Queenie’s Still Cooking on the Coast

by Anna Levy

It’s a joyful occasion to sit down with Roxanne Perkins, the Director of Communications for the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens, and Lynn Derrick, the Cafe Manager for Rhody’s Garden Café. It’s immediately clear that they both enjoy their work. As they talk about Rhody’s, it’s also clear that we can all get excited about spring, when the seasonal cafe opens again.

Lynn is often known by the nickname that adorned her beloved restaurant in Elk for more than 20 years: Queenie. And though Rhody’s first opened in 2013, it is only Lynn’s third season at the helm.

“By the time I got here,” she says, “there was a pretty solid menu,” one that included soups, salads, and sandwich favorites such as the Turkey Pesto and Portobello Mushroom Panini. That strong foundation was created by the previous cafe manager, Marie Head, who developed the healthy, locally sourced offerings. With a background in catering and at Cafe 1 on Fort Bragg’s Main Street, she created a fresh, simple menu with something for everyone. She retired in 2022, proud to leave behind a thriving cafe ready for its next chapter.

Lynn has made a few innovations, such as a maple curry salad dressing and a Chopped Buffalo Chicken Salad, which is, in her eyes, “one of those things you get addicted to or you don’t.” It’s always challenging to make changes to a menu that’s already well-known. At Rhody’s, there are additional limitations. “We don’t have a stove in there,” Lynn explains.“I cook soups on an induction burner. We have a toaster oven. That’s been a learning curve, but I’ve got it now.”

Lynn has focused on making the quality of the food stand out, continuing to buy local ingredients, organic when possible. For example, when Cowlick’s ice cream in downtown Fort Bragg has lines out the door, “the locals know they can come here,” she confides. The cafe also buys bread from Fort Bragg Bakery and most of their sweets from the GoodLife Cafe & Bakery. Most of the produce comes from just steps away—the Gardens’ own organic demonstration garden. Lynn works with the horticultural staff to plant certain vegetables that the cafe can use, and stresses how easy it is to taste the difference. “I mean, sometimes the lettuce is that-day fresh,” she says.

The result is a simple, resoundingly healthy menu. “One of the things that I’m pretty proud of is when Blue Zones came in to certify us,” she says, referring to the organization that helps streamline the process of making healthy choices.“They said we didn’t need to change anything.” That, Roxanne and Lynn explain, is a note of distinction.

Doing something good for the community is a throughline of our conversation. As an example, the Gardens has a long history of collaborating with the Fort Bragg Food Bank to donate extra produce. “Our highest year,” says Roxanne, “we were able to donate just under 8,000 pounds of produce.”

The Gardens also tries to make sure that Rhody’s is available to the community in a variety of ways. For instance, the cafe has become a gathering spot for groups who meet there regularly, including a writer’s group, an LGBTQ group, friends’ groups, men’s groups, and women’s groups. Anyone can visit Rhody’s, regardless of whether or not they’re getting a ticket to tour the gardens afterwards. “I have some people that work around here,” Lynn remarks, “and they’ll order something to go, they’ll walk around for 10 minutes and then come pick it up, and they just feel refreshed when they get back to work.”

There’s also a clear goal to make sure that Rhody’s—and the Gardens as a whole—are accessible to as many people as possible, regardless of physical or financial needs. Roxanne describes how they are “constantly working on improving accessibility” through details such as trails that can be used by mobility scooters, which they also have available for visitors. Moreover, the Gardens ensures that lower-income folks are able to visit, whether that’s just on occasion or through an affordable annual membership option that starts at just $10 for people who qualify.

In a similar vein, Rhody’s works to make sure that there are menu options for any kind of diner, including those who are vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free. “We put a big emphasis on gluten-free when we make soups,” Lynn says, “but you know, if you want to eat vegan or vegetarian, we have more than two options, which people appreciate.”

Currently, about 50% of their food is organic. “Vegan soup was a learning curve for me,” Lynn admits. “At first, you think, how can I make this soup without cream or without butter? And then you start making them and realizing, it tastes really good.”

To Lynn, being in a place that is welcoming is personal. After running Queenie’s for so long, she says, “I haven’t really been out in the real world in years, employment-wise. I was nervous because I’ve been fired from two jobs when I was younger for being gay. So one of the things I was nervous about was, how am I going to be accepted?” But, she continues, there was “not one issue.”

All of this reflects the experience she wants for her diners at Rhody’s. “After they come to the garden,” she says, “they feel better. They feel healthier. And if they’ve eaten a healthy meal along with it, that makes them feel even healthier.”

“I’ve been in this business all my life,” Lynn concludes. “And I feel kind of blessed after all these years of being self-employed to have ended up here.”

Rhody’s Garden Café 18220 N Highway 1, Fort Bragg (707) 964-4352 x104 | gardenbythesea.org

Open daily 10:00am–4:00pm mid-March through October

Anna Levy lives on the Mendocino Coast with her family.

Photos courtesy of Rhody’s Garden Café