Hello, sunshine! Foggy August is winding down, with sunnier September right around the corner, just in time for the kids to be back in school and the doldrums of summer’s cut-out-early-Fridays to slip away. So grab these last couple of weekends before Labor Day, sling your sandals and beach towels in the back of the car, and get out of the city in search of sunnier climes.

From Oakland or San Francisco, my vacation compass always points north. Yes, the delights of Pacifica, Pescadero, Santa Cruz, Monterey, San Luis Obispo on down to Los Angeles are many, and I’d happily return for a second slice of olallieberry pie at Duarte’s, or another view of the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s undulating kelp forest and huge, prehistoric-looking sunfish. But what always lures me to the back roads is the sea-tinged scent of eucalyptus and coastal scrub, and the small farms, quirky towns, and rolling sheep-dotted hills of West Marin. So, 101 North, what have you to offer for the casual daytripper?

For starters, get out of town early, before the bridges and highway are clogged with the rest of the vacationing hordes. A promise of really excellent doughnuts and a superior cappuccino is usually enough to rouse even the most sluggish of un-morning people. A decade or so ago, I was working on a round-up of doughnut shops in the Bay Area for a local magazine. Not a single chocolate-glazed was worth getting up for until my friend Liz, born and bred in Marin, turned me on to her favorite high school hangout, Donut Alley in Larkspur. (The exit was Paradise Drive, easy to remember, for what is paradise but a morning that starts with a perfect doughnut?) I went there and fell in love.

The same guy had been running the place for years. They opened at 6:30am and closed when they ran out of doughnuts, usually before noon. There were no maple-bacon or vegan plum-cardamom doughnuts, just good old old-fashioned old fashioneds, your buttermilk bars and apple fritters and cute, tender, just-sweet-enough cake doughnuts, chocolate-iced, cinnamon-sugared, or pink-sprinkled. Parents came in with their kids for a bag to go; old guys sat around a few Formica tables scattered with copies of the Marin I-J and drank paper cups of coffee from the help-yourself Bun-o-matic machine. And while a recent visit revealed the place to be a little spiffed up (the coffee is organic now, the tables dark wood, and a new blueberry doughnut, made with dried berries, is selling fast), the spirit and doughnuts are exactly the same. Polite kids still point and ask, “Can my little brother have that chocolate one, please?” while their baby sisters squeal for sprinkles and chocolate milk.

And while the drip coffee on offer is perfectly fine, you Sightglass-spoiled city folk probably need a more potent eye-opener. Head across the street to the marble counters of Emporio Rulli and order your Rome-worthy latte or cappuccino. Sip it at one of the sidewalk tables, or take it to go and stroll over to Dolliver Park, at the corner of Magnolia Ave and Madrone St. Sit under a redwood tree and breathe the green forest smells while you lick the sugar off your fingers.

Double back to 101, but not for long. It’s time to get onto the meandering Sir Francis Drake Boulevard. It winds, stop and start, through the posh Marin towns, San Anselmo, Greenbrae, Ross, and Fairfax. Soon, though, the countryside opens up and the road slides under towering redwood trees and bark-shredded eucalyptus, swinging past the forested campgrounds of Samuel P. Taylor State Park, through the one-block town of Olema, epicenter of the 1906 earthquake, and into the (by comparison) bustling little town of Point Reyes Station. During the week in wintertime, Point Reyes Station is a very mellow place. On a sunny summer weekend, however, it’s up and lively, thronged with bicyclists and birders.

The Saturday morning Point Reyes Farmers' Market, in front of Toby’s Feed Barn and next to the town’s sweet community garden plots, has just a few farmers—Paradise Valley Produce, Fresh Run Farm, Wild Blue Farm—but they’re well stocked and doing a bang-up business in lettuce and kale, cukes and squash, bundles of herbs, freshly dug onions and potatoes, bright carrots and brighter bouquets. A glance through a wooden crate of new-crop Gravenstein apples from Paradise Valley reveals a couple of ringers: none other than the elusive, rarely seen Pink Pearls, a tart early apple whose cream-colored skin masks its fantastic, hot-pink flesh.

Stop by the Brickmaiden stall to pick up one of Celine Underwood's tangy sourdough loaves, baked in a wood-fired oven in a little unmarked cottage just across the street. It’s the same cottage where Chad Robertson and Elisabeth Pruiett of Tartine got their start in 1994, baking bread and pastries for small stores and farmers markets in the area under the name Bay Village Bread. Next to the bread stall is Wild West Ferments, offering handmade sauerkraut along with canning jars full of wonderfully fruity, lacto-fermented “sodas” in flavors like nectarine-vanilla and plum.

Osteria Stellina's GBD Grilled Cheese serves up three kinds of grilled cheese: a basic one with Valley Ford Estero Gold cheese on Stellina's own crusty bread; sharp cheddar with a griddled egg; and “The Bill from Bo,” Bill Niman’s slow-roasted brisket with Estero Gold. The Marshall Store, from across Tomales Bay, is serving up oysters to go, on the half shell or barbecued.

