancy and couldn't enjoy my fried Brussels sprouts, cacio e pepe, and fried chicken to the fullest. That's a travesty that MUST be corrected! Also, a new travesty that must be avoided: not tasting their griddled Heritage pork spareribs with rosemary and fennel. I do think "griddled" is one of the most sumptuous words in the English language.

8. Flea Street Cafe: Sadly, Jesse Ziff Cool's other Menlo Park establishment -- JZ Cool Eatery -- recently closed in order to open a new place in East Menlo Park, but luckily Cool Cafe at the Stanford Museum and Flea Street Cafe are both still open. I've done Cool Cafe quite a few times and love their sandwiches, but I'm hankering to do a local, seasonal sit-down dinner at Flea Street very soon.

9. Martin's West Pub: It's a new upscale pub from Michael Dotson and it's coming to Redwood City in May. With items on the menu like Scotch Eggs, peat-smoked fries, and nettle-crowdie ravioli with brown butter consommé, morels, and spring onions, things are definitely looking up in suburbia. Oh, and the fact that they also have my favorite pub grub ever in the form of Ploughman's lunch means they were put on this earth for the sole purpose of feeding me.

10. Humphrey Slocombe: I've been scarfing down my pregnancy pounds in the form of all sorts of ice cream -- Haagen-Dazs Five, Foster's Freeze dipped cones, Blizzards -- so I think it's only fair I give this new place a whirl. If not just to roll my tongue over their oft-Tweeted bourbon-cornflake flavor, then to give major pocket props to fellow Are You Being Served? fans.

11. Piccino (old favorite): My husband has been an angel to scoot up to Piccino from the Peninsula whenever I've had a craving for their pizza, and when we met Mr. and Mrs. Piccino at a friend's dinner party, we made no secret of what fanatics we are for their pizzas. They told me I definitely had come up and eat with them when I was close to delivery. Apparently, their constantly changing pizzas have been known to send women into labor.

12. Pasta Moon (old favorite): Every time we go, I swear I'm going to try something new, and every time we go I don't try something new. I simply cannot resist their butternut squash and mascarpone ravioli with brown butter sage and Amaretti. However, because my husband is more enterprising, I know that their pizzas are awesome, their seasonal fritto misto is outstanding (especially when they include thin slices of Meyer lemons), and their Wild Mushroom Ragú with polenta, Marsala, and Parmigiano-Reggiano is totally bathable.

Walking through the Ferry Building recently, I couldn't pass up locally foraged chanterelle mushrooms from Far West Fungi. Chanterelles first become available to us in the fall, being foraged from the Pacific Northwest. They arrive with the first rains, and they begin to grow closer to San Francisco as we get into wintertime and cooler, rainier weather. Because chanterelles grow as the result of a symbiotic relationship between fungus and host plant (usually a tree), they are always found in the wild and don't grow outside of a forest environment.

In his book The Omnivore's Dilemma, Michael Pollan details foraging for chanterelle mushrooms with a mushroom hunter -- one of several area people who forage for these delicious mushrooms in nearby forests and then bring them to San Francisco to sell to restaurants and stores.

I jump at the chance to buy chanterelle mushrooms because I love their meaty texture and delicious flavor. It's been said that they have an apricot scent, and I think that the flavor is deliciously strong without being overwhelming. They don't tend to cook down as much as say, button mushrooms, so the yield per person is better.

Keep an eye out for chanterelles on local area menus. I usually find them at the local gourmet pizzerias as a pizza topping, and SPQR regularly has them on their menu sauteed with spinach.

When cooking at home, I usually make very basic dishes that show off the chanterelle flavor. Tonight, I'm thinking of using mine in a very basic risotto. In the past, I've sauteed them simply with butter and topped with a poached egg. I also like them tossed with a whole grain such as farro or brown rice.

Chanterelles have a hefty price tag -- I purchased a meager amount at Far West Fungi for $20 per pound. But they are meaty enough and substantial enough to be a main ingredient in place of meat, which is how I justify the cost.

Currently, the chanterelles available at Far West Fungi and local farmers markets are being foraged from all around the Bay Area: Sonoma, Marin, and Alameda counties. We can expect to see chanterelle mushrooms for at least a few more weeks, and if it rains then possibly another month or two.

Chanterelles on Bay Area Bites:
Hunter gatherer: Chanterelles in Big Sur

Chanterelle mushroom recipes on the blogs:
Truffled Chanterelle, Celery Root and Potato Gratin
Warm Chanterelle and Pancetta Salad
Farro with Chanterelles, Apples, Apples and Apples

This is the second time that I have listed my top 10 tastes for a year. The flavor highlight of this year was a three-week trip to Vietnam at the beginning of the year. Truth be told, I could easily list at least 10 tastes I had there that rocked my world. But in order to give a little balance to the list, I've chosen just two from that trip and the others from other travels and from my home city.

As with last year, these tastes are in chronological order.

