Avila Valley Barn
The Perfect Spot for Your Country Fix
by Willow Douglass-Thomas
Leaving rural Anderson Valley and relocating to San Luis Obispo was a challenging transition that came with quite a bit of culture shock. After a long day of work and classes, I can’t just go home to my off-grid farm and spend time with my animals like I used to. So when I long for the comfort of home, I find myself pulling into the dirt parking lot of Avila Valley Barn, just a short ride from the heart of San Luis.
When I arrive, the first thing I do is grab one of the three-dollar enormous heads of romaine lettuce and mosey my way around the farm, feeling my stress melt away. To the sound of local live music, I stop at each outdoor pen to give a few pieces of lettuce to all the creatures. The highland cow, Georgia, is what makes me feel most at home, but I love checking in on the alpacas, emu, goats, chickens, donkeys, and more.
After evenly dividing my romaine between all of the animals so no one feels left out, my next stop is always the country gift shop and farm stand. Filled to the brim with homemade pies, fresh produce, and tasteful gifts, it is easy to get carried away. From preserves and pickles, to cookware and gardening tools, there truly is something for everyone. And that’s before you get to the food stalls out back.
The Avila Valley Barn property was purchased in 1970 by Dr. John DiVincenzo, a local orthodontist and avid apple breeder who wanted it for his apple orchard. In 1986, he built a small farm stand to sell his fruit, as well as vegetables and fruit from other local farmers. He hired Debbie Smith to manage it. The job provided housing, which Debbie and her seven children required. The doctor rightly assumed that the children would be helpful to have around.
When Debbie was first hired, there was little on the property aside from the orchard and the small farmstand. Over time, she began to play a more prominent role at the farm. She expanded the farm stand into the complex of buildings and animal pens it is today, adding animals and attractions as she went. When the doctor passed away in 2009, Debbi became the official titleholder of the property.
Throughout Debbie’s tenure, most of her seven children and their friends helped in one way or another on the farm. Some managed the farm stand while others drove tractors or operated the shops and food stands. Years of group effort and personal experience paid off. In 2019, Debbie’s twin sons, Jake and Jessie, stood up as she stepped down. Today Jake, Jessie, and Jake’s wife, Raven, are running the farm and carrying on Debbie Smith’s legacy.
Avila Valley Barn continues today, and is thriving. After I inevitably check out with more than I planned in my basket, I join the rest of the hungry guests at the Chicken Shack and SmokeHouse. Many people gravitate towards the pulled pork or tri-tip sandwiches, but I have always loved the crispy chicken sandwich that is served on a garlic-toasted bun with pickled onions and tangy coleslaw. Those who are looking for a quick bite to eat will often stop by the corn stand to get a cob and smother it in the various spreads and seasonings they have set out.
I sit on the picnic tables and watch youngsters run around with the farm dogs and chickens, while their elders listen to the music and observe. Some children ride ponies or go on a hay ride around the property, while others take part in one of the many seasonal activities. In the spring and summer, you can pick your own bouquet of flowers or seasonal produce, while in autumn and winter you can bring your family to pick out pumpkins and Christmas trees.
When I finish my meal, I walk the short distance to the Sweet Shoppe for a cone of Slo-Maid local ice cream. The sweet treat usually wraps up my time at Avila Valley Barn, and I go home with my heart full and feeling revived from my country fix. That is, until I find myself pulling into the dirt parking lot this time next week.
Avila Valley Barn
560 Avila Beach Drive, San Luis Obispo
(805) 595-2816 | avilavalleybarn.com
Willow Douglass-Thomas is a student who grew up in Anderson Valley and is now attending school in San Luis Obispo. She loves spending time with animals and incorporating bits of home into her SLO life.
Photos by Torrey Douglass
KuneKune Pigs
A Grass-Fed & Gentle Breed from New Zealand
by Holly Madrigal
Ask a toddler to describe a pig, and they may describe a pink, oinking, curly-tailed animal from Old MacDonald’s Farm. But stop by Sean Armstrong’s farm in the rich farmland of Arcata, California, and you will see something different. KuneKune pigs are hairy, with colorful spots ranging from gold to chocolate. Their upturned noses and slightly squished faces are as distinctive as their short stature and round bellies, and they have distinctive wattles that hang down from their chins. They oink happily as they forage around the enclosure, and Sean Armstrong smiles broadly at his KuneKune as they snuffle around looking for treats.
Sean is a renaissance man who is deeply passionate about affordable housing, the clean energy transition, indigenous justice, and small scale organic farming. His interests have always been wide ranging and eclectic. Reflecting that, in 2008, he turned his focus toward importing a little known breed of pig to the U.S.—KuneKune—one of only two types of grass-fed pig in the world, and so small and tame they could be safely farmed outside of barns.
KuneKune have an interesting history. They originated in New Zealand, where they were bred by Māori farmers in the 1800s (“KuneKune,” in fact, is a Maori word meaning “fat and round”). They are known for their docile temperament and ability to graze on pasture, while producing high-quality meat. They are unlike any other breed in the world.
There is no certainty about how the pigs came to the island, but they are not the same breed as those brought by Captain Cook. Ancient middens of the Māori do not show pig bones, so it appears the original pig population may have been brought on Chinese whaling ships in the late 1700s. The Māori are master farmers, descending from Polynesians who bred bananas, chickens, sugarcane, citrus, and more crops that were brought to New Zealand in roughly 1250. The founding stock of pigs was dramatically altered by the Māori breeders, ultimately shifting its digestive system to eat just grass, shrinking its legs to half size, its nose into a near-pug, and its personality so sweet you can pick up shrieking piglets without upsetting the mother.
In the 1970s, when they were facing instinction, two New Zealand biologists brought the breed to the wider world, buying roughly 10% of the existing stock kept by Māori farmers, creating a breed standard and registry for purebreds, and showing them at a zoo amusement park to the New Zealand public, where one-third of the population still live on small farms wells suited for KuneKunes. The pigs first arrived in Britain in 1992, brought by a couple charmed by the KuneKune while visiting New Zealand. They realized the importance of having a population in a different country as insurance against disease on the islands or similar catastrophes.
In the early 2000s, Sean became interested in the breed and traveled to New Zealand with the intention of importing them to his diversified farm in Arcata. It is likely he would have brought in more investors if he had known what he was getting into. It was a huge investment—two years and $70,000—to get 10 of the pigs to the United States and then to Arcata, when the piglets only cost $50 each in New Zealand. Exporting animals from New Zealand, an island nation that takes biosecurity exceptionally seriously, took a year of paperwork followed by a year of multi-stage quarantines. The United States then required one month of USDA-overseen quarantine in upstate New York, on the other side of the continent from Arcata. Sean spent extra effort, time, and money to get genetically diverse, healthy piglets, selecting the best 10, nine of which survived.
Sean worked with a New Zealand couple that has raised the pigs themselves as part of their permaculture food forest. He visited eight farms and multiple breeders that were providing the piglets, taking voluminous notes on how to care for these unique pigs. “We think that this can be an almost revolutionary product in the United States,” says Sean. “The KuneKune is an ultra-tame, tiny pig that can eat grass like a cow and has a pug nose so it can’t root up the pasture.”
Now, more than twenty years later, those first pigs that were brought to Arcata have been bred and their offspring sent all over the U.S. and Canada, and there are now tens of thousands of descendants. Sean’s herd, originally owned with his ex-wife, once numbered one hundred. Life changes and new farming priorities—a three-acre fruit forest—have shifted Sean’s focus, and now his herd consists of just four pigs.
KuneKune enthusiasm has exploded across the U.S., with hundreds of breeders dedicated to maintaining and improving the breed. The KuneKune Facebook group is lively, friendly, and full of advice and camaraderie, and includes not only breeding tips and standards but also troubleshooting.
When I ask Sean if he would do it again, he replies, “I actually dream about doing it again, but only approaching Māori farmers next time, and paying them well for what they have—far more genetic diversity in their herds. White farmers in New Zealand that we sourced from only had access to 10% of the Māori’s KuneKune herd, and the resulting inbreeding shows up in birth deformities and health issues that we have to work hard to weed out. So I’d like to do it again in collaboration with other U.S. breeders and Māori farmers, with a redoubled focus on genetic diversity.”
Sean’s investment has paid off, if in no other way than in the proliferation of a species in danger of extinction a mere 50 years ago. Thanks to his efforts, American farms and homesteads can now include KuneKune. Cute, docile, and grass-fed, they are a truly unique breed of pig.
Tsar Nicoulai Caviar
Sustainably Raised in the Sacramento Valley
by Holly Madrigal
Tsar Nicoulai Caviar Eating caviar can be a ritual of luxury: Top a cracker or blini with a dollop of crème fraîche, using a mother of pearl spoon, scooping a portion of the salty jewels, sprin- kling with fresh chopped chives, and popping it into your mouth. Savor the rich sea butter taste, complemented by the cooling crème fraîche and tangy chive with the caviar bursting in your mouth.
For the caviar-curious, the product is the salted cured roe of the sturgeon fish. Considered a delicacy, it historically hailed from the wild fish in the Caspian and Black seas near Russia and Iran. These fish are now endangered (because the fish is killed in the harvest process), so enterprising entrepreneurs decided to find out if they could cultivate sustainably-grown sturgeon in the United States. Founded in 1984 in San Francisco, Tsar Nicoulai sought to create handcrafted, small- batch American caviar, and they have succeeded.
Christina Jones has been with Tsar Nicoulai for two years. Growing up in Mendocino County, she knew she wanted to pursue a culinary life from a young age. She attended the California Culinary Academy in San Francisco, followed by a decade cooking on private yachts before returning to Anderson Valley, where she opened a restaurant called Aquarelle. Eager for a new challenge to stretch her skills, Christina went on to work as the head event and wedding chef for a retreat center in Anderson Valley. She then helped build the culinary tasting menu at Roederer Estate, which is when she got into caviar.
Caviar is a luxurious product to pair with bubbles, and Christina discovered Tsar Nicoulai when crafting the offerings to pair with Roederer’s award-winning sparkling wine. When she began working with Tsar Nicoulai regularly, they tapped her to be the local sales representative. She now provides this top-notch caviar across northern California, as well as places like Palm Springs. “We have a lot of customers in Palm Springs now,” shares Jones, continuing, “It is so easy to get there from Santa Rosa, and the restaurant scene is exploding there.”
Tsar Nicoulai’s farms are based in Wilton, in the Sacra- mento Valley, where they farm the sturgeon that produces the caviar. They work hard to be eco-certified by creating a closed-loop system that filters the fish tanks through water plants, partnering with U.C. Davis to study how to reduce their environmental impact. Water use is a big issue in California, so the company is vigilant; the primary water loss, 10% or less, occurs via evaporation. They use no antibiotics or GMO additives in the farming of the fish.
American White Sturgeon is native to the waters all along the west coast. They are very similar to the Russian and Iranian ossetra, which is the type that used to make up the bulk of the world’s caviar production. The founders realized they could farm these fish near the delta where the wild fish swim.
The fish need to age for seven years before they can be harvested for caviar, though some are grown for eight years or more for certain types of caviar. To utilize as much of the fish as possible, Tsar Nicoulai has several products in addition to their caviar. They have a state-of-the-art smokehouse on the property, and since sturgeon primarily have cartilage instead of bones, they are especially suited for making fish stock full of collagen and Omega-3s. A fish biologist friend who has visited the farm declared, “The caviar is amazing, and it is super cool what they are doing. If you get the tour, you can touch them, and it is the closest experience I’ve had to petting a dinosaur.”
“[Caviar] all comes down to levels of quality. The quality is deter- mined by color, flavor, firmness, and size ... The entry-level is darker, smaller, and not as firm ... The most exclusive variety is lighter in color, firm, and larger in size,” explains Jones. Tsar Nicoulai sells six grades: Classic, Estate, Select, Reserve, Golden Reserve, and Crown Jewel.
“It is the ultimate slow food. To eat caviar is a luxury. I love the ritual and care—it’s an event. Because it is an expensive treat, you can eat it at celebrations or when you just want a reason to savor.” Some people can be intimidated by trying caviar, and Jones shares that one of her favorite ways to introduce people to it is to top a potato chip with crème fresh, a dollop of caviar, and fresh chives. The chips are approachable, and then the tasters are blown away by the flavors of the caviar. It’s something you could try at home or with friends for a special event. “Caviar elevates every event where it is served,” Jones adds.
Recently the company, whose business offices are based in Concord, purchased a competitor, making them the largest provider of domestic caviar in North America. This is a big deal because most of the imported caviar sold in the U.S. comes from China, which has no similar ecological or safety measures.
In Mendocino County, you can purchase Tsar Nicoulai’s caviar at Harvest Market and a few other specialty shops. Or stop by their caviar tasting bar in the ferry building if you are visiting San Francisco. You can also purchase directly from the website, and Jones says that she is happy to be your caviar concierge if you would like to purchase larger amounts and have them shipped to you. So if you find yourself a bit “caviar-curious” as the new year approaches, get your hands on some California-grown caviar and welcome the new year with a little bit of luxury.
Order online at tsarnicoulai.com.
Photo courtesy of Tsar Nicoulai Caviar
Chico Rice
Family Farming a Staple Grain for Four Generations
by Holly Madrigal
One has to appreciate the age-old practice of the barter. I was recently more than happy to deliver a box of locally grown grains for Rachel Britton of the Mendocino Grain Project to Corners of the Mouth on the coast. She “compensated” me with a bag of Chico Rice, remarking that it is “the freshest rice you will ever taste.” Most store-bought rice has been sitting in silos and storage for more than a year. “These guys,” she explained, “a father and son team, get us this rice months after processing.”
Chico Rice, run by Tom Knowles and his son Carter, is a family business. Tom’s grandfather started the farm in the early 1950s. His primary job was as a banker, and he began a side project of buying up land. Much of what he could afford was considered lower quality land, meaning more clay soils. The farm he purchased and added outside of Willows had clay soils, which turned out to be perfect for growing rice. Tom’s dad was the youngest of five sons. He took on the farming of the rice and later passed it on to Tom.
A fresh-from-the-field ethos was part of how Chico Rice made their mark. For a time they would take some of their harvest, load a mill and a generator on a flatbed truck, and set up at the Chico farmers market, processing the rice right there at the booth for purchase. It was very cool to see the raw rice grains come out the other side as brown rice or more polished ‘blonde’ rice. “It drew a crowd, but our neighbors at the market could do without the machinery noise, so now we just sell the rice more quietly,” laughs Tom. Rice has quickly become one of the major exports of California agriculture. Eaten by most cultures around the world, rice can be largely divided into the tropically grown indica type, which produces basmati and jasmine varieties, and Japonica rice. In the U.S., much of the indica rice is grown in Arkansas, Louisiana, and eastern Texas where it is super-hot and humid. Chico Rice cultivates Japonica rice, originally from China, which thrives in the more temperate climate of Northern California. Its clay soils make the perfect base for growing it.
The ancestral plant of rice is a water grass. Rice seeds are spread via small airplane, and after sprouting, the fields are flooded with a few inches of water. The clay soils retain the pools of water, which also suppress the competitive weeds. The rice is harvested in September, and the hard grains are processed to remove the hulls, which are used for non-edible purposes like horse bedding and soil amendments.
Once the hull is removed, the rice begins to oxygenate and change flavor. Tom says, “When my friends tasted our rice, they were blown away. It has incredible flavors and nuance because the germ is still on there. For the first few months, the taste is completely different than the rice you would normally eat. It is filled with natural oils and is so nutritious.” The grains are then polished—this is what they tried at the farmers market. Minimal processing retains the germ, considered ‘brown rice,’ and it has a delicious flavor and toothsome texture.
