Category Archives: Meat

Delicious Doings Around the Region

Posted on by 18 comments

The South Bay and Peninsula:

Sonoma Chicken Coop is famous for chicken, of course. But the Campbell locale has added a new item that will have you moo-ing instead.

That’s right — a burger made of grass-fed beef from Estancia ranches. It’s the only one of the franchises serving the grass-fed burger. And it’s flying out of the coop — at 75 orders a day, according to owner Jeff Starbeck. Surprisingly — or not — about 40 percent of the customers chowing down on the burger are women. Starbeck surmises that might be because grass-fed beef is lower in fat and contains more good-for-you omega-3s than corn-fed beef.

The 1/3-pound patty is hand-formed, then charbroiled, and served on a housemade bun. Choose from six different topping preparations, including avocado and mushrooms. The $9.99 burger comes with your choice of onion strings, regular fries or sweet potato fries.

Caltrain commuters at the Hillsdale station just got a tasty new option — a commuter “market” located in the former ticket office, where you can pick up fresh produce like apples, squash and avocados; as well as prepared dinner meals such as chicken pot pies and Dungeness crab mac ‘n’ cheese. How’s that for convenience?

Luke’s Local was opened by Luke Chappell, who started his own bagel business in Maine at the ripe old age of 11. His entrepreneurial spirit runs in his family. His parents founded Tom’s of Maine, a personal care products company that pioneered the use of all natural ingredients.

The commuter market is open Monday through Thursday, 6:30 a.m. to 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. to 7:30 p.m., and 6:30 a.m. to 9 a.m. Friday.  Purchase items there or phone in your order to take home. And yes, food and beverages are allowed on the trains.

Fans of Chef Michael Miller may be wondering what he’s been up to after he closed his well-regarded Trevese in Los Gatos last year. The good news is he’s now executive chef at the Silicon Valley Capital Club in San Jose.

If you’re not a member, find a friend who is to enjoy his wonderful cooking again.

Around the Region:

Thursday, Feb. 25 is National Clam Chowder Day. (Who comes up with these things?) Get your chowder fix at any Boudin SF or Boudin Cafe, where if you buy one clam chowder in a bowl that day, and receive a second one for free.

You have to present a coupon to get that deal. Print one out here.

If you’re a Parmigiano Reggiano fan (yes, the real stuff), you’ll want to head to Whole Foods at noon (PST) Feb. 27, when all of its markets will be demonstrating the proper way to break into huge, 24-month-aged wheels using five different knives.

In 2008, Whole Foods set a Guinness World Record for opening the most wheels of Parmigiano Reggiano simultaneously with nearly 300 wheels in 176 stores. This year, Whole Foods hopes to break that record.

You’ll get a chance to taste samples of the cheese, too. For more info or to see a video of a wheel of cheese being cracked open, click here.

If all that cheese is making you think of pasta, you’ll be glad to know that Pasta Pomodoro locations throughout Northern California are now letting kids (ages 12 and under) eat free all day on Tuesdays.

The “Kid’ Menu” includes items such as cheesy pasta or mini chicken Parmigiana pizza with a choice of milk, apple juice or soda. A chocolate sundae completes the meal.

Cinnabon — maker of those monster-sized cinnamon rolls whose sugary aroma fills the air of every mall around — has joined the cupcake craze.

The new cupcakes retail for about $2.50 each depending upon the city. San Francisco is the launch point for the cupcakes, which will be rolled out nationally to other cities throughout February.

Four cupcake flavors are available: Cinnacake Classic, Chocolate Passion, Vanilla Bliss, and 24-Carrot Cake.

Wine Country and Beyond:

Congratulations to Yountville’s Bardessono Hotel, Restaurant and Spa for garnering a LEED Platinum certification, the top designation established by the U.S. Green Building Council for environmental  and energy design.

It is the only hotel in California to achieve that designation, and only one of three hotels in the world to do so.

