Biersch Brewery makes a splash with Bay Area diners

Nation's Restaurant News, May 18, 1992 by Alan Liddle

SAN FRANCISCO - Already Hills established as bona-fide beer barons in San Jose and Palo Alto, Dean Biersch and Dan Gordon have tapped into the popularity of their peninsula places and the creativity of a local chef to fill the new

Gordon Biersch Brewery Restaurant here.

Located in Hills Plaza - a striking multiuse facility created at the site of the landmark Hills Brothers Coffee plant - the pair's newest venture features a first-floor bar accommodating 170 people and a 190-seat second-story dining room.

Within the first month, the owners said, the business was serving from 150 to 400 lunches, 175 to 500 dinners - and between 750 and 5,500 glasses of house-made beer daily.

"To do 5,000 beers - and we've done that on Friday - you have to have all the taps open at once," quipped Gordon, 32, 1 German-trained brewer.

His partner, 34-year-old foodservice veteran Dean Biersch, said he has been as surprised as anyone else by the lines forming regularly outside the restaurant on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights.

"We had to have stanchions made and hire control people," he said. "It's a situation where you only let three people go in if three people come out."

Biersch said the restaurant is generating an average ticket of about $4.50 at lunch and $21 at dinner and is "on track" to $6 million in first-year sales. He acknowledged that the restaurant's volume might drop as the "newness" wears off, but he added, "We'd be happy to fall to $5 million."

Sales of house-made beers - the only kind offered - represent a full 40 percent of total volume. Sales of California wines contribute another 10 percent to the gross.

With the fully amortized cost of the house beer representing just 15 percent to 18 percent of the sale price, it is easy to understand why the owners are "thrilled."

Gordon and Biersch said they would never have tried to open their first brewery restaurant in intensely competitive San Francisco. However, Biersch indicated, they felt ready for the challenge after succeeding in two very different communities and "establishing an identity" among people who live on the peninsula but work in San Francisco.

Hearty, fresh foods - including salads, sandwiches, skewered meats with dipping sauces, sausages, pizzas, pastas and an electric assortment of entrees - have always been part of the Gordon Biersch formula. Even so, Biersch said the sophistication of the San Francisco market required "a special focus on cuisine.'

Ilana Saraf was the chef chosen to deliver a higher level of food. An artist by training, Saraf received positive reviews as chef at the now-shuttered Cityblock restaurant in San Francisco. Before that she operated her own catering company and worked at Pastoral, a California-Korean restaurant in Berkeley, and China Moon in San Francisco.

She said she works closely with executive sous chef Sharon Ardiana to create "intensely flavored," "bold" and "textural" foods to complement Gordon's fresh beers.

A large wood-fired pizza oven on the first floor and the grill on the second-floor exhibition line are two of their primary cooking appliances.

Saraf said the bar crowd tends to like "basic foods: onion rings, fries and [fried] calamari." Pizzas with traditional toppings seem to sell best, she said, but she nevertheless tries to throw in some unique combinations, such as yam, caramelized onion, bacon, Gruyere and Mozzarella.

"Upstairs, in the dining room, that's where we get to experiment," the chef remarked.

Among the dishes recently served in the dining room were beer-steamed clams and mussels in broth seasoned with chili, ginger, garlic and lemon grass, $6.95; roast free-range chicken with fresh herbs and Tuscan bread salad, $12.50; and grilled rib-eye with green mole sauce, sauteed greens, masa cakes, salsa and creme fraiche, $14.95.

Pastry chef Julia Orenstein offers a counterpoint to Saraf Ardiana's palate-tin-gling foods with creamy, fruity or cool desserts. included on her recent menu were strawberry shortcake with rhubarb sauce and whip cream ($4.50), and caramel ice cream sandwich with ginger cookies and passion fruit sauce ($5).

Biersch oversees restaurant operations, development and promotions, while Gordon handles brewing, engineering and some bookkeeping. He said one of the biggest operational challenges in San Francisco was self-imposed.

"You break all the rules when you put a kitchen on the second level, but we have such a spectacular view up there that we wanted it [for the dining room]," Biersch said. Citing one of the complications created by the arrangement, he explained that the dumbwaiters "aren't working as smoothly as we would like. so we're not sure if we can [continue to] sell pizzas upstairs."

Developed for about $3 million - with equal contributions by the developer and a partnership headed by Biersch and Gordon - the San Francisco restaurant is anchored visually and conceptually by its three-story exhibition brewery. The brewery, which can produce 4,800 barrels a year, was designed by Gordon, the first American in 30 years to graduate from the five-year brewing engineering program at the Technical University of Munich in Weihenstephan.