The ’blonde’ rice—rice with the hull and germ removed, also known as Haiga-Mai rice (half-milled)—still has some color to it. It is closer to a white rice but with much more flavor. The bartered bag I received was this type. It did indeed taste fresh and so delicious with a delicate, slightly nutty flavor. I was surprised by how quickly it cooked. More germ makes it so the rice is slower to absorb water, so brown rice takes longer to cook than white. This blonde rice was tender and fluffy in thirty minutes. Tom recommends a rice cooker because you can set it and forget it. “I usually set up my rice before I go to work,” he says. “It is perfectly cooked when I get home. The kids are always sneaking bites of the finished rice, so I need to make a lot.”
Chico Rice is now largely run by Tom’s son, Carter, the eldest of four siblings who has now begun a family of his own. “I was careful not to pressure him,” says Tom. “I felt like I had some family responsibility to take over, and of course I love it, but I was pleasantly surprised when—after graduating from San Diego State and some other jobs—Carter decided to move home and take on the business. Now that I know the legacy is covered, it gives me peace of mind. Now Carter has two young boys of his own.”
Of course, farming in the modern age has its challenges. California has many regulations, but they have led to a global reputation for “clean rice” grown with sustainable practices. Drought can be tough for rice production, and in 2022, the farm had to curtail their planting for the first time as an especially arid year reduced their water rights. But the rain came the following year, and Chico Rice has adapted. The water used by rice cultivation has many benefits for wildlife. As a wetland crop, rice fields make up critical habitat in the central valley bird migration corridor. “We have lots of birds in the rice fields all year round,” adds Tom. “In the winter, rains help fill the ponds and huge flocks come to rest. They help decompose leftover straw residue, and put some fertilizer on the fields.”
If you want to get your hands on this delicious rice, purchasing bulk through the website is easiest. “We had a beautiful new package designed by an artist friend of ours,“ says Tom. “Most of the rice sells direct to wholesale through a large rice processor. We hold back two truckloads, or about two percent, of the best quality rice to mill and package for our sales.” You can buy it through the Mendocino Grain Project and smaller retailers like Corners of the Mouth in Mendocino. “I love farming but I also love being a farmer,” Tom adds. “Well, I’m not doing it as a favor. It is our family livelihood, but we’re feeding people. It’s important. People need to eat and be nourished. We are part of that.” Small family farms like the Knowles’ can, despite their size, have a significant impact on a local food system, adding resilience and diversifying options while providing exceptionally fresh and nutritious food. And when their crop is grown with the skill and attention Carter provides, informed by the generations before him, it’s reflected in outstanding quality and flavor. Though be warned: once you try it, there is the risk you’ll settle for nothing but super-fresh, locally grown rice ever again.
Order rice online at chicorice.com.
Photos courtesy of Chico Rice
The Flavors of Flowers
Heidrun Meadery’s Sparkling Honey Wine
by Torrey Douglass
The idea of mead often conjures the image of a Renaissance fair libation—sweet, thick, and cloudy. At least that was what Gordon Hull pictured 26 years ago when approached by a local beekeeper who was trying to offload a surplus of honey. He was living in Arcata, California, at the time, a graduate student taking a break from his geology studies and working for a local microbrewery. He was also home-brewing beer in his garage, which is why the beekeeper thought to ask if Gordon would transform his excess honey into mead in the first place. At first Gordon politely declined, picturing the treacle-adjacent beverage most people associate with mead. But the beekeeper kept asking, and after researching some recipes, Gordon found one that would produce a specifically dry mead and took on the challenge.
The resulting honey wine went down well with Gordon and his friends and disappeared fast. Eager to try again, Gordon contacted the original beekeeper for more honey, only to learn that there was none available. He found a different beekeeper in another part of town and made a second batch, following the original recipe with precision. Despite his faithful replication, the new mead tasted entirely different from the first. Since the only differential was the source of the honey, it was clear to Gordon that the plants providing the nectar to the bees ultimately determined the flavors expressed by the mead.
Gordon’s imagination was captured, and he opened his own meadery in 1997, the fifth one to register in the United States at the time (today there are 500+). He eventually developed a simple recipe using the champagne method of wine making, known as méthode champenoise by fancy folk. He used only honey, water, and champagne yeast, and the resulting wine was crisp, clear, and refined—a far cry from the syrupy Ren Faire refreshment. Gordon named his meadery Heidrun after the goat in Norse mythology that provided not milk, but mead to the god Odin—who imbibed nothing but. Heidrun operated in Arcata for 15 years before relocating to a former dairy property outside of Point Reyes Station in Marin County in 2012.
Heidrun partners with commercial beekeepers in Marin and Napa counties, throughout California, into Oregon, and even Hawaii. They also have an international program called the World Honey Initiative that sources honey from countries like Tanzania, Chile, and Colombia. The beekeepers use their hives to provide pollinator services to large farms. Due to the size of those farms, the resulting honey comes from only one type of flower, making flavor variations from differing crops particularly distinct.
Mead predates wine by about 1000 years, and honey itself is highly resistant to spoiling—intact honey has even been found in ancient Egyptian burial grounds. So while honey is typically harvested from April through October in the northern hemisphere, it can be stored in 55 gallon drums almost indefinitely, allowing the meadery to produce throughout the year, with an output of 3000 to 3500 cases spread across 13 varietals.
To make the mead, honey is gently boiled with water for 15 minutes to clarify and homogenize it. Any honeycomb and vegetation rises to the top and is sifted off. The recipe requires four parts honey to one part water and uses a champagne strain of yeast, since wild yeast does not yield consistent results. The mixture ferments for two to three weeks before resting in a tank for one month. It’s then bottled, and those bottles are stored for two to three months as the elixir goes through a secondary fermentation to add carbonation. This step also allows the yeast to settle and clarify the wine. Next, the bottles are turned (riddled) to gently move the yeast from the side of the bottle down to the neck so that it can be removed (disgorged). To do this, the bottles are inserted top-down in the neck freezer, which utilizes -40°F glycol to freeze the liquid and yeast. This yeasty mead popsicle is then removed, and the bottle is fitted with the customary cork, foil, and cage.
Heidrun is situated on a gentle hillside that faces west toward Tomales Bay, and, beyond the hills on the horizon, the ocean. They offer both tours and tastings, and the fee is waived if you make a purchase (3 bottles for tastings, 4 for tours). Tastings are held in a rustic greenhouse space with cafe tables and chairs, as well as a sweet selection of bee-related products, including some of the honeys from international origins. There are various gardens around the property to feed the bees, and a basket of picnic blankets in the tasting room encourages visitors to take a glass out and enjoy the scenery for a spell, possibly with some nibbles brought along or purchased on site for just that purpose. It’s a beautiful bit of west Marin, and a delightful way to explore the delicious possibilities of this truly unique wine.
Heidrun Meadery
11925 State Route 1, Point Reyes Station
(415) 663-9122 | heidrunmeadery.com
Open daily 11am - 5pm
Photos by Torrey Douglass
Bodega Bay Oyster Company
Farming Shellfish for Almost 40 Years
by Lisa Ludwigsen
The cold clear waters of Tomales Bay in Marin County, just north of San Francisco, have provided food, medicine, materials, and transportation for thousands of years. Just onemile wide and nine miles long, this inlet of the Pacific brings fresh salt water with significant daily tidal surges, especially at its narrow mouth. Great white sharks are known to breed near the Bay’s mouth, and the San Andreas Fault runs right down the middle. Tomales Bay is a dynamic body of water, and it’s an ideal location to grow oysters that are not only delicious and fun to eat, but turn out to be an important contributor to the near-shore ecosystem.
In 1985, Martin Strain was a CPA living in San Francisco. He’d grown up in Marin County, part of a large family of Irish immigrant farmers and ranchers who had been in Olema since the 1850s. The young Mr. Strain found that he preferred working outdoors to life in an office, so after some careful research, he took the leap and leased 20 acres in Tomales Bay, and Bodega Bay Oyster Company was born.
Almost 40 years later, Bodega Bay Oyster Company is a leading supplier of wholesale shellfish—oysters, mussels, and clams—throughout the Bay Area. Martin’s two grown children, Whittaker (Whitt) and Lindsey, along with his wife Mary, have joined the business. Bodega Bay Oyster leases 90 acres in Tomales Bay and has a thriving retail outlet near Valley Ford, where visitors can purchase shellfish to go, shuck their own oysters, or order oysters (raw or barbequed) to consume on-site with a local brew or bottle of wine. Their adjacent AirBnB allows guests to fully immerse themselves in the world of local oysters with tours, as well as lessons on shucking and making a mignonette, a popular accompaniment served with raw oysters.
It’s a good time to be in the oyster business. “The pandemic was actually good for our business,” said Whitt, “because we provided a safe space for people to leave the house, gather outside in our picnic area, and eat fresh local oysters.” Sales reflect that the public’s interest in oysters and shellfish continues to grow.
People have been eating oysters as long as the two have interacted. Shellmounds are important archeological sites composed of discarded shells of oysters, mussels, clams, and other human refuse. The Bay Area city of Emeryville was originally built on a massive shellmound created by the Ohlone people, dating back to 800 B.C., which measured 60’ high by 350’ long. It held valuable evidence that oysters and other shellfish have been a crucial source of food for over 2500 years. Today, in areas across the country, oyster, clam, and mussel shells from restaurants are being diverted from the landfill to construct new coastal reefs that create habitat, stabilize shorelines, and improve water quality. In essence, they are present-day shellmounds.
Farming shellfish is a different pursuit from wild harvesting. And while it seems that farming oysters in a biodiverse shallow-shore estuary like Tomales Bay would be relatively easy, growing oysters, especially now, isn’t without significant challenges.
“The threats to the well-being of oysters change year to year. We need to be ready to adapt to the constantly changing conditions in near-shore waters,” Whitt explained. Challenges include unpredictable climate shifts, closely monitored state and federal regulations, and getting along with neighboring upstream ranches and other oyster farms. They demand patience, a measure of creativity, and commitment to resilience.
Bodega Bay oysters begin as tiny seed larvae, shipped from hatcheries in Hawaii, Washington, and Humboldt, as well as a supplier on the East Coast. Each shipment holds approximately one million seed babies, each of which is roughly the size of a red pepper flake. The larvae are promptly transferred to 2’x2’ floating bins, where they spend approximately six months under a steady flow of circulating water, being monitored and mechanically sorted until they’ve grown large enough to be transferred to 4’x2’ grow-out mesh bags in the oyster beds in the bay. Harvest takes place depending on desired size, anywhere from 18 months for extra-small up to 5 years for large oysters. Though time to maturity is very long, shelf life is short, so timing is always critical.
Oysters grow based on available nutrients, water temperature, and ocean acidity. Unlike farming on land or even other types of aquaculture, there aren’t a lot of shortcuts. The farmer can’t pump up nutrients to make the crop grow faster or employ chemical amendments to deter pests. Oysters require steady attention to ensure that storms don’t dislodge anchored frames and that natural predators, like otters, crabs, birds, and fish, don’t cause damage. Beyond that, they will grow in their spot, filtering up to 50 gallons of water per day per oyster as an added bonus.
Warming ocean temperatures, which leads to increased levels of carbon dioxide in the water, is a major concern for the health and wellbeing of oysters. The higher acidity of the water prevents young oyster shells from solidifying and also lowers their resistance to pathogens. Whitt and Martin are working with teams of scientists from National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration, The Nature Conservancy, the University of California, and California State University through the Sea Grant Program to study and develop strategies to address the threat. Scientific interventions have already helped with the recovery of kelp bed collapse associated with warming oceans in northern California.
Whitt is optimistic about the bigger picture for shellfish farming and aquaculture in general. “Awareness of the critical role of shellfish in creating healthy and clean water ecosystems is encouraging,” he said.
Within the stated mission of Bodega Bay Oyster Company is a commitment to “act as stewards of the marine environment as well as acting as responsible community members.” Whitt intends to continue to honor that mission by building public awareness and support for local aquaculture through more outreach and education.
Like the Strain family, Tomales Bay oysters are hard workers. The symbiotic partnership between humans and marine animals has always benefited the larger community. Together they improve the ecosystem, help keep our coastal waters clean, and provide a tantalizing taste of the cold, briny Pacific waters we share. Eating a Tomales Bay oyster is like swimming in that wild, salty, foggy bay—without even getting your hair wet.
Bodega Bay Oyster Company
12830 Valley Ford Rd, Petaluma
(707) 876-3010 | BodegaBayOyster.com
Open daily 9am - 5pm
Photo of juvenile oyster by Lisa Ludwigsen. All other photos courtesy of Bodega Bay Oyster Company.
Drewish Deli
New York Quality Bagels in the Heart of Healdsburg
by Barbara Barrielle
When you think of a business born in a garage, you probably think of a technology startup, not a bagel company. Yet in 2018, Drew Ross did just that when he started Healdsburg Bagel Company in his home garage—after turning it into a commercial kitchen, of course.
Originally from New York where good bagels are plentiful, Drew Ross moved to Healdsburg in 2005 after a career as a professional touring musician. When his father-in-law came to visit, Drew, then practicing psychotherapy, was hard pressed to find a decent bagel anywhere in Sonoma County. So he did what any enterprising bagel lover would, and in 2013, he embarked on his quest to create his own perfect bagel recipe.
New York’s favorite carb is boiled and then baked. While some people give credit to the water of New York for their renowned bagels, Drew had to adjust for our local H2O. Hundreds of recipe tweaks and thousands of batches later, Drew let his friends have a taste. With their enthusiastic approval earned, he started Healdsburg Bagel Company (HBC) in 2018. He converted his garage into a commercial kitchen, put his kids and some of their friends to work, and started delivering bagels to homes around Healdsburg.
He also took to social media. “I put a post on Facebook and told folks about the bagels and offered local delivery. People responded and I got pretty busy with that. I then got the bagels into Big John’s Market. They were my first wholesale account. It just kept building from there.”
I was one of his early customers and had a standing order for a dozen assorted (mostly everything) bagels delivered to my door every two weeks. Those little circles of heaven would arrive warm and fresh, hand-delivered by Drew himself. I just needed to make sure I had cream cheese on hand. “My family is all from Brooklyn but they moved to Los Angeles in the 1950s,” says Drew. “They found a good bagel shop on Beverly Boulevard and made that a regular stop after shabbat dinners and LA Dodger games on Friday nights. Fresh bagels that night and for the Sabbath the next day.” Drew branched out to sell bagels, cream cheese, breakfast sandwiches, deli specials, and other typical Jewish favorites, including challah, babka, and the classic matzo ball soup—which flies out of the door as soon as each batch is made.
During the pandemic, Drew and Healdsburg Bagel Company expanded wholesale accounts and increased the number of North Bay farmers markets he attended. He moved out of the garage and rented commercial space as demand grew. HBC was present at 14-16 farmers markets a week when his commercial accounts passed 20, and at a single farmer’s market like Fort Mason in San Francisco, Drew could blow through 600 bagels in a morning. His business was booming. It was time to take the next step.
“I had confidence in finding a retail shop. The town was rallying behind me, tourists supportive, too,” explains Ross. “I leased 1500 square feet and a kitchen in a former restaurant in Healdsburg, hired my manager Elizabeth Cosin, and have a significant staff for catering. We are open as a deli four days a week and, although I never thought this would be my full-time job, it is and it’s profitable.”
Drewish Deli opened in July 2023 on Mitchell Lane, just north of Healdsburg’s bustling downtown square. The space is simply designed with classic white subway tile, rustic wood paneling, and deep navy blue accents. The deli serves good coffee, and there’s plenty of camaraderie among the locals who gather there around the various tables. You can sink your teeth into the fresh, chewy bagel—maybe with a healthy size schmear of scallion cream cheese and a few slices of housecured gravlax, topped with fresh-sliced tomatoes and onions and sprinkled with capers. It’s delicious and much cheaper than flying to New York for a fix.