Not in the mood for oysters or cheese? Well, there’s always what might just be the best burger in West Marin, served right on the way out of town at Marin Sun Farms’ butcher shop and café. (Their beef jerky is perfect trail food, too.) Otherwise, fill out your picnic menu at Tomales Bay Foods, home of Cowgirl Creamery, and take your pick of perfect picnic spots. Families with children can head to the placid shoreline of Hearts Desire beach along Tomales Bay near Inverness. Too full of sunbathers and kayakers? Take the short, shady hike through the mossy, Hobbit-y trees to nearby Shell Beach, generally a little less populated. Or go exploring among the numerous ocean beaches, lagoons, and estuaries of the Point Reyes National Seashore itself.

On the way home, sand in your shoes, cell phones ignored, you can keep the beachy feeling going by snagging an outdoor table overlooking the marina at Sausalito’s Bar Bocce, ordering a pitcher of beer or a glass of white sangria while you wait for your crisp-crusted calamari pizza to arrive, dribbled with lemon oil, flecked with chiles. The best seat in the house isn’t actually in the restaurant; it’s the bench down on the beach, shaded by a big umbrella, where you can dig your toes into the sand and toast your very, very good fortune at having all this bounty in your backyard.

Margo True, the food editor for Sunset, will be demonstrating recipes from the magazine's latest cookbook,The One-Block Feast, at the Point Reyes Farmers' Market at 10am on Saturday, August 27.

Dining in Marin is tough. I've said it before and I'll say it again: there's just not a whole lot to choose from when you're seeking really good quality food without twenty-seven small children running amuck in a spot that's actually open past 9 p.m. Because my folks live in Marin and I visit often, I'm always on the lookout for new restaurant openings and places to try, and ever since Bar Bocce opened a few months back, it's been at the top of my list. Wood-fired pizzas, beautiful patio right on the water, bocce ball courts, inexpensive/local wine list, kind of infamous brownie? This had to be mostly hype, right?

First thing's first: Bar Bocce has the menu and the kitchen staff under control. The menu is a simple, straight-forward and inspired mix of American and Mediterranean food and Robert Price (former Buckeye Roadhouse chef) is manning the kitchen. So far, life is good. The appetizers are all small plates--perfect for sharing--and we found the pizza to be an ideal size for two people as long as you're ordering a few other things for the table. So we did. I suggested the meatballs; my mom was dying to try the oven-roasted asparagus with pecorino. And the pizza? It was a unanimous choice with the Dungeness crab pizza with Meyer lemon and avocado creme fraiche.

After ordering, we had a chance to take in the scenery, the amazing view, and the crowd inside the restaurant. There's no way to quibble with the fact that the 22-person outdoor seating area is one of the more beautiful in the county. It sits right next to the Bay with a dramatic pergola and an inviting fire pit and bocce ball court. This is the new spot to gather for happy hour drinks and watch the sun drift off into another day. The best news? There weren't twenty-seven screaming toddlers. But after experiencing the dramatic outdoor space, there's something about coming inside that seems a bit anticlimactic. It's almost as if they literally ran out of money before they began developing and designing the interior space. It looks much more like an average pizza shop, complete with large televisions broadcasting live sports games. We could've lived without this.

But when it all comes down to it, the food is what will bring people back. And Bar Bocce has the food down. Our meatballs--a blend of three different kinds of meat, bread crumbs, and a secret blend of spices-- were incredibly flavorful and left us actually wishing we'd ordered the meatball pizza. The asparagus was perfectly roasted, and the Crab pizza was almost an order-again. The sourdough crust was perfectly chewy with a nice, slight char on the edges. Just the way it should be. But the crab itself was a little sparse and we thought the creme fraiche just came off as a little showy. A Dungeness crab pizza should stand on its own. And this one could, absolutely, with just a few tweaks.

Left: Roasted Asparagus and a Meatball; Right: Dungeness Crab Pizza

In addition to refreshingly good Marin food, I'd return for the atmosphere alone. Especially in the summer when that outdoor patio will be just a smidge warmer and early mornings at work don't seem quite as urgent. And you won't feel nearly as guilty about spending $8 on a brownie.

Bar Bocce's Brownie

I just couldn't resist trying the Bar Bocce brownie served with a cognac whipped cream. I asked our server what the story was with it and she explained that it's made with a dark, dark cocoa powder and includes espresso powder to enhance the depth even further. Now there are two types of people in this world: people who enjoy chewier, fudgy brownies and others who enjoy cakey brownies. I think both will be pleased here. The Bar Bocce brownie falls comfortably in between the two camps with a fudgy center, chewy edges and the ever-lovely mound of whipped cream.

Need a new place to try in Marin? Inspiration for your next date night? Patio-hopping after a long hike? Bar Bocce can (and will, in time) answer all of these questions. I'm willing to go out on a limb here and say that summers in Sausalito just got a whole lot sweeter.

Bar Bocce
1250 Bridgeway 1, Sausalito CA 94965
(415) 331-0555
Monday-Saturday 11:30 a.m. - 10 p.m.
Sunday 10:30 a.m. -10 p.m.; Brunch on Sat. and Sun. served until 2:30 p.m.

