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.

Oh, the joys of a summer picnic in San Francisco! The five o'clock winds whirling away the paper napkins, leather-jacketed guests huddled around the grill for warmth, tippy paper plates piled with rapidly cooling veggie dogs...need I go on?

If you've lived in San Francisco through more than one ostensible summer—those months between Memorial Day and Labor Day when Walnut Creek swelters while we shiver—you've been to a picnic like this, in Golden Gate Park or in an Inner Richmond backyard, where the hosts have high hopes that end with everyone back inside, squeezed into the kitchen drinking Trumer Pils by the stove.

Still, it's not always like that. There are always a few blissful 80+ degree days, where Dolores Park becomes a shirtless, sundressed parking lot and even Baker Beach is warm enough to lure full-body sunseekers to its clothing-optional end. Or there's a speedy BART ride to that place across the bridge called the East Bay, with its sunny skies, warmer temps, and many, many parks, where most of your home-buying friends live now, anyway. And away from the ocean, the inner reaches of Marin, along with Napa and Sonoma, offer reliably toasty summer weather.

So, no excuse not to pack up the picnic basket this weekend. Picnics and barbecues, by their nature, are expandable, pot-lucky affairs. Some hosts do their duty by laying out chips, guacamole, baby carrots and beer, leaving it up to the guests to bring their own sausages, steaks, or salmon for the grill—a recession-wise move when local wild salmon runs $20/lb or more. Jealously guarding your own little slab of protein from the grazing hordes can feel a little greedy, but hopefully, some generous soul will have had the foresight to throw down a few extra sausages, skewers, or veggie burgers for their six-pack-toting friends who forgot to hit Bi-Rite on the way.

Tables are inevitably cluttered with salads and dips, plastic tubs or bowls of thrown-together, easily-transportable stuff that no one really loves but everyone eats: potato salads, pasta salads, hummus, salsa, quinoa-and-bean things. Personally, I've received modest but heartfelt acclaim over the years for my potato salad, which is neither truffled or lobstered, but simply made from scratch rather than being bought by the pound at Safeway.

The trick to good potato salad is a two-step dressing process, and most importantly, making it the day before. Potatoes are stolid things, and they need some time to jazz themselves up. Sitting on BART for 30 minutes nestled up against a cold pack won't do it. Give your potatoes a full 24 hours in the fridge to soak up their dressing, and you'll have something worth eating. Otherwise, you'll have OK salad followed by really spectacular leftovers.

The method is more important than the exact measurements, which will vary depending on your taste and how many potatoes you have lying around. Waxy potatoes, like the commonly found round, red-skinned ones, will give you a neater salad, since they tend to keep their shape better when boiled. Once your potatoes are boiled tender (but before they start collapsing and exploding), drain them and let them cool just to the point where you can handle them without burning your fingers. Peel and cut into just-a-little-bigger-than-bite-size chunks. Toss with some minced shallot, a bit of freshly minced garlic, a generous dose of white-wine or rice vinegar, and plenty of salt and pepper. Turn them around in this; they should be well moistened but not sitting in a puddle. Cover and put this away at room temperature for an hour or two, or in the fridge if you need to leave it longer than that.

Once your potatoes have soaked up a little tang, you can decide which way you want the dressing to go: a mustardy, olive oil-based vinaigrette, with the crunch of whole-grain mustard and perhaps a little diced red onion for color, or the all-American mayonnaise-y way, with lots of good mayonnaise whisked with a little milk or sour cream to lighten it, plus a dab of mustard and a good squirt of fresh lemon juice, tossed with the potatoes to coat with some finely chopped celery and scallion. Whichever you choose, toss it well and put it back into the fridge to mellow. Taste for seasoning before serving; potatoes can usually stand a lot of salt and pepper, and the French-style salad always benefits from a generous handful of chopped flat-leaf parsley thrown in at the very end.