As for the Drewish future: “The deli is definitely keeping me very busy, but I am working on a rather large distribution deal in the new year and also looking at providing “deli baskets” for gifts for the holidays,” says Drew. “Also, going to continue to develop and expand the deli menu. Who knows where the future will take me!“
If you find yourself in Healdsburg, satisfy your bagel and deli craving and support a true local business every Thursday through Monday. The enterprise started with the search for a good bagel and now supports a team of employees and several families—and makes a whole lot of former New Yorkers and current bagel lovers very happy.
Drewish Deli
11 Mitchell Lane, Healdsburg
(707) 955-0600 | DrewishDeli.com
Open Thurs - Mon 7:30am – 2:30pm
Barbara Barrielle is a freelance wine and travel writer as well as a film producer. She is also the press contact for Anderson Valley Winegrowers Association and can be reached at press@avwa.com. Follow her @barbarabarrielletravels.
Photos courtesy of Drewish Deli
Hauling for the Holdenrieds
The Enduring Legacy of a Lake County Farming Family
by D.R. Darvishian
The view from a big rig is sometimes astounding, but there are notable blind spots while perched behind the wheel high up in the cab. As it worked out, just before she disappeared from my line of sight beneath the whole-acre hood of a 1999 Kenworth model W900L truck, I saw Debbi Holdenried and came to a stop.
Standing with her hands on her hips, she was staring at me and obviously speaking, but I couldn’t make out a word. The truck’s ancient air conditioner barely chirped, so I wore a bandana and kept the windows rolled down, but I still couldn’t hear her. I shut off the motor.
“What are you doing?” she yelled.
“What do you mean?” I shot back.
“Dust! Look in your mirror. Slow down, please! Slow … down,” she said, pumping her palms at the ground, as if telling a group of exuberant cowboys to cool it.
Back in 2020, the Holdenrieds needed drivers and were paying good money, so after its ice age in limbo, I renewed my old Class A license. I’ve been a fan of this hardworking farming family ever since. Debbi and her husband Brent, along with their three sons, run Holdenried Harvesting Inc. in Kelseyville (pop. 3,382). They grow wine grapes, pears, hay, and alfalfa, and also provide custom harvesting and bulk agricultural transport services. They worry about dust because it can drift in tiny mites which feed on the leaves of pear trees and grape vines. As someone who’s been around farmers most of my life, and even had a Jack Russell terrier who barely survived a dust-borne fungal infection, I should have known better.
“Alright, I got it,” I shouted.
“Thank you!” Debbi yelled back.
I started the truck and eased on to another set of empty “gondola” trailers, the kind seen hauling grapes and holding up traffic all over California during late summer and fall. Every season, usually starting in late July, Debbi manages 20 or more truckers. She dispatches each of them, two or three times a day, into various orchards and vineyards to get 20-ton loads of pears and grapes bound for fresh-product distributors, canneries, and wineries scattered throughout the north state. The work goes on every day of the week, with some shifts lasting 14 hours a day or longer, usually into late September but sometimes into October. Like everyone else, if Debbi’s not catching a few winks of sleep, she’s onto another assignment. And she somehow finds time to shop, prepare family meals, arrange gatherings, and participate in the high school life of her youngest son, Gene.
Brent covers the farming on almost 600 acres and keeps up repairs. Though he has help from longtime mechanic, Brian Rentsch (yes, sounds like “wrench”), and a ranch foreman named Raphael Fernandez, he personally deals with what comes with farming and drayage: the endless weeding and mowing, the fertilizing and watering, the breakdowns, blown hoses, flat tires and oil changes, the plumbing and broken radiators, frost protection, seasonal laborers, the pruning, the mud, heat and mosquitos, the midnight-to-dawn spraying, worker safety and shelter, busted trailers, bent bumpers, stuck trucks, shifted loads, bad fuel, and broken straps. He’s also a fill-in driver and runs their complex and finicky machine grape harvesters.
Two years ago, he even had to chase down his own stolen pickup. Debbi shook him awake around two in the morning, when the thief started the engine. Brent found it abandoned—minus all the tools he’d had in the bed. He then got some coffee and started his workday.
After attending Chico State University for a few years, eldest son Carson returned home to run the hay and alfalfa operation, in addition to hauling and operating the enormous harvesters. Their middle son Evan followed in his footsteps, earning a degree in farm management at Chico and now working toward an advanced degree in finance from there as well. They all pitch in during harvest, whether it’s painting gondolas, digging post holes, or washing trailers. Their mother often has them working on so many projects that they sometimes call her Debbi, just like the other workers. “I live on the ranch, so she can pretty much get hold of me any time,” said Carson.“Which she does.”
Debbi is also a powerhouse of a host. Last June, the Holdenrieds feted 250 people in the backyard of their 1928 American Craftsman home to honor a retiring school superintendent. “I could do without socializing so much,” Brent said mildly during an interview with the couple. “I’m just saying.”
“I like entertaining and I like working,” Debbi said simply. “And I’ve always had a job.” Past positions included horse grooming as a girl, winery quality control, canning her own fruit, and running Holdenried Harvesting Inc., one of the most well-known such outfits around according to Shannon Gunier, co-owner of North Coast Winegrape Brokers in Lower Lake. “I think they’re well known because they’re hard working and really good people to work with,” said Gunier, whose own family business is brokering grapes and bulk or finished wines to buyers outside of California. “They’re scrappers, like us,” she said.
Debbi’s younger self, Debra Raye Tuttle, grew up in Hopland, the oldest of three daughters. They were horse sisters and rode for miles through the orchards, vineyards, and hills along the green Russian River. Later, they won top honors in state and national equestrian competitions. Her parents, David and Melodye Tuttle, were also farmers. They eventually moved to Lake County, where David reportedly planted the first European vines in the high Red Hills appellation. Andy Beckstoffer, the largest grape grower in California—dubbed “Grapelord of Napa” by The New York Times (2020)—followed his lead by expanding into Lake County and planting the well-regarded Beckstoffer Vineyards. Beckstoffer grapes can be found in a number of Northern California’s popular wines, and is now Holdenried’s largest haul.
Brent’s family has been here since 1858, raising cattle and farming the lowlands between Mt. Konocti, the volcanic massif near the county’s geographical center, and Lakeport, on the shore of Clear Lake itself. Brent’s mother, Marilyn Holdenried, is also a force of nature, not unlike his wife. She’s both a passionate voice for family farmers and founder of the Lake County Quilt Trail, a public art series of huge painted blocks imitating quilt patterns and displayed on buildings and barns all over the county. Common in the midwest, Lake County’s trail is the first of its kind in California and includes over 50 stops.
These deep roots in local farming have served the Holdenrieds well, and the family continues to build upon that legacy. The next generation is stepping up, with Carson aspiring to plant more land with either pears or hay. I so admire the grit, warmth, and talent of these folks that I’ve signed on for another season, getting paid well to deliver some of the best agricultural bounty anywhere.
D.R. Darvishian is a longtime writer, journalist, editor, and middling poet in Lakeport. He’s partial to Jack Russells and good Belgian ale.
Family photo by Jamie Johnson and courtesy of Holdenried family. All other photos by D.R. Darvishian.
Psychic Pie
Sebastopol-Made Roman-Style Pizza That’s a Cut Above
by Lisa Ludwigsen
Sometimes an imaginative spin on a food favorite can make the world seem shiny and new again. So it is with Psychic Pie’s take on Roman-style pizza. Far from the ubiquitous American fast-food version, or the simple puffycrusted Neapolitan, or even the tasty, crispy wood-fired flatbread style, Psychic Pie creates a uniquely local pizza experience from a small storefront in Sebastopol.
Psychic Pie’s Roman-style pizza is sold Al Taglio—to the cut. Par-baked in large format pans and sold by weight, you can order as much or as little as you like. The minimum order measures three fingers wide, which encourages exploration of the tasty combos that rotate daily. Cut from the big pie with industrial sized kitchen scissors, slices can be taken home to finish off or baked on-site to dine in. All eat-in orders are accompanied by those big scissors—the best tool to cut the thick slices into manageable sections.
Though descriptions of “seasonal” and “local” are trendy these days, Psychic Pie co-owner Leith Miller said, “I can truthfully claim that 90% of our ingredients are locally sourced.” Those fresh, seasonal, local ingredients determine the restaurant’s eight weekly pizza selections, yummy salads, and small but mighty dessert choices. This pizza doesn’t rely on heavy sauce or loads of cheese for satisfying flavor. Instead, expect to find yummy thinly sliced potato covering a slather of crème fraîche, topped with a sprinkling of chopped dill and chives, and finished with red chili oil. Another option might be maitake, shiitake, and cremini shrooms combined with ricotta, chevre, lemon zest, and herbs. Meat lovers will find house-made sausage, pickled onion, and mozzarella topping a thin layer of light tomato sauce. Each day’s offerings are different, and like most truly satisfying food, the quality of the ingredients makes the final product sparkle.
Miller’s partner in work and life is Nicholi Ludlow, the crust maestro. His background as a longtime professional sourdough baker is showcased in a soft yet crunchy, slightly spongy, tangy pizza base that captures that traditional Bay Area sourdough taste. Miller said, “We have built solid relationships with local farms because we want to bring all the tastes of Sonoma County, including sourdough, to the Italian pizza tradition.” Ludlow’s thick crust shines as the proper backbone for all those exciting combos.
Psychic Pie’s cheerful brick and mortar location in south Sebastopol grew from a pandemic pop-up side-jam. Take-n-bake was their game back then, and word of mouth spread quickly. Leith and Ludlow are formally trained in scientific professions—Leith holds a PhD in biology, and Ludlow studied to become a podiatrist. They met in high school, and both worked at Del Popolo pizzeria in San Francisco.
The popularity of their Sebastopol pop-up provided the encouragement to open their shop in a busy mini-mall on Gravenstein Highway South in Sebastopol. Launched in February 2022, the shop has allowed Leith and Ludlow to expand their food offerings, build their clientele, and provide a welcoming vibe for diners to sit and enjoy a glass of natural wine or Sonoma County beer with their meal.Psychic Pie offers fresh salads, and for dessert, big cookies and local buffalo milk gelato from Marin County. That soft-serve buffalo gelato is an experience all its own. The food at Psychic Pie is not precious and it’s not inexpensive. It is fresh, alive, imaginative, and utterly satisfying.
Photo credit: Jo Ann Baumgartner.
Psychic Pie
980 Gravenstein Hwy S, Sebastopol
(707) 827-6032 | PsychicPie.com
Open Thu - Sun 11:30am to 8pm
A New Day for Allensworth
Black-Led Sustainable Agriculture in California’s Central Valley
by Tiffani Patton
Originally published in Nexus Media News at https://nexusmedianews.com/allensworth-sustainable-agriculture/.
In 1979, an idealistic 44-year-old Black woman named Nettie Mae Morrison moved with her husband to Allensworth, 75 miles south of Fresno, in California’s Central Valley. “She wanted to be a part of history,” said her son, Dennis Hutson, who was in his mid-20s at the time of the move. The town had a distinctive past. It was founded in 1908 by Allen Allensworth, a man born into slavery who became the first African American to reach the rank of lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army. About three square miles in size, it was the first town in California founded and governed by Black people—and it served as a beacon of possibility for Black people all over the nation, its population growing to around 1,200 people.
But the community soon fell on hard times. In 1914, the Santa Fe Railroad Company moved its rail stop from Allensworth to nearby Alpaugh, a majority-white town, dealing a major blow to Allensworth’s economy. That same year, Col. Allensworth died after being struck by a motorcycle during a visit to Los Angeles. It was access to water, however, that proved the most challenging.
According to California’s water regulatory agency, “The company that sold the land to Col. Allensworth [the Pacific Farming Company] didn’t fulfill its promise to build an adequate water system, leaving the growing population with debt and dry wells. Drought struck the Central Valley soon after the town was founded, which led to poor crop yields and further decreased vital water supplies.” In 1966, the town suffered another blow when officials discovered arsenic in the drinking water, and by the 1970s, Allensworth no longer appeared on most maps.
The town’s storied past and ongoing challenges were what drew Morrison there, Hutson said of his mother. She dedicated the rest of her life—from 1979 until her death in 2018—to Allensworth, where she joined church efforts and nonprofit campaigns against local polluters and rallied to secure clean drinking water for the community. On weekends, her five grown children joined her in her efforts.
Decades later, two of her children, twins Dennis Hutson and Denise Kadara, felt a similar calling to Allensworth. Hutson, a Methodist preacher and Air Force chaplain living in Las Vegas at the time, remembered his frustration that little seemed to have improved for local residents despite his mother’s many efforts. As recently as 2020, nearly one-third of the population still lived below the poverty line. “I asked myself, ‘Why doesn’t the government do something?’” Hudson recalled. “A voice [in my head] responded, ‘Why don’t you do something?’”
So in 2007, Hutson and Kadara, ages 54, and Kadara’s husband, Kayode Kadara, decided to buy 60 acres from a retiring farmer in Allensworth, calling it the TAC Farm. (TAC originally stood for The Allensworth Corporation, an entity that has since been dissolved.) Over the next few years, Hutson moved from Las Vegas, Nevada, and the Kadaras from Half Moon Bay, California, to settle in Allensworth full-time. Their goal was to create a Black-owned, Black-operated farm that would honor Allensworth’s legacy and boost the local economy. They began to farm a mix of collards, okra, mustard greens, watermelon, and black-eyed peas because, as Hutson said, “I’m going to grow food that I know Black people want to eat.”
The Central Valley produces about 8% of the country’s total agricultural output and nearly 40% of its fruits and nuts. But climate change poses a serious threat to the region’s farms. Annual average maximum temperatures in Allensworth, and the surrounding San Joaquin Valley, increased by 1°F from 1950 to 2020. That figure is projected to increase another 4-5°F in the next 30 years, according to a state-commissioned report released in 2022. The region has also been experiencing its most severe drought in a millennium, according to a separate study published earlier that year in the journal Nature. (Editor’s note: the heavy rains of early 2023 hopefully alleviated some of the drought stress, but also caused extensive flooding in the region.)
The extreme heat and drought don’t just threaten crops. These conditions make farm work more dangerous and pose critical health risks for surrounding communities, according to Chantelise Pells, a water-systems researcher at U.C. Merced and co-author of the state-commissioned report. “When you compound the expenses of air conditioning, poor air quality, and limited access to water, [the climate crisis] is a huge economic burden for low-income communities,” Pells said. “They have to make a choice of whether to suffer in the heat or not have enough money to meet their basic needs.”
According to the same report, hundreds of thousands of residents in the San Joaquin Valley do not have access to clean drinking water and instead rely on store-bought bottled water. More frequent heat waves, which are often accompanied by poor air quality, increase the economic burden on low-income communities in the region that already experience disproportionate rates of asthma and heat-related illnesses.
Lack of rainfall and snowmelt runoff also mean farmers rely more heavily on groundwater, a practice that has become unsustainable, experts say. And amid the water scarcity, small-scale farmers like the Hutson-Kadaras are struggling to compete with larger farms. “Most small-scale farmers don’t have the means to dig deeper wells and compete with large farms for access to groundwater,” said Angel Santiago Fernandez-Bou, a researcher at U.C. Merced and co-author of the state-commissioned report. “During a drought, this can be a big problem for small or disadvantaged farmers.”
In 2007, for example, Hutson dug a 720-foot well on his family’s property, only to discover that his neighbors, who operate larger-scale operations, have wells thousands of feet deep. He realized that meant his well—and the farm’s lifeline—would be at risk of drying up long before his well-financed neighbors’ water sources would. “When you are in the midst of a drought in a state that is having severe water challenges, it seems to me that you would rethink how you do your farming,” Hutson said, “that it would encourage you to consider other ways to provide for your livestock [while] at the same time trying to provide for your environment.”