It's no secret that the lines at Sol Food in San Rafael have been creeping down the block lately. What used to be a little hole in the wall Puerto Rican joint is now a booming, booming business. But right across the street on Lincoln Avenue is a reason to ditch that long wait for some of the best Mexican food in the Bay Area.

Living in California, you forget that not everyone has good taquerias close to home, work, school, the freeway--you name it. When you talk to people living in, say, Seattle they'll tell you that really good authentic Mexican is tough to come by. So when my sister and her boyfriend were visiting (from Seattle) last weekend and mentioned a hankering for some legitimate mole, I know we had to go to Las Camelias.

Las Camelias is the baby of chef and owner, Gabriel Fregoso who grew up in the very small town of Cuautla in western Jalisco. His mother and grandmother were big cooks, and in 1976 Gabriel came to Marin and started working at the Lark Creek Inn in Larkspur. He worked his way up to the position of cook, and a few years later opened Las Camelias using his mother and grandmother's recipes. In a county where restaurants open and shutter in the blink of an eye, thirty-two years in business is a pretty big deal. Gabriel's doing something right.

When you walk in, the first thing you'll notice is the warm, rustic atmosphere with heavy wooden chairs and tables and thoughtfully chosen artwork. The servers will set you up with a "margarita" right away (they don't have a liquor license so they're really wine margaritas). But they still make their own in-house margarita mix and it veers far from the often overly-sweet store bought variety. Try one. Trust me.

Then you must try the guacamole. I'm a bit finicky about guacamole. But at Las Camelias, they do a really simple version that has grabbed my attention: tons of avocado, a little chopped tomato, onion, and the perfect amount of cilantro and lime juice. No distracting spices. Not too salty or creamy.

Now to get down to business, I'm actually a little embarrassed to admit what I love to order at Las Camelias. It's a salad, possibly the lamest thing to order at a Mexican restaurant known for their spicy moles, incredible tamales, and slow cooked enchiladas. But this salad is a combination of many of my favorite things in the world: They start with lettuce and shredded organic chicken and throw in shredded cabbage and carrots, rice, cheese, guacamole, tortilla chips, and finish it off with a subtle sweet and sour dressing. It's pure magic, really and it's so filling that I generally bring leftovers home for lunch the next day.

Arroz Con Pollo Salad

My second favorite thing to order at Las Camelias are the Enchiladas Diablo Con Pollo. One reason I love ordering them is because the waitstaff sizes you up when you declare you'd like them. They try and measure your spice tenacity and have, on a few occasions, tried to talk me out of them. Are you sure? Very spicy, ok? And truthfully, they are certainly spicy but not unbearably so. There's a lot of layered flavors in the sauce and warm spices, but nothing that'll send you grabbing for your neighbors water glass. What I truly love about these enchiladas is how they're stuffed full of Rocky Junior chicken and spicy diablo sauce and little else. No big globs of cheese or unnecessary fillers. And Las Camelias serves most dishes with their famous white refried beans. I actually have friends that come here just for the beans.

Spicy steak fajitas: notice those white beans!

When I first started coming to Las Camelias I was a vegetarian and I was addicted to the Vegetarian Combination Platter. It comes with a huge poblano chile filled with caramelized onions and simmered in a light sour cream sauce with corn and zucchini. This is basically the perfect food on a foggy Bay Area evening. But wait. There's also the tamale with chayote and potatoes. And last, the crispy vegetarian burrito, all served with black beans and ancho chile sauce. It may be vegetarian, but it's very far from light--you get a little taste of many things they're known for and my meat-eating friends would always look on with envy.

So while Gabriel Fregoso is dealing with some tough competition across the street, I'm certain that Las Camelias is not going anywhere. The food is the real deal, the atmosphere is date-worthy while still maintaining a laid-back and comfortable vibe, and the waitstaff is gracious and attentive. Lately, visitors or no visitors, I can't get enough of the place.

My sister's boyfriend: soon to be a member of the clean-plate club

Las Camelias
912 Lincoln Avenue (between 3rd and 4th)
San Rafael, CA 94901
(415) 453-5850
Hours: M-Th 11:30am-9pm
Fri.-Sat. 11:30am-9:30pm
Sun. 3 pm-9pm

Arizmendi San Rafael finally opened April 6th!

I've been looking forward to this bakery opening for months. Seasons, actually. You see, it's not that we don't have Arizmendi in the city. We do. And it's fantastic--although on the opposite end of town from where I live. But my mom is a quick hop from the new location in San Rafael and I find myself at her house often because a) she's cool, b) she cooks for me and c) she has much better cable and cute dogs. So when I heard that Arizmendi had finally opened this week, I made a point to cruise on over and check it out. All in the name of research.

If you're not familiar with Arizmendi, they're not only an incredible bakery but they use a very cool worker cooperative business model. Over thirty years ago now, Berkeley's worker-owned, Cheeseboard cooperative opened. The model was so succesful that they helped open another bakery in Oakland that year--Arizmendi on Lakeshore Avenue was born. The rest is history. So without going into too much detail on the ins and outs of cooperatives (although it's quite fascinating), in short everyone weighs in on decisions ranging from opening hours to new pizza flavors.

