Ahi tuna tostadas at Barrio Cocina at Old Possum Brewing in Santa Rosa. (Heather Irwin/Sonoma Magazine)
Chef Carlos Rosas, the owner of gourmet taqueria Barrio in Sebastopol, has taken the kitchen reins at Old Possum Brewery in Santa Rosa. But expect more than tacos here.
“This is what I truly want to be doing,” said Rosas, sitting at a table after serving up dish after dish of heartbreakingly good fare that gives him a chance to exercise his abundant culinary skills.
Starting with a simple Baby Beets salad ($11), Rosas’ talent is clear. Jewel-colored roasted beets swim in a bath of creamy Greek yogurt and goat cheese with tart Cara Cara oranges. It’s a clever take on the usual beet salad. We also love the Dos Ahi Tuna Tostadas ($13) with a generous serving of raw ahi mixed with nutty, smoky chipotle aioli and microgreens.
Dirty rice with Carnitas and grilled cheese in a verde sauce at Old Possum Brewing/Barrio in Santa Rosa. (Heather Irwin / Sonoma Magazine)
Don’t miss the Red Snapper “black” ceviche ($13) with earthy black chile, lemon and sweet potato puree; Dirty Rice ($12) topped with moist barbecue carnitas; or Fish and Chips ($12) with malt vinegar aioli. You pretty much can’t go wrong on the entire menu. Pair with Old Possum Rosita Lager.
I’m not ashamed to say that my copious “oohs” and “ahhhhs” over the food were noticed by people at neighboring tables who looked a bit embarrassed for me. Not exactly in the “When Harry Met Sally” way, but not too far off. The food is wonderful.
Old Possum Brewing is in an industrial district in Santa Rosa, but it’s fairly easy to find at 357 Sutton Place. Look for the large outdoor patio that’s perfect for sunny days. Open from 11:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday (until 4 p.m. Sunday).
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Moving On: Forestville’s Twist Eatery has been sold after nine years, according to owners Toni and Jeff Young. The couple’s last day was July 10, and they’re planning to take a break and then possibly “pop up somewhere next year,” according to Toni.
“We can’t thank you enough for your support and kindness over the last 9 years. Some of you found us early on; others have joined us over the last few years. Either way, thank you, thank you for coming along for our wild ride,” she added. No word yet on the new owners, but stay tuned.
Portrait of beautiful female gardener carrying crate with freshly harvested vegetables in farm. Young female farmer working in field.
Old MacDonald never had an Instagram account. But he had a farm. And on that farm, he had a pig and some cows and some ducks and so on. But he probably never had to post daily updates letting everyone know how his animals were doing. Or find the best light or background before taking a photo of his horse. Or pretend like everything was perfect on that farm, when maybe some days, it was really just one big, dirty, sweaty, backbreaking mess.
“I’ve been stung by bees. I’ve had sunburns. I’ve twisted my ankle in a row — but no one wants to know about that stuff. They just want to see the pretty buckets of flowers,” says Sarah Deragon, who runs Radical Family Farms in Sebastopol with her partner Leslie Wiser. A series of early Instagram posts about harvesting pea shoots, also known as the Chinese delicacy dòu miáo, helped launch the farm and connect the couple with a niche Bay Area customer base hungry for Asian heritage vegetables.
On one hand, social media can be a valuable tool for farmers looking to connect directly with consumers. But it also blurs reality. Scroll through enough heavily filtered, stylized shots on Instagram and you’ll see the idealized picture-perfect postcard of the Sonoma County farm.
“It’s often very choreographed,” says farmer Will Holloway, who recently rebranded his Blue Leg Farms as Longer Table Farm with his fiancée Gina Strathman, a florist. He’s noticed that “if you look at what does best on social media, when you look at our analytics, it’s always the stuff that has a person’s face in it.”
But beyond the face, it’s what the person is actually doing that matters, especially if they strike a familiar pose. Glam harvesting is one of the most common social media farming clichés. “There’s always the bundle of flowers or carrots with the over-the-shoulder look, with the bundle under the arm. That’s an absolute classic,” says Holloway. “It’s one we often make fun of.”
