Voyage to the Other California, Part 1: Wine, Friends and Epiphanies

It is no secret that I am a bay area native. There have years upon years of my life spent driving through the Napa Valley late on a summer's night and smelling Cabernet wafting through the air, one arm dangling lazily from the window, all the windows down, allowing the smells to fully encase my senses. On the other end of that spectrum, there have also been nights in the city, and when I say the city, I can only mean one city: San Francisco. The iconoclast of the bay. East coast city on the west coast. The home of progressive political ideology. Fine foods, the edge of the culinary world, not to mention the awesome shopping. After all the time I have spent in these places, why go back now, as a tourist? Perhaps I'm not so much a tourist, this place is my home after all, but I did discover things that were new to me, experiences I had yet to have as an adult in a place I associate predominantly with my youth.

Our first night was spent in my hometown. Now, granted it isn't much, but it is gorgeous. Just a sleepy little town of 28,000, one high school, one library, one police department, and one street that has anything going on and that street isn't more than a mile long. We still have 3 Starbucks though, which I find discouraging. This town is known as Benicia, founded by General Vallejo over 200 years ago, and named for the man's wife. It was the second capitol of California, and also was and still continues to be an active port though the scenery has changed a bit. First St. used to be lined with brothels, hotels and bars. Jack London often stayed at the Union Hotel, which like many buildings in the area is protected by the historical society. Why tell you all this? context.

First St. Cafe' is also a historical building, at one point both a bar and a brothel, the building itself is over 200 years old. This was my first true place of employment in the industry. This is the restaurant that took me from dishwasher to prep cook to server. This is the place that instilled the foundation I continue to build upon as I continue to learn and grow. This is where I learned of Humboldt fog, and 10/12 versus 20/22 count for the slicing of bacon. I learned Meritage, Pinotage, Zinfandel, Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley, Geyserville, Alexander Valley, Paso Robles and on and on and on. I learned eggs, basted, poached, over easy, medium, well, hard, soft-boiled. Everything I know I owe to them. That is why when I come home I always make sure I stop by and have a bite to eat.

Now of course I had to bring my dining partner with me. It's not a vacation if you can't share and reminisce about the experience. I also wanted to show him what I had been raving about all this time. We had the Crab and Artichoke dip with fresh Acme baguette for an appetizer, along with a bottle of Murphy Goode Fume' Blanc. Dungeness crab meat mixed with artichoke hearts, mayonnaise, white onion and Parmesan cheese, heated until lightly browned on the top and garnished with parsley. I love warm mayonnaise. Some people detest it, and maybe it's from 3 and 1/2 years of eating this stuff, but it's delicious and you can't stop me. The baguette is always awesome, if you have a chance to get to Acme you have to try it, but Acme will come back into play later. After we annihilated the dip we indulged in carbonara and the tortellini bolognese. Carbonara was perfect, mixed with raw egg and bacon, and fresh spring vegetables. The bolognese was exactly how I remember is, spicy linguica, creamy tomato sauce with cheese filled al-dente tortellini. It was like being 17 again with my tri-colored hair, taking a break at the bar before the rush hit. That calm in the restaurant, like the eye of the storm, nothing moving while everything swirls around you, but on to dessert. We had my personal favorite, the key lime pie, made with real key lime juice and the Jack Daniels pecan pie. Now granted these were not masterfully presented, but that's not really what owner Mark Krull wants. It's simple with good tastes, flavors that keep you coming back again and again.

Our accommodations for the night were at a dear friend of mine's. She is the Pastry Sous Chef at Five restaurant inside the Hotel Shattuck Plaza. This is one of Scott Howard's restaurants, classic American bistro, I suppose, unfortunately I did not get the opportunity to try the place. Next time, there's always a next time. We went back to the house after dinner, which is less of a house than you might think. It's located in the Benicia Arsenal. As home to the former capitol, there was a strong military presence there, which is now only  noted by the old military buildings. One of these buildings is the old officers' quarters, where quite a few of my friends live, as well as my chef best friend previously mentioned. That night was spent sharing experiences and things that had happened since the last time I had been up. Loves gained and lost. Life going on. Fortunately however, my friend had most of the weekend off, which led to the awesome events of the next day.

Day 2: Wine country, the smells, the splendor, and the change of heart.

