There’s nothing that gets my blood pumping faster than a whiff of new restaurant about to open. And this fall, there’s plenty to be excited about. From Petaluma to Windsor, at least a dozen new spots have either recently opened or are preparing to start service before the end of the year (most sooner).

You’ll notice that quite a few are scrambling to open in Petaluma by the end of the month for the town’s popular Taste of Petaluma on the 29th (stay tuned for more on this next week)– always a great way to nosh through some of the newcomers and see if they’re worth a trip back.

But that’s hardly the full scoop. Check out all the spots I’m salivating about.

Recently opened
Vino Grigio: Former SF chef Antonio Olivia has taken over 3 Blocks Off, changing up the menu to reflect his passion for authentic Italian cooking with a Slow Food twist. Early reports give high praise to his spot-on style and obsessiveness with getting things just right, and I’m already pretty excited about this opening. Check out the grilled mushrooms (Funghi ai Ferri), roman style cracker crust pizzas, house made gnocchi and veal saltimbocca. Olivia will be serving up a version of his Ravioli Norma (a ricotta filled ravioli with eggplant and goat cheese) for Taste, which I can personally vouch for. 220 Western Ave., Petaluma, 778-8211.

Oteao: Bubble tea finally makes it to the North Bay. Plus, fresh mochi and amazing world-purveyed teas in a shop so funky, it belongs in Manhattan. Or at least SF. Don’t miss the mango bubble, with gooey little tapioca balls you suck through a straw. Also featured at Taste of Petaluma. This is a company to watch, having recently sold their kid-friendly Cuteas line to Williams Sonoma. 151 Second St., Petaluma, 707-781-0657

Jennie Lows: A new–and very purple–outpost for this Marin classic. Homestyle Chinese that’s both familiar and exotic from Asian cooking guru Jennie Low. Devotees especially love her lemon chicken, which has a tart, tangy zip. She’ll be serving up crab puffs and potstickers during Taste. C St. and 2nd, Petaluma, 707.762.6888.

On the horizon
Fregene’s Santa Rosa: Word is this favorite Petaluma pizzeria will open in late October or November in the Mission Center near Pamposh.

UPDATE Chinois: Ume owners are rumored to be putting the finishing touches on a Chinese/Pacific Rim restaurant on Windsor Town Green. Asian food guru Mei Ibach has consulted on the menu. Look for an October opening.

La Dolce Vita: September 21 is slated to be opening day for Sahar Gharai’s new wine lounge, also in Theater Square. She’ll be serving up bruschetta and olive crustini during Taste.

Stout Brothers Irish Pub: Opening has been pushed back to October for this much-anticipated spot in downtown Santa Rosa.

UPDATE Tres Hombres: 60 types of tequila, tacos and other south of the border grub in Petaluma. The spot opens with a full bar and limited menu Sept. 21, full service at the restaurant by Sept. 26.

Peter Lowell’s: Organic pizzas and vegetarian fare in Sebastopol. End of September, early October opening planned.

Stark’s Steakhouse: Word on the street is that Willi’s folks will probably be opening their fifth venture in December, despite a recent press release saying “Fall 2007”.

Blue Burgers: No word on this forthcoming burger and breakfast joint in Petaluma. But after a peek inside, things look at least a couple months out.

Cuban in Sebastopol: Still no word on a rumored Cuban joint in downtown Petaluma. Stay tuned.

Have you heard about anything opening? Suspicious signs in vacant restaurants? Let me know by emailing your tips to biteclub@pressdemo.com

A cross between your average Thompson table grape and the tart-skinned black Concord, Bronx grapes are a rare heirloom varietal worth seeking out. Available for a limited time at Whole Foods in the North Bay, they have a delicate pinkish color, and a honey sweet taste that rival the tasty Muscat.

You won’t find these grapes just anywhere, however. California’s Lagier Ranch has one of the only mother vines of these grapes, and grows them on his Northern California farm for distribution around the Bay Area. Insanely delicate, they’re almost impossible to transport, they’ve been honored by Slow Foods Arc of Taste, these are cherished grapes in danger of disappearing altogether.
Get ’em while they last.

Though there’s not much meat to this tidbit, BiteClub’s still gnawing eagerly: The long-awaited Starks Steakhouse is set to open this fall. I’d heard a bit of buzzing about things happening at the former Michele’s near Railroad Square, then found out that waitrons at Mark Stark’s other restaurant, Monti’s, were reportedly wearing “Coming Soon” shirts with the steakhouse logo. Then, last week, official word that the opening was set for the coming months.