At Radical Family Farms, Deragon and Wiser try to find a balance between aspirational and educational. “I feel like that’s part of the romance of the farm — and I think we’re aware of selling that part of the dream — but I feel like it has to be a mix. It can’t all be perfect vegetables and people in floral dresses harvesting. It’s also hot and dirty work. The people I like to follow are more genuine in sharing successes and failures. But there are still those people who farm in this idealized way that people who are actually farming know is total bullshit,” says Deragon.
It’s not enough to just feed mouths anymore. Many of today’s successful farmers are constantly on display. That means that they have to do things their green-thumb predecessors never did, like looking into a camera and talking directly to clientele to cultivate Facebook and Instagram followers who aren’t satisfied with a simple CSA box subscription.
“It’s like you have to always put your best face forward or you always have to be performing,” says Melissa Lely, who runs Bee-Well Farms in Glen Ellen with her husband, Austin. She says she’s definitely felt “the pressure to present the glamorous farm and not the dirty, grungy farmer.”
She and Austin met at Chico State, where they both majored in special events and tourism. After graduation, they stumbled on farming when a family friend offered up his property. It’s probably why Melissa identifies so much with some of the struggles experienced by the newbie farmers featured in the 2018 documentary “The Biggest Little Farm.” During the pandemic, Bee-Well pivoted away from farmer’s market sales and began selling directly to a nearby farm and restaurant, something that requires less social media presence, which “to be honest, is a relief,” Lely says.
For farmers already burdened with a heavy workload, social media can feel like the last straw. “It can be a slap in the face, because farmers have so much on their plate already, just growing food, much less running a business, with payroll and insurance, and then social media on top of it — it can be a full-time job,” Holloway says.
At Flatbed Farm in Glen Ellen, owner Sofie Dolan sets a calendar alert every Friday to prompt her to post something about Saturday’s farmstand. But it doesn’t always happen. “Is it super-important to post every week? No. I don’t feel obligated,” says Dolan, who lives part time in San Francisco, where she and her husband are partners in the restaurant 25 Lusk. “But I try to do it with integrity and intention when I do it, not so much just for the sake of doing it. Because I do feel like you can definitely tell photos that are thrown out there because you feel obligated, versus photos thrown out there that are saying, ‘Let me show you what’s blooming right now’ or ‘Can anybody tell me what this is?’”
Then there are the longtime farmers who got into the business to work the land and not a desk and can get away with totally ignoring social media. When farmer Paul Wirtz and his wife, Candi, created a Facebook page for Paul’s Produce nearly a decade ago, “the typical reactions were, ‘Oh wow, I didn’t realize you guys had such big tractors’ or ‘Oh my god, look at how long the rows are.’ But I don’t know if it ever really amounted to anything,” says Wirtz, who has been farming in Sonoma Valley for more than 30 years.
As for reality versus fantasy on the farm — if perfectly polished vegetables and straw hats with turquoise cowboy boots are at one end of the spectrum, and shoveling manure is at the other, maybe chronicling more of the grit of daily life on the farm should be left to documentary filmmakers.
“That’s not something that we’ve jumped into yet, showing people what it takes and how hard it is,” Deragon says. “But does anyone really care? Do they care how hard it is or do they just want the end result?”
Ji Ma, left, Chao Dai, and their son, Philip Ma, own Asia Mart in Santa Rosa. (Christopher Chung/ The Press Democrat)
Sonoma’s family-owned international markets connect expats and immigrants to the cuisines of their homelands. The foods they carry are authentic and delicious — and absolutely worth seeking out.
El Brinquito Market
On weekend afternoons, the sight of steam rising from the grill in front of El Brinquito Market in Boyes Hot Springs is a beacon to drivers along this busy corridor of Sonoma Highway just west of downtown. For locals, the spicy grilled chicken, beans, and fresh tortillas are hard to resist.
Inside the colorful corner shop is a small grocery and a large meat counter. Marinated fresh pork and beef are prepared by artisan butcher Herlindo Torres, who has worked here for 17 years. Chips, Mexican pastries, dried chiles and spices, and pantry staples (tortillas, masa, a jumbo 32-ounce bottle of Tapatio) are mainstays, and on weekends, the store has fresh tamales, carnitas, and homemade flan — that is, if you’re lucky enough to get there before they’re sold out.
