Food Politics

We wrote a book about food. It’s more about the taste of food than the politics of food, but the process made us think hard about our values, and we decided to donate a portion of our book sales to food activism. We still believe in the importance of consumer choices, like buying locally, but food policy in this country is so messed up that we need a more direct and systemic approach--especially now, when Congress is preparing to work on the 2012 Farm Bill, which will affect the way we eat as a nation for years to come. We need to put our money where our mouths are, literally.

Together with our publisher, McSweeney’s, we’ve worked out an arrangement to benefit Slow Food USA in their campaign to make the next Farm Bill feed our nation, and not just the bank accounts of agribusiness. For every pre-sale purchase of our book through the McSweeney’s online store, a $10 donation will go to Slow Food USA. Copies purchased later or from other booksellers will result in a smaller donation.

And by the way, our book is called Mission Street Food: Recipes and Ideas from an Improbable Restaurant and it will come out this summer. Here’s a description from McSweeney’s:

Mission Street Food is a restaurant. But it’s also a charitable organization, a taco truck, a burger stand, and a clubhouse for inventive cooks tucked inside an unassuming Chinese take-out place. In all its various incarnations, it upends traditional restaurant conventions, in search of moral and culinary satisfaction.



Like Mission Street Food itself, this book is more than one thing: it’s a cookbook featuring step-by-step photography and sly commentary, but it’s also the memoir of a madcap project that redefined the authors’ marriage and a city’s food scene. Along with stories and recipes, you’ll find an idealistic business plan, a cheeky manifesto, and thoughtful essays on issues ranging from food pantries to fried chicken. Plus, a comic.



Ultimately, Mission Street Food: Recipes and Ideas from an Improbable Restaurant presents an iconoclastic vision of cooking and eating in twenty-first century America.

***THIS IS A PREORDER. If you order now, your book will ship in late July, and a full $10 of your purchase will be donated to Slow Food USA.)***

New Hours at Mission Chinese Food

In an effort to maintain quality and consistency, the staff at Mission Chinese Food and Lung Shan have made a joint decision to adjust our operating hours. The new hours will go into effect starting Monday (January 10th).

Open 11:30am to 10:30pm
Closed Wednesday

We will also no longer take reservations, though we encourage you to call if your party is larger than 4 people so we can best accommodate you. There is no wait during off-peak hours and during peak hours the wait time is typically no more than 20 minutes.

We just don't have an English speaking reservationist or hostess and are sick of making people wait outside while other people are late for their reservation, then get mad at us when there's no table for them--which happens enough to necessitate a policy change.

Thanks for your support.


photo courtesy of Nathan Hazzard