Insiders are keeping mum on other details, like, uh…the menu, but I suppose if we’ve all had to wait this long, a few more weeks won’t kill us.

But jees, the suspense is killing me.

Starks Steakhouse, 521 Adams Street, Santa Rosa

Only in Napa could a guy spend fourteen years and countless millions building a 121,000 square-foot castle to a collective yawn.

Maybe it was the decade-plus of building. Maybe it was just another castle in a valley full of McMansions, chateaux and bombastic monuments. Maybe it was because you had to pay $15 bucks just to get past the moat.

Known by neighbors simply as Sattui Castle, the twelfth-century faux fortress dubbed Castello di Amorosa quietly opened outside of Calistoga in April 2007. But what few realized was that this was no Disney-esque facade.

With a reported price tag of more than $30 million (financed in part by owner Daryl Sattui’s populist Hwy. 29 winery) emptied his bank account employing dozens of local craftsmen to build his castle the old-fashioned way–using 850,000 bricks (many of which were imported from European ruins), stone quarried on-site, Italian terra cotta roof tiles, salvaged wooden doors and period-appropriate metal work. Inside would be a tricked-out torture chamber, labyrinthine cellars, family chapels, a great hall and crumbling towers.

Compared by some to grandeur of Hearst Castle, Castello di Amorosa is certainly a spectacle to behold. Sattui’s passion for medieval architecture demanded authenticity in the winding stone stairways, vaulted ceilings, secret underground rooms and soaring turrets. And though there have been no Rapunzel sightings yet, tour guides do admit to losing several visitors in the dungeons below. The courtyard is a mish-mash of styles, keeping with Sattui’s vision of the always-a-work-in-progress architecture of your average medieval castle. Downstairs, the torture chamber includes a spiked rack, 300-year-old iron maiden and a squirm-inducing chair called the Impaler. Even the bathrooms have carved stone sinks with spitting gargoyles as faucets (but thoroughly modern plumbing).

But beware invaders, boiling oil awaits all who lack reservations. Okay, not really, but you do have to call ahead or you may be waiting at the doors for a while. Daily tours cost $25 (including a tasting) and are by appointment only, though procrastinators can sometimes get in the same day. The well-guided tours are easily worth the extra dough, lasting about 90 minutes and taking visitors to private areas on all three levels, it’s a fun and educational romp through 800 years of history.

Greeters turn away would-be gawkers at the door, though you can pay a $10 for a walk-in tasting and glimpse some (but not much) of the castle on your own. Locals are offered half-price tastings Monday through Friday. Children ten and up are welcomed on the daily 10am tour for $15 if accompanied by an adult.

Tours conclude with a limited tasting of Sattui’s new Castello di Amorosa wines–designed to be a step up from the everyday wines available at his other Napa winery. Still in their infancy (2002 is the first vintage), the wines range from chardonnay and gewürztraminer to beefy Napa sangiovese and cabernet sauvignon. Shell out the extra $10 for a reserve tasting where you’ll experience the winery’s better bets: ’03 Il Barone Napa Reserve Cab ($75), and the ’03 Super Tuscan La Castellana Reserve ($65). Neither of these youngsters stand up to their price tags but are certainly quaffable little upstarts. Dungeon-wandering does, afterall, work up a powerful thirst.

If you go: Castello di Amorosa is located near Calistoga at 4045 North Saint Helena Hwy. For reservations, call 707.967.6272. Weekend tours tend to fill up, so you’ll want to book early. Small children aren’t recommended in the castle and may be turned away from the tours. Allow at least two hours for the complete tour and tasting, and it’s worth shelling out the extra $10 for a reserve tasting.

Take a guided photo tour

From pig’s feet and escargot to jellied bone marrow, the French have an uncanny ability to drown pretty much anything in béchamel or brown butter and make it exceptional. But what keeps eaters beating a path to Chef Philippe Jeanty’s Yountville restaurant is his elevation of rustic cuts and home-style French cooking from merely palatable to universally comforting.

A perennial vote-getter on the Chronicle’s Top 100 Bistro Jeanty is oft-lauded as Wine Country’s most authentic French country bistro. A native of Champagne and the opening chef of Domaine Chandon, Jeanty’s menu features simple dishes like rabbit terrine, Coq Au Vin, cassoulet, Sole Meuniere, steak frites, foie gras pate, fried smelt and roasted bone marrow–classics informed by a mother’s kitchen and hometown bistros. Classics that, to the consternation of some and comfort of others, remains constant. (Beef stew and cassoulet in summer? Really?)

