Healthy & Inspired Eats from Chef Phil Castro

by Sarah Reith

Phil Castro is part of Ukiah’s culinary history, from the Palace Hotel to the expanded offerings at the co-op cafe. He has bussed tables and run restaurants and found his bliss in the calm, clean quiet of a kitchen after sixteen-hour days.

Being the chef at the Ukiah Natural Foods Co-op has taken some getting used to for a kitchen veteran like Phil. “Clocking in and out,” he marvels, like he’s trying out the words of a new language. “Mandatory breaks. Going home after eight hours.”

Phil is one of those remarkable people who has always known exactly what he wanted to do with his life. When he was a child, his babysitter taught him how to make blackberry dumplings, which he still describes like he can taste them. His mom had some solid staples too, including a chicken cacciatore recipe that he still uses. But as a kid, he recalls, “If I wanted anything different, I had to make it myself.” Not that his parents weren’t supportive. When he was in Mrs. Hildebrand’s cooking classes at Ukiah High School, he reminisces that “I subjected my mom and dad to whatever I was trying. They would sit through it.”

Now Phil has taken on a mentoring role as he expands the menu at the co-op cafe. He’s started to write down all the tips and tricks that have become part of his culinary metabolism over the last forty years of working in kitchens. “Right now, I’m writing everything I know about chicken,” he reflected one sunny fall morning.

While coworkers benefit from Phil’s accumulated wisdom, customers get to romp around in the field of flavors he provides. The salad bar and the burrito/taco bar allow them to assemble their own meals. Burrito eaters can select a variety of animal proteins or chickpea fritter with Mexican spices, a creative take on the typically Middle Eastern falafel.

“I like to go around the world,” Phil explains. Items in the hot bar rotate throughout the week, from an in-house Thai curry paste with 15-20 different seasonings to Filipino chicken adobo, Korean BBQ, and pulled pork sandwiches on the weekend. He even stole a recipe for pasta sauce from his girlfriend’s grandmother, who told him never to use it. “But that was ten years ago,” he reasons, so the statute of limitations on secret family recipes has long since expired. The key here is not to use ground meat. Instead, use a great big slab of beef or pork. “Cook it all day, until it falls apart,” he advises. The ease with which he gives away this secret hints that there’s a lot more to it than that.

Phil’s journey to this plum job in the middle of town, with humane working conditions and a full staff, has been long and winding, with a few mishaps, a dash of shared fame, and lasting friendships along the way. Early in his career, he lost a few fingertips on the tomato slicer at Sizzler’s. That didn’t stop him. As a young man, he worked as a busboy at the storied Palace Hotel, which still stands (sort of) in the heart of downtown Ukiah. He’s cooked pizza in Rohnert Park, held down a few catering jobs, and worked at the now-closed Willowside Cafe in Santa Rosa. In 1995, the SF Gate restaurant critic Michael Bauer gave the food at Willowside three and a half out of a possible four stars, describing the ingredients like they were members of a talented dance troupe. (The restaurant’s atmosphere only got two stars, which is still pretty good, considering it used to be a chicken coop.)

Phil has also worked in all the restaurants along Ukiah’s Gourmet Row, including Patrona, Ukiah Brewing Company, and Saucy (now Cultivo). He cites Cynthia Ariosta, the former owner of Saucy, as one of his favorite employers, recalling that “we worked daily to make Saucy successful. We painted on weekends, dusted flour off the walls and really worked as a team on everything we did.”

After Cynthia moved on, Phil stuck around at Cultivo for a while, then ran the kitchen at The Pub for two years. But prolonged street work and sidewalk closures in downtown Ukiah took their toll. Finally, the man who had been working all his life was unemployed. In the two months that he wasn’t surrounded by huge amounts of food and industrial cooking implements, he gained 60 pounds. Without the rhythms of a working kitchen, he just hung out at home all day, making cookies and fry bread. “I need a diet job,” he decided. In the way that work falls into the laps of people who have built their reputations over decades, the job at the co-op cafe materialized.

“I do miss doing desserts here,” he confides wistfully, though he is thinking seriously about adding baklava to the ever-expanding menu. He muses for a little while about the various sugars he’d like to try, and how he can make it dairy free but not gluten free. And then he commits. “If you call me, I’ll make it for you,” he decides. Can I put that in the article? I wonder. He doesn’t hesitate. “Go right ahead,” he says. I know exactly who will be putting in the first order.

Ukiah Natural Foods Co-op
721 South State Street, Ukiah
(707) 462-4778 | ukiahcoop.com

Open every day 7am - 8pm

Co-op cafe items are available at different times of day.
Soup & salad bar and burrito & taco bar: 10:30am - 7pm
Hot bar: 10:30am - 6pm
Build your own bagels: 7am - 2:30pm
Espresso & juice bar: 7am - 6pm

Sarah Reith enjoys wildlife, gardening, and lounging around in her wild garden in inland Mendocino County.

Photos by Yvonne Boyd