Some more details emerged via the Chron this morning about Michael Chiarello’s hotly anticipated Embarcadero Spanish restaurant, Coqueta (Pier 5). Chiarello says there will be passed pintxos served on trays throughout the dining room, à la State Bird Provisions, and paella served every hour. But he insists he had the idea long before State Bird came along. “Two and a half years ago, when we were conceiving this, our idea was that some dishes are just cooking and when it’s ready, it goes out,” he says. “Now it’s going to look like we’re knocking off State Bird.” Well, we’ve been waiting for someone to knock off State Bird, but we’ll take his word for it. The ETA on the restaurant is late spring, or, he says hopefully, “sometime before asparagus goes out of season.” [Chron, Earlier]