In warm weather, the small patio is a favorite spot for sipping espresso and lingering over crepes Suzette. Inside, the restaurant is intimate and cozy, painted in a soothing tone of buttercup and plastered with vintage French adverts and Marcel Pagnol posters. Lace curtains adorn the windows and a country bicyclette sits parked outside with flowers in its basket. Calculated charmant, bien sur. Mais charmant.

Best bets on the lunch/dinner menu include the pork belly and lentils ($14), fried smelt, and Entrecote frites (a grilled rib eye steak with fries and Bearnaise sauce, $28), tomato soup in puff pastry ($8.75), and Coq au Vin ($16.50).

Daily specials supplement the menu–like a recent Sunday’s addition of bone marrow. Not the easiest dish to approach, it’s elegantly crude. High level stuff even for experienced gourmands, it amounts to gently scooping out the inside of a roasted cow femurm spreading the gelatinous goo on a crouton and moaning ecstatically. And while a silver spoon, civilized drip of Bordelaise and swig of Cotes du Rhone helps the process feel less flagrantly carnivorous, one can’t help listening cautiously for the disapproving clucks of angry vegans.

With the opening of Jeanty at Jack in SF and PJ Steak (which has since closed) fans howled (as fans often do) that consistency had begun to suffer. Along those lines, the Sole Meuniere ($18.50) was the meal’s only casualty. And while it was perfectly okay, the flavors were a bit muddy and tired. The brown butter seemed oilier and less nutty than expected. The citrus tang that I so love in this dish was only in the small bits of cut lemon I had to squeeze myself. And the capers were merely window dressing. Perhaps I should have followed the old adage about fish on Sunday and stuck with the steak.

Desserts keep the French accent with a focus on rich crème brule and delicate crepes Suzette with orange butter. For a change of pace, skip the sweet stuff and tuck into a nice slice of Epoisse (served a bit chilly for my taste, but nonetheless stinkily delightful) with candied walnuts and poached pear as you ponder post-modern existentialism and the brilliant humor of Jerry Lewis.

Bistro Jeanty, 6510 Washington Street, Yountville, 707.944.0103

Despite the construction dust, cardboard-covered floors and heady smell of fresh paint, things are cooking at the forthcoming Peter Lowell’s Café in Sebastopol. Not so much the hearth-baked pizzas or braised rapini planned for their late-September opening; not the minestrone or fresh bagels listed on the first menu; not even a hint of dandelion greens. Instead, it’s the sizzle and pop of a big idea about to be served.

Co-owned by former Seattle Chef Steven Peyer and Sebastopol native Lowell Sheldon, the back-story goes like this: Two young guys working in a Pacific Northwest restaurant start daydreaming about their own place–a place where they can express their mad passion for “produce-based” (read vegetarian with some local seafood thrown in for flexitarians) with an Italian flair.

Fast-forward three years and the two are putting the finishing touches on their 100 percent organic and sustainable café/pizzeria serving casual breakfast, lunch and dinner fare. Mission accomplished.

Tucked into a green-building community of live/work lofts still under construction (but scheduled for completion in the fall), the restaurant has a built-in audience of folks who get the whole green vibe. Which is exactly the idea. Peyer and Sheldon envision the café as something of a community kitchen where folks can stop by for coffee (Ecco, of course) and a bagel, a pizza or salad for lunch and fresh made risotto for dinner, along with a glass of biodynamic wine. (Sheldon’s father happens to be the architect of the community.)

Sound familiar? After the launch of West County Grill, Rosso and Ubuntu in fairly short order (all of which owe much to Alice Waters’ decades-old philosophies on food), the idea of gourmet pizzas, designer greens and personal relationships with producers does have that déjà vu all-over-again feel.

But Lowell and Peyer hope to differentiate themselves by, well, just being themselves–falling somewhere between earthy-crunchy and high-concept and focusing heavily on solid flavors. “Our slightly off-kilter attitude towards business -one where people, animals and the environment come before profits, where organic is a way of life and where the highest quality cuisine is a top priority–is in keeping with our community’s standards,” says their menu.

