In the meantime, some things to be thankful for: Smart friends full of ideas; great and talented partners, smooth working relationships, and a business lithe enough to turn on a dime; a genius husband of 23 years who supports you in all you do. Happy launch day to all!

UPDATE: OC register finally has some real coverage up. See it here.

Headed back to the video wall to sweat Indiana, which at this writing is too close to call according to MSNBC. Below, my polling place. And be sure to click here to see Val’s cool voting pix.

An ethereal, gently warm fall day. Leaving the famous vine-lands of Sonoma under sunny skies, rolling north and into the NorCal leg of the trip, we headed for Ukiah on a chowhound tip. We were looking for The Sagely City of Ten Thousand Buddhas — a Chinese Buddhist monastery — and its Jyung Kang (To Your Health) Restaurant. The monastery was founded by Venerable Master Hsuan Hua, a prolific founder of Buddhist institutions and the teacher of the Six Great Guidelines: not contending, not being greedy, not seeking, not being selfish, not pursuing personal profit, and not lying. The restaurant is of course entirely vegetarian; its emphasis is on “the love of fresh organic ingredients and the well being of all living beings.” They use no MSG, onions, garlic, chives, scallions, leeks or eggs. Still, we’ve heard their food praised for its flavor and the savory deliciousness of their tofu and gluten dishes.

The monastery is not a tourist attraction, but a quiet, contemplative working religious community and school. All visitors are asked to sign in at the visitors center, where we parked, signed in and set out across the campus to the restaurant. A peacock wandered by and as we walked along, passing the Instilling Goodness School, we were struck by the stately institutional architecture of the many buildings on the large park-like compound. It seemed late 19th/early 20th century, with Arts and Crafts dignity, and it spoke of a previous purpose for campus. Later, we were to learn what this was.

But on our visit that morning, we walked through the peaceful campus and by the great hall adorned with fantastic and gigantic painted figures, heavenly kings shod with curling slippers, surrounded by curling clouds in the Chinese style. Monks and students were gathering at the hall for midday devotions. We passed one small procession, lead by a bell ringer and accompanied by chanting students. Up the path an older nun walked with a younger companion who shaded the elder woman’s shaved head with a parasol. They talked softly. A school girl tagged alongside.

The small restaurant is in a pleasant but plain lunchroom with large windows. It reminded me of a classroom from my country grammar school in Ohio. When we arrived, a large three-generation Asian family was sharing a feast at a table in the middle of the room; the food looked great and the smells were enticing.

We sat near an open window and made our selections from a large menu filled with unfamiliar dishes, but thankfully, with many pictures. The friendly woman who took our order suggested the stir fried broccoli and house special fried rice, to which we added Vegetable Dumplings, Hot and Sour Soup, Seaweed Soup, Golden Balls with Ginger (savory fried gluten balls). Now, I thought the broccoli and fried rice might not be the most exotic things I could try, but she was so friendly, and so sure we would like them, that it only seemed polite to accept.

And, they were so good, the distinct flavor of each ingredient still fresh tasting, bright. The big bowls of soups were tangy. The seaweed soup tasting of the ocean. The hot and sour broth was light and complex with tender mushrooms and a delicate bean curd mesh. The dumplings were tender with a yummy mixed veg filling. And the Golden Balls were golden! These were little balls of salty savory wheat gluten fried and served with thinly shredded ginger. Nice texture, not too chewy. Very snacky. Very easy to pop one after another.

All this was served to us in giant portions, easy enough to feed four off any one plate and two on our “small” soup orders. So we feasted and packed up plenty of leftovers for dinner. $32 dollars for two meals of impeccably fresh, local and lovingly prepared food. Perfect.

On our way back to the car, the doors to the great hall were open to let in the day and we stood with our backs against an outside wall to listen to the resonant chanting, and then we peeked into a side hall filled with hundreds of golden and gilt porcelain Buddhas smiling serenely into the quiet. We visited the bookstore and then headed out the Mountain Gate, north for the great redwood forest.