In 2011, the Hutson-Kadaras participated in an organic farming training program, where they learned adaptive practices, such as enriching their soil with organic compost and installing windbreaks—hedges of trees to protect crops against wind—that would limit their reliance on synthetic fertilizers, reduce soil erosion, and conserve water. In the past decade, the TAC Farm has adopted other climate friendly practices, including closed-loop agriculture, a technique in which farmers recycle nutrients and organic matter material back to the soil. The Hutson-Kadaras also raise rabbits, feeding them organic alfalfa and using their nutrient-dense manure as fertilizer.
Hedgerows and windbreaks reduce soil erosion, minimizing soil disturbance, which in turn leads to less dust and fewer pollutants in the air. Healthy soil increases water retention, leaving more water in the aquifers. The cover crops add fertility to the soil, reducing the need for agrochemicals that pollute the air and water. The benefits of these farming practices, if adopted widely, reverberate throughout the surrounding community, according to Pells. “Using regenerative practices [like cover cropping and reducing tillage] is a win-win,” Pells said. “It improves water and air quality, while lessening the economic burden on the farmers themselves.”
The experiences over the past 15 years have convinced the Hutson-Kadaras of the importance of small-scale and cooperative farming. The benefits aren’t just environmental, Hutson noted. Surrounding communities have been shown to benefit economically as small farms generate jobs and circulate income among local establishments.
State officials are now looking to the Hutson-Kadaras’ farm as a model for developing a new generation of small-scale, sustainable farmers. Earlier this summer, state lawmakers earmarked $10 million in funding to help Hutson and Kadara develop a farmer training program that focuses on sustainable practices and cooperative methods that can help fight the tides of climate change and transform the Central Valley into a more economically and environmentally sustainable region. The program will primarily recruit burgeoning Black, Indigenous, and other farmers of color in an effort to close some of the racial disparities that are rampant in food and agriculture. After seven months of training, participants can lease a small plot of land on the Hutson-Kadaras’ farm for the next 2½ years and sell their goods to local cooperatives.
Drought and extreme heat notwithstanding, Hutson said his dream—to make Allensworth once again a beacon of hope for Americans of color—is slowly becoming a reality. In June 2022, California Governor Newsom set aside an additional $32 million dollars in the state budget for Allensworth, a majority of which will go to building a new visitor center that will connect the town’s history of Black self-determination with its future as a sustainable and equitable farming hub.
“I want Allensworth to be known for training and producing the next generations of cooperative, small-scale, sustainable farmers—whether they are Black, Latinx, Indigenous, or Asian,” Hutson said. “That’s what I hope for and that’s what we are working toward.”
Photo credit: Jo Ann Baumgartner.
This article was made possible by a grant from the Open Society Foundations. Nexus Media News is an editorially independent, nonprofit news service covering climate change. Follow us @NexusMediaNews. Read the original article at https://nexusmedianews.com/allensworth-sustainable-agriculture/.
Tiffani Patton is a Bay Area-based food justice advocate and Co-Director of Real Food Media.
Too Good To Go
An App to Find Food Bargains Near You
by Torrey Douglass
$15 of pastries for $5 from Le Pain Quotidien
Comedian Paula Poundstone once quipped that the organic melon she purchased in order to feed her kids healthy food had a window of ripeness so unpredictable and brief that she had to wake them at 3am to eat it. I get it. After spending a pretty penny on avocados, I find myself monitoring their progress daily like a worrying mother hen over her eggs, hoping I won’t miss that divine moment that occurs between the phases Rock and Mush. We’re taught that eating fresh foods is essential to good health, but if those foods are untouched by preservatives and processing, they will logically decay more quickly. As a result, if you lose track of the state of your produce drawer (or cheese drawer or breadbox), you’re going to be faced with some expensive additions to your compost pile.
An instinctive abhorrence of food waste is rooted in most cultural traditions. Expressions of gratitude before a meal can be found around the world and throughout time, sometimes as part of a spiritual tradition and sometimes simply as recognition that a person is fortunate, in that moment, to have what they need. It’s baked into our bones that we should not take our dinner for granted—we need food to survive, after all—and we definitely should not waste it.
Yet in 2010, the USDA estimated that over 30% of food in the United States is wasted at the retail and consumer levels. This refers only to food that has been selected and prepared for sale, as opposed to, for example, food that doesn’t meet consumer expectations and so is left behind in the field. The USDA estimated that waste was equal to 133 billion pounds and valued at $161B. Considering the effort, energy, and resources that go into growing food, getting it to the store, and then getting it home, it’s a Grade A bummer with sides of guilt and frustration when it goes bad.
Restaurants have a front row seat to the problem of food waste in America, and some concerned tech wizards decided to use their skills to help them do something about it. Enter Too Good To Go, a food app that connects hungry customers with restaurants looking to unload excess food. On the app, a food business posts the availability of “surprise bags”—bags of unsold (and undisclosed) food priced at one-third of its retail value—typically for $4 to $10.
Too Good To Go was started in Copenhagen in 2016 and landed in the U.S. in September 2020 in Boston and New York. A press release in April 2022 claimed that the company has “saved 100M[illion] meals across 17 countries” since it launched. Bakeries, restaurants, schools, and other organizations sign up, pay $1.79 to the app for each bag sold (in addition to the $89 annual fee), and generate additional revenue for their business by selling food they would otherwise throw away.
The app and others like it are recognized as an important piece of the solution to food waste. Food banks prefer non-perishable items, and organizations that prepare free meals require ingredients in bulk. They are not the right partner for a pizzeria that has some spare slices at the end of the day, but for folks who care about minimizing food waste, or are just looking for good food at a discount, Too Good To Go is the answer.
The app arrived on the West Coast in September of 2021, launching in San Francisco, Portland, and Seattle. Since then, it has become available in other areas, including Los Angeles. Not long ago, Sherri Smith, a writer in Sherman Oaks, took advantage by picking up a bag of mixed pastries from her local bakery, Le Pain Quotidien, for only $4.99. Sherri shared, “I got an array of pastries for a great price. It’s a neat idea, and still novel enough that several restaurant staff came out to see me pick up my order. I think we were all delighted to see the app in action.”
The app is in common use in the Bay Area as well, with participating restaurants in the North, South, and East Bays, in addition to an impressive 582 businesses just in the city of San Francisco—a yummy mix of bakeries, cafes, markets, taquerias, and more. Joe, from Cindy’s Market on Hayes Street, said they’ve used the app for almost a year and they’ve had a good experience with it. “It’s a good way to get rid of old, and beats throwing it out.” He noted that the checkout process can be a little awkward during the pick up, since the order must be confirmed on the customer’s phone, but otherwise they have been pleased with the system, using it to unload pre-made sandwiches at the end of the day.
Pam works at Peet’s Coffee in Santa Rosa and uses Too Good To Go to pass along unsold pastries—croissants, cookies, scones, and cinnamon rolls—and 1-pound bags of coffee beans. She’s been selling on the app for a few months and said that customers are enthusiastic about her bags. “It’s great for folks who just need a quick bite, or have some hungry kids at home, and it saves waste,” Pam enthused. She particularly appreciates how the app tracks the carbon saved by redirecting the food away from landfills, commenting that, “It’s nice to see the impact.”
Our country has an alarming volume of food waste, and it’s essential we all take steps to address it. There are all sorts of ways we can contribute, from meal planning so that we purchase only the food we’ll use, to composting our food waste in order to keep it out of landfills. Picking up a surprise bag is an easy way to be part of the solution. It provides yummy food at a fraction of the price while helping restaurants reduce their waste costs. Altogether it’s a pretty sweet feeling—almost as sweet as that organic melon at 3am.
Find out more at TooGoodToGo.com.
Top photo courtesy of Too Good To Go. Photo p48 courtesy of Sherri Smith.
The View on a Plate
Barndiva in Healdsburg
by Torrey Douglass
There’s no arguing that Healdsburg has gotten fancy, and has been so for quite a while now. But decades ago it was just a small, quiet town in northern Sonoma County where my family would visit friends over summer vacation. Those memories from long ago are suffused with the hot, dry air of August, delicately scented with sage. There were relaxed lunches under an oak tree whose crispy leaves were so sharp that I had to watch my step, even with summer-hardened bare feet. On hot afternoons we’d take a boat up one of Lake Sonoma’s fingers and jump into the dark water to cool off, carefully avoiding the branches of submerged trees still rooted in the reservoir’s floor.
Those days, the town was different. The shops were quaint instead of opulent, community events had a country fair feel, and when Costeaux French Bakery opened its doors and began serving cappuccinos—cappuccinos!—the inter-national novelty felt like the apex of elegance.
These days, Healdsburg’s fancy-factor has grown well beyond espresso topped with a little foam. Art galleries and chic boutiques surround the manicured town square. A local resort with eye-popping rates caters to A-listers escaping the limelight to soak in some wine country charm. And the food scene has kept pace, with trendy buzzwords d’cuisine sprinkling the menus, and wine lists so thick they could press the table’s (seasonally appropriate) floral centerpiece as a keepsake.
I don’t mean to be snarky. Food is wonderful, and fancy food is extra wonderful. But it has to be grounded, it has to be rooted in a philosophy that’s bigger than any ego involved. Otherwise, to quote Gertrude Stein, “there is no there there.” It has to have a center, a heart, or it risks being exposed to be as insub-stantial as a $46 tablespoon of prawn foam.
For Barndiva, tucked on a quarter acre lot down a side street off the square, that overarching philosophy is captured in three words: Eat the View. It is the food equivalent of the New Age spiritual axiom, “Be Here Now.” It asks, Where are you? What do you see? What’s grown and raised here, made by the hands of others who live here? Let’s eat that.
Co-owner and Creative Director Jil Hales explains, “Eat the View is more than a tagline attesting to a commitment to source food grown with sustainable and ethical intent. View is context. It’s what you get by paying attention in the moment. Beyond what a guest comes to eat and drink, our hope has always been that you will be nourished by every-thing you see and interact with here; that those elements will play over the entire experience in a way that you can, hopefully, play forward.”
Lots of restaurants have hopped aboard the organic / local / seasonal bandwagon. And that’s a good thing—the elevation of local food has benefits ranging from mitigating climate change to sustaining local jobs. It’s a core reason why this magazine even exists. But it’s a lot easier to type those words on a menu than to follow through with an ongoing, steadfast commitment. Yet since opening in 2004, the Barndiva team has done just that, seeking out the best foods grown and produced in Mendocino and Sonoma counties.
It helps that Barndiva founders Jil and Geoff Hales are farmers (of a sort) themselves. In 1984, Jil and her first husband, David Feldman, bought a 40-acre property not far up Greenwood Road outside of Philo. David had met Milla Handley at a champagne symposium, and his interest was piqued when she effused about the beauty of Anderson Valley. Two years later the farm came on the market, and they purchased it soon after. The family had small boys at the time and, as Jil puts it, “I wanted my boys to really get their feet in the dirt.”
The land came with established orchards of apple and pear trees, as well as a vigorous trio of heritage fig trees. The family was based in Los Angeles at the time, and Jil drove the first few apple harvests down to a food co-op she had helped start in Santa Monica. But that soon lost its appeal, and they began juicing their fruit with help from Tim and Karen Bates at The Apple Farm. The Bates family had moved to Philo the same year, and they have remained good and trusted friends for over three decades. Juicing became increasingly challenging as market conditions changed, so once Barndiva opened, it became their farm’s best (and only) customer.
A genuine family affair, Barndiva has been managed by Lukka Feldman, Jil’s son, since its opening, and he’s now co-owner as well. Jil provides creative direction, and Geoff looks after the numbers. Lukka’s partner Daniel Carlson, whose background is in seed propagation and floral design, joined Barndiva in 2016 to help oversee the gardens and take over what had become an extensive floral program in the restaurant. After six years of living between Healdsburg and Philo, though, the pair were ready for new challenges, and they moved to London in 2020. Lukka still handles main management tasks from abroad, returning regularly for in-person visits, and also oversees his new Barndiva California Wine import company. Daniel now works in the prestigious nursery at the paragon of English gardens, Great Dixter House & Gardens southeast of London.
Since the two moved, the orchards and gardens have been left in the capable hands of Nick Guili, with Dan continuing to provide garden design and oversight. Previously a private landscaper and volunteer with Alemany Farm in San Francisco, Nick moved to Philo in February of 2020. “There are worse places to be during a lockdown,” he shares, looking around the garden with a smile. He treks down to the restaurant every Wednesday, bringing the farm’s best fruits, herbs, and floral arrangements of the week.
There, the farm’s offerings are integrated into the restaurant with creative ingenuity. You might find the orchard’s apples, figs, and pears anywhere on the menu, not just salads and desserts. After the fruits have peaked, they are turned into shelf-stable items—apples, for instance, become apple brandy, apple syrup, and apple cider vinegar—so the kitchen can access flavors from the farm at any time of the year. Out in the dining room, floral arrangements provide glorious bursts of color, and the bar sports a brigade of glass vessels containing bouquets of leafy herbs for the mixologist.
Beverage Manager Scott Beattie helps guests “Drink the View” by building drinks around what he forages or has Nick grow for him. His concoctions include huckleberries, fir tips, and bar-top herbs like rosemary, fennel, and basil, as well as a huge range of edible florals. As the author of Artisanal Cocktails: Drinks Inspired by the Seasons, Scott is a natural fit for the Barndiva team. A recent addition to the drinks list, ‘You Are Time,’ honors the late Sally Schmitt of The Apple Farm. The cocktail features Seville Orange-In-fused Buffalo Trace Bourbon, Reduced Barndiva Farm Apple Cider Syrup, and Whiskey Barrel-Aged Bitters. If you order one, there’s a good chance it will be assembled by Geoff and Jil’s daughter, Isabel, who has worked behind the bar since graduating from college five years ago.
Herbs are expertly employed in the kitchen as well. Chef Erik Anderson, who earned two Michelin stars while at Coi in San Francisco, is uncannily adept at creating unexpected flavor combinations, resulting in simultaneous surprise and delight. I spent most of my dinner with brow furrowed, trying to parse the distinctive flavors as they harmonized in my mouth, savoring each bite of the duck breast au poivre while my husband enjoyed the succulent steak with black chanterelles and potato cake. Tasty bread creations accom-panied some of the main dishes, like the caramelized shallot brioche that came with my duck, or the petit baguette with the roasted chicken, each made by Pastry Chef Neidy Venegas. Neidy is also responsible for their masterful desserts, adhering to the Barndiva ethos of layering flavors in ways that are both unpredictable and deliciously satiating.
When it comes to food, there’s nothing more fancy than a Michelin star, and in October of 2021, Barndiva was awarded their first. When Jil reflects on the honor, she credits “a model of genuine hospitality that has its roots from our years in Anderson Valley trying to sustain our small farm holding. Respect for hard work and love of a singular landscape resonate through all we do.” That respect is reflected in the 19% service charge that is shared among the entire staff—not just front-of-house workers—and allows them to provide a living wage and health care. Jil shares, “This industry is at a crossroads. Sustainability means care for people as well as how you source food. If restaurants are to come out of COVID times with their spirits—along with the bottom line—intact, we’ve got to start taking better care of the people who produce food, put it on our plates, and wash up afterward.”
Barndiva’s accomplishments are the result of continuous self-evaluation, the desire to do better, and their commitment to uncover more and better ways to “Eat the View.” They will keep reaching for new heights, even as their feet stay firmly on the ground, their eyes on a landscape rich with culinary potential.