Then there are deviled eggs, which everyone loves but not enough people make. The reason? Most likely, the unhappy memory of trying to transport a plateful of the slippery little devils on the N-Judah, arriving with all the tasty yellow filling smooshed into the plastic wrap. For the classic cut-in-half eggs filled with a swirl in the shape of fancy cake icing, you really need one of those made-for-the-purpose plates dimpled with little egg-shaped indentations. Which you'll use maybe 3 times a year, which is why so few of us have them.

Not to worry, though. There's another way to make deviled eggs that neatly sidesteps the need for specialty plateware. So, boil your eggs the way you do, keeping in mind, my chicken-keeping friends, that backyard-fresh eggs will be much harder to peel, leaving you with something like a pock-marked chunk of moon rock. It will be much easier to separate white from shell if you use a stash that's been waiting in the fridge for a week.

Anyway, peel your eggs. Now, standing the egg upright on its narrower end, slice a little bit off its round bottom, so it has a nice flat surface to sit on. Now slice off the top, about a third of the way down. Scoop or pop out the yolk, and drop it into a bowl. (Generally, as an egg ages, its yolk sinks closer to the wider end.)

Once your whites de-yolked, consider your flavorings. Everyone loves a plain deviled egg, the yolks mixed up with mayo, a pinch of dry mustard, a wee bit of paprika, perhaps a drop or two of lemon juice. Which means, of course, that you probably can't wait to mix it up and put in curry or wasabi or smoked paprika. All of which are fine, as long as you don't go nuts and overwhelm the nice rich egginess of the basic product.

Lately, I've become particularly enamored of deviled eggs sassed up with the salty, umami-laden punch of anchovy. Spanish boquerones, marinated white anchovies, are expensive and gorgeous, but whole salt-packed regular ones work quite well, too. (Fancy Italian delis often have a large open can of the salt-packed ones around, and will scoop out as many as you need. Rinse off the extra salt before using; some soaking may necessary if they still seem excessively salty.) There's also the funkier, fishier canned versions, as well as anchovy paste in a tube.

Anyway, as in Caesar salad, the anchovy is just there to enhance the final product and give it that more-ish edge, not to scream ANCHOVY ANCHOVY ANCHOVY!!! So, mash your little fishy in, just a bit more than you think you should use, forking it together with your cooked egg yolks into a crumbly paste. Moisten with a squeeze of fresh lemon juice, a glug of olive oil, and enough mayonnaise to bind it. Taste and adjust the seasonings.

If you have a pastry bag, pop in the tip of your choice (use one with a wide opening), and scoop your egg filling into the bag. (You can also use a small resealable plastic bag, scooping in the filling, pushing it into one corner, then snipping off the point of that corner with a pair of scissors. Voila! Instant pastry bag.) Twist the top shut and start shooting the rows of hard-boiled whites full of your deviled-egg mixture. (You'll get the most impressive results if you do this on site, rather than trying to travel with them once they're finished.) Keep chilled until ready to serve.

The best summer desserts are simple to make, portable for picnics, and highlight the season's sweet, luscious fruit. Trifle would be at the top of my own list.

While its name might lead you to think that this dish is of little consequence, it belongs in the pantheon of fantastic frugal food, along with panzanella (another wonderful summer dish) and pain perdue (good anytime of the year or day). Back when little bits of bread or cake were far too valuable to toss away, even if stale as a board, cooks invented ingenious ways to use up every last crumb. Dry cake has a way of soaking up endless flavor and, in the process, transforming itself into a silken gift.

A recent pile of cake trimmings, a bit too much creme fraiche in my refrigerator, and a few overripe peaches, combined with favorite pantry staples, Knob Creek Bourbon and Sonoma Syrup, melted together into a most heavenly dessert. Sherry, amaretto, Cointreau, or even orange juice could have stood in for the simple syrup and booze, but do keep in mind that the English call this Tipsy Cake for good reason.

While trifle properly appears in a glass-footed, straight-sided bowl, making it in a portable container means you can bring this dessert to a picnic to share its goodness.

Following its humble, serendipitous origins, I think it best to avoid recipes when making trifle, as no two will be the same. (Otherwise, you've actually gone out to buy all the ingredients rather than looking around your kitchen for odds and ends to use up.) A quick run to the corner store is fine for one or two, but if you're ticking off every ingredient on the list while at a grocery store, then you've kinda, sorta lost the heart of this dish.