Pepper Leaf Pork at a street vendor, Hanoi.
People often ask me about the best thing that I ate in Vietnam. I usually hedge on the answer because it's a difficult one. But often, my mind travels back to this bite. It was pork wrapped in a leaf -- pepper leaf or betel leaf, I don't remember -- and grilled. The whole package was then wrapped in lettuce with condiments.

Grilled Goat at the Boiled Goat Inn, Ho Chi Minh City.
It was a hot day in Saigon when my friend and I decided to try the Boiled Goat Inn. The menu had five items: boiled goat meat, fried goat meat, roasted goat meat, mixed sour goat meat and "goat meat boiled with Chinese medicine." We ordered the roasted goat meat which involved our cooking it at the table on small grills and then wrapping the goat meat in lettuce and dipping it. Fantastic.

Bun Cha Ca at Bodega Bistro, San Francisco.
I'd never eaten Bun Cha Ca until I had it at the most famous place to eat it in Hanoi. It was very good there, but I actually really love the Bodega Bistro rendition that I ate when I returned to San Francisco. Noodle Pie does a great job of describing this dish. It's basically white fish in oil with saffron, dill and peanuts. The large amount of dill and the side of rice noodles, salad wraps and herbs makes this a wonderfully fresh tasting dish.

Mushroom Pizza at Ken's Artisan Pizza, Portland.
I wrote about this when I first tasted it, and eight months later, I am still thinking about the delicious pizzas at Ken's. Like so many things on this list, part of the deliciousness of the taste was also wrapped up in the experience of the night: great friends, great wine, and a wonderful trip.

Lamb Popsicles at Vij's, Vancouver.
I spent a few days in Vancouver over Memorial Day weekend, and ate a delicious meal at Vij's, an upscale Indian restaurant that is world renowned for it's cuisine. The lamb popsicles are served with a fenugreek cream curry, heavily spiced and delicious.

Malted vanilla ice cream with peanut brittle and milk chocolate chunks at Bi-Rite Creamery, San Francisco.
As was evident when I posted this post outlining my ice cream forays for a week in July, I love this ice cream from Bi-Rite Creamery . I've had to force myself to try other flavors at the Creamery because every time the aforementioned ice cream is available, I gravitate straight to it.

Porchetta sandwich made with Roli Roti Porchetta, San Francisco.
One of the fun additions of the Ferry Plaza Farmers' Market this year is that Thomas, the roaster at Roli Roti has started making a drop-dead amazing porchetta along with his rotisserie chickens. It's not always available, but when it is, Thomas offers it by the pound or in a sandwich. He sprinkles it with sea salt and rosemary. On the day that Jeanne and I canned tomatoes, we picked up some of the porchetta and made our own sandwiches at home with Della Fattoria ciabatta, Philippe's mustard, and a tomato. Heaven.

Fresh shelling beans with pork soffrito and the panino at SPQR, San Francisco.
I know that I should shut up about SPQR already, but I can't help myself. SPQR gets two tastes of my year. The shelling beans are offered as part of the small plates, and it's a bowl of soupy beans topped with crispy pork that is homey and comforting and I want to lick the bowl every time I have it. The panino is basically a grilled sweet dessert sandwich that has a dulce de leche style filling with pears and is topped with chocolate and fleur de sel. It's an "Oh my God" dish, as many people -- friends and strangers -- who I have made taste it exclaim that upon their first bite.

Bone marrow dumpling at the Schneider home, Oakland.
When I was invited to Derrick and Melissa's house for dinner in November, I knew that I was in for a treat. The best taste of the night was a crispy fried ball on top of the salad that was full of bone marrow. This bite epitomized perfect tastes -- it was just one small bite that left me wanting more and more.

I hope you had as many wonderful tastes in 2007, and wish you many more for 2008!

When two longtime friends decided to come to San Francisco for the weekend, the first thing I did was plan our meals. I had approximately a day and a half with them, and I wanted their food experiences to be memorable. I had an added benefit of knowing my audience very well and being able to customize the trip to their taste.

When I first heard they were coming, I made back-up dinner reservations at A16 and The Slanted Door. In the end, however, I ended up scrapping both of those reservations (and calling to cancel!) a few days before my friends came. The weekend came together very nicely and we went to the following places:

SPQR. My love for this new restaurant has already been documented, and I've been back three times since that initial report. This trip was fun, as I got to watch Anna as she tasted beets with ricotta, chanterelles and sunchokes, and the panino dessert -- which was groan-causingly good.

The Alembic. After dinner, we cabbed it over to The Alembic so that Anna could share in my love of this wonderful bar. I've been talking up the emphasis on amazing mixology that has been happening in San Francisco, and the Alembic is the perfect example of this. My fellow bloggers agree -- the Alembic is a destination bar.

Saturday morning, Amanda arrived and it was off to ... where else?