As I drove for the Humboldt woods, Val iPhoned up the history of the 400+ acre campus and found that it was once a State Hospital, opened as the Mendocino Asylum for the Insane in the 1890s. Many buildings were being added to the site through the 1930s. The hospital was closed in the 1970s during a drought which made its further operation impossible. Venerable Master Hua purchased the property in the late 70s and used his “wisdom eye” to find a well that now feeds the whole complex.

In two hours we made the Humbolt Redwoods State Park. Humbolt is the home of one of the Great American Car Touring Roads, Highway 254, The Avenue of the Giants. The road leaves the busy 101 and winds gently through the spectacular redwood forest. It is lined with turnouts and parking areas, where visitors can just pull off, hop out of the car and in a few short steps be in a quiet grove of ancient and enormous trees, shaded by the high canopy, walking on trails carpeted with fallen needles and lined with sorrel and fern. So idyllic, you expect the fairies or your spirit guide or the leprechauns to show up and take you on some sylvan adventure. There are also the roadside attractions, like artifacts of vacations gone by: the tree you can drive through, the chimney tree, the house made of one tree, the eternal tree.

We took the Avenue and rolled along at 40 mph, stopping at this grove or that, as the day wore on. There’s no explaining the feeling of being in the presence of these trees; their scale throws off your perception, giving you an off-kilter other-worldly feeling. Each curve of the road reveals a wowing view and and you drive through the forest open mouthed. We pull off mid-afternoon and walk a trail down to the stony bank of the Eel River. We sat on the stones, shared big bites of Healdsburg Farmers Market marionberry pie and watched the river roll silently by. Birds fussed from the trees towering over far side of the river. Tiny fish darted in the shallows at our feet.

Then it was back up the trail that winds under fallen giants and through verdant underbrush to the car. Back onto the road. It was almost twilight when we got to the Founders Grove, a most spectacular and easily accessible old-growth grove that has been a preserve since the 1920s. It is the home of the Dyerville Giant. One of the forest’s largest trees, it was more than 370 feet tall — that’s 30 stories or as tall as Niagara Falls — and 1600 years old when it fell in 1991. It is more than 50 feet in circumference. A burl on the fallen tree is expected to sprout new growth, in keeping with the species name: Sequoia Sempervirens, or ever living.

Walking through the grove — alone, in the late of the day — was like being in the nave of a great cathedral with soaring ceilings, sacred perfumes, dappled lighting, velvet quiet. And when the sun was getting low and we knew we could linger no longer, we headed back to the car and walked up on a doe and her two fawns grazing on sorrel and stepping silently through the sword fern. We stood still, breathing quietly and watched the little family until they moved off into the deeper woods. Then we walked quietly back to the car.

^ On the Eel River trail

^ In Founders Grove

^ With the Dyerville Giant

^ Fallen trees become home to thousands of species

^ A fawn in Founders Grove

We stopped for the night at Rio Del at the very humble, but perfectly fine, Humboldt Gables Motel. We got there just before the fog started to roll into the spaces between the hills. There in our little room, we laid out a left over supper of our Jyung Kang food and our salads from Bangkok Cuisine in Berkeley. Then we cuddled up in the cool night to dream our woodland dreams.

Motelling Sidebar: We love the old 50s motels, but they share one problem: tissue thin walls. At the Humboldt Gables, the German guy in the room next to ours was snoring an aria from the Gotterdammerung and it sounded like his head was on the pillow next to mine. A 21st century solution: my iPhone app, Ambiance that lets you select from a menu of sounds to drown out noise in your environment. To counteract a German tourist snore, I found rain on a tin roof to be perfect. Soon I dropped off and was probably snoring the harmony like a Rhine maiden.

^ Humboldt Gables Motel, Rio Del CA Click here for a map of this day’s locations.