The Iñiguez family have owned the market for 20 years. Checkout clerk Esmeralda Sandoval, who also works as a custodian at nearby Sassarini Elementary, says it’s a family affair on weekends around the grill. “There will be seven or eight of the grandkids, everybody working together. You see the little kids getting the plates and wrapping up food for the customers— everybody’s included in it, and that’s really nice.”
17380 Sonoma Highway, Boyes Hot Springs, 707-996-4912.
Fresh pastries at El Brinquito Market in Boyes Hot Springs. (Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat)A picture of the Virgin of Guadalupe hangs on a back wall of the El Brinquito Market in Boyes Hot Springs. (Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat)
Asia Mart
When Analy and El Molino High School culinary students test recipes featuring Asian ingredients, they know just where to go: the Asia Mart emporium in northwest Santa Rosa. The market has been around nearly 30 years and is run by Philip Ma, who grew up helping out alongside his mother and grandmother. Ma, who worked at luxury hotels in San Francisco before returning to Santa Rosa to take over the family business, says customer service sets the store apart. “People want to cook something new, but sometimes they don’t know where to look. And they think there might be a language barrier.”
Imported snacks (basil chips from Thailand, shrimp chips from Japan) and hard-to-find cult sweets (green tea KitKats and almond Pocky) are popular, but the store also carries cooking sauces, pantry items (a dozen types of coconut milk, pickled mango and tamarind leaves, jackfruit in syrup), rice and buckwheat noodles, and frozen meat and fish. Fresh produce — long beans, mustard greens, Shanghai bok choy, and Jamaican yams — are sourced on twice-weekly trips to the San Francisco produce market. And the shop also carries bulk rice, housewares, herbal medicines, and tea.
“Definitely, the store brings people together,” says Ma. “We’re lucky to live in a diverse community.”
2481 Guerneville Road, Santa Rosa. 707-542-3513, asiamartsr.com.
European Food Store
“Every day is like travel for me, and it’s really nice to be able to explore the world through food— especially because that’s the best option we have right now,” says manager Jill Schulze of European Food Store in Santa Rosa. The bright, friendly grocery is owned by Olga Rozhkova, who arrived in Santa Rosa from Russia with her husband over 20 years ago. In Moscow, Rozhkova was a clothing designer, but after her son was born, Rozhkova realized there was no place nearby to find the foods she missed from home, and she decided to open a small store.
The shop sells prepared foods and ingredients imported from across Europe — Russian foods like caviar, pickled mushrooms and eggplant, kvass (a lightly fermented rye drink) and pelmeni (dumplings) — but also dozens of different sausages and pâtés, pasta and spaetzle, and fresh farmhouse cheeses. There are plenty of sweets too: traditional pine-cone jam from Georgia, spicy black licorice from Finland, sunflower halva from the Ukraine, and Swiss and German chocolates. And folks pop in all day long for hot piroshki (beef- or mushroom-filled pastries) and loaves of fresh-from-the-oven German rye.
It’s the connection to customers that matters most to Rozhkova, who is rebuilding after losing her family home in the Tubbs fire. “So many customers lost homes, too.
So it’s special when we can help them find something that makes them feel whole.”
One of the most anticipated openings of the year is The Matheson, Dustin Valette’s new multi-story restaurant and lounge. Slated for an August opening, the three-level building includes the Matheson restaurant on the ground level, a mezzanine overlooking the restaurant for private events and the rooftop lounge, Roof 106.
Expect very different experiences throughout the space. The ground floor restaurant will serve up refined, modern wine country cuisine along with inspired sushi as well as a full bar, a wine list with more than 400 bottles, and a state-of-the-art wine wall with 88 wines on tap, showcasing a broad range of local producers and beyond. Valette will head the kitchen, along with chef de cuisine Matt Brimer and pastry chef Skyler Spitz. The sushi bar will also feature dishes conceptualized by sushi master Ken Tominaga, executed by sushi chef Daisuke Soma.
