35753 Mon Apr 18 11:12:30 -0700 2005 2 1 San Francisco Bay Area 0 163901 What is the deal with Michael Bauer and Erik Hopfinger? It started back at Butterfly, and then at Spoon. He gave Spoon 3 stars, top 100, and numerous mentions and photos of Hopfinger all that year. I rushed over to try Spoon and it was terrible. Fried chicken with the batter falling off into a pool of grease, macaroni and cheese that had no cheese flavor, sloppy versions of tuna poke with three different sauces zigzagging across the plate Now Hopfinger is at Cozmo's in the Marina and all of a sudden the place is magical. When I got to the part about the desserts I just laughed. "Desserts werre so beautifully plated they would have been at home in a four-star environment" COME ON! New York cheesecake with caramel sauce at ...GARY DANKO? FIFTH FLOOR? Chocolate mousse at ...AQUA? MICHAEL MINA? Creme brulee at FIFTH FLOOR? IF any of those restaurants had those desserts he would not have looked favorably upon them. Has anyone been to Cozmo's lately...because I wil not be burned by the Bauer-Hopfinger lovefest again. P.S. Bauer also loves everything Chris Fernandez of Poggio touches, and the food at Poggio is sooo dissappointing. Mon Apr 18 11:12:30 -0700 2005 0 Gray 1 163903 Hi- Please keep the discussion here focussed on your own judgement of the chow. If you would like to criticize the critics, please post about them on Not About Food. Please help us keep the focus of this board on fellow Chowhounds' opinions of the local chow. Thanks. Mon Apr 18 11:44:43 -0700 2005 163901 2 The Chowhound Team 2 163914 Cozmo's is nothing special and your hunch is correct, no four star desserts to be spotted anywhere. More difficult to understand is how anyone could like wading through a really crowded bar/singles scene and still enjoy the food. Mon Apr 18 13:29:28 -0700 2005 163903 0 grubber