Last month, while we waited for the skies to clear over Hollister so we could go up for our breathtaking glide, we drove up the road to see what was on offer at the locally famous Casa de Fruta. The Casa is a fruit stand/roadside attraction on steroids with an overwhelming amount of stuff. The whole place was hung with new garlic braids. A new braid was on our shopping list for in this area — which is famous for its garlic production — and, the price was right, so we found a nice one and checked out.

We put the braid in the back of the truck and headed off to soar through the now-clearing skies. But when we got back to the car after our glide, the heavy garlic smell hit us as soon as we opened the door. Whoa! Val wrapped the braid in two plastic bags, put the package in a brown paper bag and then tucked it deep into the kitchen stuff in the very back of the Element.

A short time later, we were on our way to Berkeley and I had to roll down my window for some fresh air. Pew! Afraid to leave it to embed its essence into the car, we took the braid into our room at the Berkeley Rodeway Inn. We stored it in the little alcove off the bathroom and we opened our window onto the courtyard. But as I reclined in bed, blogging our day, I could still smell the garlic and it was starting to get to me. Finally, I’d had it. I took the garlic out to the parking lot and put it under the front wheel of the car, where, Val pointed out, it looked like a suspicious package. A stink bomb, I said. By then, I was crabby about it — I don’t care what happens to it, I just can’t stand to smell it anymore, I said. Let some fool steal it, then it will be his stinky karmic problem. Val said he thought it would be better if he bungeed it to the roof of the car, which he did.

Back in bed, I was thinking I didn’t like the way the weird little package called attention to the car. I knew I couldn’t breathe its perfume for another two weeks. We have to get rid of it, I told Val. Cut our losses. We couldn’t mail it to ourselves, because our mail was on hold at the post office for three more weeks and you can get yourself in trouble by stinking up government workplaces. Then it came to me: we’d mail it to Laurie with instructions to hang it in one of her out-buildings, where its scent would not offend. And let me just say: you know you have a good friend when you can mail your stinky problems to them. (Thanks, Laur, you’re the best!)

So the next day, with great relief, I slid the braid into a Priority Mail box and handed the stink to the USPS. What a free feeling! In a couple of days, Laurie reported the package’s receipt and the braid is now hung safely in her garage, where the dogs give it an occasional curious sniff, but human noses remain unassailed. This weekend the braid will finally come home to Covina. It will be stored in our garage, where we hope it will mellow, or at very least, inhibit termite colonization.

At Quivera we purchased a drinkable and robust organic Zinfandel which we paired with creamy, delicately goaty and yummy Cowgirl Creamery chevre, the last kitchen garden tomato, olives and radishes.

^ Quivera Winery

Then it was back to Locals for their delightful vertical tastings, where we enjoyed Zinfandels from four different wineries tasted side by side — and four Pinots and three Sangioveses. What a great way to taste wine! It’s not about finding the best, but about using one to taste the other, to make comparisons, to find our what you like and to find the wines that fit you. That kind of tasting opportunity is not to be had at an individual winery’s tasting rooms. We bought several bottles from Portalupi, Dark Horse and Ramazotti wineries.

And Carolyn Lewis, the Locals owner who was pouring for us, took a look at a my biz card and a few of my paintings on the iphone and invited me to see her nice new gallery space up the block. She’s interested in the work and wants me to keep in touch — if I ever build up some inventory! A very unexpected and very nice turn in the day.

Then we were off to the Healdsburg Farmers Market for some dinner ingredients — Val found garden fresh long green beans and he suggested a big dinner salad of beans, potatoes, eggs, tomatoes, arugula — a take on a purslane salad we’ve been eating based on a recipe from our favorite Cretan cookbook. We picked up the ingredients. Plus, for Val, some smoked black cod that the fisherman-vendor said was “caught in 600 feet of water, 30 miles out in the Pacific” and smoked by the fishermen themselves. And of course, some pie — marionberry.