Upstairs, Roof 106 will be a more casual indoor-outdoor setting with craft cocktails, small plates and seasonal flatbreads from the custom, 3,800-pound wood-fired Mugnaini oven.
The wheat flour for the flatbread dough is sourced from a biodynamic, organic farm and vineyard owned by winemaker, visionary farmer and baking legend Lou Preston. The dough includes a yeast from the historic “Williams Selyem strain” from Burt Williams, a famed pinot noir pioneer and personal friend of Valette. The menu was developed in partnership with Roof 106 chef de cuisine Brian Best.
Stay tuned for lots more info as the opening gets closer, but meanwhile, get a little drooly with some stellar pix of the food to come…
Catching an outdoor movie beneath the stars is a favorite summer pastime in Sonoma County. After a long pandemic year, great films are finally returning to the big screen. In downtown Santa Rosa, the Metro Chamber and Sonoma Clean Power will present “Movies on the Square” every Wednesday in July, featuring a lineup of family-friendly classics.
Kicking off the event series tonight is “The Princess Bride,” a fairy-tale adventure for all ages. Movies are free to attend and before each movie starts, visitors will be able to enjoy fun activities tailored to each film. A live fencing demonstration will warm up the crowd before “The Princess Bride.” On July 14, there will be an inflatable baseball game before a screening of the 1993 comedy “The Sandlot.” Then, on July 21, an 80s cover band will set the mood before “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” and, on July 28, giant inflatables will make moviegoers feel very small before viewing “Honey, I Shrunk the Kids!”
The Movies on the Square event series is part of Santa Rosa’s Open and Out initiative, which aims to welcome visitors back to the downtown area. Other events include live music every Thursday through Sunday from 5 to 8 p.m., various art installations, makers markets, a bartending competition on July 29 and other fun events to come.
“We’ve gotten a great response from the community,” said Cadance Hinkle Allinson, Executive Director of the Santa Rosa Downtown District, about the initiative. “We are happy to be providing a nice fun place for people to come together again.”
Moviegoers can bring their own lawn chair and blankets to Courthouse Square. Takeout food can be ordered from one of the many surrounding restaurants and the event’s main sponsor, Sonoma Clean Power, will be handing out free popcorn to moviegoers. Bayside Church will also be selling popcorn, lemonade and other refreshments.
Movies on the Square is a free event series. Parking is also free after 5 p.m. in all city garages. Music will kick off the event around 5:30 p.m., followed by the pre-movie activities at 6:30 p.m. The film begins at sunset.
If walls could talk, Napa’s Milliken Creek Inn would have fascinating stories to tell.
Tucked along a bank of the Napa River, the main house of the inn served as a stagecoach stop in the 1850s, welcoming weary travelers during the California Gold Rush. Then, at the turn of the century, horticulturist Ira McKenzie took up residence at the property and planted Japanese maples, live oaks, magnolias and other trees that still remain on the three-acre grounds. This summer, Milliken Creek Inn is adding yet another chapter to its rich history as it unveils a sophisticated redesign that makes the modern traveler feel as though they’ve struck gold.
The new lobby, furnished with sofas and armchairs and adorned with green plants and blooming orchids, feels more like a friend’s home than the entrance of an inn or hotel. The front desk — a small counter — is tucked away behind a set of French doors, and guests can enjoy some complimentary fruit cordial upon arrival. Shady paths, flanked by redwoods, bamboo, Japanese maples and magnolia trees, then lead the way to the guest rooms. The verdant surroundings inspired the inn’s redesign, and the exteriors’ neutral, earthy hues combine with natural light to create a peaceful environment in which to sit back and relax in an Adirondack chair by a bubbling fountain or a fire pit.
Napa’s Milliken Creek Inn. (Courtesy of Milliken Creek Inn)Cedar guestroom at Milliken Creek Inn. (Courtesy of Milliken Creek Inn)
The eleven guest rooms at Milliken Creek Inn have been updated with modern decor and soothing color schemes, and each room has its own configuration; many have river views, decks or patios, soaking tubs and fireplaces. Four rooms now come with their own fire pit, which ignites with the turn of a dial. S’mores kits are available in each room, next to the Nespresso machine. After a day of wine tasting, guests can sink into comfortable beds, watch a movie on Apple TV, and read a magazine or order in-room dining on an iPad.
