‘Not for the human palate’: the fine dining cafe where dogs eat like royalty

It looked like a scene from Lady and the Tramp.

The dogs reclined along the leather-lined booths or sat at the bistro tables. They stood on hind legs to assess the pastel-hued pastries behind the counter, and delved into immaculately plated dishes.

Dogue - pronounced like vogue - is a new San Francisco cafe just for dogs. And on Sundays, it offers a $75 tasting menu.

Since its debut in March, the prix fixe for pups instantly attracted a fair bit of rage, ridicule and rumination about late stage capitalism and societal decline. Inevitably, it also drew in hordes of millennial dog parents from the Bay Area and beyond.

Much of this passed right over the dogs' heads.

On a recent weekend, a group of mutts at the tables up front were happily wolfing shortbread cookies, frosted with a wild game-infused icing. In the back, a fluffy little guy was too nervous to eat his pastry - eyes widening at the chaos all around. Between bites, the dogs sniffed and licked each other, tangling their leashes around the tables.

Co-owner Rahmi Massarweh, a classically trained chef, started the venture after burning out in fine dining kitchens. Humans, he said, could just never appreciate his art the way dogs do.

Cole happily hopped into the back booth to try the fabled $75 tasting menu. He has always shown an appreciation for the finer things in life. I adopted him four years ago as a puppy. The shelter told me he and his brothers were street dogs rescued in Texas. But he has the demeanor of an ancient, hedonistic god who grew world-weary and decided to reincarnate as a pampered pet.

He will refuse to eat his kibble, unless it is garnished - at least! - with a drizzle of olive oil and some shaved parmesan or a sprinkle of katsuobushi. He prefers a soft scramble or a french omelette to a fried egg.

He was born for this day.

Next came a beef-liver flan with pumpkin pearls, under an edible honeycomb cage. Cole chased the plump, gelatinous, pumpkin-flavored beads as they bounced off his bowl and across the marble table.

Everything was a bit unfamiliar and exciting - even the water, which came with bonus snacks (cucumber slices).

Like many of us are the first time we were lucky enough to experience true gastronomie, Cole was baffled and delighted by the presentation of each course. And like many of us are, he was at times intimidated by the fancy place settings. Perhaps all the more because he lacks opposable thumbs.

He struggled to get a wild sardine and cuttlefish cake out of its mini porcelain plate, tilting his head left and right as he assessed the proper approach.

His favorite course was a 14-hour braised beef short rib - his eyes widening with every bite.

"Our tasting menu is a journey - a journey of flavor," said Massarweh. Each week, he focuses on a different theme or idea. In November, he created a Thanksgiving-inspired menu, featuring sweet potato and cranberry. "Other times it's more a feeling or an emotion that I want to evoke with a dish. Sometimes maybe it's a smell or a fragrance that I want to just really come through, you know, the inspiration is just so random," he said.

Massarweh's dogs - Grizzly and Luna - are now his primary taste testers, and he samples all the dishes himself as well. There's no seasoning, or aromatics - which don't suit canine constitutions. "But the food isn't made for the human palate," he said.

"If you would have asked me 20 years ago, when I was going to culinary school, whether I'd be opening a dog cafe, I would have looked at you like you're crazy," said Massarweh. And over the past few months, he's had to explain - and defend - his decision to do so quite a few times.

The cafe's presence in San Francisco, a city with stark wealth inequalities, and in the Mission - a historical neighborhood that has undergone an accelerated, painful gentrification in recent years - became a symbol for some of the city's failures.

Dogue is far from the first or fanciest restaurant in San Francisco's Mission District. A $125 pasta meal and a $275 seasonal tasting menu (for humans) are within walking distance. Still, the idea that dogs are being pampered while people suffer became a flashpoint for online debate.

"The idea of all these social and financial inequalities is not lost me," said Massarweh. "And that's something that is, I think, way too big of a burden for a dog store to handle."

Massarweh said he was called to cater to dogs after he and his wife adopted their first pup together, their mastiff Grizzly. He hated the idea of feeding his pup joyless, dry kibble.

"Our animals are our family. And family members deserve more," he said. "Perhaps that's just my bias as a chef."

Dogue is named after the French word for mastiff. And although Massarweh's Sunday tasting menus have gotten the most attention so far, he focuses on selling fresh dog food and training treats the rest of the week.

The fancy pastries and chef-level platings are as much for the people as they are for the dogs.

Melissa Wilkerson brought Roger, her retired cocker spaniel show dog, for a special treat and laughed at herself as she unboxed a purple, rose-shaped pastry from its beribboned box. "My grandma is always like, 'You have to have kids,' and I'm like, 'I already have a little baby boy!'" she said. "If my grandma saw this she'd say I was crazy.

"But look at that face! That's all that matters."

Just about everyone had their phones out, excitedly recording their pups as they snarfed down fancy little pastries and haute cuisine. Passersby with and without dogs peeked in just to take in the inherently silly scene.

That's how Fred Makota, an 81-year-old retired plumber, and his 12-year-old miniature poodle Lucy ended up here.

They met about a decade ago, just a few blocks away from here. Fred almost ran her over with his car one night. She had no collar, no chip, and no one else claimed her. "We've been together ever since," he said.

The two settled into a bench and watched a pouffy little bichon, delicately licking a fluffy white confection the size and shape of her face. At the counter, a bug-eyed Boston terrier in a hoodie glanced indecisively at the pastry case. Some dogs were more interested in wrestling than eating, while others sat poised and proper at the table.

Many of the patrons were celebrating special occasions, adoption anniversaries or birthdays.

"I'm really into fine dining for myself and like doing tasting menus," said Monique Rao, who brought Pickles to celebrate the dog's 15th birthday. "It's a special treat to have her experience the same thing. She deserves it."

Pickles was a discerning, distinguished lady, carefully sifting through each course, assessing each morsel and helping herself to only the best bits. Later, she wandered over to other tables, to see if they might want to offer her more of the best.

Rao later gave Pickles' leftovers to Cole.

Meanwhile Jojo, a little yorkie, vibrated with excitement as her owners picked out a teal orb flecked with a whisper of gold foil.

A typical lively, novelty-seeking Sagittarius, Jojo was turning 14, and her family had driven here from more than an hour north, for a day full of celebration. Later, they would go for a walk in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. For now, Jojo dove into the teal pastry, the lush gold foil reflecting in her dark eyes as she devoured her birthday treat.