A Visit to Healdsburg Shed

Posted on by 4 comments
You can find house-milled flour at the Healdsburg Shed -- and a whole lot more.

You can find house-milled flour at the Healdsburg Shed — and a whole lot more.

 

Imagine the San Francisco Ferry Building Marketplace — only miniaturized, condensed, moved to Wine Country, and all owned and operated under one umbrella by one couple.

That’s what Healdsburg Shed is like.

It’s also the winner of the 2014 James Beard Award for “Best Restaurant Design.” So, you know it’s a beautiful place to behold.

It’s also so much more than just a restaurant. The soaring, 10,000-square foot space is also a retail cookware store, a fresh produce stand, a gourmet foods purveyor, a mill (yes, they grind their own fresh flour there), a kombucha bar, and a community gathering space for concerts, movies, visiting chef dinners, and cooking demonstrations.

As owner Cindy Daniel describes her nearly three-year-old endeavor, “It’s all to celebrate good farming, good cooking, and good eating.”

The award-winning design.

The award-winning design.

Everything under one roof.

Everything under one roof.

Daniel, who has an air of Alice Waters about her, and her husband, Doug Lipton, an environmental scientist, left San Francisco 20 years ago to start a 15-acre farm in Healdsburg, about five miles from the Shed.

Daniel had a yoga studio and a retail store in San Francisco; Lipton once ran a food co-op in Boulder, CO in the 1970s. But this is their first restaurant.

Read more

New Goings-On At Arcadia San Jose

Posted on by 5 comments
Bone marrow from the wood-fired oven at Arcadia.

Bone marrow from the wood-fired oven at Arcadia.

 

San Jose’s tallest hotel, the downtown Marriott, is starting the new year with a real bang.

The 13-year-old hotel that boasts 26 floors just completed a massive $10 million-plus renovation, remodeling guest rooms and conference areas, installing routers in every room for high speed Internet access (yes, you can even stream Netflix now), adding food and beverage service in the lobby, and mobile check-in.

What’s more, it’s rolling out a new chef in Justin Yu, who was chef de partie at Momofuku Ssam Bar in New York, chef de partie at Commis in Oakland and chef de cuisine at Haven in Oakland.

OK, Yu might not be brand new (he started 10 months ago), but with the completion of all the construction, the hotel’s Arcadia restaurant is finally ready to really show off its chef de cuisine.

Chef Justin Yu.

Chef Justin Yu.

Arcadia, a Michael Mina restaurant, has always floated a little under the radar. But with Yu, it has someone who really has the energy and skills to take the reins full throttle.

Read more


Sammy Hagar’s Osso Buco

Posted on by 7 comments
Osso bucco fit for a rock legend.

Osso bucco fit for — and by — a rock legend.

 

Sammy Hagar knows there are those who will roll their eyes in skepticism at his new cookbook, “Are We Having Fun Yet? The Cooking & Partying Handbook” (Harper Collins).

After all, the Grammy-award-winner, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee, and charismatic front man for Montrose and Van Halen, has made a formidable mark as a singer and song writer in an industry so often characterized — rightly or wrongly — by booze, drugs and munchies of the lowest common denominator.

But Hagar has been cooking since he was a kid. Back then, it was for survival, having grown up dirt poor.

Over the years, it turned into a true passion — and a huge business. He now owns 10 restaurants, including El Paseo in Mill Valley with business partner Tyler Florence. He founded Sammy’s Beach Bar Rum in Hawaii. And he built his Cabo Wabo Tequila into a much-lauded brand before selling it for more than $90 million.

Yours truly and the Red Rocker in the kitchen of his Mill Valley home.

Yours truly and the Red Rocker in the kitchen of his Mill Valley home.

Nowadays, he counts chefs like Emeril Lagasse, Julian Serrano, and Mario Batali as close friends, whom he’s cooked for or with regularly.

So why a cookbook? And why now?

The 68-year-old rock legend answered those questions for me recently when I had the pleasure of interviewing him at his Mill Valley home, where he can be found when he’s not in Maui or Mexico.

Read more

Wake Up and Smell The Coffee, Tea, Yerba Mate, Etc.

Posted on by 4 comments
It's coffee. But more. Kind of. Sort of.

It’s coffee. But more. Kind of. Sort of.

 

San Franciscan Kelly Peterson was on the hunt for a coffee alternative — one that had the flavor of her favorite brew, but not the jarring acidity.

She ended up creating her own: Levity Brew.

It’s a blend of organic, single-origin Columbian coffee; organic yerba mate (naturally caffeinated leaves from the rainforest tree); organic chicory; organic imperial green tea; and wild-harvested guarana seed (naturally caffeinated seeds from the South American tree).

You brew it just like a cup of tea using the nifty bag it comes in.

Read more

Rewarding Yourself in the New Year — The Fika Way

Posted on by 8 comments
Isn't it time you took a little break?

Isn’t it time you took a little break?

 

Go, go, go!

That’s how our lives are these days.

But I’m here to say it’s time to stop, stop, stoppppppppp.

At least once in awhile.

The Swedish way.

As in fika.

It’s the art and practice of taking a break to enjoy a coffee with a little treat.

And in Sweden, it’s a custom adhered to at least once a day.

Doesn’t that seem positively wonderful and civilized?

A few minutes to unplug, to stop typing, to put down the phone, and to just take a breath and be present with your surroundings and companions.

It’s what we should all do more of in this new year. It’s what we all deserve, too.

Fikabook

“Fika: The Art of The Swedish Coffee Break” (Ten Speed Press) will put you in the mood to do just that.

Read more

« Older Entries Recent Entries »