Part of their mission statement reads:

Acting on the belief that beneficial change can come through collective action, we are a worker-owned and democratically-operated bakery cooperative. We make decisions by consensus and we share all of the business tasks, responsibilities, benefits, and risks, while being accountable to each other.

Call me crazy but this sense of care and ownership shines through in the product. Without a doubt. In the San Rafael store, this passion is immediately detectable. While I was expecting a more watered-down Arizmendi experience that would possibly cater to a different, more suburban clientele, I was pleasantly surprised.

Here's a peek at what I found:

Arizemndi bakers preparing loaves of multi-grain bread



Customers. Many, many happy customers

When I was chatting with the bakers, they mentioned that the San Rafael store's opening day was Arizmendi's biggest ever (they have East Bay and San Francisco locations as well). It was apparent on my first visit that the excitment had yet to wane.

You'll see all of your Arizmendi favorites, including the english muffin and corn cherry scone!


And a new discovery for me--intrigued by the name, I had to try one:

"The Chocolate Thing," a simple, yeasted breakfast bun generously studded with chocolate

So while I visited the San Rafael shop for a few breakfast treats, there's a lot more going on at Arizmendi. They do incredible pizzas--you can check online for their pizza of the day and pop in to buy a slice or a light-baked pie to finish baking at home. They also do artisan breads, simple cookies, and coffee drinks using Equator beans. The San Rafael location has a spacious eating area to lounge and catch up with a good book or just people watch from of their huge street-side location. And if, much like me, you can never have too many morning pastries, here are a few additional suggestions. I can attest to their greatness:

• Corn Cherry scone: a simple, delightful combination. Crumbly. A little bit savory, a little bit sweet.
• Homemade english muffin. Enough said.
• Pecan Roll: This is a nice one to share with your breakfast buddy. Light yeasty dough, nuts, caramel flavor.
• Chocolate Chip Cookies: This is not a fluffy, airy cookie. It's rather flat, dense, and generously strewn with chunks of chocolate. One of my favorite chocolate chip cookies around. And yes, I realize for most people this wouldn't be considered a morning pastry...

Generally speaking, each Arizmendi location will have a few specialties that they only do at that location. I chatted with the bakers to see what would be uniquely San Rafael and they said it was just too early to tell at this point. They wanted to start with the standard, successful line of Arizmendi products and give themselves some time to get to know the customers, the location, and what's really popular. As of now, the pizza has been a huge hit (after all, where can you grab a quick lunch right downtown?) and the morning pastry crowd is growing each day. They hinted that there's a good chance you may see them rockin' the Marin Farmer's Market in the coming months, too. So there's a lot to look forward to. But it's safe to say I'm satisfied with the here and now: they're open, they've got the best scone in town, and I've got a pizza in my fridge waiting to be baked off.

Arizmendi San Rafael
(See their website for other Bay Area locations)
1002 Fourth St.
San Rafael, CA 94901
(415) 456-4093
Hours: Closed Mon.; Tues.-Fri: 7am-7pm; Sat. 8am-7pm; Sun. 8am-4pm
Twitter: @Arizmendi_SR

Trying everything at Weezy’s Grass Fed Shed

I'm a little late to the game, but I'm finally getting into the Best Food Writing 2009 anthology. It's only been sitting on my nightstand for a few months. If you haven't checked it out yet, there are some great, short pieces on everything from translating modern Indian cooking to an exploration of illegal, raw-milk cheese. Our of all of the work I've read so far (Disclaimer: I'm still not all that far into it), Tim Hayward's short piece, "Too Much of a Mouthful" caught my attention. In it, he explores the current popularity of oversized portions--particularly in the U.K.

Interesting enough, I was finishing Hayward's piece as I sat waiting for a friend on the patio of Weezy's Grass Fed Shed in San Rafael. I'd heard about this place right when they opened from a friend who worked in the area. She boasted that they served Prather Ranch beef burgers for a mere $3.00. I argued with her about the impossibility of that statement, and she assured me that it was true but that they make it all work because the burgers are small.

Great. Perfect. I hate how sluggish I feel after a big burger, so I quickly find a fellow burger lover and we agree to meet for lunch and check it out.

The shed’s small outdoor patio

Now when my friend mentioned that the burgers are small, she wasn't messing around. Think somewhere in between slider and very small burger. Tim Hayward, the writer I just spoke of, would be proud. In his piece, he closes by commenting on the irony of careful food preparation in the U.K. combined with the obscene, difficult-to eat portions:

Any cook worth his Maldon salt, be he three-star chef, sandwich slinger or pie-maker, will have thought long and hard about every aspect of a dish he's created. By the time he's given it a final wipe with the rag and sent it out to delight me he will have used all of his knowledge, skill, experience and training to ensure that it is properly sourced and prepped; perfectly cooked, seasoned, rested, and sauced. Is it really too much to ask then, that it should also fit in my mouth?

Clearly, Louise Clow-Birkenseer ("Weezy') would answer with a resounding "No." Not only are her burgers made with the finest ingredients, they’re also a very civilized and appropriate size. You can swing by and grab one as a late afternoon snack or, as my friend Creg and I decided to do, order a whole bunch (or, let's be honest: pretty much everything on the menu). At that size and that price, why not?