Barndiva
231 & 237 Center St, Healdsburg | (707) 431-0100 | Barndiva.com
Brunch Fri - Sun, 11AM - 2:30PM
Dinner Wed – Sun, from 5:30PM
Photo p47 and top of p48 by Torrey Douglass. All other photos courtesy of Barndiva.
Torrey Douglass is a web and graphic designer living in Boonville with her family. Her life’s joys include reading by the fire, cooking something delicious, and inspiring her dogs to jump into the air with uncontained canine happiness.
Singing Frogs Farm
Pioneers of No-Till Farming in Sebastopol
To start a farm you need three things: dirt, sun, and water. In recent years, researchers have taken a closer look at the dirt piece of the farming equation, studying how soil quality impacts the nutritional value of crops and, more broadly, the long-term viability of farms. Healthy, vibrant soil is biologically rich on a macro and micro level—in other words, full of life. Compared to depleted soil, soil rich in organic matter can absorb more water, store more carbon, and produce better, more nutrient-dense food. Good dirt is the lifeblood of a farm.
For “no-till” farmers Elizabeth & Paul Kaiser of Singing Frogs Farm, retiring the plow was an essential first step for preserving soil health, though they didn’t realize it at the time. When the couple started on their no-till journey, there wasn’t even a term to describe this unique method of farming that plants crop after crop in unturned soil. Over the years they refined their techniques through trial and error, and as they did so, the no-till farming movement evolved and became established right along with them. In the process, they’ve experimented their way into the enviable position of managing a profitable, highly productive, fully organic, pesticide-free farming operation.
The couple met as Peace Corps Volunteers in The Gambia, West Africa. After returning to the U.S., Elizabeth earned her Masters in Public Health and Paul his degrees in Natural Resources Management and International Development. They were inspired by John Jeavons and Eliot Coleman, intensive farming experts who specialized in growing large volumes of organic food on small plots of land. In 2007, they found eight acres in Sonoma County where they could start their regenerative farm while remaining close to family. The property would eventually employ the equivalent of seven full-time, year-round workers and produce more than six times the state average for crop output per acre.
In their second year of farming, while plowing under his cover crop, Paul was barely able to stop the tractor just inches in front of a mama Killdeer—a plover—dancing in front of her camouflaged ground nest, trying to pull his attention away from her eggs. The Killdeer was shaking from the shock of staring down a tractor to save her eggs. Paul plowed around her nest for the rest of the season. This highlighted the dichotomy the Kaisers saw between trying to promote life and sometimes inadvertently killing it, and the memory of this experience was one of their first steps away from tillage.
Tillage refers to the practice of turning over the soil to loosen it, break up and bury weeds away from the sun, and mix in fertilizer. Tillage also dries out the earth, exposes the beneficial insects within to predators, and creates a fine, silky soil with little biological complexity. This practice also puts a hard stop to the development of micro- and macro-biological life in the soil, rendering it dependent on added inputs. As Paul explained in a 2017 keynote speech he and Elizabeth gave at the Northeast Organic Farming Association:
“Tillage breaks up your large aggregates in the soil, reducing the soil size so you have a larger surface area to volume ratio—which means more volatilization of nutrients. A lot of your nitrogen and carbon gets volatilized out of the soil, [and] combines with the oxygen from the tillage in the air to form nitrous oxide and carbon dioxide, two of the most potent greenhouse gasses. And yet, as a farmer, the two things you need most in your soil are carbon for soil structure and nitrogen for plant growth. So the very act of tillage is taking the two things you need most in your soil, removing them, and creating greenhouse gas emissions.”
At first, the motivation for pursuing a no-till approach was threefold: social—they had great employees and wanted to keep them, so they needed the farm to remain productive throughout the year; economic—property taxes were looming, and winter season crops would help pay for them; and ecological—they knew that leaving the soil undisturbed was better for the overall ecology of the farm (as with the Killdeer). At first, they continued to aerate the soil by “broad forking,” using a tool devised from a horizontal bar with long vertical tines attached to it. The broad fork can be sunk into the soil and gently pulled to break up compacted beds and allow more air to circulate beneath the surface. It’s a helpful tool for farmers transitioning away from tillage.
By leaving the soil unturned, the micro- and macro-biology—also referred to as organic matter—can build up naturally. Photosynthesizing plants turn sunshine into sugars, complex carbohydrates, and other micronutrients. They use some, but also exude about 40% of what they generate into the soil through their roots. Farms in the U.S. average less than 2% organic matter in soils that contained 6-10% before humans intervened. By planting a diversity of crops and leaving the soil undisturbed, Singing Frogs Farm built up the organic matter in their soil to over 11% in less than five years.
Except for a few crops like carrots, radishes, and beans, most plants are started in the nursery. That way, only the best and strongest are moved into the beds. By transplanting mature, healthy seedlings into soil rich with organic matter, they consequently need less water, are more disease and pest resistant, and possess larger leaves which shade the ground, benefitting the soil biology and outcompeting the weeds. On the rare occasion when rows are dormant, they are covered with a breathable black fabric to expedite the decomposition of roots and trimmings left behind by former crops, building up that crucial organic matter. This approach means the team spends virtually no time at all on weeding—a task that is the bane of organic farms everywhere—all without using pesticides, organic or otherwise.
Another essential component of the no-till methodology is biodiversity. Planting a diverse mix of species keeps the pests guessing, and welcoming animals onto the property, both wild and domestic, provides natural pest control. In addition, multi-cropping in the same beds adds health and resilience to both the crops and soil while reducing watering, wind and sun stress, and weed management. Hedgerows, which Elizabeth calls “biological infrastructure,” protect the plant rows from wind and frost, stabilize field temperatures, and create healthier microclimates for crop growth. Hedgerows also host all manner of critters, from owls and snakes who hunt rodents to bees and other pollinators. She understands how beginning farmers, faced with their endless to-do list, can be tempted to postpone hedgerow planting. But the bushes and trees take time to mature, particularly in a temperate zone, and since the hedgerows play an essential role in the land’s biodiversity, crop health, and farm productivity, she recommends planting them as early as possible.
About 70-80% of the time, a thin layer of compost is added to a bed after its plants are harvested. After all, the mature seedlings they will move into that bed are the plant equivalent of growing teenagers, and all teens are renowned for their endless appetites. But the farm uses less compost than you might think. The Kaisers subscribe to the notion that “a farmer’s footstep is the best fertilizer.” In other words, maintaining frequent, direct contact with the land and its crops will allow a farmer to provide hands-on care, as well as the opportunity to spot and address issues before they get out of hand. Consequently, they advise new farmers to start small, to “do less really well,” as Elizabeth puts it. When they have a patch of land that is struggling, they plant short-term crops in it to ensure it is visited often and gets extra attention.
And the rows get a lot of attention. With the exception of those that can’t be used for food crops due to rainy season flooding, the beds grow 3-8 sequential crops—all generating income—over their 12 month cycle. If the transplants need generous space but take a while to grow—like leeks or cauliflower—a short term crop is planted in the open area so the row can continue to produce revenue while the slower plants mature. By the time the quick crop, like lettuce, is harvested, the cauliflowers are large enough to shade the space where they grew and prevent weeds.
At first, all of the food grown on the farm was sold through the Singing Frogs Farm CSA. These days, the CSA has a substantial waiting list and distributes 40% of the farm’s output, while 50% is sold at farmers markets, and 10% to local restaurants. Almost all of what they grow remains within a 10-15 mile radius of the farm.
When asked what she enjoys about living and working at Singing Frogs Farm, Elizabeth mentioned the pleasure of working outdoors, the satisfaction of watching things grow, and the joy of working with “tremendous people.” She motioned across the field to a CalPoly graduate who studied sustainable agriculture and is there to gain experience before starting his own farm. Working a different row is a woman who had her own farm on the East Coast before relocating to the area for her husband’s new job. She showed up one day asking for a part-time position so she could get her hands back in the dirt.
The team is hard-working, highly valued, and necessary for the exceptionally productive farm to continue operating. As a result they are paid well, and burnout is avoided since no one on the property works more than 40 hours per week. This is possible since almost all working hours are spent in production (planting and harvesting) rather than maintenance (tilling and weeding). The sum of all these parts is a farm that generates $145,000 in revenue per acre per year. The state average for organic, tilled farms is $14,000 per acre.
With results like this, one might think it makes sense to scale up. While that would be possible, Elizabeth is quick to point out that 70% of the planet’s food is grown by small producers. She and Paul would rather see 100 three-acre farms in and near population centers rather than one 300-acre farm located remotely.
The success at Singing Frogs Farm has generated a lot of interest from other farmers, researchers, and agriculture specialists. Elizabeth and Paul are generous with their knowledge, shared through farm tours, speaking gigs, and workshops. They conduct studies all the time, from studying the quality of water runoff to measuring organic matter at various soil depths. In 2019, they agreed to participate in a study on how soil health impacts the nutritional value of crops. Cabbages from the same seed pack were grown at both Singing Frogs Farm and a nearby, traditionally tilled organic farm, then analyzed. The Singing Frogs Farm cabbage contained more vitamins, calcium, carotenoids, and phytosterols than its counterpart. In fact, when compared with a previous USDA study of organic vegetables, the nutrient density of vegetables from Singing Frogs Farm was 100% to 400% greater. The book containing the study, What Your Food Ate: How to Heal Our Land and Reclaim Our Health, is by David R. Montgomery and Anne Biklé, available in June 2022, and is another piece in the picture of how vital soil health is to the quality of our food.
Restoring organic matter to the soil is not just good for us, but necessary to keep our world livable. An EU/UN(1) study found that agriculture has the greatest capacity to reduce carbon emissions at the cheapest cost compared to other sectors: 89% of that capacity is better soil management—putting all that carbon back in the soil where it belongs. “There are so many solutions to climate change,” Elizabeth shared. “I just love our answer.” Looking over the fields of crops, green and bushy as they turn sunshine into sustenance, it’s easy to agree.
Singing Frogs Farm
1301 Ferguson Road, Sebastopol, CA | SingingFrogsFarm.com
1Hoglund-Isaksson et al. EU Low Carbon Roadmap 2050, Energy Strategy Reviews, vol 1 #2 2012
Rancho Gordo Heirloom Beans
by Holly Madrigal
The Rancho Gordo label—a retro image of a woman licking her teeth— is eye-catching, not to mention the gorgeous heirloom beans visible in transparent packaging. It’s clear from the outset that there are no boring beans to be found under this label. Based in Napa, with 38 varieties of beans and legumes available on their website and at almost every decent grocery store, these heirloom varieties have changed the way people view beans. Some examples: pale purple Ayocote Morados; King City Pinks; Vaqueros, looking like nothing so much as an actual Holstein hide; Yellow Eyed Peas; and my favorite, Scarlet Runner beans, with their gorgeous deep crimson speckles. It would take ages just to sample all these delicious offerings.
Rancho Gordo celebrated their 20th anniversary last year, and the expansion from small garden plots grown by owner, Steve Sando, to full-on staple crop sourcing and production has been significant. Rancho Gordo now works with growers in Mexico and Central America through their Xoxoc Project to obtain much of their expansive selection. The company has also branched out into chilis and sauces, grains, and seeds. Steve has written books on the subject. It seems there is a hunger for more beans.
It helps that this relatively simple, calorie-dense food is incredibly good for you. Nutritionists agree that beans are a wonderful source of healthy fiber and protein. Their creamy goodness adds heartiness to soups, stews, and burritos. But Rancho Gordo beans are equally good just on their own. Simply prepared with minimal spices so as not to overwhelm the flavors, these heirloom beans have a richness that makes you understand why almost every cultural diet includes them. Indigenous to the Americas, beans were grown in Mexico as far back as civilization existed there. And Italy, France, and the Middle East all have their own culinary ties to different pulses.
Perhaps that is the market that Rancho Gordo was so poised to develop—the beans from our cultural memories. As much as we are used to bulk commodity pinto and black beans, the ones offered by Rancho Gordo are in a different league. Heirloom varieties are often passed down through generations of families. The diversity on offer is a testament to the genetic variations and conditions that cause one type of bean to thrive in a particular place. Heirloom beans are also often fresher than their generic cousins. Fresher beans can cook faster and even (gasp!) not require the overnight soak. (Ok, the merits of soaking can be debated another day.) Suffice it to say that you want to simmer the beans in water or broth until tender. This can vary depending on variety, size, etc. Stovetop, clay pot, pressure cooker, and even last year’s trend, the Insta-Pot, can cook you up a delicious serving of beans in less time than you’d expect.
Next time you are in Napa Valley, it is definitely worth a stop at Rancho Gordo Beans. The image of the lady licking her teeth is sure to draw you in. The endless options of colorful, flavorful beans will keep you coming back for more.
Rancho Gordo
1924 Yajome St, Napa, CA
(707) 259-1935 | RanchoGordo.com
Open Mon - Fri 10am - 5:30pm, Sat 11am - 5pm
Marin’s Cattle Controversy
Organizers Want Ranchers Out of Point Reyes National Seashore
by Lisa Ludwigsen
Point Reyes National Seashore, located in Marin County, is a 71,000-acre jewel comprised of stunning beaches, dense forests, esteros, rolling grasslands, historic ranches, and even a waterfall. The park’s proximity to the 7 million residents of the San Francisco Bay Area ensures heavy year-round use by locals as well as visitors from far off places. More people than ever are enjoying the spectacular natural scenery that Point Reyes offers.
The park’s proximity to such a large population provides a rare illustration of the interplay between public and private lands, especially as it pertains to the ranching of beef and dairy cattle, which has been an integral part of the area since the 1850s. Several of the existing 20 ranches operating within park boundaries were founded to meet the needs of Gold Rush-booming San Francisco to the south. Beef and dairy products were transported via barges and sailing ships from docks inland to feed hungry San Franciscans.
One hundred seventy years later, these ranching operations have come under scrutiny for the environmental impacts caused by grazing cattle, including damage to native plants, erosion, and run-off into estuaries, creeks, and Tomales Bay, which supports thriving aquaculture farms growing oysters, mussels, and clams.
In a portion of the park, cattle also compete for water and forage with a herd of native tule elk, one of two subspecies native to California that were reintroduced to the park in 1978, after having been hunted to near extinction by 1850. The herd living at the tip of Point Reyes National Seashore, at Pierce Point, has been so successful post-reintroduction that it has exhausted both fresh water and grazing resources. The exceptional drought has exacerbated the herd’s challenges to the point that they suffer various ailments brought on by deprivation, including starvation. It is a heart wrenching situation.
Without the balance of natural predators, herds of managed or wild native animals can naturally outgrow their habitat. Elk predators, primarily bears and wolves, are not part of the current Point Reyes ecosystem. Mountain lions are present in Point Reyes, but not in sufficient numbers to control the herd, nor are they a primary predator of elk. In order to stay healthy, managed herds like the Point Reyes Tule Elk require culling or relocation. Culling is often conducted through permitted hunting, which can also generate funding for the park. But hunting is not feasible in a place so densely utilized by the public, so the job of culling falls to those charged with management, in this case the Point Reyes National Seashore.
This complex collection of issues rose to the forefront in 2016, when three environmental groups filed a lawsuit claiming the park did not properly study the environmental impacts of ranching within the park. Organized protests, exposés, films, and letter-writing campaigns highlighting the suffering of the elk and concerns over poorly managed ranches led to vocal and organized demands to cease all commercial operations within the park. This would allow native ecosystems to be restored and the elk to roam freely within the national seashore. In many ways, this makes sense—restore the park to its pristine condition, allowing visitors to experience a model of the area’s original, natural state, when native people lived on and managed the land.
