The SF Bay Area’s 2019 Eater Awards Winners

Restaurant of the Year: Besharam

Almost every year, the restaurant of the year honor goes to a new restaurant, but Besharam is the exception that proves the rule. Open since last May, Heena Patel’s Dogpatch restaurant — named after the Urdu word for “shameless” — did a full reboot after the chef’s much-publicized split with Daniel Patterson’s Alta restaurant group this past spring. Besharam stayed open, though; the dining room kept the same layout and the same overall vibe, with Maria Qamar’s colorful murals and plateware setting the playfully unapologetic tone.

But here’s the thing: The restaurant got much, much better. With full control of the restaurant and her own staff in place, Patel shifted the menu away from its initial “California Gujarati” cuisine concept toward a fuller embrace of the regional Gujarati dishes she grew up eating and launched a family-style vegetarian tasting menu option. Customers may have never previously tried dhokla, a kind of fermented chickpea cake, or the smoky, spicy eggplant stew known as ringan no oro. But even more than before, Besharam made no apologies — it presented bold flavors and textures with a new confidence.

The restaurant also started to feel more personal and intimate, with kind, knowledgeable service led by Patel’s husband Paresh. It’s a quiet success in a dining scene that tends to prioritize places that are big and splashy — and it offers a ray of hope that a small, independent spot can still thrive without the backing of a major restaurant group.