The Contiki burger: a little bit sweet, a little bit savory.

Before I report back on our favorites, a little background: Weezy's started as many great things do: when someone notices a lack of something in their neighborhood or town and decides to fill it. Weezy lives in the sleepy part of San Rafael known as Terra Linda--quite residential with very few good dining options. Weezy missed a good burger. She wanted to walk and pick one up. She'd always wanted to add to the community in some way and felt that really good quality food should be available to everyone at a fair price. Enough said. The shed was born.

Creg and I visited on a quiet and unusually sunny weekday and found Weezy whistling on a stool in the back of the shed forming small meat patties. High school kids were working through the line with smiles and enthusiasm. It all felt very organized but completely laid-back at the same time. For example, as we were hemming and hawing over what kind of fries to order (sweet potato or regular), the kids at the register encouraged us to go with both: We'll mix them up for you! OK, sold. I overhear another customer debating between the limeade or the raspberry lemonade. The cashier's solution? It's so good if you mix them both! We do it all the time. Trust us, you'll love it! I like this carefree, go-for-it attitude. Why take lunch too seriously, after all?

Then as if the kids at the counter aren't excited enough, we go outside to enjoy our burgers and Weezy herself isn't far behind with her own lunch tray. She sits down next to us, soaking in the sun, chatting with customers and introducing herself, and literally oohing and ahhing over her burger. From the sound of things, she's behind these little burgers 110%.

Creg and I tried the White Trash Burger (with American cheese, iceberg lettuce, and Thousand Island dressing), Burger in a Lettuce Cup, the B-rad (with bacon and Tillamook cheddar), the Contiki (with pineapple and Teriyaki sauce), and the Moo-Less Burger (homemade vegan patty with 20 different ingredients served on a bun with cream cheese and special sweet potato sauce).

The Moo-Less Burger

Each burger is right around $3.00 and weighs in at 1/8 of a pound unless you opt to do the "Double Wide" upgrade with is ¼ pound for an additional $.75. I have to say, I'll probably upgrade next time. It seems like a great deal. I expected to really love the White Trash burger, but there was something about the crispy bacon, juicy and perfectly cooked meat, and slightly sharp cheddar that made me grasp onto the B-rad and not let go. Sorry, Creg. I'll give you a bite next time.

I'll be back for this one: the b-rad burger

So as the weather turns warmer, as you look to new spots to try, I'm all for taking Tim Hayward's implied thesis to heart--size matters. Something is lost in quality and in experience when you're presented with an entire pound of it. According her website, for Weezy "it’s not just a job, it’s a lifestyle." I have to say--if I lived just a bit closer, I'd start to integrate Weezy's more into my own.

Weezy's Grass Fed Shed
621 A Del Ganado (in the Scotty's Market Shopping Center)
San Rafael, CA, 94903
(415) 479-7433
Hours: Everyday 11am-8pm; for coffee and pastries (NEW) only 7am-11am
Also, find them on Facebook

View Larger Map

The rain was pouring down in sheets, the streets smeared and shiny as licorice along Larkspur's main drag. You'd think that, on this chilly, wet Monday night, everyone would be at home pulling a pizza from the freezer and flipping through the Netflix stack, but up and down Magnolia Street, there's not a parking place to be found. By eight o'clock, nearly every table at Picco is full and happy.

Welcome to Marin Mondays, chef-owner Bruce Hill's popular eat-local brainstorm. The concept is simple: each Monday, the restaurant offers a homey, five-course prix fixe menu showcasing local producers, for $30-$33 a person. (The restaurant's extensive regular menu is also available, and the Marin menu items can be sampled à la carte.) Think Ad Hoc with a locavore twist, and so far, it's brought out big crowds every week, on a night that's typically a slow one in the restaurant biz.

This might be a tricky proposition in, say, Fargo, or Cleveland, but with the Pacific Ocean on one side, San Francisco Bay on the other, and the rich, rolling green fields, woods, and pastures of rural West Marin (plus oyster-friendly Tomales Bay) in between, Marin County is pretty much a year-round bounty of bliss for local-conscious eaters and producers alike. Fishermen, dairy ranchers, farmers, vintners, and foragers all work the land (and water) here, raising sheep, cows, goats, and chickens on grass, farming oysters in the bays, making cheese, distilling liqueurs, catching squid, growing greens, picking mushrooms, baking bread in wood-fired ovens, and more.

So, sourcing: not a problem. And the menu's once-a-week status gives Picco's cooks the chance to be micro-seasonal in their creativity as they come up with new recipes based on whatever cool stuff is available each week. As long as there's enough of it to feed one night's worth of customers, they can use it-- a great boon to the foragers and farmers with just a few acres of continually cycling crops. And the menu isn't strictly local-limited; there's coconut milk in the curry, candied ginger on the ice cream, sriracha hot sauce on the fish cakes. But flavorings aside, the bulk of the ingredients come from nearby, because even in the depths of winter, abundance reigns.