The protest activity was also timed with the scheduled review of the ranching leases by the National Park Service. Activists were demanding that the leases not be renewed. Yet in August 2021, the leases were approved for an additional 20 years, with option for renewal. Other aspects of the new agreement included stricter oversight of ranching in sensitive riparian, wetland, and estuarine habitats; reducing the acreage used for ranching; and allowing fewer dairy animals. Also in the agreement: no new dairy operations and no commercial poultry or row crops. The controversy and disagreement will no doubt continue.
When looked at through the lens of local food production, this complicated scenario reveals yet another dimension. What would happen if we eliminated a sustainable food source produced within a stone’s throw of a major population center, especially in these times of ongoing food supply uncertainty? Where does our food actually come from? We’re seeing the cracks in our food system in the form of empty grocery shelves and steadily rising prices. One of the many lessons of the pandemic is that these food insecurities might not be temporary. It may be time to rethink how our food is produced and distributed.
Chris Jepson, grocery manager of Ukiah Natural Foods Co-op, which has been in business since 1976, reminds us that the pandemic, coupled with climate change, revealed that food shipped long distances, via a centralized distribution system, has considerable inherent flaws. “I used to place regular orders from our main distributor and be confident that the truck would show up, on time, four days a week,” shares Chris. “At the height of the pandemic, trucks didn’t show up at all, or only half the order was delivered.” We continue to see those empty shelves of products we’ve always considered as staples. Chris adds, “I still have significant challenges with supplies of some staple items, so I now rely on a variety of distributors to source essential food for our customers, and it is still a challenge.”
Food prices are also on the rise. Ongoing drought has severely limited corn production in the Midwest, which affects prices on everything from cereal to meat, because animals, especially poultry, rely on inexpensive feed to keep prices low. “Without corn, prices on many products go way up,” says Chris. Labor shortages continue to hamper international shipping of everything from food products to ingredients and packaging. It really is surprising that a system so ingrained in Americans’ expectation of food stability could falter so quickly.
While the quantity of food produced from historic ranching operations in Point Reyes National Seashore isn’t large in the big picture, it does represent a sustainable food source close to home. As Chris says, “Short term food production leases do not provide incentive for farmers or ranchers to care for the land. The idea that livestock operations can continue to exist in the same place for 150 years is the very definition of sustainable farming.”
Whit Strain, a second-generation aquaculture farmer with leases in Tomales Bay and Bodega Bay, believes there is room for everyone—for the public to enjoy Point Reyes National Seashore and farmers to produce food there. Oysters are exceptional water filterers, but they require clean water in order to be suitable for consumption. “We are downstream from just about everyone,” says Whit. After big winter storms, run-off from Point Reyes ranches causes bacteria levels in the bay to rise and prevents oysters from being harvested until water quality improves. This consideration is built into the expectations of aquaculture farmers in Point Reyes. Whit says, “Humans are part of the problem and part of the solution. There is a lot of interest in the environmental benefits of aquaculture and much we can do to continue to care for this place while producing very high-quality food.”
Reconciling the preservation of public lands with the business interests of the ranchers that use it is a complex issue. It’s important to keep sustainably produced local food a top consideration in decisions regarding land use as we move forward in these uncertain times. Chris Jepson points to a poignant quote from food writer Paul Greenberg: “There is no more intimate relationship we can have with our environment than to eat from it.” Ultimately, if we take care of our environment, it will take care of us.
Photo p 45 Cows on Point Reyes (37434p) by Rhododendrites, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
Peace & Plenty Farm
Growing Saffron in Lake County
by Holly Madrigal
An exceptionally exotic, faraway spice is now being cultivated very close to home. Crimson-gold saffron threads are plucked from purple-hued blooms right in Lake County, at Peace & Plenty Farm in Kelseyville. Saffron is harvested from the stigma of the saffron crocus (crocus sativus), a fall-blooming variety whose harvest begins around mid-October and lasts into November. It likes a Mediterranean climate and well-drained soil and requires zero water in the summer, which works well for Lake County. “We think of it as gathering the eyelashes of the sun,” shares Melinda Price, co-owner of the farm.
The exquisite aroma and flavor of saffron are used throughout much of the world to impart color, amber flavor notes, and complexity to culinary dishes. The largest grows of commercial saffron are found in Iran, with small amounts produced in Spain, Afghanistan, and Kashmir. “There are some neat groups like Rumi Spice that are helping war widows and veterans transition from growing opium to growing saffron. Iran is the predominant grower, but there are international sanctions. So, most of that is sent to Spain and rebranded as Spanish saffron. As a high-value crop, there is much adulteration in the market. There is a third more saffron sold in the world than is grown,” explains Melinda, noting that threads or stigmas of other flowers are often used to bulk up shipments.
Melinda and her husband, Simon Avery, began Peace & Plenty Farm in 2017 with no previous cultivation experience. The couple met in 2016, and both had a shared vision to begin farming. They began to research how they could make a living while working outside. What could they grow that could provide a decent income? Canadian intensive farmer Jean Martin Fortier was an inspiration, but the two were unsure if they could jump right into the level of planning required of that method, let alone make a living selling carrots or kale. “Ironically, we are making a living selling carrots and kale,” laughs Melinda. “Our farm stand has become a significant portion of our income. We are one of only a handful of farm stands in our area, and people often stop by.” The farm stand fridge is filled with crisp cucumbers, bags of bright green spinach, pesto, and saffron lemonade, which glows a brilliant yellow.
“So we researched possible things to grow: Hops—too much water; Mushrooms—we don’t want to live in a warehouse; Vanilla—no, not working in California,” explains Melinda. In one of those synchronistic moments, Simon was driving home from work when he heard a story on NPR about the University of Vermont’s program to help small farmers introduce saffron into their rotation of crops, following in the tradition of the Amish and Mennonite farms, which have been growing saffron for centuries. Far from a luxury item, it gets cooked into many dishes and steeped in milk for drinking, and they eat it as part of their daily diet. “And now I realize that having large families to help harvest must have been a benefit,” laughs Melinda. “Each of these blooms gets picked by human hands. No machine can do this. Working with a harvest crew is resource-intensive.”
After much research, they settled on saffron as their crop of choice. The spice has the highest value per weight in the world, more than gold, more than cannabis. “We did some Google searches, and no one was growing saffron in California, no one!” says Melinda. She went to a conference in Vermont that year and bought 7,000 corms (the small bulb that grows the plant) before they even purchased the farm. “I didn’t want to miss the timing,” says Melinda. “If I hadn’t bought them, we would have had to wait a whole other year!”
They started looking for property and quickly got priced out of Sonoma County. They saw a listing for the property in Kelseyville that was everything they wanted. An old horse ranch that had gone to seed, it had a lot of fences and about seven acres of star thistle. “It all happened quickly once we found it,” adds Melinda. “We moved in and were on a shoestring budget. Simon and I have built all this as we go. We didn’t have the capital to rent a machine or equipment to clear it, so Simon used a weed-whacker and cut it all down by hand. He is still ruined by it. But we were on a schedule. We had purchased corms and needed to get them in the ground by September of that year.”
The process has not been without challenges. Gophers were the primary nemesis the first year; now the entire saffron patch is underlaid with hardware cloth. They learned the hard way not to water heavily. “Little did we know that would cause some of the corms to rot,” exclaims Melinda. “We sure learned that lesson.” Another obstacle—the widely held belief that saffron is a rare spice only used with particular dishes. As evidenced by their experience with the Amish mentioned above, “We want to promote this spice as an everyday enjoyment, not just an ingredient to leave on the shelf,” explains Melinda.
Melinda and Simon are balanced with their specialties. Melinda thrives with the saffron sales, marketing, and managing their farm stays. Simon makes everything happen, building the beautiful spaces, planning construction, and working the farm. “Simon can build anything or fix anything,” says Melinda, “all the irrigation, and remodeling.” Everything on the farm is aesthetically stunning, from the board and batten farmstand and cold storage to the rows of 720 manicured lavender plants, tidy vegetable rows, and a hoop house where tiered racks of chamomile and calendula blossoms dry for their custom-made teas. The couple works together to harvest the vegetables and saffron.
To start reawakening and blooming in the fall, crocus sativus needs really cold nights and a bit of moisture. “When the bloom starts, it will be one or three flowers the first day, then the next day maybe thirty, then a hundred, and all of a sudden you will be picking 44,000 flowers in one day. That was our record last year.” Melinda describes what sets them apart is that they harvest at night time when the flowers are just starting to emerge. Experience has shown them that when the sunlight hits the blossoms, they begin to open and the moisture in the stigma escapes. By shifting to a nocturnal harvest, the saffron remains plump and extremely flavorful. “They are bright, bright fluorescent red and full of life.” They pluck the flowers out of the field intact. One bulb can produce twenty-five blossoms, sending out one bloom and then another a few hours later. They make multiple harvest passes through the night as new blossoms emerge.
They gather and place the full blooms in cold storage, then undertake the tedious process of plucking out each stigma. “We sit and develop these piles of flowers around us, piles of purple. We gather the blossoms and toss them out in piles under the walnut trees for the bees. The bees come and rustle around in the discarded blooms and become absolutely coated with the pollen. Even though we have removed the stigma, there is so much goodness left for them.”
The first harvest in 2017 was 25 grams, the second year yielded 300 grams, the third year they brought in a kilo, and last year they harvested two kilos of saffron! They are happy with this amount. They have no need to be on every supermarket shelf, but would rather curate their vendors and focus on creating really beautiful products. “For example, I may have been put on this earth to make our saffron-infused honey,” says Melinda. “We partnered with a local beekeeper to use his raw honey. It is just so special.”
The future is bright at Peace & Plenty Farm. The couple is restoring the historic barn and will begin booking weddings in early 2022. They currently host farm stays where guests can sleep in a restored vintage airstream in the saffron farm and gaze out across the lavender fields. If you have a moment, stop by the self-serve farm stand. Simon shares that they once had a visitor buy a bunch of greens, only to throw it over the fence to their happy chicken flock. “It was the silliest thing, using a $4 bunch of greens, so Melinda made little seed bags for 25¢ so that people can feed the birds,” he laughs. “Visitors love it, and we have really fat chickens now.”
The farm welcomed Martha Stewart Living Magazine a few years ago and is preparing for a visit by PBS this fall. The couple is in discussions to host farm-to-table dinners with Arnon, former chef at Chez Panisse, creating a saffron-influenced meal, with locally made Obsidian wines to complement the menu. The last dinner served out under the walnut trees sold out in three days, so act swiftly if you want to partake.
“We do like to think about the cool correlations between this plant and our lives. My ancestry is Dutch and of course, they grew bulbs. Simon is British and there used to be “Crocers” in England in medieval times who grew saffron. There is a town in England called Saffron-on-Walden. Even though they don’t have the experience of growing saffron, there are hints and echoes in our ancestry.” A barn on the farm proudly displays a large quilt square as part of the Quilt Trails project. The couple learned the name of the heritage quilt was the “Peace and Plenty” design, and it felt like providence. “We knew that would be the name of our farm, because what more could we want than Peace & Plenty,” adds Melinda.
As Ruby, the resident pup, sits in the shade of the farm stand, the light pours in golden beams through the saffron honey, making the individual jars of stigmas glow red. Take a cool jar of saffron lemonade from the fridge and pop the top. You will swear you can taste the sunshine on your tongue.
Peace & Plenty Farm
4550 Soda Bay Rd, Kelseyville | PeacePlentyFarm.com
Farmstand open daily 9am to dusk
Stay on the farm:airbnb.com/users/show/729211
Photo p 44 by Karen Pavone. All other photos by Holly Madrigal.
Shelter Cove Avocados
Growing a Tropical Treasure in the Northern Wilds of Humboldt
by Holly Madrigal
Cape Mendocino, just up the Lost Coast from Shelter Cove, forms the elbow of the state. The westernmost point of the contiguous U.S., this little town grips the coastline, a landing strip running end to end because many residents continue to fly in to fish, surf, or relax within view of the craggy cliffs. Shelter Cove is south facing, despite the general illusion that the coastline so blue on the horizon is to the west. The area is known for fish, forestry, and cannabis, but its hidden secret is a surprising crop—avocados.
The challenge of growing what is considered a sub-tropical plant on the foggy northern California coast did not deter Trent Sanders. As a longtime resident of Shelter Cove, Trent had his attention piqued by a neighbor. “There is a house down by the beach with a huge avocado tree, and it was an inspiration to me. It must be 30 or 40 years old. I saw that growing and thought, what the hell, that thing is huge! You can grow avocados here!”
Trent speaks with the rapid-fire speech of someone whose mind goes a mile a minute. His youth belies an extensive knowledge of growing and landscaping. His dog Winston explores at our feet as we tour the orchard. Trent originally started with two small trees. “I planted these near my house, and they almost didn’t make it. The first two or three years they just looked horrible. They were really struggling. I almost cut them out two or three times, but once we put the lawn in around them and built up the topsoil, they took off. They really want that regular consistent water and lots of food.” He planted thirty more, terraced near the house, and then bought another ninety and planted them on a lot across the street from his stunning hillside home. Trent now tends about 130 avocado trees in an area no bigger than an acre. He bought these from a commercial grower in Fallbrook, near San Diego. They said, “You’re crazy! Avocados won’t grow in Northern California,” Trent recalls. But when they learned he was in Shelter Cove, the grower said it just might work. He had heard of the microclimate up there. “We believe this is the farthest north orchard in California. It’s all small subdivided lots up here, no flat acreage. So those who are growing are on hillsides and terraces.”
This sleepy town of 850 is as out of the way as you can get, about an hour and a half from the nearest larger town of Redway on Highway 101. Many people come to this corner of Humboldt County for the fishing. A lone surfer catches breaks in the cove, and the local brewery, Gyppo Ale Mill, serves up tasty brews to locals and the hikers reaching the end of the Lost Coast trail, none of them aware that, less than a mile from the water is an avocado orchard tucked in amongst the fir trees. “They don’t like it hot, they don’t like it cold. They like that medium, Santa Barbara-like weather. They are finicky bastards,” Trent laughs. “For how far north we are, they do amazing.”
A low ridge separates us from the ocean, and Trent says that the small ridge tends to deflect most of the strong wind. This hillside forms a bit of a sunbelt. In fact, the sun is shining down as we look past the orchard to the Lost Coast cliffs in the distance.
Trent describes how to create the ideal conditions. ”You want to plant them in the spring because they need the whole season to get their roots in. They don’t have a big tap root, they tend to have a web-ball of superfine roots. They want regular water but not too much. They love the rockier and well drained soil. I planted mine about 9 feet apart, closer than the 15 feet usually recommended for fruit trees. I planted the citrus first then added the avocados in a grid around them.”
Avocados are botanically a berry with a single large seed surrounded by buttery flesh. Satsumas, meyer lemons, and orange trees are laden with fruit next to the dark green foliage of the Haas, Reed, and Lamb Hass avocado varietals. “They say the Mexicolas are good for cooler climates but I prefer the Haas. They just have excellent flavor, and that other variety never worked that well here.” Haas avocados are the most common cultivar. (Geek note: All Hass avocados are descendants of a single “Mother Tree” planted by a mail carrier in La Habra Heights.) Avocados can self pollinate, but Trent recommends growing a couple of Zutanos to help with pollination. “The trees are an A and B type. The flowers all open at different times, so if all the blossoms of one Haas tree are open, you want a good pollinator tree nearby. It will increase the yield.” So for every twenty fruiters, you want to plant one Zutano pollinator.
Trent tends his corner of Eden, filling the yard and orchard with diversity. “This hedge here is pineapple guava, that fence line over there is passionfruit.” Trent easily climbs up the low hanging branches and grabs a few ripe fruits. “These Zutanos get a dusty, matte color, and they ripen green. The Haas turn black when they are ready. There is lots of fruit on this one too, even though it is a pollinator,” he says as he plucks the fruit. “You can harvest at your leisure. The fruit sets in April or May. They have these tiny little BB-sized fruits in April, then by August or September it grows to about the size of a golf ball. They will get to regular avocado size, but you can let it hang a whole other year before you pick it and it will just get creamier.” The little trees produce 30-50 each year, but they hang so they are not all ripe at once. Trent sells them at farmers markets in Arcata and in town.