We headed out Sweetwater Springs Rd. — one of the trip’s most twisty and beautiful roads — in the low afternoon sun, to the Armstrong Redwoods State Natural Reserve, where we cooked dinner in a grove of soaring redwoods. Beautiful. Quiet broken by the tapping work of woodpeckers. Val made his delicious egg and potato salad and served it up with smoked fish, luscious figs, Quivera Zin — all in a truly grand dining room.

As the light faded and I washed the dishes, bats fluttered overhead feasting on sunset insects. They were so high up, they looked like butterflies. We headed back to the hotel via the easier River Road drive, just as night really took hold.

^ Our redwoods dinner

^ Val at Dinner

^ Clean up in the redwoods

Click here for a map of our Sonoma locations.

After the great tasting, a few purchases, a birdseye view of the bottling floor and a turn around the brewer’s neat little museum of traditional sake making tools and techniques, we were hungry for sushi, but by then it was coming up on 2 pm, the dreaded sushi restaurant deadzone. So we headed to the Berkeley Imperial Tea Court where we split a bowl of hand-pulled noodles and some dumplings. We didn’t want to eat too much because we had early dinner reservations at the wonderful Chez Panisse Cafe. So we nursed our leafy oolong teas, refilling our gaiwan and sipping the tea slowly from the cup while holding back the tea leaves with the lids. Then it was back out into the warm fall day to the Rodeway Inn to shower and dress for dinner.

^ Sho Chiku Bai being bottled

^Beautiful equipment at the Takara Sake Museum

^ Kate at the Imperial Tea Court

It was exciting to go to Chez Panisse — a restaurant famous for its commitment to fresh, local, organic and sustainably grown ingredients prepared with beautiful simplicity. And the nice, but easy, bistro atmosphere of the upstairs cafe really fit with the rhythm of the trip. The haute experience of Aubergine in Carmel had been a sort of fabulous gustatory marathon with white glove service — so filling that we tread that line between bliss and pain — so we vowed to take it a little easier for the rest of the trip. So, the cafe was a better fit for us than the more formal restaurant downstairs: three courses of our own choice was the way to go for us.

^ Chez Panisse and Val’s beautiful sardine appetizer

We arrived at 6 pm and were taken directly through the handsome craftsman restaurant to a perfect little corner table next to an open door with a beaded curtain. “It is nice to enjoy the breeze as the sun goes down,” said the maitre d’. And it was. The service in the busy room was attentive, snappy. The aromas coming from the open kitchen were enticing. It was fun to have a glass of Cava and pore over the menu, discussing ingredients, preparation, and just breathing in the terrific smells.

In the end, Val got an appetizer of the ingredient of the moment, Monterey Bay sardines, and I got gently baked chevre and salad of greens. For entrees: Val had a pan-roasted quail with fig and pea pods and I had the nettle and pecorino pizza. We shared dessert of lime sorbet, coconut tapioca pearls and fresh strawberries. Everything lived up to our highest hopes — freshness perfected by skill, served with graciousness and professionalism — a true pleasure.

If there was one tiny minus, it was that my pizza was big enough to feed two, too much for me. A neat plus: when I told the waiter I had to switch to a non-alcoholic beverage (I had to drive later) he suggested an interesting Gewerztraminer grape juice that was almost as complex as wine and went very well with the pizza.

A cup of coffee after dinner was my fuel for the drive 90 minute drive to Healdsburg, our base for exploring the world famous wine regions of the Dry Creek and Russian River Valleys. We arrived at 10:30 pm at the Blah Best Western and settled in for our two day stay.

Pasolivo Olive Oil Tasting Room, Paso Robles: We drove out Vineyard Drive, another nice Paso country road, to the beautiful, peaceful and welcoming Willow Creek Olive Ranch and the Pasolivo tasting room. There Jolie Yaguda, a member of the oil-making family, continued our oil-tasting education — even giving me a cool tasting chart and pouring our oil into special oil tasting glasses called assaggiaolio instead of little plastic cups. With charmed timing we arrived between groups of visitors, so we had Jolie all to ourselves and had an unhurried conversation about oil, food and Paso Robles. We got a tour of the press and although they won’t be harvesting (all hand-picked) and crushing until around Thanksgiving time, it was interesting and fun to see the machines and find out how they do things. We picked up some of their award-winning oil and some cool olive-based products — surprising and yummy olive jam and some tapenade.