There is no restaurant on the property but guests receive a breakfast spread every morning, which can be enjoyed at one of the inn’s secluded outdoor spaces or in the room. Breakfast options include a mushroom, spinach and feta frittata; breakfast sandwiches with eggs, bacon and cheese on an English muffin or croissant; a Belgian waffle; steel cut oatmeal; and yogurt with house-made granola. Freshly squeezed orange juice, coffee and tea is also included.
Before the pandemic, the inn hosted a nightly wine and cheese reception with a local vintner. Now, guests receive a cheese plate and fresh-baked cookies that can be enjoyed with a glass of wine on the property. The pandemic also has changed the check-in process. Before arrival, guests receive an email that walks them through the process: keycards will be waiting as they arrive at the property, but guests can also access their rooms by using their own cellphones. Guests can now communicate with staff through text messages and, once it’s time to check out, this can also be done via text.
Click through the above gallery for a peek at the redesigned Milliken Creek Inn, part of the Four Sisters Inns collection.
1815 Silverado Trail, Napa,707-255-1197, millikencreekinn.com. Rates start at $495.
Dos Tacos with two yellow tortillas, your choice of meat, topped with chipotle aioli, pico de gallo, arugula and micro greens from Barrio Fresca Cocina Mexicana in Sebastopol’s The Barlow. (Photo by John Burgess/The Press Democrat)
What goes best with a cold Sonoma-brewed beer? Baby beets with goat cheese is not out of the question. Fish and chips? Yes, please. But a carne asada taco and a brew are truly the Donny and Marie of pairing in our book. A little bit country, a little bit rock ’n’ roll and a lot delish. That’s why we’re so excited about the matchup between Old Possum brewery and the Barrio, an elevated taqueria at Sebastopol’s Barlow.
Barrio will serve ridiculously tasty food at the brewery (357 Sutton Place, Santa Rosa) that includes harissa potatoes, baby beets with goat cheese, ahi tuna tostadas, red snapper ceviche, rice with barbecue carnitas and a host of other tasty nibbles.
Torta el Chavo served on torpedo bread with pork belly, chipotle aioli, pico de gallo and arugula from Barrio Fresca Cocina Mexicana in Sebastopol’s The Barlow. (John Burgess / The Press Democrat)Pouring beer at Old Possum Brewing Company in Santa Rosa. (John Burgess/The Press Democrat)
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Before you huff at slow service, let me share a recent interview with Lucas Martin of K&L Bistro in Sebastopol.
Though most of us have heard about the struggle for staff in the hospitality industry, the reality is far worse. Martin has had to close — often unexpectedly — on nights when a staff member fails to show up.
“It’s collateral damage from COVID. At least one day a week someone calls in sick. They’ve got daycare issues because the kids are at home,” he said. Before the pandemic, K&L had a roster of nearly 35 employees, both part- and full-time. Now they’re working with five, including Martin and his wife, Karen.
“I could hire a bunch of kids on summer break, but we need people who can multitask,” he said. After years of building a brand, sloppy service is worse than closing. “It’s a coin toss, but that’s our philosophy,” he said. “But it’s never going to be the exact same place it was, because it’s just not the same world we live in.”
Part of his plan going forward is to re-evaluate his business, at least when he figures out what the “new normal” is. Clearly it won’t be 35 employees, he said.
“I just don’t know if that will be a financial possibility for the future,” Martin said.
Nigiri plate at Sushirosa in Santa Rosa. (Heather Irwin/Sonoma Magazine)
Robot replaces Guy Fieri. OK, sort of. But hey, robot!
At the former Tex Wasabi’s in downtown Santa Rosa, Flavortown’s Mayor Guy Fieri has left the building and he’s been replaced by a sushibot.
