Page 560 – Sonoma Magazine

Social Club Restaurant announced for Petaluma

August 2012

By biteclub

UPDATED: More details on Social Club are emerging…

The Chef De Cuisine will be Bob Simontacchi, formerly of Brick and Bottle.
GM Damion Wallace will be heading up the beverage program, and says one of the restaurant’s signature drinks will include egg whites as an homage to Petaluma.

Opening is now slated for Sept. 5 and the preview menu includesstarters of Penn Cove Mussels and nectarines; “Social Plates” for sharing that include pulled pork and pork belly sliders and chicken wings; Entrees of grille dPrather Ranch flatiron steak and Petaluma fried chicken with jalapeno whipped potatoes and baked to order chocolate chunk cookies, roasted figs and chocolate Nutella cake in a cup for dessert.
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More SF players moving north: The team behind SF’s CIRCA, The Cosmopolitan and Parlor Bar plan to open The Social Club, in Petaluma this July.

Taking over the long-empty Pazzo space at 132 Keller Street, Exec Chef Steven Levine will create a rustic American menu around a wood-fired oven and grill expected to include smoked short ribs, grilled Angus hangar steak, Prather Ranch burgers and Sonoma fried chicken. Prices will range from $5 to $24. Levine garnered critical acclaim for The Cosmopolitan and was the former chef of Freestyle in Sonoma. Owners are currently looking for a chef de cuisine.

Big names attached include restaurateur Mick Suverkrubbe, designer Lauren Germia ((Blackbird, Churchill, Citizens Band), a beverage program developed by Alex Fox (Bar Tartine, Gary Danko and Myth) and GM Damion Wallace (Wexler’s, Bistro Aix, Gary Danko and Myth).

The bar menu will include 50 bottled craft beers, single malt whiskeys, scotches and bourbons, along with an affordable wine list. Outdoor fire-pits and a large patio are a key outdoor feature planned for the restaurant.

Three Squares Cafe

August 2012

By biteclub

What was once Syrah, then Petite Syrah will become Three Squares Cafe in mid-September.

Opening for breakfast, lunch and dinner daily, the forthcoming cafe is slated to serve up hearty rib-stickers including prime rib and fried chicken in the evenings; red flannel hash, omelets, Hangtown fry, huevos ranchers and matzo brei with potato latkes for brunch; oyster po boys and burgers for lunch and butterscotch pudding and pies for dessert.

But behind the griddle will be the familiar face of Executive Chef Josh Silvers, who has owned the iconic Railroad Square restaurant for more than ten years (as well as nearby Jackson’s Bar and Oven). Though the names have changed over the last few years, the soul remains the same — evolving with the times and with Silvers’ own culinary outlook as he’s shed more than 40 pounds and come to rethink the kind of food he’s eating.

Calling his new menu “wholesome comfort food”, Silvers focus is on visceral, familiar flavors rather than haute, aspirational dishes. “It’s not so cerebral. I want you to just be able to close your eyes and say, ummmmm,” he said.

For the next several weeks, Petite Syrah remains open, serving up some crowd favorites from the past. The exactly closing date for the restaurant is still up in the air, pending city permitting and signage issues, but the changeover is likely to happen within a couple days.

Stay tuned for more details.

Fabiani’s (which was Franco’s) reopening

August 2012

By biteclub

Franco’s Ristorante, which went dark earlier this year, is reopening as Fabiani’s on Saturday, August 18, 2012. The menu and vibe will be familiar — not much has changed — but the restaurant will now make better use of its outdoor patio, adding live music. “We didn’t want to chance what worked,” says new partner, Durelle Finster. “It’s like a little Mediterranean villa,” she added. They’ll host the grand opening at 3pm on Saturday with wineries Seghesio, Sunce and Kaz doing wine tastings, an hors d’oeuvres menu and radio station KRSH onsite. Dinner and music lasts until 9:30pm. The restaurant is open for lunch and dinner daily. 505 Mendocino Ave., Santa Rosa.

Backyard opening in Forestville

August 2012

By biteclub

The former Sarah’s Forestville Kitchen will reopen in October as Backyard.

At the helm: Former Ad Hoc and Peter Lowell’s chef Daniel Kedan and Seth Harvey, formerly of Petite Syrah and the Girl and the Fig. Marianna Gardenhire will be pastry chef.

The menu: “It’s all from the backyard of Sonoma County,” said Kedan, who plans to highlight local farms and producers for the California-cuisine menu. “The food is what you’d have if you came to my house for a party,” Kedan said. Having worked at Lowell Sheldon’s farm-to-table eatery for the last year, he’s familiar with many of the local producers, and has continued to hone his classic techniques. The highlight of the Forestville space is a large outdoor patio, that’s usable about eight months of the year.

Inside is a 40-seat dining room. They’re sprucing up the space and working on the menu over the next few months, but plan to serve breakfast, lunch and dinner at the restaurant.

Daniel Kedan's Antipasti at Backyard in Forestville — Kedan's Antipasti

Sugar Plum Season

August 2012

By biteclub

At their height, French prune-plum orchards covered nearly 20,000 acres of Sonoma County. Centered around Healdsburg, it was as staple crop, along with apples, walnuts and canning cherries beginning in the late 1800s (and bolstered by Luther Burbank) until the late 1970s.

