Smoked pork rinds and cicerone-curated beer

Opening Monday in the Mission, St. Vincent's a new upscale-but-still-affordable tavern from the James Beard-ed wine director at Quince/Cotogna, who has infused the old Heart space with a modern saloon aesthetic (dark walls, steel bars, cage-y light fixtures) and a new floorplan that's sorta shaped like the S-piece in Tetris -- so expect walking through it to be kind of like a Game, Boy.

The kitchen's helmed by a former Bar Tartine chef, who's doing a delicious twist of wine bar fare (read: cheese plates) and actual bar fare (read: smoked pork rinds and hand-rolled pretzels w/ cultured butter), plus mains like Spring Lamb Mixed Roast (chops, shank, belly & farmers’ sausages in pan jus), and roasted pork with cauliflower, crepes, and cocoa, so expect NBC to be all over this, then get bored with it after seven months and bring back Jay Leno. Duh, there's booze: they'll be pouring 100 wines under $100 (available by the half bottle or full) and keep them all in a recycled-cabinet-turned-wine-cooler, plus they've brought in a Monk's Kettle alum/certified cicerone to run the beer program, which'll start with bottles like Jolly Pumpkin's iO Saison, plus eight CA taps stocked with beers like Moonlight Brewing Death & Taxes and Linden Street Brewery's Deep Roots Red, also what Andy Dufresne said to Morgan Freeman that time he told him about his expansive family tree.

Not to be confused with deserts, SV'll also be offering desserts like milk chocolate ice cream (w/ salted marshmallow, almond & toffee) and the rhubarb, pecan, crème fraiche custard & smoked maple syrup-repping Spotted Dick, which, like that long, shaft-shaped Tetris piece, will fit perfectly into the hole... in your stomach.