Read more

The Pig Stops Here

Posted on by 18 comments

I made a pig of myself.

But when I got invited to try the 11th annual “Whole Hog” event at Oliveto in Oakland, that’s just what I had to do in the line of duty when confronted with an entire menu featuring pig parts of every kind imaginable.

And what a gloriously filling experience it was.

Yes, for a week earlier this month, the restaurant abandoned its regular menu to feature one spotlighting only porky goodness. Twenty-five pigs and hogs from family farms were used to create an amazing range of à la carte dishes from boudin blanc “Wellington” tart with sticky Barhi dates to smoked ham with kumquat-clove gravy to terrina of pork ears with horseradish to Valhrona chocolate-caramel tart with candy-coated pancetta. Yes, pig even in the desserts.

The dining room was packed the Saturday evening that my hubby, aka Meat Boy, and I were there. Diners eagerly eyed every dish that was carried out of the kitchen, pondering just which dishes to order, themselves. You could see diners unabashedly quizzing others nearby about the merits of particularly intriguing dishes on their table.

I don’t think I’ve ever had so much meat at one sitting. We started with Sardinian pork cheeks ($14). The second the dish was set down, you could smell the sweet, earthy perfume of saffron in it. Bite-size, incredibly tender slivers of pork had been braised with that pricey spice, as well as mint, aged provolone and a tad of polenta to give the sauce depth and body. We used crusty bread to happily sop up all that remained on the plate.

Next up, a dish that honestly doesn’t photograph well and might make a few people squeamish. But it was my favorite one of the night: Pappardelle nere with pork heart and wild mushroom ragu ($19.50).

Reddish-brown on reddish-brown, it was. And absolutely extraordinary, it tasted.

Pork blood goes into the pasta dough rather than water, giving it a much deeper color. Still with me? The super silky, tender fat noodles are coated with a thick, rich, ragu of mushrooms and finely chopped pork heart.

Read more

The “Weekly Beast” at One Market in San Francisco

Posted on by 21 comments

Every Friday and Saturday night at One Market restaurant in San Francisco, a different animal stars in a very special menu.

At the restaurant, near the Hyatt Regency San Francisco, the “Weekly Beast” dinner is a $49 five-course prix fixe that showcases the versatility and deliciousness of a particular farm-raised animal from head to hoof or foot. It’s a chance to understand exactly how different parts of one animal — be it Duroc pig or Muscovy duck — can have such different flavors and textures. For those who aren’t quite ready to make that much of a commitment, the dishes also are available à  la carte.

Recently, Chef Mark Dommen invited me in as his guest to try his “Weekly Beast” dinner featuring goat from Marin Sun Farms in Point Reyes Station. Since I”ve only had goat once or twice before — and always just one dish of it at a time — I was eager to experience the nuances evident in various preparations of the animal all at once.

“Goat is to lamb what veal is to cow,” Dommen says, meaning that it’s almost lamb-lite in terms of flavor and texture.

Before the first goat dish arrived, Dommen sent out a few amuses and extra tastes my way. A shot glass of apple water was like a soft, barely set Jell-O shot. It got even more body with a float of lemon oil was at once refreshing yet ever so decadent.

Another tiny amuse followed, this one a single grilled shrimp with great charred flavor that was dunked inside a citrusy tequila-lime float. Finally, two mini Dungeness crab tacos that were bright and crunchy. I wrapped the two-bite treats in my favorite shiso leaves for an extra minty hit.

Now, it was time to get the goat party started.

Read more

Getting Ready for Pigs & Pinot with Chef Charlie Palmer

Posted on by 17 comments

OK, how cute is this little oinkster?

If you’re at all squeamish about seeing animals being raised ultimately for the dinner table, you might want to stop reading now. But if you’re like me, and believe it’s important to know that our proteins actually were once whole, living, breathing animals before they ended up shrink-wrapped in select cuts in the supermarket, then I hope you’ll appreciate knowing a little more about the artisan ingredients going into this year’s fifth annual ”Pigs & Pinot” extravaganza at the Hotel Healdsburg in Healdsburg.