Watch for details on their opening. Meanwhile, you can peruse their website at www.peterlowells.com

This isn’t a story about Ubuntu. But it starts there, on a very hot, very sticky Napa afternoon not so long ago–in fact last Friday. The story opens with BiteClub standing a the dark, all but empty restaurant wondering…um…exactly what happened to the breakfast and lunch service scheduled to start last week.

No dice. Maybe in a few weeks, they said. Maybe not. And so go restaurant openings.

Which wouldn’t be a total tragedy but for the mouthwatering tales of fig pizza and Epoisse lavished on me by a girlfriend who’d eaten there just last night. Fig pizza. Epoisse. Say no more. “But I just kept thinking,” she lamented, “that fig pizza would have been so much better with a little prosciutto on it.”

Because, really, what isn’t? But BiteClub regrets to inform readers that–at least on the opening menu at Ubuntu–“vegetable-inspired meals-to be enjoyed by both omnivores and herbivores” translate as vegetarian/vegan. No ham. No bacon. No prosciuitto. And on that hot afternoon, no lunch.

Cursing this second strike-out at the Napa newcomer, I called in my late-afternoon safety–the one valley spot that would definitely be open, definitely be packed and almost certainly have pizza (fig or not) to console my bruised karma: Bistro Don Giovanni.

Double-parked limos and cell-phone-yacking wine barons (this is crush after all) along the sidewalk belie the fact that Don Giovanni is, in fact, a pretty casual spot. It’s Napa’s hang-out–where everyone from the mommy-tracked to the fast-tracked rub elbows and chow on house-made focaccia, strawberry lemonade, bistro burgers and rustic pastas.

Around since 1993, the restaurant (owned by Donna and Giovanni Scala) has always fallen a bit below the radar of tourists despite having amazing patios, an impressive wine list and consistently impressive Cal-Ital (heavy on the Ital) dishes like carpaccio, lamb meatballs, lemon-cream ravioli and roasted chicken. Call it a blessing, though you’ll often have to wade through locals crammed like sardines around the bar to get to your table. You’ll live.

And alas, there on the menu was my edible Holy Grail (at least for today): A wood-fired fig pizza with gorgonzola, caramelized onions and, you guessed it, prosciutto. Ciao bella. Crispy, thin, smoky and savory with fresh slices of sweet fig. All the better with a crisp glass of rose and worth every bit of $14, mi amore.

Who needs karma? Just add prosciutto.

Bistro Don Giovanni, 4110 Howard Lane, Napa, 707.224.1090.

Fire it up
Toques off to the fall crew of the Santa Rosa Junior College Culinary Café, which re-opened on Wednesday. With their every move on display in the open teaching kitchen and fishbowl bakery, the heat is on these eager chefs-to-be from day one. The debut menu includes a variety of seasonal dishes–from spiced carrot and potato soup with tomato chutney to heirloom tomatoes, veggies from their own organic farm and fresh peach pie. With the focus on hands-on experience, you may get the culinary equivalent of a fuzzy beauty school perm from time to time (please, no cantaloupe on my Pavlova). But at rock-bottom prices ($3.50 for salads and desserts, around $8.50 for entrees) it’s worth the risk to fully explore the a la carte menu. Best of all, tips help keep these young chefs in their whites. The bakery is open weekdays for coffee and fresh-made pastries. Check out front-of-the-house fixture Betsy Fischer and SRJC culinary guru Michael Salinger’s food and wine pairing experiences on selected Fridays through October--two hour sessions featuring fresh, local ingredients and three Sonoma County wines. SRJC Culinary Arts Cetner, 458 B Street, Santa Rosa. Reservations recommended (but not always necessary): 707.576.0279.

Help launch Santi’s new restaurant
Chef Dino Bugica and owner Doug Swett of Santi recently purchased the defunct Smokehouse just a few steps away from their Geyserville restaurant. With plans to open an “old World pizzeria” to accompany Santi, the crew are seeking investment from the community. If you’ve got deep pockets and a hankering for all the salumi you can eat, give them a buzz. Santi Restaurant, 707.857.1790

New Chinese
A second Jennie Low’s has opened in Theater Square serving up regional Chinese dishes from the recipe box of long-time cooking teacher, Jennie Low. The Novato outpost, opened in 1992, remains open. C St. and 2nd, Petaluma, 707.762.6888.

Ready to eat the worm?
P-town is also about to get a new tequila bar and restaurant come mid-to-late September. Tres Hombres, which has a rockin’ outpost in Chico, will feature 60 kinds of tequila along with Cal-Mex inspired food. Ole! Check out the menu.