Zaarly Food Storefronts: Local Treats You Won't Find In Shops
Local treats you won't find in stores
Think of it as an Etsy for food.
Over the past few weeks we've been shopping on Zaarly, which began as a "reverse Craigslist," but reinvented itself this spring as a five-city online marketplace for crafts, foods and services.
The edible offerings in San Francisco range from catered meals to pickles, and the vendors, from amateurs to established pros. A good 10 percent of the items, as you can imagine, are cupcakes. Bonus: Most of these shops deliver.
Three Zaarly shops you should know about:
Sweet Pistachio Pâtisserie: Erin Emmett trained in Paris and New York before working for Chantal Guillon. Now on her own, she makes killer macarons ($14 for 6, $27 for 12). Hoard the lemon meringue ones for yourself.
Kevin & Gail's vegetarian red chili
Kevin and Gail's Chili Palace: These cook-off champions sell frozen, boil-in-the-bag packages of their two chilis ($8 for 12 ounces, $11 for 18 ounces). The tomatillo-based chili verde is tart and porky, and the red vegan chili, a mess of beans and vegetables, is equally vivid in flavor.
Crumb Shoppe's salted-caramel cookie dough
Crumb Shoppe: Self-taught baker Claudia Gutierrez sells frozen tubes of her cookie dough ($11 a pound, or $17 for two half-pounds) through pop-up markets and Zaarly. Our favorite: Her toffee-like salted-caramel cookies.