That’s the extra set of hands, er, chargable wait-tron, helping out at the new Sushi Rosa restaurant on Fourth Street. Excuse us for the childish glee in getting a plate of nigiri deftly rolled to us from the sushi bar by a friendly roving robot that guides itself right to our table. Plus, in a time of staffing difficulties, a robot isn’t a bad way for an extra hand, er, chargeable wait-tron, to help out.
The sushi is solid, if not Hana-Japanese level. What we love is the menu with page after page of rolls and nigiri, including a vegetarian “nigiri” plate as well as more traditional dishes like dried squid with vegetables (ika sansai), Japanese pickles (tsukemono), a whole mackerel with fried bone and pickled vegetable maki. Entrees like chicken teriyaki, pork with katsu sauce and udon are also available, as well as a small sake menu.
Plus, there’s the robot. Cute! (Kawaii!) Sushi Rosa is open 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday and 5-9 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. 515 Fourth St., Santa Rosa, sushirosa.com
Not since celebrity bombshell Jayne Mansfield’s 1960 visit to the Flamingo Resort in Santa Rosa has there been so much buzz about the iconic midcentury modern hotel.
With a refreshed look and a spanking-new restaurant as hipster-slick as a pompadour with a mid-fade, it’s finally ready for prime-time lounging, people watching and, of course, eating. Possibly all three if you’re lucky.
Headed by Santa Rosa-based Point Group (who also did the Sandman hotel in Santa Rosa), the Flamingo makes us feel like we finally have a true destination resort for the under-60 crowd.
The public and private parts of the hotel are now clearly distinguishable, with the entrance’s move to the side of the resort and soaring windows framing a revamped pool area and restaurant with lanai seating at the new Lazeaway Club.
Trio of cocktails at Lazeaway Club. (Courtesy of Flamingo Resort)
Veer to the left, then through the lobby/lounge to what used to be the old restaurant entrance. Though not much seems to have changed inside, outside on the patio you’ll feel like your’re on a mini journey to Palm Beach. Comfy chairs and loungers are the top choice if you want that laid-back experience, but four-top tables are perfectly lovely, too.
The pool area is bounded by clear glass panels, keeping dripping-wet kids from traipsing through the dining room and restaurant guests from taking up residence in the luxurious lounge chairs around the pool. It’s a fair exchange. It also makes for remarkably entertaining viewing from your dinner table as tots cannonball into the pool with nary a drop hitting you.
The restaurant had all but fallen off the map before the pandemic, though Chef Annie Hongkham did a great job with Wild Bird, a fried chicken takeout option during the pandemic. Now it’s re-envisioned through renovations made in collaboration with restaurateurs Anderson Pugash and Benson Wang of Palm House Hospitality, founders of Palm House and The Dorian, in San Francisco. Chef Sergio Morales, formerly of Sam’s Social Club in Calistoga, now leads the kitchen, serving up tropically inspired food with a strong California connection.
Though the restaurant is still getting up to speed with staffing and consistency, the food is certainly buzz-worthy, and several of our first-look dishes were impressive winners. The cocktail list is extensive, with plenty of tiki tipplers and slushy sips for hot days.
Overall, it’s a wildly fun culinary vacation by the pool with fresh, well-prepared island-inspired dishes that aren’t overly complicated, but perfectly enjoyable. Plan to grab a rum drink and stay awhile. Caftans encouraged.
Smashburger at the Lazeaway Cafe at the Flamingo Resort. (Courtesy of Flamingo Resort)Spring onion pancakes with dips at the Lazeaway Cafe at the Flamingo Resort. (Heather Irwin / Sonoma Magazine)
Outstanding dishes
Scallion Pancake with Trio of Dips, $14: A high point on the menu where everything just works in snacky perfection. Crisp scallion pancakes with homemade avocado sesame, soy chili and pimento kim-cheese (kimchee cheese!). We fought over this one.
Shaking Steak Frites, $36: Excellent grass-fed beef cooked medium-rare with a piquant soy lime sauce is a great pick. The cost of beef is skyrocketing everywhere, so I don’t begrudge the price. The twice-baked Texas fries were especially good dipped in the leftover sauce.