And the menu is open to interpretation each week, instead of being locked down in the pristine, unadorned Cal-Med style, all sea salt and olive oil, that has become the de facto way of cooking local here. On the night we went, the inspiration was Thailand, with a side of Jersey & Buffalo. Or at least that's how we interpreted the appearance of sliders, chicken wings, and soft-serve ice cream between the squid salad and beef curry. To sip, there are two local libations, a Stubbs Estate organic chardonnay and a Shaken, Not Stirred cocktail made with house-infused elderflower liqueur and Square One cucumber vodka, made in Novato.

Last Monday, in honor of Beer Week, there was beer from Marin Brew Company in every dish, from Hog Island manila clams steamed in Albion ale to a fritto misto battered with IPA, cheddar soup with pilsner and rye croutons, and a stout cake with Straus Dairy caramel ice cream.

But back to Thailand in Marin. We started with a light and lovely squid salad, tender and tangy and tangled with cubes of crunchy Asian pear and fresh herbs, alongside a puff of succulent miners' lettuce, that wonderful winter weed named for adding much-needed vitamins to many a Forty-Niner's salt pork-and-sourdough diet.

Next up, a gloriously (but not excessively) greasy fish "slider," White Castle meets Thai fish cake. Unlike the fish cakes in Thai restaurants, which are often bounceably rubbery, these were more like crab cakes, made with rock cod from Bolinas, gentle and just a little springy, lavished with crunchy County Line cabbage and Star Route Farm carrot slaw, dripping with sriracha-spiked mayo and paired with super-crunchy, extra-salty chiplets made from sunchoke curls.

Superbowl-sublime chicken wings from Coastal Hill Farms followed, lacquered sticky-meaty mouthfuls, messy and wonderful. A thick puddle of seasoned Straus yogurt sauce and a mound of shredded celery root with baby watercress replaced the ranch dressing and celery sticks of sports-bar tradition. Dressing up lowbrow favorites doesn't always work (I'm still shaking my head over the dainty arugula-and-mandarin-orange salad served with the lobster roll at nearby Yankee Pier when they first opened—when, as every New Englander knows, a true lobster roll needs nothing but a bag of chips) but in this case, it's great.

By this time, we're pretty happily fed. The main dish, a Mussaman beef and potato curry, looks a little skimpy lurking at the bottom of its big white bowls, but it's deceptive. Rich and coconut-sauced, dotted with translucent, almost fetal baby radishes, the Marin Sun braised short ribs fork tender and lush, it turns out to be all we need.

All we're expecting for dessert is a bitty swirl of Picco's famous Straus Dairy soft-serve, what might fill a Chinese-restaurant teacup. Instead, we get a massive swirl towering above a cereal bowl, heavily crunched with candied ginger and pecan praline. Lovely, palate-cleansing, and crazily big.

Then again, being graced with too much ice cream made from the milk of happy local cows? Way, way down on my list of Bad Things.

Picco
320 Magnolia Ave.
Larkspur, California 94939
Map
415.924.0300
Picco on Facebook

Photos by Debra St. John

San Rafael's Sol Food: Puerto Rican food done right

By the time this post is published, I will have packed up a 14-food U-haul, probably strained my lower back, and sweated up and down five flights of stairs (no mom, there's no elevator) as I schlep my life's belongings into a little apartment in Alamo Square Park. I'm unspeakably excited about moving from San Rafael to the city; truthfully, this was all supposed to happen a year ago. But you know how things don't always go as planned. So as folks were busy making New Years resolutions and goals for the coming year ahead, I've been taking a moment to reflect on living in Marin and what I'll miss.

Now there's a big part of me that feels like this list is quite small. I'll be honest: I haven't been the most vocal member of Marin's fan club. In fact, I never even joined. Socially, I'm generally the youngest one at any given location by a good twenty years. I'm not raising kids, and I'm in a pretty darn low tax bracket so that makes me the exception. And heck, I often like to eat dinner after 9 p.m. Suffice it to say, I've learned to eat earlier. Not only can you not get a decent burger after the sun sets, you can barely get a gallon of milk or sack of flour. The place shuts down. However, San Rafael has a lot going for it, too. I loved getting to know all of the hiking trails with my mom's two dogs. West Marin is a quick, awesome getaway where life feels slower and somehow more conscious and deliberate. It's generally easy to park in Marin, I love my consignment store, and can't get enough of the Fairfax Scoop in the summers. And of course, you can get the best Puerto Rican food in the Bay Area. I'll miss all of those things, especially the latter.

If you haven't been to Sol Food, it's owned by Sol Hernandez, an enterprising San Rafael native who decided to bring Puerto Rican food to Marin. She lived on the island for quite awhile with her boyfriend and his mother and spent her free time learning how to cook the local dishes. The original Sol Food is a tiny little outpost on the corner of 4th and Lincoln in San Rafael. There aren't any formal indoor tables although there are stools by the window and up by the counter. When I first started hitting up the authentic eatery, I could just stroll in, order, and be on my way. Now I rarely go to this location because it's always obscenely crowded, and I can usually find seating at the other location right away. Locals differentiate between the two in size, calling the original location on 4th Street "the small one" and the newer location on Lincoln Avenue "the big one."

