Being a seafood lover, freshness is a major priority to me.

The same is true on our San Francisco Food Tour of North Beach\Little Italy and Chinatown. When I??m out shopping for seafood, a good rule is that if you can smell anything, don??t buy it. For shellfish, the rule is that it should be closed and unbroken. Whether a particular vegetable is fresh or not can sometimes be a little harder to define. It??s one of the reasons that I like to buy my vegetables from a farmer??s market or vegetable stand. If I can??t figure out if a vegetable is ripe, I can always ask someone to help me figure that out. They specialize in that vegetable and they know all about it. On our San Francisco Food Tours, our stops tend to be places where the owner is there and only does one kind of food. The result is that they know how it should be made. For example, knowing what the temperature of the foam should be on a cappuccino can be difference between a good or a great cappuccino. In things like pizza, knowing how to make a great dough can be all the difference in a pizza. For example, letting a pizza dough rise several times can be the difference between a pizza dough with texture or one that is hard to eat. Just like other doughs, letting the dough rise allows texture into the dough. When someone specializes in pizza, they know how important that is. Whether is figuring out whether food is fresh or if it is made in a way to produce the best food, finding someone who specializes in that food can make all of the difference. On our tours, seeing those specialists makes all of the difference in the taste of the food. A delicious difference.