The Food of California

An trip to California’s beautiful coast brought me closer to food than I ever have been, and also helped me realize how truly important our resources are.

Last week, I took an incredible vacation to the beautiful coast of California. We started in Los Angeles and then took the long and winding drive north on Highway 1, stopping in Santa Barbara, Pismo Beach and Monterey, and winding up in San Fransisco. The drive up the coast through Big Sur is honestly one of the most beautiful places I’ve been in my life, and even now I get goosebumps and my heart beats just a little bit faster when I recall the breathtaking views.  I really could go on and on about the incredible scenery and the fantastic sights and places we visited in the Golden State. But this is a food blog and I figure I should mostly share with you guys the food of California, no doubt some of the freshest and most beautiful I’ve seen, and how it brought me to a realization about our very limited resources in this world.

 

One of the reasons I love living in New York so much is because of the access we have to fresh, locally grown foods through weekly farmers markets and even in the grocery store. I always thought we had it pretty good; the Hudson valley is home to a plethora of farms where everything from meat to veggies to dairy is grown and produced. There are even places in Brooklyn that are growing fresh vegetables and raising honeybees on rooftops. But all of our resources here still seem to pale in comparison with the food in California.

Our drive up the coast was littered with instances of incredible fresh produce, seafood plucked straight from the ocean, and farm animals left and right. Our first stop fresh off the plane in Los Angeles was Venice Beach, where a craving for fresh seafood was satisfied by fish tacos and a Hawaiian raw fish salad called poke at the Venice Ale House. This started a trend for the rest of the trip; we had fish tacos the next day on the Santa Monica pier, and then we must have had fish tacos and poke at least four or five times more during the rest of our stay. But while we no doubt had some awesome food experiences in Los Angeles – such as a restaurant at the end of the Malibu pier serving farm to table food and unique ice cream flavors like as basil lemon and saffron, and of course a night at In and Out Burger – our real food journey started on our third day on our journey to Santa Barbara.

 

The drive to Santa Barbara was filled was farms and fields, most of which were growing strawberries. We stopped on the side of the road and bought “half a crate” of strawberries – six of the baskets we normally see them come in from the grocery store – for 10 dollars. This was the first, but certainly not the last, instance in which I was amazed at how inexpensive some of the produce is in California, which kind of make sense since its all being grown right there. Either way, I was ecstatic to spend the rest of our drive up to Santa Barbara munching on some of the best strawberries I’ve ever had with the scent of strawberries filling the car.

 

The hotel we stayed in in Santa Barbara was right on State Street, littered with little shops and restaurants. After returning from a long walk down to the pier, we were amazed to find that a farmers market had been set up right along State Street while we had been gone. This farmers market had some of the biggest and freshest produce I’ve ever seen, and some fruits and vegetables that I’ve never heard of or only seen on the Food Network. We stopped back into our hotel for a moment, and when we came back out we realized that the air all around us smelled of fresh herbs and sweet fruits. And as much as I love New York City, that’s one thing I’ve never experienced at any of the farmers markets here. Unfortunately we were returning to a hotel that night (no kitchen) and so I had to resist the urge to buy every piece of fresh produce in sight.

 

The drive to our next stop, Pismo Beach, made me truly realize why California is known as the food basket of America. We drove through what felt like never ending farm land, and I loved every second of it. Every new field we passed filled the air with the scent of a different fruit or vegetable; more strawberries of course, broccoli, pungent garlic, earthy lettuce, fresh celery, and more. I never even realized how strongly vegetables could smell before I drove through field after field of them.

When I eat a meal back home in New York, chances are that a good percentage of the produce was grown in California. In a culture that is so used to being handed things, that takes for granted the food on our plates, it’s incredible to see where that food actually comes from, to see the town where people make their livings off of growing and harvesting it. Yes, we saw an abundance of it. But at the same time, I have a new appreciation for the work and the resources that go into food that I would normally take for granted, especially considering that California is in the midst of a historic drought. In a state that grows a large chunk of our produce, it’s an extremely scary thought that the lands could be drying up. I truly commend Californians for the effort they are making in conserving water, but it really makes me reconsider my own use of resources that I never imagined would be so scarce. Check out this Think Progress article for more info on the effects that California’s drought could have on America’s entire food system.