Regardless of which one you choose, Sol has successfully created two restaurant spaces that look and feel like Puerto Rico: colorful shutters and chairs, green plantains holding down stacks of napkins, and big leafy plants gracing every inch of usable counter space. Loud, lively music streams throughout the bustling cafe, and one of the things I love the most are the communal tables (at the larger location). Here, you may be seated next to a teacher grading papers, an older man reading the paper, gossipy college students, and tattoo artists from down the street. There aren't a lot of places around Marin where young and old, conservative and raucous, come together and chat over pink beans and rice.

Two of Sol Food's signatures: their infamous housemade hot sauce and decorative shuttered interior

Now, the food: Everything on the menu is delicious, from the Maduros (sweet fried yellow plantains) to the Bistec or Cubano sandwiches. I was a vegetarian for the first few years that I lived in San Rafael and I'd come to Sol Food often to get a side of beans. It's the best deal in town, and still my go-to meal when I'm in a hurry or want a light lunch. For a mere $3.95, you get a generous portion of pink beans, half an avocado, and a plantain of your choosing. It's delicious, it's cheap, and it's made with local and organic ingredients. Can't beat that.

My favorite Sol Food dish, Pollo Al Horno

Today though, I generally rely on the Pollo Al Horno: boneless, skinless organic chicken thighs marinated with oregano and lots of garlic. It's served with an organic salad, plantains, and rice and beans. If someone could teach me how to make chicken this juicy and flavorful, I'm not sure I'd eat anything else. Ever again. Their daily specials are something to organize your week around (check online for information). Mondays are my day of choice with the Arroz Con Picadillo, seasoned ground beef over rice served with beans, fresh avocado, fried plantain, and greens. Picadillo is a traditional dish in many Latin American countries and is often served with rice or used as a filling in tacos or empanadas. It sounds basic--kind of like you could whip it up at home. But you can't. I assure you. The beef is spicy and has a kick of vinegar, garlic and onion. Head over on a Monday and you can see what I mean. Order a Fizzie Lizzie, their Cafe Helado (sweetened iced espresso with milk served in a mason jar), or a coconut water to wash it all down.

So while I can't wait to live in a neighborhood where I can get a slice of pizza into the wee hours and where there will be more than two other people my age walking down the street (I'm kidding...sort of), I'm grateful that San Rafael's just a skip away. My mom lives here, so I'll come back to hike with her dogs, throw in load of laundry every now and then, catch up on Dexter, and get my fill of pink beans and rice.

Sol Food Restaurant (Small One/Original)
732 4th Street
San Rafael, CA 94901
(415) 451-4765
Hours: Sun.-Thurs. 7am-12am; Fri. 7am-2am; Sat. 8am-2am

Sol Food Restaurant (Big One)
901 Lincoln Avenue
San Rafael, CA 94901
(415) 451-4765 (same number as above)
Hours: Daily from 11am-10pm

Opening of Golden Orb Piroshki Shop

I first stumbled across Golden Orb as I was routinely stalking Arizmendi Bakery, trying to figure out when their San Rafael location is finally going to open. Ah yes, disappointed yet again (it's been so long). But yesterday morning, my disappointment waned when I discovered a new red and gold sign had popped up further down the street. I parked, did some exploring, and found the smiling faces of managers and adept piroshki purveyors, Ashley De Rutte and her fiancé Breeze Kinsey bustling about the Golden Orb. Ashley's father, David Daunell, is the owner--you may remember his name from Moosetta's up in Sonoma, the popular piroshki shop that his mother Caroline ran with her husband, Chef Marvin Joyce until the late 1990s.

Shop Managers Breeze Kinsey and Ashley de Rutte

Now if you're new to piroshki, they're not a light food. However, they're perfect for this time of year when the rains and gray winter days are looming. Their origin is actually difficult to trace, with Poles, Russians, Latvians, and Czechs all claiming them as their own. Regardless, the piroshki's you'll try at Golden Orb are a traditional Russian hand pie stuffed with a variety of savory fillings. While the beef or the cabbage vermicelli are certainly the most traditional, they've added more contemporary flavors such as chicken potpie and spinach parmesan--all for less than the price of a grande latte. Ashley and Breeze also offer a few salads and a small but lovely selection of baked goods, fair trade coffee beverages, and teas.

Menu Offerings at Golden Orb

I tried the two biggest sellers, according to Breeze: the beef, onion, and dill along with the cabbage, vermicelli, carrot and caraway seed. They were each placed in little bags, warm, and perfectly golden on top. The dough was much chewier than I'd expected and much less greasy. After everything I'd heard about piroshki, I was expecting a major gut bomb. And don't get me wrong: they're certainly filling, but not in a 'I need a nap' sort of way, but more in a 'wow, I just had a satisfying meal all contained in a little bread pocket' kind of way. The filling-to-dough ratio was perfect, and I obviously couldn't finish both in one setting so I reheated half of the beef piroshki later in the day and it was just as good the second time around.

Piroshki breakfast...and lunch

I wasn't planning on writing about piroshki for this week's post. But after eating at Golden Orb and talking to Breeze and Ashley, I couldn't stop thinking about the quaint and inviting space or those warm savory pies. And I'm not sure that's because they were so delicious (although they were) or because they were a new-to-me food. Even if piroshki aren't part of your cultural tradition, there's something about them that feels familiar--something you can't quite stop thinking about. At Golden Orb, Caroline's granddaughter is keeping the family legacy alive in a small but tangible way, something we should all celebrate in this season of mass consumption and big box stores.

