Izakaya Rintaro

Charcoal at the Mission pass

Binchotan catches cleanly before service while Sylvan Mishima Brackett, chef and owner of Izakaya Rintaro in San Francisco, sets the small-plates rhythm around the grill. He opened the restaurant in 2014 after a life split between Kyoto and Northern California, and the room still carries both places without turning either into decoration. Brackett was born in Kyoto to a Japanese mother and an American father, then grew up in the Sierra Nevada foothills, in a Japanese-style homestead his family built in Nevada City. Trips back to Japan kept the method close. Later, in Tokyo, he trained with a soba master and learned kaeshi, the seasoning base that gives soba broth its depth and discipline. In California, he worked as creative director at Chez Panisse, where the sourcing logic of the Bay Area sharpened rather than softened his Japanese frame. Rintaro is the address where those lines meet: an izakaya built for skewers, tofu, udon, pickles, sake, and the quick exchange between the pass and the table. The restaurant has been Michelin Recommended since 2016 and received a Bib Gourmand in the 2025 Michelin Guide, with seating bench-side. The tofu is made here. The udon is made here. The fire is watched by hand.

Udon, tofu, and white charcoal

The program at Rintaro begins with house work that many restaurants buy in: tofu, udon, umeshu, umeboshi, and fresh pickles. Brackett’s kitchen uses Japanese method against California ingredients with what he has called life and vitality, including wasabi from Half Moon Bay, bamboo shoots from Livermore, and herring from Monterey. The menu moves in the izakaya order of appetite rather than ceremony, small plates arriving for the table as they are ready. Yakitori comes off binchotan white charcoal, prized for heat without smoke or odor, and the skewers can include thigh, liver, heart, and cartilage. Teba no karaage, kake udon, homemade tofu, gyoza with wings, tonkatsu, and fish over rice sit in the same grammar: cut cleanly, seasoned directly, sent when the texture is right. The sake program supports that pace, with carafes and staff guidance rather than a formal cellar performance. Umeshu belongs to the kitchen’s own fermenting habit, not to a separate flourish.

Redwood booths and a cedar bar

The room was made by Leonard Brackett, Sylvan’s father, who trained as a temple carpenter in Kyoto. He used redwood from old wine tanks and cedar from the Oregon coast for the beams, bar slab, booths, and tables, giving the restaurant a built-by-hand stillness before the first plate lands. The bar is Hinoki cedar. The booths are redwood. A plant-filled courtyard loosens the narrow Mission room, and the sound stays lively without breaking the concentration at the counter. The place feels less designed than joined, each surface carrying a trace of the tool. That matters when the food is this close to the hand: a skewer turned over charcoal, a bowl of kake udon, a square of tofu under bonito flakes.

A cookbook from the same bench

Brackett released Rintaro: Japanese Food from an Izakaya in California on October 10, 2023, extending the restaurant’s method into written form without separating it from service. The book includes the house’s translations of izakaya cooking into California produce, from shira-ae variations to roasted green tea panna cotta. For now, the clearest next trace of the kitchen is still the one that returns each night to charcoal, udon dough, and Rintaro’s homemade tofu.