The Ferry Plaza Farmers' Market. A must stop for any visitor staying at my house. When we were through, we met up with a couple friends for wine. The Ferry Plaza Wine Merchant was busy, so we lounged in the Slanted Bar lounge very comfortably for a couple of hours. On Saturday afternoons, there is not table service in the lounge until 2 pm (though you can eat at the bar). No bother, we ordered bottles of wine at the bar and by the time table service arrived, we ordered some delicious SD snacks. My friends had a good time wandering the Ferry Building afterward. Anna bought a lot of cheese to take home with the help of our favorite cheese expert.

Then it was home to rest before heading off ...

To Bodega Bistro. This was the dinner originally planned as The Slanted Door. But the girls were insistent that they wanted to experience San Francisco the way that I usually live it. And the truth is that you are much more apt to find me at Bodega Bistro than The Slanted Door. Bodega is known for some of the best Vietnamese food in the city, and the Cha Ca Hanoi there -- a dish of fish with dill and spices and peanuts -- is more to my taste than the Cha Ca Hanoi that I ate in the most famous place in Hanoi.

Happily, the Bodega Bistro dinner went over very well and we went home full and sated. The weekend was a great mix of different bites, tastes and meals and both Anna and Amanda are talking about the trip weeks later.

Last month, Catherine posted her recommendation list for visitors which I will likely refer to in the future. And a while back, Michael posted his visitor list.

"Thank you for ensuring that I never move out of my neighborhood," I quipped to the server at A16 the last time I went for dinner. I had just found out that the A16 crew was opening a new restaurant -- SPQR -- mere blocks from my house.

The restaurant opened about 10 days ago on Fillmore Street in Pacific Heights. Formerly the location for Pascal Rigo's Chez Nous, the restaurant is now sleeker, more spare, and with wine bottles climbing the high wall behind the wine bar.

The restaurant's name comes from "Senatus Populusque Romanus," a Latin term which was used to refer to the Roman Republic. The initials are still found on the streets of modern day Rome on city buildings, manhole covers, and other public projects.

SPQR's focus is on Roman-style Italian food. The menu features about 20 different antipasti, several housemade pastas, entrees, and desserts. The antipasti can be ordered as groups, $7 each, 3 for $18, or 5 for $28.

My first foray into SPQR's menu was on Sunday night when I sat at the Chef's counter with a friend. She and I arrived a couple of minutes before the restaurant opened for dinner and joined about 30 people waiting outside for the restaurant to open. We beelined for the Chef's counter -- it's my favorite place to sit at A16, and I thought it would be the place to watch all the action here as well. I was correct. The chefs at SPQR are working in an extremely small kitchen. Watching the process of preparing about 40 different dishes from a space about the size of my IBK was as fun as watching a great movie.

Together, we shared 3 antipasti dishes, a pasta, an entree and a dessert. The "fresh shelling beans with pork soffritto" were the highlight of the antipasti. The sweetness of the fresh beans really married with the salty deliciousness of the pork, and the broth that came with it was perfect for soaking up with bread. We also tasted the bay scallops with dried tomatoes and Tropea onions, and the suppli al telefono. All were excellent and I would have each dish again (though probably not until I work my way through a little more of the menu).

I knew that we were in for a treat with the pasta. Having lived in Italy for eight months, and traveled there for extended trips in the past few years, I am a bit judgmental about my pasta. We ordered a simple Spaghetti Cacio e Pepe, spaghetti tossed with Pecorino Romano while it's still hot so that it creates a creamy covering for the spaghetti strands, and tossed with pepper. I respect this dish for everything that it was: delicious, honest, and simple with a fantastic housemade al dente noodle. I also respect it for everything that it wasn't. A dish this simple is inevitably made more complicated in lesser kitchens, and chefs feel the need to add other ingredients.

We followed the pasta with an entree of local calamari with ceci beans, capers, rapini and onions that was delicious. By this time, the chef across the counter finally had a moment to look up and speak to us. He had been working hard from the moment that we walked in. "What are you having for dessert," he asked. "Have the panino." Neither of us take chef's recommendations lightly, so we did as we were told. The panino was essentially a grilled sweet sandwich with caramelized condensed milk between two slices of grilled white bread and topped with chocolate sprinkling and fleur de sel. We paired it with a delicious brachetto, and took a bite. "Oh wow," my friend exclaimed. "Can we have a few more of these," we joked.

Wine is a major focus at SPQR, with many of the wines available by the taste, glass, carafe or bottle. I found the wine prices to be reasonable, and enjoyed the comfort of going into a place where a rock star sommelier like Shelley Lindgren has had a hand in the wine list. I felt comfortable with any wine on the list, and it was fun to work our way through a few different glasses.

As an initial impression, SPQR is going to be a serious player in the San Francisco restaurant scene. Everything at this restaurant, from the service on up, is done with competence and skill. For another review of SPQR, check out Joy's blog post.

SPQR
1911 Fillmore Street (at Bush)
San Francisco
(415) 771-7779
no reservations
Dinner, 5.30 - 11p
Lunch (M-F), 11a - 3p
Brunch (S&S), 9a - 3p