I've vowed not to step into a mall for any of my holiday shopping this year (so far, so good), and over the past few days I've made another vow: more piroshki. Many more piroshki.

Golden Orb
811 4th Street
San Rafael, CA 94901
(415) 454-8692
Hours: 8am–6pm

Love is in the air: peaches are here, and all is right with the world. Yes, my sunglasses are rose- tinted, why do you ask?

I've been on the road, taking my show with me. First NYC, then Portland and most recently, Chicago. It's been fun, educational, hot, and delicious, but I've missed being home. Home is where the peaches are. Home is where I know the season's signage at my local farmers' market is. I wait and pine for strawberries, cherries soon follow, and after cherries, O Glorious stone fruit arrives, bang! a cornucopia drops out of the sky and lands on my head! It's fast. It's furious. And no one can keep up. Chefs and pastry chefs change menus daily, attempting to think of newfangled dishes to highlight summer's overwhelming, non-stop conveyor belt of tree fruit to farm, to market. It's all about pitting and prepping and ripening, and those of us who really care, trying to keep our fruit out of walk-ins.

We want our diners to get a taste of what we felt when scooping up the first apricots, felt their soft downy skin and licked our chins attempting to keep every last drop of apricot nectar, spilling out like the well which Micky and the sinister brooms let loose in the night.

This past weekend I had the extraordinary pleasure of working for my favorite peach farmer, Carl Rosato of Woodleaf Farm. On Saturday and Sunday I joined an exceptional crew to sell August's first Cassie peaches, pears, a few undercover Pink Pearl Apples (!!!), tiny sweet green grapes, red pears, mixed figs, white peaches, a dozen or so nectarines and Suncrest peaches.

Cassie peaches, in my humble opinion, are a reason for living.

While working at the markets this weekend I gave out a lot of peach advice. Peach advice for ripening, baking, storing, freezing, jamming, eating, and handling. I received a funny email, in fact, from my friend Guy today,
"That was cool running in to you yesterday, selling peaches. Can't imagine what the customers though when they asked, 'Do you have any good ideas what to do with them?' AHAHHAHAH."

A fruit-inspired pastry chef could not be happier having a job wherein he was surrounded by exquisite fruit all the day long. Fruit is an exciting field of study because not all fruit is created equal. One must know the inner workings of the family of fruit when one approaches a new branch.

Some fruit must always be picked unripe from the tree, the best example being pears. Certain fruits will continue to ripen off the tree, two examples are pineapples, and most stone fruit. There are cranky fruits who do not like to be picked with a machine, cherries, for example. And there are laid back fruits which can go either way, they're easy, like oranges or walnuts.

Peaches will ripen off the tree, on your counter, if you so wish. A good farmer will pick fruit right at the moment where she/he can get it to market looking alright and then allow the eater to ripen it a bit more to get it where it's desired. Many fruits will get softer but not sweeter if picked too early; mangoes are a great example of a fruit whose perfume is stolen when picked green or green-ish.

This weekend, in the midst of excitedly talking a mile-a-minute about peaches, I heard some great peach advice from customers. My favorite tidbit came from a fellow at the San Rafael market in Marin named Patrick. It made me stop dead in my tracks and so I wanted to share it with y'all.

What works for me, and so I share it with others is this: place peaches shoulder side down (aka "stem end"), on a flat surface, at room temperature, just until there's a bit of give under the skin, then refrigerate or eat.

But Patrick had a brilliant idea. Refrigerate peaches/stone fruit all at once and take out, placing on counter (or plate) as I've described, a few days before eating. Refrigerating fruit at home, (as opposed to the massive cold storage facilities in the "produce stream" wherein "refrigerators" are the size of private airplane hangers and temperatures are kept between 30-34F), means the fruit's ripening process is slowed down, but not stopped. With Patrick's method you don't have a lot of really ripe fruit in the fridge at once. And, also, you horde a some power over the ripening process, therefore giving yourself more time to relax, find recipes you love, and do with that fruit what you want without the pressure of doing that right now!

Patrick's method also allows you to buy a little more fruit than you might need or want to consume in one day or week. (Which of course makes the farmers happy.)

Every peach is a snowflake. Every varietal is different, every farm growing a particular varietal grows them differently. Every soil and location and method will produce a different peach. Every tree on in that orchard growing that peach will ripen and concentrate its sugars and acids differently. Depending on how much of one kind a farmer has, and which market they're selling them at, will determine or fetch a different price. And every mouth eating that peach like a snowflake will react to it differently.

We all know at what point exactly we like to eat a banana. Even within one family each member will like a slightly more or less green specimen.

My Peach Advice? Jot down the names and details of the peaches and the farmers with whom you interacted with this year so that next year you will leap at the chance to buy your favorites, have mouth notes from which to comparison shop/eat, and ripen gently and slowly the fruit you choose to buy.

And if you see me selling peaches, please stop by and say hello, I'd love to expound further, or just introduce you to my favorite fruit!