MAKING SUMMER TRIFLE

What you'll need:

1. Enough stale cake or cookies to fill 1/3 of your container.

2. Enough fresh, summer fruit to fill another 1/3. If you don't have enough, good-quality jam is good, too.

3. Enough yogurt, whipped cream, mascarpone, creme fraiche or similar creamy ingredient to fill the final 1/3.

4. Booze or juice sweetened gently with simple syrup or sugar or jam.

5. If desired, flavorful gilding such as vanilla, citrus zest, fresh herbs or cocoa powder.

Like a lasagna, it's all about layering and eyeballing. The most important steps are making sure the cake gets brushed with plenty of liquid and that it's in direct contact with the creamy diary. That's how it will melt into lusciousness. If you're fancy, you can take extra time to arrange the fruit into colorful layers, like those sand-filled souvenirs you see at truck stops.

Finish by smoothing the top with a creamy layer. You can reserve a few pieces of fruit for garnish later, or enjoy -- like I do -- that lovely expanse of white that magically hides so many layers beneath.

Now comes the tough part: waiting. The trifle needs its beauty rest just like we do. A four-hour nap in the fridge will bring together the ingredients, but eight hours is what it really needs, if not a full-on, twelve- to twenty-four hour deep sleep. After that, a few serving bowls and spoons are all you need to serve and enjoy.

As a part of Out and About in Rockridge, Market Hall merchants will spill out onto College Avenue for their annual "Picnic in the Street." Enjoy food and wine tastings, cookbook signings, music, and dancing. Children's activities include cupcake decorating and pumpkin painting. There will also be a Cookbook Exchange—bring a used cookbook and exchange it for another (remaining books will go to the Rockridge Public Library).

What: Picnic in the Street

Where: North Oakland's Rockridge Market Hall, along College Avenue between Shafter and Ocean View , adjacent to the Rockridge BART Station
Map

When: Sunday, September 28th, 2008, 11:00 AM – 6:00 PM

How: Admission is free! Costs associated with some activities

Why: At the Chefs Stage several cookbook authors and chefs will demonstrate recipes, discuss and sign their books including:

Joey Altman:
Without Reservations, How to Make Bold, Creative Flavorful Food at Home

Janet Fletcher:
Fresh from the Farmers Market—10th Anniversary Edition

Alice Medrich:
Pure Dessert, true flavors, inspiring ingredients, and simple recipes

Steve Sando:
Heirloom Beans: Great Recipes for Dips and Spreads, Soups and Stews, Salads and Salsas, and Much More from Rancho Gordo

This recipe from the original edition of Janet Fletcher's Fresh from the Farmers' Market, Chronicle Books is perfect for Fall. Keep your eyes open for persimmons, coming into season this month and next.

Quick Persimmon "Ice Cream"

Serves: 4

Ingredients:
2 ripe hachiya persimmons, about 1 pound total, frozen hard
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup buttermilk or half-and-half
Approximately 2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
Gingersnaps, optional

Preparation:
Quarter persimmons carefully with a heavy knife. Remove the stems and any seeds. Halve each quarter crosswise. Do not allow the persimmons to thaw even slightly.

Put the chunks in the food processor wit the sugar and process until the persimmon is broken up into small pieces. With the motor running, add the vanilla and the buttermilk or half-and-half though the feed tube. Puree until smooth, stopping the machine to scrape down the sides once or twice. Add lemon juice to taste and puree again. Spoon into balloon wineglasses or compote dishes and serve immediately, with gingersnaps, if desired.

With the temps being on the chillier side these days, I was about to get all Dylan on yo' ass and announce, "If you wanta have a picnic, that's up t' you. But don't tell me about it, I don't wanta hear it, 'Cause, see, I just lost all m' picnic spirit. Stay in m' kitchen, have m' own picnic!" However, starting tomorrow the Bay Area mercury is going to fever up to the 80s, so it's finally time to slap on the SPF 30, grab some grub and a stadium blanket, and leave the San Franciscan layers at home.