^ Jolie walked us through a great tasting at Paosolivo

The sign in the front yard said TOMATOES, so we pulled into the drive. We were greeted by a friendly aproned lady who let us choose red round tomatoes from the heaping basket she was about to can. Sun-warmed and sweet, paired with shavings of Piave Vecchio cheese, they were the basis for our picnic lunch at the pier William Randolf Hearst built to accommodate the shiploads of stuff he needed to build and adorn his castle on the hill. Now it’s a state park where the peasants can have a good picnic lunch. Lucky peasants!

^ Lucky peasant lunch on the dash of the Element at Hearst State Beach.

Loving the motels. We really liked the Adelaide Inn of Paso Robles ($85/night). A super-clean and completely redecorated old-school motor court with a friendly staff, pool, hot tub, koi pond, laundry and cookout area. All carefully landscaped with a slightly kitschy charm. No kitsch in our roomy room that had a recliner, nice art, books (!), big bath with a window that opened — all done in relaxing colors, nice wall coverings, bed full of pillows including a big bolster — homey. We also dug the Rodeway Inn of Berkeley ($107/night), also a rework of an older motel built around a central parking court, it is family-run, clean, quiet, welcoming. The room was newly renovated, has a big easy-to-open window, a small, but spotless bath. It is in a cool neighborhood and four blocks from BART. It’s my new Bay Area headquarters. Both places had microwaves and fridges and made great bases for our explorations — we will be return customers.

^Nice RodewayInn room in Berkeley

Our splurge accommodations, Sanctuary Beach Resort in Marina, Ca, were cool enough — especially the part where we could see the Monterey Bay from our bed and walk to the beach dunes about a block away — but it also a little creepy. It is a group of little villas, each with 2 or more guest rooms, arranged on a curving labyrinth of red brick roads/paths accessible only by golf carts (you leave your car down by the entrance to the resort), so — with all the uniformed workers — the place felt a little like the village on The Prisoner. Loved the location, but I am not really drawn to stay there again.

^ Sanctuary/The Village

After soaring, Oaxacan. On our way to Berkeley from Hollister, we stopped in Watsonville for the Oaxacan specialties of Fiesta Tepa-Sahuayo. This modest, 12 table, shopping-strip restaurant is a passport to southwestern Mexico and the word is that you can get dishes here that are hard to find in El Norte. I had white enchiladas with huitlacoche and squash blossoms. Earthy, delicious, filling. Val had coctele de camaron y pulpo, a shrimp and octopus cocktail, that was like a fresh, cold seafood soup dressed with avocado and lime. We shared a made-on-the-spot guacamole. Our punch drinks (mine=pineapple, Val=tamarindo) came in big plastic pitchers for us to fill and refill our big red goblets. Nice people. Hopping Mexican jukebox. Nice breeze through the open door. The restaurant is festooned with mementos of Mexico and it is fun to discover all the weird and wonderful stuff while you munch on chips and wait for your delightful and exotic food to emerge from the tiny kitchen. Great stop. (15 First Street, Watsonville, CA)

^ White enchilada with huitlacoche and squash blossom

^ Val with pineapple punch at Fiesta Tepa-Sahuayo.

Egg custard tarts from Golden Gate Bakery, Chinatown, San Francisco: We were warned there would be a line snaking out of this best-of-chinese-bakeries, reknown for its egg custard tarts and its moon cakes. We joined the line and enjoyed just standing in the cool afternoon breeze and breathing in the delicious smells coming from the tiny storefront. Customers lined the counter to order up three and four big pink bakery boxes jammed with the famous confections. The egg tarts going straight from the kitchen into the waiting boxes — too popular to ever sit in the case. The smell was even more wonderful when you made it into the bakery and we had to keep our heads to order only 2 custards, 2 macaroons and a mooncake. We had the tarts as desert after our dinner of light thai salads. Incredible! Not too sweet, fluffy, eggy custard in a light, flaky and delicious crust. I told Val, I know I will stand in that bakery line again in my life, but next time, I’m getting one of those big pink boxes full of these.

