May 27, 2020
First thing you should know, I’m writing this in early May. Restaurants have not reopened for on-site dining. Life has not returned to anything resembling normal. And, from this point of view, a few weeks behind your current perspective, it doesn’t look like we’ll be gathering in large crowds anywhere anytime soon.
My friends in the restaurant industry have been hit harder than almost any other group during the pandemic. The well-loved institutions that have stayed open by offering take-out and delivery have done so with skeleton crews and shoestring budgets.
Apr 1, 2020
In the early 2000s, local breweries began popping up where no food or drink establishments dared to open before. Light industrial areas, warehouse districts and other commercial spots where rent was cheap and square footage plentiful became destinations for a new generation of brewer.
One of Sacramento’s first such breweries was Track 7 Brewing Company, which opened in 2011. The award-winning beer-maker set up shop in a “roll-up door” strip of industrial shops near the train tracks adjacent to Sacramento City College.
Mar 30, 2020
Our family has been picking up East Sac’s One Speed pizzas and salads to go for dinners. I often thought of The Waterboy, chef Rick Mahan’s shuttered elegant Midtown restaurant.
Much to my delight in my in-box this week was news and details of their new Pop-Up Weekend Gourmet Dinners to go.
Feb 26, 2020
I’ve lived in Sacramento for almost 40 years, so I’ve been to Celestin’s Restaurant. It seems like a fact of life for any long-term diner in this town—if you’ve been around for more than two decades, you’ve eaten at Celestin’s.
You might have dined at the J Street location, where Patrick Celestin and his wife Phoebe held court starting in 1983. That same space became the first home of Kru Contemporary Japanese Cuisine, by the way. If my spatial geography is on point, I believe that same space is now the tiki bar extraordinaire, The Jungle Bird.
Jan 28, 2020
Think back to 2006. What do you think Sacramento saw itself as nearly a decade and a half ago? Where did you see Sacramento’s dining scene? Was farm-to-fork even on your radar?
In 2006, Heather Fargo sat as mayor, Kevin Martin led the kings in scoring and Patrick Mulvaney had a clear-eyed vision of what made the dining scene in Sacramento special. He recognized our rich agricultural legacy and year-round seasonal bounty, things we locals took for granted, as unique and something to be celebrated.