Now, whether you pack cold fried chicken or lentil salad, whether you opt for a market-worn canvas tote or a full-loaded picnic basket, or whether you go to the beach or spread out in Golden Gate Park, I'm here to tell you about five indispensable picnic tools I can't do without.

Opinel No. 9 carbon steel pocket knife: I used to bring my trusty, fifteen-year-old Swiss Army knife on picnics, but as much as I loved the cunningly stored plastic toothpick, my old backpacking tool just wasn't picnic practical. Gunk and crumbs got jammed in every crevice, and I never seemed to use any tool other than the corkscrew. Furthermore, both blades dulled quickly and I bent back way too many nails just trying to pull the bottle opener out!

Once my husband got this classic, French folding knife for Christmas, we realized it was just what we needed for any and all of our cheese slicing, sausage cutting, or radish slivering. The carbon steel blade takes eons to dull and the entire knife wonderfully lightweight. Over one hundred years old, these knives are as brilliant as they are beautiful. ($12.55) (I might have to take up foraging just to have an excuse to buy the super special mushroom knife. But that's another post.)

GSI Lexan® Wineglasses: Elegant, stackable, and lightweight, I simply adore these wineglasses. I stumbled upon them at REI and couldn't get over their brilliance. In fact, I might have to go back for the corresponding Champagne flutes. ($5.95 per glass)

Small Wooden Cutting Board: Lightweight and packable, mine measures 10x10, but Crate and Barrel has some even smaller than that. ($8.95)

L'Occitane Verbena Towelettes: Isn't progress a wonderful thing? I remember when the only choice we had for après picnic clean-up reminded me way too much of changing my little sister's diapers. Thank god L'Occitane stepped in with their version of wipes, which they call "towelettes," thus elevating the product even further. French and herbalicious, the towelettes clean, refresh, and aromatherapize you as you lie in the sun and digest your wine and cheese. You can also get lavender flavored ones and they even repel mosquitoes! ($8.00 for a pack of fifteen densely packed towelettes.)

Swiss Spice salt and pepper shaker: Sleek, refillable, and humid-proof, this combined salt and pepper shaker is as adorable as it is useful. It packs flat -- unlike my old Morton favorites, which are decidedly not moisture resistant -- and is just so darn adorable. ($16.00)

We each need a good food buddy or two. Mine is a petite Filipina who can eat anyone under the table. Cindy modestly claims it's all about the pacing, but those of us who've had the pleasure of dining with her know that it's really 1) her absolute love of anything sweet, sour, spicy or savory, and 2) a secret second stomach.

So, yesterday, when I found her picnic spot in Golden Gate Park, I wasn't surprised to see that more blankets were dedicated to the spread of food than to her widening circle of guests. It was like a sprawling landscape of culinary discoveries. Others are content with plastic containers of potato salad or some Italian sausages or maybe a hamburger patty or two. Not Cindy. She was already passing around plates of steak with chimichurri sauce, paper thin slices of headcheese, and expertly tied bacon bites.

The best things about a true food buddy is an openness to tasting anything and the gusto of enjoying everything. Whether it's her own cupcakes with chocolate ganache or Nutter Butters topped with June Taylor plum conserve, she relishes all food to the very last plate-scrape and finger-lick.

We ate nonstop for 5 hours.

Fig and Nectarine Bacon Bites

These are simple to make yet very, very good. Bring bacon bites for your next potluck picnic and see how many new friends you make.

1. Trim off the stem tips of fresh figs and slice nectarines into thick wedges. Cut each strip of bacon lengthwise into two thinner strips.

2. Wrap each piece of fruit carefully with a ribbon of fatty goodnes.

3. Sear the bacon bites at the edge of the grill, where it's not quite so hot, or wait until the coals are dying down at the end of the picnic.

Serve over baby arugula leaves as a salad or nibble as is, hot and glistening, for dessert. I think they would be lovely over vanilla or caramel ice cream.