Ripped out to make way for vineyards, they’re difficult to find these days, cropping up wild on farm lots and often ignored altogether. But finding that rare untended gem is something of a minor miracle, and worth seeking out.

Recently, I visited the Rincon Valley farm of Ariel and Jeff Russell from Redwood Empire Farm. They’re two of my absolute favorite farmers, with Jeff’s family working the same land for several generations. I stumbled over one of their plum trees, and took a picture, astonished by its beauty when forager/chef John Lyle pointed it out to me.

Available only a few weeks each year (and so delicate they’re almost impossible to keep for more than a few days), Redwood Empire Farm has some available this week at their farm stand, which is open Tuesday and Thursday from 3 to 6 pm and Wednesday from 10 am to 2 pm just off of Hwy 12 at 55 Middle Rincon Road, in east Santa Rosa. Or online at redwoodempirefarm.com.

(They’ve also got some incredible sweet and hot peppers and of course, tomatoes for sale right now.)

Aqus Foundry Fest

August 2012

By biteclub

Saturday, August 18

Aqus Foundry Festival is live music, food, Lagunitas beer, wine and family fun on the river. Check out Djin, The Easy Leaves from noon to 7pm at 189 H St., Petaluma. The event is a benefit for Petaluma Bounty. Aquscafe.com.

Star Party

August 2012

By biteclub

Friday, August 17, 2012

Beer, wine and stars gather at the Laguna Environmental Center as astronomical guides from Wine Country Star Party guide you through an observation of the night sky. Watch the sunset unfold over the Laguna and observe the resident barn owls and other crepuscular critters become active at dusk. Observe planets, stars, constellations, galaxies, star clusters, and nebula with powerful 10 and 12 inch reflector telescopes.

Cozy up with a cup of cocoa to share questions, stories, and awe at the mystery and beauty of the amazing universe! Ages 18 and up, maximum 20 participants.

Advanced registration required, $75.

Casting for The Big Dish

August 2012

By biteclub

Calling all home cooks! Fave food personality Clark Wolf will is casting for his new reality cooking competition show on KOFY TV. They’re looking for Bay Area cooks who want to share a family recipe and have it featured on KOFY TV as well as the possibility of being featured in top restaurant. Enter online here: kofytv.com/the-big-dish

Julia’s 100th Birthday

August 2012

By biteclub

Happy 100th Birthday Week, Julia Childs. She inspired generations to get out their whisks and dive into cooking. And continues to do so…

Since every food writer is paying homage to what she taught them this week, I figured I’d joing the fray. For me, Julia was so much more than a television chef. She was an iconic woman who used her wit, intelligence and humor to entertain, rather than relying on surface beauty to get her point across. Something that often seems missing on television. Julia never shied away from speaking plainly, making a faux pas or expressing herself as well, herself. Instead, she embraced all that life had to offer without reservation or fear of being different.

What a lady.

So enjoy Julia Remixed: Give it a sec…it gets even more spectacular as you go.

What’s your Julia memory?

PS: This is pretty great, too. Happy little trees.

Tilted Shed Ciderworks

August 2012

By biteclub

Somewhere on the banks of the Russian River is a wild, abandoned apple orchard with a treasure-trove of heirloom apples.Not that the casual passer-by would be much interested, since most of these ancient varietals — Roxbury Russet, Muscat de Bernay — aren’t all that tasty for eating. But to Scott Heath and Ellen Cavalli, they’re priceless.

The owners of Forestville’s Tilted Shed Ciderworks, a hard cider brewery, spent months searching out bittersweet cider apples planted by long-ago orchardists. Mostly forgotten in favor of sweeter Gravensteins or plowed under for vineyards, they’re part of West County’s past, brought to life again in a handful of cases of Lost Orchard Dry Cider released this fall. Without much residual sugar and a lightly tannic finish, it has more in common with sparkling wine than the treacly booze juice that passes as cider in many bar taps.

Gently carbonated and aged for six to eight months, the couple’s other hard ciders are equally intriguing: A semi-dry Gravenstein-based cider called Graviva and a forthcoming release called Smoked Cider that uses smoked apples as its base.

Still in the micro-production stage, with just 700 or so bottles in their first release, Heath and Cavalli operate their business mostly out of a neighbor’s cider press and their Forestville farm, which sits on 5.4 acres. Committed to using only heirloom cider varietals from Sonoma County, they spent this spring and summer planting their own cider orchard, expected to be in production by 2014. Until then, they seek out the few and far-between West County orchards that have a few of the heirloom cider varietals tucked away in forgotten corners. “It’s a bit of a scavenger hunt to find these scarce apples in Sonoma County,” said Cavalli.

With growing interest in craft ciders, akin to the boom of craft beers in the 1980s says Cavalli, they hope to increase interest in grafting cider apples to existing apple trees in West County and strengthening the region’s historic connection as an apple-growing region.

And the name? Well, it turns out there actually is a tilted shed on the couple’s property that inspired the moniker. The old wooden barn withstood decades of abuse, but the introduction of several sheep in a nearby pen may spell its ultimate destruction as tilt becomes something more akin to askew. It’s legacy, however, is assured on each year’s labels.

Want to get a taste? Watch for Tilted Shed to show up at some local grocers later this fall. Until then, you can order online at tiltedshed.com