Petaluma: Big Little Food Town
Petaluma is fast becoming Northern California’s most interesting food destination. Visit before the hungry hordes descend.
Words by Rebecca Flint Marx
Photographs by Kamil Bialous
Illustrations by Zoe More O’Ferall
SMOKED CARROT LOX: an ostensible menu typo. And yet silky slices of the stuff arrive at the table, the root vegetable coaxed into an improbably meaty resemblance to the real thing via an elaborate process that involves nori and smoked sea salt, a low-and-slow bake, and some whimsy. It’s just one of the wildly creative dishes on the menu of The Drawing Board, part of a crop of new restaurants that have popped up recently and turned the easygoing town of Petaluma, a historic poultry-farming hub an hour north of San Francisco in Sonoma County, into one of the Bay Area’s best — but still relatively unsung — dining destinations.
The spot opened in January, and on chef Ariel Nadelberg’s wide-ranging menu, you’ll find grilled lamb kofta and a grass-fed beef burger alongside that carrot lox and vegetable cashew cream cheese. The restaurant’s high-ceilinged dining room is also an excellent place for a cocktail. Jennifer Grossbard, the restaurant’s bar director and in-house forager, incorporates botanical elixirs sourced from the Sonoma and Marin coastlines into creations like the Prescription, a Scotch-based drink that includes Fresno-chile tincture and ginger-turmeric honey and somehow tastes both wicked and wholesome.
Those who prefer their lox to be fished from the sea instead of dug from a garden can hit up The Shuckery. An oyster bar opened in October 2016 by sisters Aluxa and Jazmine Lalicker, it has a beautiful blue-tiled bar and a menu that showcases both raw bivalves and cooked dishes such as fish tacos and bacon-wrapped scallops. And if the bacon wrap proves more appealing than the scallop, follow the intoxicating scent of smoked meat a couple of blocks north to Brewsters, a 350-seat outdoor barbecue-and-beer garden. Opened in November 2016 on the site of a former chicken-incubator factory, it offers something for everyone: a bocce court, live music, water for the dog, a playground for kids, and a surprisingly robust roster of seasonal vegetable dishes (shout-out to the roasted cauliflower with black-garlic vinaigrette). No wonder that on a sunny day, it feels like half of Petaluma is here. The other half is probably at The Block, a beer garden and food-truck park that opened in April and features a rotating selection of gourmet trucks from around the Bay Area, from Tips Tri-Tip Trolley to The Bodega, a purveyor whose standouts include sorrel-cured steelhead trout and chèvre on a bagel.
A five-minute stroll away is Thistle Meats, a whole- animal butcher that sells housemade charcuterie, sausages, and prepared foods. It first opened in 2014, but the shop was badly damaged in early 2016 when a driver crashed through the front window. Earlier this year, Travis Day, a well-respected San Francisco chef, took the helm and reopened it in May with an expanded menu featuring smoked chicken salad with Marcona almonds and lemon crème fraîche and a series of Sunday Suppers (held in the parking lot out back) showcasing local chefs. Day isn’t surprised that talent is getting drawn up north. The vibe is calm, the setting picturesque, and the direct access to ingredients unparalleled. “We’re right in the middle of the farms that we use,” he said. “My lamb farmer is down the street.”
WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU’RE NOT EATING
KAYAK: To work up an appetite, rent a kayak from Clavey Paddlesports and explore the Petaluma River or nearby Tomales Bay.
HIKE: Take a 20-mile scenic drive to gorgeous Point Reyes National Seashore for some of the best hiking trails — and views — in all of Northern California.
BROWSE FOR BOOKS: The Petaluma branch of Copperfield’s Books — there are eight stores throughout Sonoma, Napa, and Marin — is the only one with a used bookstore inside, sort of a store within a store, where you can browse thousands of antiquarian titles.
GRAB SOME SPICE: At Sonoma Spice Queen, Petaluma local Wind McAlister stocks everything from annatto powder to za’atar. She also creates her own proprietary blends free of fillers, MSG, sugar, and salt.
GO WINE- TASTING: While you’re in wine country, have a drink! Keller Estate, Azari, and Kastania vineyards should be on your radar. Call ahead to make an appointment for a tasting.
Four West Coast Destinations Fit for Foodies
LOS ALAMOS, CA
Pico opened in 2016 in the Los Alamos General Store, a center, of sorts, for this small Santa Barbara County wine-country town. (The ricotta gnudi alone justifies the nearly three-hour drive from L.A.) Sample wines across the street at Frequency Wine Company, then grab a rosemary–olive oil loaf from Bob’s Well Bread Bakery.
HALF MOON BAY, CA
Surfers and fishermen have long flocked to this coastal town about 30 miles south of San Francisco, but new dining spots are also attracting those not perpetually clad in wet suits. Monsoon Himalayan Cuisine offers Nepalese food such as chicken sekuwa (skewers), and Dad’s Luncheonette, which is housed in a train caboose, hawks its grass-fed beef hamburgers topped with a locally sourced fried egg.
McMINNVILLE, OR
One of the most notable new additions to this bucolic town just over an hour outside Portland is KAOS, an ambitious food-and-wine complex. It features The Barberry, a fine- dining restaurant serving Pacific Northwest cuisine, like wild halibut with housemade pasta and pickled mustard seeds; 1882 Grille, a rooftop gastropub with 15 beers on tap and a bar top made from a recycled bowling-alley floor; and Oregon Wine Village, a tasting room.
WALLA WALLA, WA
Passatempo Taverna, a hot ticket in this quaint Washington wine-country town, is a rustic Italian spot that opened last year and boasts fresh handmade pasta from Executive Chef Aaron Mooney. Another noteworthy newbie is the Whoopemup Hollow Café, which serves up hearty Southern dishes like gumbo and muffuletta.