It seems nothing short of a miracle to be standing in an avocado orchard here at the edge of Humboldt County, but Trent shows that it can really be done. His enthusiasm for the fruit is contagious, making even moderate gardeners want to give it a shot. He has a friend that grew an avocado from a grocery store seed sprouted on the windowsill, so who knows. Perhaps there is local guacamole in our future after all.
Pie Ranch
Striving through Thick and Thin for a Better Food System for All
by Torrey Douglass • photos by Lily Ruderman
Believing that we can collectively do better—for the planet, its creatures, ourselves, and our neighbors—is part and parcel of Pie Ranch’s guiding mission to bring “greater health and justice to our food system.” This ambitious organization is situated in the Pescadero coastside community, roughly halfway between San Francisco and Santa Cruz. Founders Nancy Vail, Jered Lawson, and Karen Heisler bought 14 acres in 2002 in order to build what their website describes as “a regenerative farming and food system education center.” Essentially, they want youth and the public to be able to experience a working farm, one that could grow every ingredient required to bake a pie. True to this original ambition, Pie Ranch has fruit trees, wheat and a mill to grind it, and an animal husbandry program that currently has only goats but has included a milk cow in the past, and hopefully will again in the future.
The drive to do better includes more than just hosting field trips to their CCOF certified organic farm. Pre-COVID, Pie Ranch offered summer internships, overnight farm stays, and venue space for private events like weddings and popular public gatherings such as the monthly barn dance and community potluck. In years past, the farmers and apprentices of Pie Ranch grew food for a 100-person CSA as well as for their year-round farm stand, but they handed the CSA off to their incubator farm, Brisa de Año Ranch.
Nina Berry was hired as the Programs and Events Coordinator for Pie Ranch in February of 2020, but within a month her job shifted radically. Berry went from managing weddings, school visits, and the farm’s public events to heading up the aggregation aspect of Farm Fresh Food Relief, a new program the ranch implemented with Fresh Approach, a Bay Area organization devoted to making healthy food more affordable. As a result, rather than spending time on the phone coordinating teachers and brides, Berry was calling farmers to get fresh produce for their boxes (10-15 pounds each), and the ranch’s outdoor kitchen transitioned into space for building and distributing them. “It was a sharp turn,” Berry shares. “A lot of people committed to making it happen and were willing to be flexible in order to make it possible. I learned that things can work when a lot of people believe in them.”
This program was possible thanks to a USDA grant awarded to Fresh Approach. At its height, more than 800 boxes per week were delivered to people experiencing food insecurity. Though the grant ended in August, Pie Ranch continues its efforts on a smaller scale under their Food Hub program, providing approximately 200 boxes a week to folks in the Pescadero area, as well as a few groups in San Francisco and East Palo Alto.
The hardships of August did not stop after the USDA funding was lost. The devastating CZU Lightning Complex Fires ignited, burning over 86,500 acres in San Mateo and Santa Cruz counties, including portions of Pie Ranch. They lost water tanks, fruit trees, their greenhouse, and the Steele Family Home, a 157 year old structure that included apprentice living spaces, offices, and the organization’s library. Some of the full time staff members lost their own homes, as did many neighbors. Yet the historic wildfire had not even been contained before the Pie Ranch team had decided to rebuild.
With fire recovery in process, and in light of the previous year’s challenges, the ranch leadership has chosen to simplify for 2021. The farm will focus on growing staple crops like wheat, corn, fruit, berries, tomatoes, and winter squash. Virtual learning is in the works, and resuming in-person youth visits remains a priority once that can be done safely. “We want to remain resilient throughout the rest of this time, stay grounded, keep feeding people, and growing things,” reflects Berry.
The overarching goal, though, is to return to food and farming education as soon as safely possible. It’s the essence of their mission, after all. In conjunction with their efforts to build a healthier and more just food system, Pie Ranch particularly chooses to work with first generation farmers, people of color, and women. They also have a cultural easement in the works which will grant land access to the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band, descendants of the original inhabitants of the property. Even as they work to restore and rejuvenate internally, they continue to focus on all the good they can do outside the farm’s borders. After all, there is no limit to how much better we can do.
Pie Ranch | 2080 Cabrillo Highway, Pescadero
Office (650) 879-0995 | Farmstand (650) 879-0996
PieRanch.org
The Bilingual Botanical Bus
A Mobile Holistic Herbal Clinic Serving Sonoma County
by Dawn Emery Ballantine
We certainly live in interesting times. Most of us have had to pivot our lives and our businesses in order to create a modicum of normalcy during this pandemic. For many folks in northern California, however, this type of life-upending crisis was already the norm before COVID, dating from the big fires in 2017 which did so much damage in Mendocino and Sonoma counties and surrounding areas. And as always, in times of trouble, good things can arise from the ashes, like the community-based service non-profit known as The Botanical Bus.
When the Tubbs Fire plagued the Santa Rosa area in 2017, a local herbal apothecary—Farmacopia—turned their store into a free clinic for weeks, offering support, advice, referrals, and herbal medicinals to help meet the needs of the community. Lily Mazzarella, owner of Farmacopia, and Jocelyn Boreta, a staff member, realized that this support was essential for their community, and they set about finding a way to continue to meet that need. This brainstorming led them to co-found The Botanical Bus Bilingual Mobile Herb Clinic.
Jocelyn, now Executive Director of The Botanical Bus, has learned that crisis shines a light on health inequities, as we have clearly seen with COVID-19. And during the 2017 fires, particularly in the case of Sonoma County’s Latinx community—largely farm- and vineyard-workers—these inequities were intensified due to deficits in social determinants of health such as workplace safety, toxic stress, limited legal status, lack of health insurance, and unequal access to emergency financial assistance. Not surprisingly, Jocelyn found that 90% of the evacuees in the evacuation centers were Latinx immigrants, with limited family, resources, insurance, or safety net. Jocelyn and Lily felt that “the call to action was getting more and more urgent.”
This grassroots project is grounded in community and took its baby steps in the Land Path Bayer Farm community garden, in conjunction with a group known as Cultivando para Salud (Farming for Health). Started by social worker Angeles Quiñones, every Friday for the past three years, until the COVID shutdown, Jocelyn and Angeles met with a group of mostly immigrant, Spanish-speaking women from Peru and Mexico to learn about plants and to share ideas about recipes, remedies, herbal medicine, and nutrition. The group grew in a familial way, celebrating births, mourning the passing of members, and dealing with the short and long term effects of the fires. Jocelyn believes that “the knowledge in the community is profound … and needs to be recognized, and celebrated, and empowered … Link that with health equity, then we have a thriving population.”
The Botanical Bus is based on a three-pronged approach, which began with the community gardens project. They subsequently launched the Promotoras de Salud program (Community Health Workers), staffed by women from a full range of backgrounds and expertise who provide educational trainings and workshops. Though staff feared that these might be more difficult given COVID in-person meeting restrictions, they were surprised that the move onto the Internet ultimately enriched the meetings. Suddenly, they had folks joining in from disparate parts of Sonoma County, and even from as far away as Michoacan, thus connecting sections of the community in ways that hadn’t been possible before.
The final step in the plan was the Botanical Bus itself, a mobile holistic herbal clinic which launched in September 2020, providing services to farmworkers and the Latinx community. The mobile clinic offers a range of care including acupuncture, chiropractic, herbal medicine, massage therapy, homeopathy, and more, while adhering to COVID safety measures. A free lunch of tamales and herbal aguas frescas is also provided.
The two-hour clinics currently take place at La Luz in Sonoma, La Plaza in Santa Rosa, Corazón Healdsburg, and at Red Car Wine vineyard (shout out to them for taking special care of their workers!). While the original plan was to take the bus around to the various vineyards, that has proven a bit more difficult than envisioned. They hope to build partnerships with vineyard owners to make this a reality in the near future.
One of the foundational goals of The Botanical Bus is to partner with at least ten other community organizations in their work. To that end, they have created relationships with many organizations such as Traditional Medicinals, Galen’s Way, Tadine’s Tea Company, Mercy Wellness, Occidental Arts & Ecology Center, Be Here Farm in St. Helena (which tragically burned in the most recent Glass Fire), The California School of Herbal Studies, and with Daily Acts in Petaluma. Jocelyn enthuses that “the connectivity between non-profits in Sonoma County is super inspiring and empowering.”
And during this current pandemic, cooperation is essential. The Latinx community makes up only 26% of Sonoma County’s population, but they comprise 80% of the diagnosed cases, harkening back to the social determinants of health. So, says Jocelyn, “Let’s sink into the power that our Latinx community has, the power to nurture, the power to heal with culturally relevant forms of healing … There is tremendous displacement within the immigrant community, and the power of herbal medicine connects people to place, cultural identity, family, and tradition, and is really needed right now.”
The group recently launched an emergency mutual aid project with the help of Daily Acts. Since the women can no longer access their community gardens,The Botanical Bus brought the gardens to them. Their partner organizations donated 4,000 organic medicinal and culinary plant starts which are culturally relevant (think salsa garden), organic soil, seeds, bilingual literature about planting and care, and five- and 10-gallon Geopots. These Geopots make it all possible for folks who live in small places with no garden land around them. The project was eagerly welcomed by the community.
Happily, the Community Garden project is slowly beginning again. One group recently planted 70 organic herbs in the community medicine garden at La Plaza family service center in Santa Rosa. They will hold COVID-safe workshops in the garden once a month, led by the promotoras, who are now paid to teach the workshops. The topics are seasonal and include building immunity, respiratory health, wellness, and la cosecha (the harvest). The herbs are donated by local herb companies and the California School of Herbal Studies. As Jocelyn says, “We thrive off of partnerships. Partnership is everything.”
Jocelyn is justifiably proud of the program. Her grandmother and great-grandmother were farmworkers. Jocelyn grew up in Sonoma County, and though she left for 10 years, she returned when her children were small and re-invented her life, choosing to focus on what she could do to help her family thrive and to show up in her community. The early years of the program were tough, as grassroots organizing is time-consuming and all her time was unpaid. Then the press began to take an interest, and Farmacopia offered to help launch the non-profit.
True to their mission statement, they launched the Botanical Bus with a crowdsourcing campaign, raising $20,000 within 30 days. They are still figuring out the details of board development and how to secure ongoing funding, as current support is from temporary grants, sponsorships from the herb industry, and individual donors. Their goal is to secure enough consistent funding to permit them to grow their foundation programs and expand to new ones to meet the emerging needs of the community.
The next planned emergency mutual aid campaign reflects a new coalition between The Botanical Bus and Sonoma County, which recently launched the CURA project to organize doctors, nurses and community health advocates to provide outreach to farmworkers around COVID-19. The Botanical Bus’s promotoras are going through the training now and will be hired as community health advocates, bringing their skills into the field.
The joint campaign will also distribute Care Kits to everyone who attends the mobile clinics and to the farmworkers who attend CURA’s meetings. The goal is to distribute 500 bags, which contain an herbal healing salve, chapstick, medicinal teas, and referrals to community resources for both physical and mental health. They hope to raise $5,000 via VenMo for the project to cover the costs of the kits.
Jocelyn has witnessed the way that ”herbal medicine connects people to their identity, to their abuelita, the plants their families threw into soups, the smells, the earth where they’re from.” There is a wealth of knowledge of herbal medicine and nutrition in the elders of the community. Gathering together across generations to learn more about nutrition and health is helping to teach an often undervalued workforce to value themselves as human beings with the potential to thrive, by prioritizing their health and wellness in a culturally relevant way. And in these interesting times, we could all benefit from this lesson.
The Botanical Bus is based in Sonoma County. Help and learn about their trainings and clinic locations at www.thebotanicalbus.org. If vineyards wish for their workers to have these Care Kits, they can contact the Botanical Bus for distribution, at no charge.
Dawn Emery Ballantine lives in Boonville, where she curates and sells books at Hedgehog Books, edits this magazine, and is always happily surprised by all the folks doing good in the world.
Farm + Flour
Cloverdale’s Farm Fresh Local Food Service
The first day Mendocino County’s shelter-in-place order took effect was also supposed to be the last day of Shannon Moore’s lease on her commercial kitchen. After over a decade supplying Cloverdale with cupcakes, pies, cookies, galettes, cakes, and other edible delights through her baking enterprise, Flour Girl, Shannon was ready to slow down, have a rest, and explore some new options.
One new project includes managing the Cloverdale Farmers Market. The small Tuesday gathering has historically been held in the lot next to the popular coffee spot, Plank, in Cloverdale’s charming business district. Small and intimate, the market enjoys a loyal following of customers for the farmers and other vendors (including Flour Girl) who sell there. The market was in the midst of its certification process when the former manager retired earlier this year, and Shannon was willing to step in to keep it alive.
Like so much else that was derailed by the pandemic, the year-round market was suspended when shelter-in-place orders came down, and ultimately the decision was made to cancel it for the foreseeable future. “It was just too many logistical things for us,” Shannon reflects. The market will return once conditions allow, but in the meantime, the link connecting farmers and other food vendors from their customers was broken.
The solution for its repair came via a phone call from Shannon’s friend and Cloverdale farmer, Rebecca Bozzelli of Lantern Farm, who suggested creating a farm box program where members receive a weekly box of local goodies. At first the partners started small with just produce and baked goods, but the project quickly evolved to offer much more. While customers can get the typical CSA-style farm box full of the best of that week’s harvest, they can also add all sorts of other a la carte items, including Flour Girl cupcakes, cookies, and galettes, as well as sausage, sourdough, olive oil, mushrooms, preserves, and handmade pasta, all made by local Cloverdale food businesses. Customers can even add non-edibles like t-shirts, soap, candles, and flower bouquets to round out their order.
Members can log onto the Farm + Flour website starting at 10am on Thursday and place orders through Sunday at 5pm. Deliveries and pickups happen on Tuesdays. There was high demand from the start, with news of the new food operation spreading through social media, email lists, and word-of-mouth. Says Shannon, “Everyone is so grateful we’ve been offering this outlet for people to get fresh, locally grown produce.” Meeting the demand while building out the business has been challenging for a two-person venture, making the support of friends and volunteers indispensable. The website was developed pro bono by a friend, and even the delivery drivers are volunteers.
It’s tempting to think of Farm + Flour as the Cloverdale Tuesday Farmers Market online, but Shannon is quick to point out that it is an entirely separate project. The endeavor allows Cloverdale farmers (as well as bakers, butchers, and craftspeople) a place to sell their goods, and it gives area residents a place to buy locally produced food.
While it looks like the relaxation Shannon was seeking won’t happen any time soon, she finds this new adventure deeply satisfying. It’s even possible that these types of hyper-local food hubs become the “new normal” as we move into an uncertain future, providing a much-needed marketplace where farmers can sell to their local communities.
Farm + Flour | FarmAndFlourBoxes.com
Photos courtesy of Farm + Flour.
Community Food Drive Project in Lake County
Times of uncertainty and crisis can give birth to whole new ways of collaboration and service. Unfortunately, COVID-19 is just the most recent crisis to hit Lake County. Multiple rounds of devastating wildfires and massive power shut-offs have tested even the most hardy residents. But, as Mr. Rogers’ mother famously said, “In any disaster, look for the helpers.” And these helpers have arisen in force in Lake County.