I had scheduled us to do a wine tasting at Ehlers Estate in St.Helena. This is a boutique winery that was established originally in 1886. It has a staff of 18 people, they produce roughly 6,000 to 8,000 cases a year. To give you an idea, many wineries produce 30,000+. At the beginning of the tour, our guide, Dejan, poured us each a bit of the 2009 Sauvignon Blanc to drink as we strolled throughout the estate. The day was pure magic. A perfect temperature of about 75-80 degrees, clear sky, which brought out the incredible lushness of the valley, it almost appeared to glow. You could smell and taste the fertile lands that surrounded you, topped of with a sip of cool Sav blanc and I began to relax. All the stress built up in my body seemed to let go at that moment. Now I was truly on vacation. After telling us about the long history of Ehlers, Dejan told us about the bio dynamic farming methods used in the vineyard. Bio dynamic farming is very different than anything else, but it is almost an ancient art. Used in medieval times it is based largely on lunar cycles, legumes and other plants are planted between the rows of grapes to ensure soil fertility, and no, I repeat, no chemicals are used what so ever. This is different from organic farming in that organic farmers are allowed to use certain chemicals approved by the FDA. We strolled through their on site garden, that contains tomatoes and artichokes among others. I don't want to ruin the tour for others so I will move on.

In the cellar, we got to have a bit of the 2008 vintage, from the barrel, that has yet to be released. It was the 120/80, which is ideal, optimal blood pressure. This ties in, I swear I'll explain in a minute. The 120/80 is about 80 percent Cabernet Sauvignon and 20 percent Cabernet franc. Now the tie in here is that when the owner of Ehlers passed away he left the estate to his foundation for cardiovascular research, the name escapes me, but now all the profit from the estate goes to this foundation. The logo even features hearts in it if you look close enough. The taste from the barrel was quite good considering it was still young. Almost tasted like a Beaujolais. Pretty amazing, it had this great smoothness which is a characteristic of the wines produced here. Soft tannins, or as I like to call them satin tannins, really burst in your mouth and create this great texture that is incomparable to anything else. After this we advanced to the salon for a tasting paired with some awesome little bites. A bit of beef with Himalayan salt and rosemary, a beet and bing cherry compote with rogue smoked bleu cheese and a lamb sausage with spring vegetable ratatouille. I forget the order, but there was their Cabernet Franc, Merlot and the 1886 which was incredible. I could drink bottles of it, but at 95 a bottle that could get a little pricey. Everything was great and Dejan sat a chatted with us for quite a while. Everyone there was very personable and amazingly gracious. We purchased a bottle of sauvignon blanc for the road.

On the road we had a light buzz, not our driver of course. We drove up a little further to Calistoga just to have a look around and then headed back toward our point of origin to have lunch. We went to the Rutherford Grill for your traditional wine country style cuisine. After a short wait, we had a table. I ordered a viognier, my dining partner had a nice glass of sav. My friend (and DD) had an Izze soda. We started with the Grilled Artichokes which were halved and seared and served with an aoili. This came at the recommendation of my friend, and I was not disappointed, they were exquisite. I'm going to grill my artichokes from now on. They were so tender. It turned me to putty. After that we had our main. The french dip with au jus and coleslaw, the burger, and I had bangors and mash, served with a spicy mustard. Everything was incredible, the bread on the french dip was perfect and absorbed just the right amount of jus. It was accompanied with a horseradish sauce that was amazing.The fries with the burger were crisp and thin. My bangors were plump and juicy, and the potatoes were full of chives and garlic, all in all an amazing lunch. So, amazing in fact that we skipped dinner.

The drive back to Benicia was quiet as we let our experiences sink in. I was experiencing a euphoria unlike any I have experienced before. Magnificent views of vineyards, turned into other agricultural lands with pumpkins and assorted vegetables to dry fields of wild grass, back into the urban sprawl once again all within 25 minutes. The closeness of things sets in. Southern California is so spread out. It can take hours to get places for a "staycation." Up there the world seems so far away, yet it is really just a short drive down the road.

The night was full of drink and old acquaintences, people I had been to high school with and hadn't talked to since, and it reminded me of something. I got out. I made it to a place where I could truly be happy, for as much nostalgia as that little town has for me, I could never truly return to stay. The bay area? surely the region is full of things to be desired, but for Benicia, I had done my time and now it is time to move on. After the bar, we turned in for the night in order to prepare for the next days travels. We were about to journey to our hotel room in Berkeley and then off to the city for some pre-pride festivities. We had no idea what joys were to come, but I assure you they almost trump what has been done thus far. Ehlers was amazing, the flavors I had experienced that day almost overloaded my senses and I began to realize that I was still a stranger in the land I spent most of my life. I was missing something all those years, or perhaps I just couldn't fully appreciate it yet. I felt a door in my heart open and I let everything in. I did not judge with the sharp blade of my criticism as I would usually, I was hypnotized. So much joy, so very impossible to leave, but the journey that lie ahead was so much more than I could ever imagine.