Chocolate Lava Cake with Caramelized Pineapple, $8: A lovely dish for sharing. I’m not usually a chocolate super fan, but the sweet pineapple was an excellent foil.
Quite good
Coconut Green Curry, $21: Fresh, tasty and well-made with crispy tofu and makrut lime leaf. Seasonal vegetables make this a lovely vegetarian dish. But charging $3 for steamed rice on the side seems a bit excessive.
Lazeaway Smash Burger, $12: Two griddled patties of grass-fed beef with American cheeses, shredded lettuce, Korean chile barbeque sauce and a milk bun. Nicely done.
Ahi Tuna Poke, $18: The flavor of this dish, with tart ponzu sauce, macadamia nuts, pea shoots and nori, was spot-on. What weirded us out a little was the color of the fish, a dull pink that lacked the bright jewel-red color we’d like to see from sushi-grade ahi. Flavor-wise, it wasn’t problematic, though. Maybe an off day from the seafood market?
Lazeaway Club at the Flamingo Resort is open starting at 5 p.m. for dinner, Wednesday through Sunday. Extended hours coming in mid-July. 2777 Fourth St., Santa Rosa, flamingoresort.com
Table Culture Provisions owner/chefs Stéphane Saint Louis, left, and Steven Vargas. (John Burgess/For Sonoma Magazine)
Executive chef Armando G. Navarro of Sonoma’s El Dorado Kitchen will never forget the moment three decades ago when he applied for one of his first restaurant jobs. He was working his way through a top Bay Area culinary school when he and a classmate applied to a Napa Valley restaurant they’d heard was hiring.
“I went in first and they said, ‘No, we don’t need people. We’re not hiring.’ And then my friend from the same classroom went the next day, and they hired him,” says Navarro.
At the time, he was frustrated and confused. Looking back, he believes he knows exactly what was goingon: Navarro, who grew up in Mexico, was brown, and his friend was “a white boy from Wisconsin.”
Chef Armando Navarro makes a Duck Confit and Foie Gras Terrine at the El Dorado Kitchen in Sonoma.
It’s no secret that the restaurant industry can be a toxic soup behind the scenes — something most diners never see.
Over the past year, calls to correct biased hiring practices, harassment, and unequal pay have grown more urgent.
Inequities once ignored are now being magnified — and the fallout has prompted a sea change across the industry.
The needs are clear. Last year, a Michelin Guide survey of its more than 1,500 recommended restaurants throughout North America found that just a fraction of Michelin-recommended restaurants boast a person of color as the head or executive chef. When the selections are narrowed down to restaurants that are owned by people of color, the figures drop even further. And a joint study by UC Berkeley and the nonprofit Restaurant Opportunities Centers United found widespread economic and racial segregation between front of the house servers and bartenders and back of the house kitchen workers in Bay Area restaurants.
But here in Sonoma County, a new wave of young chefs of color are at the forefront of a paradigm shift that aims to create a more enlightened and forward-thinking kitchen environment. Here, young, highly trained chefs are striking out on their own to open new establishments, while also working to increase equity in local fine-dining kitchens and advocating for better pay.
Chef Jevon Martin of Street Social with longtime partner Marjorie Pier, who also manages the restaurant. (John Burgess / The Press Democrat)
“Sometimes when you’re doing what you love and you’re paying your dues, you allow things to happen that should not happen,” says chef Jevon Martin, a graduate of Le Cordon Bleu and co-owner of Street Social in Petaluma. “The culture of the restaurant industry is abusive for everyone. You go into it thinking, well, everyone is getting abused. So when things happen, you go, ‘Is that because I’m Black?’” Martin says the answer too often was, yes.
So if there’s a glass ceiling in Sonoma County, where many executive chef positions at fine-dining institutions are held by white men, sometimes the best way to change the game is to open your own restaurant. That’s what Martin did at Street Social, and that’s what fellow chefs Stéphane Saint Louis and Steven Vargas made happen when they launched Table Culture Provisions last year, also in Petaluma.
“For us, it’s really a melting pot. Everybody simmers at the same level,” Saint Louis says. “It is very important, now that we’re in charge, that we create a space where everyone has a voice, and everyone is treated equally.”
