| My eating adventure began in the south bay with a trip to Calafia Cafe in Palo Alto. It's by Chef Charlie Ayers, who earned fame at Google, and it's quite tasty. We each got a "Zazzle Zinger" smoothie (organic orange juice, carrot juice, peaches, honey, agave and vanilla yogurt) and then split the "Sunshine Day Dream Pizza," made with "roasted and pureed eggplant, grilled zucchini, roasted red peppers, mozzarella with a pumpkin-hempseed pesto." Mmm.
The next big treat was Gather. It's about a block from the downtown Berkeley BART, and I hear that it's relatively new. The restaurant serves meat, but one of their specialties is a vegan charcuterie sampler, which we got as an appetizer to share. I think we all agreed that if we had it to do over, we'd get it as our meal because it was so good. Each of the five dishes were different and delicious, and sharing them was a bummer because you barely get more than a bite of each. We also got a kale salad (good) and a mushroom pizza (to die for). I don't know what they did to the pizza to make it taste so amazing, but WOW. (Actually, that was my reaction to many things I've eaten this week.)
After that came Bi-Rite Creamery in the Mission district of San Francisco. I got the honey lavender and the chocolate and let's just say it was hands down the best ice cream I've ever had.
The big finish was a trip to Millennium tonight. I've actually been waiting to go there since 2008, so there was a lot of anticipation leading up to the meal. The star of the show was the "Sesame Cornmeal Crusted Oyster Mushrooms served with sweet & spicy apple-pepper jam, shaved onion & radish salad." It was absolutely one of the most delicious things I've ever put in my mouth. In addition to the mushrooms, I got a creamy parsnip and celeriac soup that was totally delicious. (I must add that as a new gardener I have a newfound appreciation for both vegetables, as they are both favorites and I now know how darn long it takes to grow either of them.) My evening was made even happier with a cocktail, and maybe it made me a little too happy because I can no longer recall what was in it. All I know is that it involved pear, vanilla, kumquat, and gin. We finished up with a dessert called Death by Chocolate and Peanut Butter. It was a chocolate tart with cream on top and a scoop of peanut butter ice cream. (I should also add that the restaurant is entirely vegan, making this kind of dessert a work of sheer genius.) The dessert was so good I was sorry I agreed to share.
As is often the case with such good food, each of these places is much easier on your tastebuds than it is on your wallet. For a more simple and affordable treat, I recommend checking out Arizmendi Bakery, a worker-owned cooperative that churns out divine pastries and coffees in Emeryville and a few other locations in the Bay Area. They also serve pizza. |
