When Joe and Kai Gilman opened their restaurant, Twin Lotus Thai, early in 2022, they had no intention of turning it into a music venue.
Joe says the business was an “empty-nest” project for his wife Kai. But the humble spot in College Greens quickly became one of Sacramento’s best jazz rooms.
How did this transformation happen within 12 months? It’s no mystery once you know the Gilmans.
Relationships distinguish the farm-to-fork movement. While farmer-to-chef seems like the obvious partnership, one joy I get from this column is digging beneath the surface to see a myriad other relationships that bring food to our tables and connections to our neighborhoods.
Researching last month’s column on the city’s Urban Agriculture Incentive Zone Program, I met Earl Withycombe, a landowner, community activist and incentive zone pioneer.
He told me how as a landowner he collaborated with city officials to help develop the zone program and work out details so other landowners might benefit.
When restaurant partners Chris Sinclair, Raphael Jimenez Rivera and Matt Brown created Bodega, they wanted an East Coast feel with Caribbean flair. It’s a taste of home they can share with their West Coast neighborhood.
“In New York and New Jersey you can get Puerto Rican food, Caribbean food almost everywhere,” Sinclair tells me. “It’s as common as tacos are out here on the West Coast.”
The neighborhood approves. The reception has been stellar since Bodega’s August opening. Diners come from around the corner and across the region to visit the Pocket shopping center where the restaurant sits.
Despite rave reviews, Sinclair thinks of Bodega as a humble neighborhood bar and family restaurant. “Two of the three owners live in the neighborhood, and all of us have kids,” he says. “We want neighbors to come out for a lively dinner, families to come over after the soccer game, and everything in between.”
Imagine a Sacramento where every few blocks community gardens flourish. Where we have access to the food bounty of our region. Where we can walk with our kids, parents or partners to harvest grapes, pomegranates, broccoli heads, mustard greens and basil tops.
In almost every neighborhood, a vacant and unimproved lot awaits cultivation. The ghosts of fig trees whisper potential.
Jayna Gyro is easy to miss. The corner of Alhambra and Folsom boulevards sports several chain eateries, and, without a closer look, Jayna Gyro blends in and disappears.
But take that extra look. You’ll learn this new Mediterranean restaurant paints outside the lines of “fast-casual” and brings an unexpected level of sophistication.
Jayna, the third California restaurant of Yusuf Topal and his ownership partners, improves the relationship between casual and fine dining. It’s no wonder. Topal’s other restaurants, Tarla Mediterranean Grill in Napa and the first Jayna Gyro in Emeryville, sit proudly in the upmarket and quick-eats categories.
Sacramento’s version of Jayna blends the best of these worlds. It’s an order-at-the-counter place with a narrowly focused menu and small drink menu. But lurking in the peripheral vision is an interior bright with touches of the Greek isles.
One day not long ago, I visited the International Garden of Many Colors with the Del Paso Heights Growers’ Alliance co-directors.
The 3-acre garden is cultivated primarily by elderly immigrants from Russia, Ukraine and Afghanistan. The Growers’ Alliance worked with the Sacramento Food Policy Council to help preserve the garden and supply it with essentials such as city water.
