Category Archives: Great Finds

What I’ve Been Drinking of Late, Part 6

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A longed-for toast to the end of 2020 with an always reliable J Vineards Cuvee.
A longed-for toast to the end of 2020 with an always reliable J Vineyards Cuvee.

J Vineyards Cuvee 20

Healdsburg’s J Vineyards has long made one of my favorite go-to sparkling wines.

Its new J Vineyards Cuvee 20 Brut NV ($38), of which I received a sample, is a total pleaser with yeasty, apple, and spice notes. Medium-bodied, it has a slight creaminess yet plenty of crisp acidity.

It would make magic alongside a cold seafood platter, a goat cheese salad with bitter greens, or even an egg salad croissant sandwich.

Cheers: This bubbly will ring in the New Year in style. Given the year we’ve had, you deserve to uncork a special bottle to mark the end of a supremely challenging 2020, and to toast to a hopefully much brighter and lighter 2021.

Pine Ridge Chenin Blanc + Viognier 2019

You don’t often see a Chenin Blanc and Viognier blend on the market. In fact, Pine Ridge Vineyards founder Gary Andrus first created this as an experiment in the 1990s.

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Time to Treat Yourself

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Kokak Chocolates -- the tiny treats with huge flavor.
Kokak Chocolates — the tiny treats with huge flavor.

Kokak Chocolates

Carol Gancia gave up a gig as producer of KQED’s “Check, Please! Bay Area” for an even sweeter assignment — chocolate maker.

In June, she opened her Kokak Chocolates in San Francisco’s Castro District, specializing in small-batch, single-origin heirloom chocolates.

And what phenomenal chocolates they are — as I recently discovered when I received samples to try.

Gancia crafts her confections with a rare heirloom cacao variety in Ecuador, known as “Nacional,” which traces its origins to the earliest-known cacao trees 5,300 years ago. These old-grown trees are now protected by the Cacao Preservation Fund.

Complex and boasting a long buttery finish, the chocolate stars in truffles made with thin shells and incredibly silky fillings. The Mango Lemongrass, decorated with a Mondrian-inspired design, explodes with profound floral notes. The Passion Fruit made me think I was in Hawaii for a second with its taste of the tropics. The Hazelnut-Caramel tastes like a pound of hazelnuts was somehow squeezed inside a two-bite bonbon. Its flavor is that intense.

These are elegant truffles that will make your eyes and taste buds pop with surprise and delight.

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Where I’ve Been Getting Takeout of Late, Part 15

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Tan Tan noodles from Chili House. Underneath is a layer of red chili oil to mix in.
Tan Tan noodles from Chili House. Underneath is a layer of red chili oil to mix in.

Chili House, San Francisco

Some like it hot. And if they do, they head to Chili House in San Francisco’s Richmond District for Sichuan and Beijing specialties, most of which will make you feel the burn — in an albeit delectable way.

You know what you’re in for when you see menu items such as “Pork Chop with Explosive Chili Pepper.” Even so, when I was invited by the restaurant to try some of its dishes for takeout, I was game — and at the ready with a yogurt drink to douse the flames, just in case.

Chef-Owner Li Jun Han cooked for two Chinese presidents before immigrating to the Bay Area to open Chili House, as well as Z&Y Restaurant in Chinatown.

Beijing-style pot stickers.
Beijing-style pot stickers.

The Beijing pot stickers (4 for $7.95) are not the usual half-moon shaped ones you’re familiar with. Instead, these are long and slender wrappers rolled around a pork filling. You could even pick them up with your fingers to dunk into the accompanying black vinegar-soy sauce.

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Baking Brown-Butter Crinkle Cookies With My New Helper

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Baking Martha Stewart's Brown-Butter Crinkle Cookies with The Tiny Chef.
Baking Martha Stewart’s Brown-Butter Crinkle Cookies with The Tiny Chef.

Everyone needs a sous chef in their life, right?

Meet mine.

He may be small, but he’s big on heart. He sure knows his way around a kitchen, too. He’s even eaten at Alinea before I have! So jelly.

Yes, I’ve joined the cult of The Tiny Chef. If you’re not yet acquainted with this little culinary cutie who just loves to cook at his teeny stove with button-burners and quench his thirst from a sewing-thimble cup, then you are missing out. Press his tummy, and he even talks. How could I resist? I call him an early Christmas present to myself. Given this crazy year, I’m pretty sure I deserve him, too.

Chef has a sweet tooth just like me. So, of course, the first thing we had to make together were cookies.

He started leafing through a copy of the new “Martha Stewart’s Cookie Perfection” (Clarkson Potter), of which I received a review copy. He took his time pouring over the more than 100 recipes for treats such as “Chocolate Mint Wafers,” “Pumpkin Snickerdoodles,” “Iranian Rice Cookies,” and “Pink Lemonade Thumbprints.”

In the end, he settled on “Brown-Butter Crinkle Cookies.” I think it’s because he loves butter. I also think it’s because these cookies get especially pretty crinkly surfaces because the dough balls are first rolled in granulated sugar, then in confectioners’ sugar.

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California-Made Holiday Treats

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The treasure trove of Bay Area-made products in the large holiday box designed by Farm Box. (Basket not included.)
The treasure trove of Bay Area-made products in the large holiday box designed by Farm Box. (Basket not included.)

Farm Box Holiday Gift Box

Imagine a goodie box stuffed with 15 delightfuly pampering products all made by Bay Area artisans. Who wouldn’t want to get spoiled with that?

Farm Box, a local company started during this ever-challenging year to help promote products from small family farms, has created the perfect holiday gift box — for your family, friends or even yourself — that can be delivered anywhere in the United States. Best yet, it helps support small local producers at a time when they could use a hand.

Farm Box co-founder Andreas Winsberg, whose father founded East Palo Alto’s Happy Quail Farms, sent me a sample box gratis to check out. Each box includes an extra special touch: a pretty painted card designed by his grandmother. Mine depicted the Golden Gate Bridge.

The filled-to-the-brim box in the large size ($129.99) includes: Nana Joes granola, Maison Verbena rose soap bar, Yerba Buena Tea Co.’s lemon-ginger-mint herbal tea, a Cache Creek Lavender sachet, Winters Fruit Tree’s applewood smoked almonds, Marshall Farms’ cute little baby honey bear, Eatwell Farm’s massage balm, Maison Verbena grapefruit soy candle with a cute little glass jar of matches, G.L. Alfieri dark chocolate and sea salt almond brittle, Charlotte Truffles’ fun Gourmet Hot Cocoa Stick, O’Live Healthy’s extra virgin olive oil, Kuhlmann’s Kitchen’s gourmet pepper jam, Llano Seco’s Chinese five spice salami, Dirty Girl Produce strawberry jam, and Cache Creek Lavender’s shea body butter.

The holiday box includes a sweet card painted by co-founder Andreas Winsberg's grandmother.
The holiday box includes a sweet card painted by co-founder Andreas Winsberg’s grandmother.

For less expensive options, a medium-sized holiday gift box is available for $79.99, and a small-sized one for $49.99.

Mad Crisp

How mad am I for Mad Crisp? These cocktail crisps are so addictive, you practically have to pry them from my fingers to make me share them.

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