North Coast Opportunities (NCO) is the community action agency for Lake and Mendocino counties, as well as parts of Humboldt, Sonoma, Del Norte and Solano counties. NCO has been working for years to help residents of Lake County rebuild from the fires. When this current public health crisis hit, NCO was already well invested in reaching vulnerable populations. Robyn Bera, Director of Community Projects in Lake County, immediately put out the word that NCO was there to help. Utilizing their contacts through New Digs, a Housing First program, as well as other local NCO projects, they quickly learned that food access was a major concern.
This issue has become alarmingly apparent across Lake County and beyond. Many area children normally eat multiple meals at school, so the districts have stepped up to fill that void with take-home meals. Senior citizens can often access food through their senior centers and Meals on Wheels, but that leaves many, many people to fall through the cracks. Financially vulnerable, those without transportation, and undocumented locals were seeing their food supplies dip dangerously low. Robyn and her coworkers heard this need loud and clear and jumped into action. “Our aim was to bring organizations together with similar goals and the right resources to bring this idea to fruition,” says Robyn. “Soon enough we had a virtual table of exceptional partners ready to brainstorm and contribute to the project.” Lake County is no stranger to creative collaborations to address a crisis, and so the Community Food Drive Project (CFDP) was born.
This effort to deliver food to the homes of local residents in need brought together an amazing group of partners: Hope Rising Lake County, Lake County Office of Education, Lake County Tribal Health, Partnership Health Plan, Lake County Department of Social Services, and Hope Crisis Response Network—all pitched in to make this happen. Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Santa Rosa, with many years of experience with food distribution and food pantries, quickly offered their expertise with food ordering, transportation, and packing. And some wonderful unforeseen heroes stepped up. Lake Transit Authority offered to support food delivery. “Bus drivers have a strong connection and commitment to the residents of Lake County, and we’ve been looking for ways to support the needs of the community in this crisis,” says Lake Transit’s executive director, Lisa Davey-Bates. The essential drivers were able to keep up their hours while helping provide needed nourishment to their neighbors.
It inspires the heart to see multiple agencies pull together to meet a community need. This collaboration has successfully provided food and nourishment to many Lake County residents. The CFDP currently delivers groceries to over 50 households around the lake each week and is considering adding a second delivery day to meet the increasing demand.
Any resident may call the Community Food Drive Project Hotline at (707) 993-4644. Priority will be given to those who are symptomatic, medically vulnerable, without transportation, or with lost wages. NCO is actively engaged in other ways to support the community including coordinating food deliveries with senior centers, providing childcare for essential workers, funding respite care, volunteer coordination, and more. Community Food Drive Project requires ongoing financial support, so consider contributing if you are able.
For more information, to volunteer, or to donate contact Robyn Bera at 707-278-8696
Photo courtesy of NCO.
Humboldt Bay Oysters
A Merry Merroir
by Elizabeth Archer
The North Coast is home to an impressive assortment of the world’s best and most prized foods, and nothing illustrates that point more finely than the famous oysters of the majestic Humboldt Bay. California’s second-largest bay produces the majority of the state’s oysters, a $6 million industry for our neighbors to the north.
There are hundreds of acres of oysters farmed in the bay using “off-bottom techniques,” in which human-made oyster beds are built above the ocean floor. This is in contrast to “bottom culture” oyster farming that prevailed until the end of the 20th century, at which time environmentalists, marine experts, and fishers started understanding and reacting to the damage caused by ocean-floor dredging. Since off-bottom techniques have been implemented, oyster farming has thrived as an industry and has helped the bay thrive in return.
Oysters are like the vacuum cleaners of the ocean. Each oyster filters as much as 50 gallons of water a day, removing pollutants, keeping algae in check, and helping to maintain the bay’s diverse flora and fauna. With a natural tidal design that completely refreshes the bay’s water twice a day, oysters and Humboldt are a match made in heaven.
The hardy Pacific species of oyster, which comprises well over 90% of global oyster production, flourishes in the bay. So do their smaller counterparts (both in size and market share), the Kumamoto species. Similar to Pacific oysters in that they both are from Japan, both tolerate changes in salinity and temperature, and both are delicious to eat. “Kumos,” as they are affectionately known to aficionados, are especially prized for their soft texture, sweet taste, and lack of “fishy” flavor. Thanks to the perfect water conditions, Humboldt Bay Kumos are considered by many to be the best in the world.
One of the main players in the Humboldt oyster game is Aqua-Rodeo Farms (pronounced like the cowboy contest, not the famous street), which sports the delightful motto, “We Round Them Up. You Shoot Them Down.” Owner Sebastian Elrite graduated from Humboldt State University with a degree in wildlife management in 1997 and has been farming oysters ever since. “We’re in a pretty good spot as far as environmental quality,” explains Elrite, “but there are windows where we can’t harvest that are unpredictable. We’re always monitoring for red tides in the summer, and heavy rain in the winter can prevent harvesting.” When booked in advance, “Captain Sebastian” treats visitors to two-hour, low-tide boat rides filled with educational information about oyster farming and the (optional) hands-on experience of harvesting.
Elrite also operates Humboldt Bay Provisions in Eureka. In addition to eating at the oyster bar, visitors can purchase locally made products including wine, beer, cheese, olives, and more. When Elrite eats oysters, he likes to keep it simple: grilled with butter or raw with a zesty cocktail sauce. At Humboldt Bay Provisions, a dozen raw or broiled oysters, likely harvested that morning, costs about $25.
Just like terroir informs how a wine tastes, explains Elrite, merroir—the ebb and flow of the tide, the salinity level of the water—imparts the subtle qualities and flavors of each oyster varietal. Kumos sell themselves; everyone wants them thanks to a very effective marketing campaign. With Pacific oysters, farmers name the varietals they cultivate. Aqua-Rodeo Farms is famous for the Bucksport, so named by Elrite after a town of the same name which became part of Eureka in the late 1800s. Almost all of Aqua-Rodeo’s oysters are sold locally in Humboldt County, with one notable exception: The Peg House in Leggett is one of Elrite’s oldest and most loyal customers.
If you’re looking for a good excuse to head to Humboldt, this year is the 30th annual Oyster Festival, hosted by Arcata Main Street, on June 20, 2020. This is the largest event of the year in Humboldt, attracting more than 15,000 oyster enthusiasts for mollusks, micro-brews, and music. It’s also a kid-friendly affair, incorporates art activities for all ages, and to top it off, boasts a Zero Waste badge. Elrite likes to participate in the festival, so keep your eyes open for Aqua-Rodeo oysters if you go.
With Humboldt Bay heavily monitored by a variety of organizations and governmental agencies, and with the farmers and oysters themselves doing their part to keep the bay healthy, you can feel good about eating these local delicacies. The Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch gives off-bottom Pacific oysters the “Best Choice” rating, and oyster-eaters everywhere give them a satisfied slurp salute.
Humboldt Bay Provisions
205 G St, Eureka | (707) 672-3850
www.humboldtbayprovisions.com
Open Mon-Thurs 4:30–8:30pm
Fri.-Sat.1–9:30pm & Sunday1–8:00pm
Elizabeth Archer is an enthusiastic eater and promoter of the local food scene in Mendocino County. She and her husband run Carson and Bees, a beekeeping operation in Ukiah.
Photos courtesy of Humboldt Bay Provisions.
La Cocina: A Delicious Revolution
Can a Nepalese momo create economic freedom? Can Oaxacan plantains help transcend the severe barriers facing women of color and immigrants living in poverty? Can a pho as diverse in flavors as the city itself launch a culinary career? La Cocina’s founding premise is that, by helping empower those who are already hustling to get their food out there—offering access to a shared commercial kitchen and business acumen—they could cut through the red tape needed to grow. Enter La Cocina business incubator, which emerged from the Mission District as a pathway for informal, somewhat underground setups to develop into culinary businesses that support both their owners and the greater community.
It is a reality that women of color and immigrant populations are instigators of economic growth, and yet they are often denied access to loans and financing. This leads many home chefs to seek more informal situations where they might sell tamales out of their apartments or hand-deliver baked goods to neighbors and friends to make some extra cash. La Cocina has developed an innovative way to connect this underserved community with capital and connections to gain economic freedom in the competitive and expensive San Francisco landscape.
Since 2005, this progressive nonprofit has conducted three rounds of applications per year, seeking delicious, unique foods that will withstand the competitive Bay Area marketplace. Qualified applicants are required to provide a business plan. La Cocina works with applicants through a six-month pre-incubation period, where they receive technical assistance to further develop their plans. After that, they have access to an affordable commercial kitchen and ongoing business development support, launching into the next phase of opening their own storefronts, food carts, or restaurants when benchmarks are met.
Emiliana Puyana, Program Director at La Cocina, has a local Mendo connection. She is a long-time friend of the crew of the Big Chief in Laytonville. Each summer you can find her alongside Mat Paradis, Troy Terrill, and (returned to visit this year) Clay Carpenter, cooking up a ridiculously good Cajun feast for the annual Crawfish Boil. Emiliana has serious culinary chops, having learned to cook in her family’s kitchen in Venezuela, followed by the Culinary Institute of America, before settling in San Francisco. La Cocina helped her launch Jarred SF Brine, her business specializing in seasonal pickles, and she has now returned to work for the organization. The staff at La Cocina is as diverse as the clientele, with many members sharing in their history a passion for good food.
If hearing about these bad-ass culinary heroes makes you want to taste their food, stop by one of their many alumni businesses like Los Cilantros in Berkeley, owned by Dilsa Lugo, or Minnie Bell’s Soul Movement in Emeryville, which now employs ten people. Bini’s Kitchen on Howard Street makes Nepalese dumplings called momos, served searing hot and ready to munch. Bini is originally from Kathmandu, and through working with La Cocina, she was able to bring the complex spices of the Himalayan foothills here to northern California.
La Cocina has had a significant local impact, including $15 million in sales last year, incubating 40 businesses, and helping open more restaurants than any for-profit culinary group. But now they are reaching even higher. A capital campaign for the La Cocina Municipal Marketplace is under way.
Gentrification and lack of affordability are dominant factors in the Bay Area economic landscape. This pioneering, women-led marketplace will provide a concentration of low-cost food stalls in the heart of the Tenderloin, one of the most ethnically diverse neighborhoods in San Francisco, where many residents occupy single rooms with no access to a cooking stove or oven. The Municipal Marketplace will not only serve as a showcase for local entrepreneurs, but it will also function as a community gathering space.
Pushing back on entrenched historical economic inequality is not easy, but this group of chefs, eaters, activists, and entrepreneurs is making it happen—one delicious bite at a time.
Pitch into the Capital Campaign at bit.ly/LaCocinaMM. They are close to meeting their goal. The estimated opening date is Spring 2020. They also have a wonderful new cookbook available at lacocinasf.org/cookbook. Photo by Eric Wolfinger.
The Best Stop-Spots Between SF and Mendocino Co
How To Stay Fed, Watered, and Caffeinated on the Trip
We’ve all been there: the late flight, the early flight, the Bay Area appointment, the … something that has us driving on Highway 101 and thinking only about where to stop for something to eat or drink. Word of Mouth has you covered. This collection of spots are some of our personal faves that raise the bar on flavor, value, or just plain convenience. Enjoy!
Plank Coffee
Where: 227 N Cloverdale Blvd, Cloverdale
plankcoffee.com
What: Plank is my favorite stop in Cloverdale for a fantastic americano, a delicious shrub of the day, or a choice of yummy gluten-free (or regular) confections created by the Flour Girl (who also has a pop-up shop in Cloverdale). The service is always friendly, the ambience is great, with both tables and comfy chairs, and they have a few local-interest books for sale. Great stop before or after traversing the winding curves of Highway 128. – Dawn
Diavola Pizzeria and Salumeria
Where: 21021 Geyserville Ave, Geyserville
diavolapizzeria.com
What: Diavola, right off of Highway 101, is a delightful stop after a long day, particularly when it starts with a trip next door to Locals Tasting Room, where you can buy a bottle to enjoy with your Diavola fare. The environment is warm and happy, no doubt in part because the menu is so satisfying, with pizza as tasty as it comes, house-cured meats, a reliance on local sources, and the thin, crispy breadsticks that point heavenward on each table. I’m hungry just thinking about it. – Anna
Healdsburger
Where: 48 Healdsburg Ave, Healdsburg (of course!)
healdsburger.com
What: There are lots of great options for a meal in Healdsburg, yet if you’re looking for something casual but good—as I often am when I’m in the midst of our epic drive north or south—Healdsburger is an easy choice. They’re big on the burgers, it’s true, with a range of options so interesting that it would take a good while to get through all of them (Lamb Burger with Feta and Grilled Onions, anyone? A Cajun Cheeseburger with jalapenos, perhaps?), yet there are also sandwiches, hot dogs, and salads available, including a few vegetarian choices. Don’t forget to grab a milkshake—Chocolate Peanut Butter calls my name—before choosing one of the small tables indoors or from the spots available on the patio. – Anna
SEA Noodle
Where: 286 Coddingtown Center, Santa Rosa
seanoodlebar.com
What: This Thai fusion restaurant is my go-to when passing through Santa Rosa. Chicken coconut noodle soup with extra vegetables is so rich and flavorful that it keeps me coming back. Plus, their craft mocktails like the Lychee Iced Tea let me imbibe without getting tipsy. – Holly
Crooks Coffee
Where: 404 Mendocino Ave, Santa Rosa
crookscoffee.com
What: This family-owned coffee shop was a lovely discovery one early morning on the way to the airport. Crooks offers a light food menu for breakfast or lunch and a range of hot drinks, including temptations such as a Lavender Rose Latte and a Crème Brûlée Hot Chocolate. Open at 5:30 a.m. during the week and until 11:00 p.m. on weekends means this is a great stop for stretching your legs and breaking up that long drive, regardless of the time of day. – Anna
Hana Japanese Restaurant
Where: 101 Golf Course Dr, Rohnert Park
hanajapanese.com
What: When I want to treat myself on the drive between Mendocino County and the Bay Area, I head to Hana, which offers incredible food and an atmosphere that belies its nondescript exterior. The sushi is always fresh, and it’s usually possible to get a seat that allows you to watch the chefs at work. There’s also a strong wine list and clear guidance on the sake that might suit you best (if you’re not the driver, of course!). Don’t forget to make a pit stop before you get back on the road, as the bathroom is sure to soothe the weariest. – Anna
Amy’s Drive Through
Where: 58 Golf Course Dr W, Rohnert Park
amysdrivethru.com
What: With delicious breakfast, lunch, and dinner designed for those interested in conscious eating, Amy’s menu offers vegetarian and vegan spins on classic fast food as well as options such as salads and chili. Almost everything is organic, and when it’s not, they’ll make sure you know that before you order. I often go for a veggie burger with spicy sauce, fries, and a milkshake, happily knowing I’ve eaten well at this quick, inexpensive, and always-satisfying favorite. – Anna
Café Zazzle
Where: 121 Kentucky St, Petaluma
zazzlecafe.com
What: Open ‘til 9:00pm, this is one of those places where everything on the menu is so good it is hard to choose. Voted Best Restaurant in Sonoma County by two different publications, the menu is diverse. The fish tacos come blackened, with melted cheese between the two tortillas, and are topped with fresh coleslaw and a creamy chipotle sauce. Accompanied by rice and beans, this is a delicious value. The peanut sauce noodles are also great! See? It’s hard to choose. – Holly
Bel Campo Restaurant & Butcher Shop
Where: 2405 Larkspur Landing Cir, Larkspur
belcampo.com
What: Bel Campo serves up hearty, carnivore-pleasing dishes spotlighting the high quality meat they raise on their farm near Mt. Shasta. My husband usually goes for their succulent burger, while I’m partial to the bacon Caesar salad, always with a side of sweet potato fries dipped in house-made ketchup. A relaxed café vibe that’s walking the walk (and, speaking of walking, just steps from the Larkspur ferry terminal), it’s a delicious way to kick off a trip to the city. – Torrey