“And with respect,” Vargas adds.
Born in Haiti, Saint Louis has cooked all over the world, from Shanghai to Copenhagen, and more recently at Della Fattoria and The Shuckery in Petaluma. He’ll never forget a weekly recap session with a French culinary school instructor who years ago told him, “If I’m harsh, it’s not because you’re Black.” Reflecting back, Saint Louis says, “For me, that immediately triggered, ‘What? Is it not, though?’ Because now you have that in my head, I’m thinking, ‘Why would you even say that if it wasn’t the case?’”
Stephane Saint Louis, chef/owner of Table Culture Provisions in Petaluma. (Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat)Steven Vargas, chef/owner of Table Culture Provisions in Petaluma. (Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat)
Bridging gaps in pay is at the top of the list for many in the restaurant industry.
“I would love to see all women in the kitchen get paid as much as the men,” says Yemi Salgado, a rising star at the Farmhouse Inn and part-time server at Hotel Healdsburg. “Men don’t want to be seen as equal with a short little brown girl that’s 5-foot-2.”
A few years back, Salgado, a single mom, discovered that in one of her roles, a male peer who had been on the job less than a year was making more money than she was. “He told me, ‘I should clock out first, because I get paid more than you,’” she remembers. “To have the audacity
to say that, it was enraging.”
Chef Yemi Salgado of the Farmhouse Inn restaurant near Forestville. (Christopher Chung / The Press Democrat)
In addition to the pay gap between men and women, there’s also a divide between what is earned by servers in the front of the house and kitchen workers in less customer-facing roles. At Terrapin Creek Cafe in Bodega Bay, chef/owner Andrew Truong won’t allow his servers to count their tips in front of the kitchen crew at the end of the night.
“This whole discrepancy between the front of the house and the back of the house has been so ingrained in the industry for so long, that I, as an owner, find it hard to get out of it,” says Truong, who grew up outside Atlanta, Georgia, where his parents owned a Chinese restaurant.
Truong says he is currently exploring three options to lower the pay gap: creating a new system where his servers tip out at least 5% to the kitchen, waiting tables himself (something he did while working his way through culinary school) and giving his tips to the kitchen staff, or having his cooks personally deliver plates to guests, which would entitle them to tips as a result.
Terrapin Creek Cafe chef/owners Liya Lin and Andrew Truong.
At Michelin-starred SingleThread in Healdsburg, management adopted a new pay model last summer that included the culinary staff in the tip pool, says sous-chef Andrew Hori.
When he found out he would be getting a percentage of nightly gratuities, “It was a nice surprise, because I’ve never experienced that before,” says junior sous-chef Osmel Gonzalez, who grew up in Havana, Cuba, making sandwiches and pastries that his parents sold from a small cafeteria on their back patio. When Gonzalez first started cooking in Miami restaurants, he was shocked to learn servers working directly with guests could take home thousands of dollars in a single night, while he was working 15 hours a day in the kitchen and “burning my hands” for $14 an hour.
“I think if more restaurants were to do the same [with sharing gratuities], it would be a game changer in terms of culinary staff getting paid a living wage,” says Hori, who got into the restaurant business after working for the nonprofit World Central Kitchen, which provides meals to victims of natural disasters around the world.
At SingleThread, an interesting thing happened once everyone began sharing in tips, Hori says. No servers left in retaliation. No guests objected. And the culinary staff was able to log fewer hours and make more money.
“Everybody was on board with it and realized this has always been a ridiculous thing in our industry. It was a situation where everyone wins.” SingleThread executive chef and owner Kyle Connaughton took it a step further, sharing details with staff about how exactly the new model would work for the restaurant. “It was important to him to have financial discussions with every cook,” Hori says. “Not just to tell them, ‘This is how much you’ll be making.’ But that maybe if you open your own restaurant one day, and you want to institute this model, this is exactly how you do it.”
Supporting Chefs of Color in Sonoma County
These five fine-dining restaurants are owned or run by chefs of color. And fortunately for us, there are many more examples — both at high-end, special-occasion spots and among our favorite neighborhood weeknight destinations.
