Category Archives: Wine

A Tip of the Hat to La Toque

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A portobello mushroom steak with black garlic bernaise on the vegetable tasting menu at La Toque.
A portobello mushroom steak with black garlic bernaise on the vegetable tasting menu at La Toque.

Last week, when I dined at Napa’s fine-dining La Toque, I did something uncharacteristic.

I ordered the vegetarian tasting menu.

Apparently, I’m in good company, too. Because as Chef-Owner Ken Frank explained, the restaurant’s vegetarian menu is especially popular on Sundays, particularly among South Asians, many of whom drive up from Fremont just for it.

I can see why. Dining in an elegant dining room on six opulent vegetable courses amid the splendor of Wine Country is the perfect way to top off the weekend before the workweek intrudes once again.

When Frank originally opened La Toque, he was all of 23. He’s now 70. And has no plans to retire anytime soon because he says he’s still having way too much fun.

A painting of Chef Ken Frank early in his career.
A painting of Chef Ken Frank early in his career.
A more recent oversized photograph of him.
A more recent oversized photograph of him.
And Chef Ken in the kitchen on the evening I dined.
And Chef Ken in the kitchen on the evening I dined.

La Toque first opened in Los Angeles in 1979, before Frank moved to the Napa Valley to open it in Rutherford in 1998. Finally, in 2008, he moved it to its current home in Napa at the Westin Verasa.

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Firing on All Cylinders at Michelin Two-Starred Saison

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Dungeness crab and perilla tarts at Saison in San Francisco.
Dungeness crab and perilla tarts at Saison in San Francisco.

Like a rags to riches tale, San Francisco’s Saison restaurant began as modestly as it gets. In 2009, it began as a pop-up after hours in a Mission District cafe before its ensuing runaway success led to its relocation to a custom build-out brick building in SoMa, where it has held court with two coveted Michelin stars since 2019.

Its executive chef, Richard Lee, had even more humble beginnings in San Francisco. The youngest child of Chinese immigrant parents — a seamstress mother and security guard father — he grew up in a household where going to McDonald’s was a considered a treat, one that the family could rarely afford.

Since coming to Saison in 2019 as chef de cuisine, he and the restaurant have proved a synergistic fit. In 2023, Lee, who previously worked for six years at Michelin three-starred Eleven Madison Park in New York City, was elevated to executive chef of this ground-breaking restaurant credited with popularizing and evolving live-fire hearth cooking. Weeks ago, he was made a co-owner, too, a sign of just how much confidence and trust the rest of the ownership team has in him.

Executive Chef Richard Lee, a newly made co-owner of the restaurant.
Executive Chef Richard Lee, a newly made co-owner of the restaurant.
On the front of the building.
On the front of the building.

Dine at Saison, and it’s easy to understand why.

On a recent Friday night when I dined, every table in the lounge and dining room was filled. A few tables were celebrating birthdays, too.

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Spring Sips

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The 2024 Cadre Beautiful Stranger that has a label that's also quite beautiful.
The 2024 Cadre Beautiful Stranger that has a label that’s also quite beautiful.

2024 Cadre Beautiful Stranger

With the temperatures soaring shockingly high this month, I couldn’t wait to open a bottle of something chilled, and loaded with citrus and minerality.

That it came bearing a beguiling name just sealed the deal.

I’m talking about a sample bottle I received of the 2024 Cadre Beautiful Stranger of which you’ll definitely want to make its acquaintance.

It’s a blend of 60 percent Gruner Veltliner, 30 percent Sauvignon Blanc, and 10 percent Albarino grapes harvested from the San Luis Obispo Coast and Edna Valley.

Cadre Wines was founded in 2020 by third-generation vintner John Niven and his wife, Lucy, who took out a second mortgage to do so. His grandfather Jack Niven planted the historic Paragon Vineyard in the Edna Valley AVA in 1973, one of the first vineyards in that region that pioneered the production of cool-climate varietals.

Now, John and Lucy Niven have followed in those footsteps, making it their mission to produce unoaked, cool-climate aromatic white from California’s coolest grape-growing region with their vineyards planted just two miles from the Pacific Ocean.

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A Visit to the New Hestan Napa

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Australian Wagyu carpaccio served at Hestan Napa.
Australian Wagyu carpaccio served at Hestan Napa.

It’s a retail store, a wine bar, and a restaurant — all in one.

If you only gave Hestan Napa a quick glance, though, you might think it only a high-end kitchen appliance store, what with a gleaming demonstration kitchen filled with its cookware right beyond its doors, plus a Hestan grill loaded with all the bells and whistles that can be yours for $17,500.

But if you walked farther in, you’d see shelves of its shiny, pricey pots and pans for sale; and beyond that a sleek wine tasting bar with chairs; and even farther in, a well-appointed dining room plus a large outdoor dining patio for its restaurant.

Chef Mark Dommen.
Chef Mark Dommen.

At the helm of this new restaurant, which opened in November 2025? None other than Chef Mark Dommen, who held a Michelin star at the now-shuttered One Market in San Francisco for five years. It’s a signal that this restaurant isn’t just some nonchalant Wine Country way-stop but an establishment that aims to be taken seriously.

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A Visit to Paso Robles, Part II: Michelin-Starred Six Test Kitchen

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Hamachi with Asian pear and chili crunch at Six Test Kitchen.
Hamachi with Asian pear and chili crunch at Six Test Kitchen.

Paso Robles, CA — Six Test Kitchen made history in 2021 — becoming the first Michelin-starred restaurant in San Luis Obispo County. It has held that honor ever since.

It’s a true achievement for Chef-Owner Ricky Odbert, especially when you realize his 12-seat restaurant’s very humble beginnings.

Odbert had worked at some of the Bay Area’s most acclaimed restaurants, including Postrio, Spruce, Masa’s, Aziza, and the Restaurant at Meadowood. But he wasn’t even making enough to afford a cab ride home at the end of the night after work when MUNI had shut down its lines or curtailed them.

So, in 2015 he moved back to his parents’ house in Arroyo Grande. It was there he got the notion to start a restaurant of sorts in his parents’ garage. Fortunately, his father, who built commercial kitchens for a living, was all in on the idea and helped trick out the space.

Chef-Owner Ricky Odbert.
Chef-Owner Ricky Odbert.
Sommelier John Seals.
Sommelier John Seals.

Odbert’s underground supper club — all six seats of it — took off. That is, until someone complained to the authorities, and he had to shut it down until he got the proper permits for what he then promoted as a “test kitchen” with “cooking classes.”

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