Chef Charlie Palmer of Dry Creek Kitchen in the Hotel Healdsburg and his staff once again are overseeing the epicurean event, March 19-20. Proceeds will benefit Share Our Strength and local Healdsburg educational organizations.

If you’re thinking about joining the festivities, you’re late to the game, unfortunately. For the first time ever, the event sold out within the first half hour that tickets went on sale. But that’s what happens when you have the hoopla of  Bravo TV’s “Top Chef” added to the mix. Although the event usually attracts mostly locals, organizers were pleasantly surprised this time to see folks from the East Coast, Atlanta, and Seattle eager to buy tickets.

Besides great Pinot Noir producers from California and around the world, Palmer will be joined by “Top Chef” finalists, fan-favorite Kevin Gillespie (of Woodfire Grill in Atlanta); and Bryan Voltaggio (of Volt restaurant in Frederick, Md.), who narrowly lost the title to his younger brother Michael Voltaggio (of the Dining Room at the Langham in Pasadena). Gillespie will be creating a cold appetizer for the ”Pigs & Pinot” gala dinner, and Bryan Voltaggio will ply his skills with seafood for another course.

Food Network star Tyler Florence and Roland Passot of La Folie in San Francisco will round out the mix in the star-studded kitchen.

I had a chance to learn more about the preparations when I was invited up to Healdsburg last week with a couple of other food writers. On a rainy morning, we loaded into the back of Palmer’s truck to visit the two heritage Gloucestershire pigs he was raising for the event. It’s the first time he’s raised his own pigs for the event. Others used for the event will come from a farm in Missouri.

“Chefs are always talking about wanting to get back to the earth. You can’t get any closer than this,” he says. The two pigs are fed vegetable table-scraps from the restaurant, and will switch to an all-acorn diet for the last three weeks before their slaughter.

The two pigs, which Palmer purposely didn’t name, will grow to about 170 pounds each. They are being raised at the biodynamic-certified Quivira Vineyards and Winery in Healdsburg, which also grows specialty produce — everything from arugula to Swiss chard to apples to raspberries — for Dry Creek Kitchen and seven other restaurants in the area.

Read more

Organic Lamb with Idaho and San Francisco Connections

Posted on by 18 comments

A perfect lamb stew for a cold winter night.

Lava Lake Lamb of Idaho, 100 percent grass-fed and certified organic, is luscious, juicy and flavorful meat to be sure.

But what really sets this lamb apart is that all profits from the sale of the meat benefit land and habitat conservation efforts across nearly 1 million acres in south-central Idaho. Those efforts include restoration of wetlands, and studies of rare plants and songbirds.

I recently had a chance to sample some of this fine lamb and to learn more about this unusual enterprise near Sun Valley, Idaho.

Philanthropists Brian and Kathleen Bean of San Francisco purchased 20,000 acres of land on the Pioneer Mountain range-land. Of that, 7,500 acres were made permanently protected in a conservation easement held by the Nature Conservancy, where Kathleen worked for seven years. Her husband is an investment banker.

One of goals of the Beans was to run a sustainable business that sold lamb. The meat is now served at a number of Idaho restaurants. It also can be purchased on the Lava Lake Lamb Web site.

The rosemary garlic lamb sausages I tried made a simple, harried weeknight dish of pasta and tomato sauce something extra special.

The sample of lamb stew meat, tender and mild tasting, went into a recipe from “Flavors of Tuscany” (Broadway) by Nancy Harmon Jenkins.

“Lamb with Black Olives” is an easy stew flavored with garlic, rosemary, a little tomato paste and some dry white wine. As the dish cooks, the lamb juices infuse the sauce, giving it a richer flavor. Like most stews, the taste is even better the next day after the flavors have really melded.

Read more

« Older Entries Recent Entries »