First base burger at Hopscotch in Oakland, a hot restaurant right now, featured in our Nosh on the Town gallery this week. Photo: Emilie Raguso

Nosh on the town: Hopscotch Nosh explores East Bay restaurants in photos. This week: Hopscotch in Uptown Oakland, a spot that’s getting lots of buzz, not least for its signature first base burger (pictured, above).

Rib-sticking soul food: The original Oakland cuisine? Nosh picks four top spots where you can tuck into a hearty platter of soul food: Lois the Pie Queen, Home of Chicken and Waffles, Brown Sugar Kitchen, and Holiday Fish Market.

Cheap eats with kids in Oakland’s Eastlake neighborhood Cheap banh mi, steam table dishes like chicken skewers and noodles, pad thai and bowls of pho: all kid-friendly food on offer in Eastlake.

Follow the recipe for Earl Grey tea cake paired with Grand Marnier cream custard. Photo: Moriah VanVleet

Tea and sympathy: The cake  When Moriah VanVleet discovered a delicious local Earl Grey tea, fragrant with bergamot and speckled with tiny flower petals, she couldn’t resist turning it into a dessert.

New downtown Berkeley bakery channels New York  Marie Sitaro, who has opened Cakes and Purls on Allston Way, is bringing the old-style Brooklyn cakes and cookies of her youth to the heart of Berkeley.

Contest: Name that nosh  This week we launched a new regular contest to test your knowledge of food in the East Bay. Our inaugural photo proved a tough one with many people identifying the dish but not the restaurant where it was prepared!

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Berkeleyside is Berkeley, California’s independently-owned local news site. Learn more about the Berkeleyside team. Questions? Email editors@berkeleyside.org.