^ Egg Custard of the Gods

^ Lotus Mooncake

]]> http://thenitenote.com/2008/09/23/before-i-forge/feed/ 1 http://thenitenote.com/2008/09/19/after-a-meal-fit-for-kings/ http://thenitenote.com/2008/09/19/after-a-meal-fit-for-kings/#comments Fri, 19 Sep 2008 07:21:12 +0000 kate http://www.thenitenote.com/blog/2008/09/19/after-a-meal-fit-for-kings/ at Aubergine in Carmel, no blogging tonight. Except to say chantarelles, truffles, duck and fois gras with huckleberries, Kobe beef, sardines (that’s right, I ate a sardine and I liked it!), oyster vichyssoise, poached quail egg, tuna tartare, braised oxtail, marrow souffle … Sometime tomorrow, when I am recovered, I’ll say more … about beautiful Big Sur, how gentlemen use the turnouts, our posh Monterey resort, lunch at Hearst’s pier and loving and leaving Paso Robles.

PS A tale of good karma: You know you’ve done something right when the heavily perfumed woman just seated next to you in the middle of your most extravagant and exquisitely subtle meal, insists on a better table all the way across the room! Praise the culinary gods.

]]> http://thenitenote.com/2008/09/19/after-a-meal-fit-for-kings/feed/ 1 http://thenitenote.com/2008/09/16/chef-val-al-fresco/ http://thenitenote.com/2008/09/16/chef-val-al-fresco/#comments Tue, 16 Sep 2008 18:58:08 +0000 kate http://www.thenitenote.com/blog/?p=958 We got the idea from a cooking show, New Scandinavian Cooking, in which host Andreas Viestad makes all his food — from complex gourmet recipes to simple drinks — on a portable outdoor kitchen set. We thought, why couldn’t we do some real cooking outdoors on our trip, finding fresh local ingredients and cooking them simply all along our journey. So we got ourselves a classic Coleman dual-fuel stove and a collapsible sink and packed up some of our nice All Clad pots and a variety of other equipment. Tonight we debuted the portable kitchen and Val made a delicious Farmers Market Eggplant in Tomato Sauce right here in the picnic area of the Adelaide Inn. Paired up with a grapey local Syrah, peppery olives, olive oil and bread, it really came off beautifully. It was fun. The sunset was cool and breezy. The food was fresh, hot and hearty.

^ Val with the outdoor kitchen

^ Dinner al fresco

Earlier in the day, a nice avocado sandwich lunch and a walk along moonstone beach in Cambria — fun time picking up just the right stones from the uncountable thousands of tide-polished pebbles that make up the beach. I concentrated on greens. And great pelican watching as groups of 10 and 20 caught the lift along the beach bluffs to glide south in big v-shaped phalanxes.

After lunch, a stop at Fermentations for a quick tasting. (Bought a sangiovese and a port.) And then one of my favorite scenic drives, up the winding Santa Rosa Creek Road, through the incredibly bountiful central coast countryside. From the car we saw stone fruit, apple and citrus orchards, grapes, tomatoes, pumpkins, butternut squash, corn, cattle, bee hives, wild turkeys and many other birds all along 20 miles of road. And idyllic views around every turn.

A plus: about one third the way along the road is Linn’s, home of the famous Olallieberry pie. We stopped in and got a petit cherry pie and after a little negotiation with the scruffy farm peacock (apparently, he likes pie — but who doesn’t?), we sat safely in the car to eat the pie in big yummy bites.

^ Kate and her moonstones

^ At Moonstone Beach, pelicans catch a lift.