 

Our next stop, Pismo Beach, was one of my favorite stops on our trip because it is the total epitome of what I always imagined a typical California surfer town to be. Huge waves break on the sandy shore, and the immediate area is surrounded by rocky bluffs with boulders jutting out of the ocean. The street running to the pier is lined with little surf shops and shacks of restaurants. Hungry from our drive from Santa Barbara, we chose a restaurant for lunch called the Splash Cafe. The sign outside boasted award winning clam chowder, and it certainly did not disappoint. I didn’t realize that this town was actually once known as the clam capital of the world, before its waters were overfished (see my experience in Monterey with the Seafood Watch program for more info about preventing overfishing). But while the food is great at Splash Cafe, the ambiance is just as good. The walls inside are covered with photos of the restaurant team throughout the years and hand drawn additions to the menu, and big front windows with counters to sit at look out onto the open palm tree lined street that terminates in the ocean.

 

 

Since we only had a quick snack of clam chowder at Splash Cafe, we decided to stop into another restaurant a few doors down, Mo’s Smokehouse, boasting award winning barbecue. Barbecue ribs with baked beans and cornbread again did not disappoint, but I also loved the ambiance; the walls are littered with BBQ signs, license plates from every state, and photos of other famous barbecue joints. The memorabilia comes from the owner’s trip across the country which is not only where he found some of the best barbecue, but also where he gained recipes, tips, and inspiration for his own restaurant.

 

 

The next leg of our drive up the coast was from Pismo Beach to Monterey. It was pretty boring food wise but had some of the most incredible views and scenery I’ve ever seen in my life, and I just couldn’t resist sharing some photos with you guys. We spent the morning after our long drive through Big Sur in the city of Monterey on Cannery Row, the street made famous by John Steinbeck’s book of the same name. Cannery Row now is mostly touristy shops and restaurants, but was once abundant with sardine canning factories supplied by the nutrient rich waters of Monterey Bay.

 

 

In Monterey we also stopped at Fisherman’s Warf – a pier once used as a wholesale fish market into the 1960s but again is now a popular tourist destination – where we grabbed lunch of more clam chowder and and these unbelievably fresh and huge red prawns. But the best part of stopping in this restaurant was that with the bill we got a little pamphlet put out by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch program. The main goal of this program is to make people aware of the “best choices” of seafood they should buy and order, “good alternatives” if those aren’t available, and seafood to “avoid.” Their list is based on sustainability, with the seafood under the “best choices” option being fished or farmed in ways that have minimal negative impact on the environment. I highly encourage anyone who loves seafood to check out their website, which breaks down the list by state and even lists restaurants that businesses that don’t serve seafood from the “avoid” list. In a time when we are all becoming more aware of the impact our actions have on the environment, it is a simple and easy way to be sure that we are making smart decisions about the food we eat in order to preserve our resources for generations to come.

 

Leaving beautiful and seafood laden Monterey was tough, but realizing that out next stop was San Francisco made it a little easier. This part of the drive was very similar to the stretch from Santa Barbara to Pismo Beach; more sprawling fields of fruits and vegetables, only this time they were sandwiched between mountains on one side and rocky bluffs dropping off into the Pacific on the other. Just outside of Monterey there was sign after sign advertising fresh vegetables sold at stands on the side of the road for ridiculously cheap prices; things like 5 avocados for a dollar (I’m lucky to find one for a dollar here) and 10 kiwis for a dollar.

 

We took a slight detour off of highway 1 to see a grove of giant redwoods in Henry Cowell State Park which was breathtaking, but by the time we were on the outskirts of San Francisco, the sun was just beginning to set. Silhouetted by the setting sun, farmers in tractors and sprawling farmlands sit on the edges of bluffs stretching out into the Pacific I wish I had the opportunity to capture the sight with my camera, alas there was nowhere to pull over and the memory will just have to live forever inside my mind instead.

 

San Francisco of course was fantastic with lots of great places and things to eat; “millionaire’s bacon” from Sweet Maple, thick cut bacon covered in brown sugar and hot pepper flakes, was one highlight. But I won’t take up any more time retelling stories of my trip and instead I’ll leave you with a few awesome images from our last stop and reflect on a few final thoughts. I love living in New York City and I love the access we have to fresh food, but on California’s coast I experienced a closeness to the food that I consume that I have never experienced before. It’s a place where you can see your food being grown, smell it in the air, watch it being caught on the side of a boat (with the unwanted pieces being thrown over to waiting seals in the water), and have it on your plate as fresh as you’ll ever get it.

 

But at the same time, being so close to my food made me realize how truly important our resources are. The water that grows our produce, the fish in our ocean, the animals who give us their dairy and meat, they are not to be taken for granted. As much as we may think they are, our resources are not limitless. And if we want them to be around for generations to come we are going to have to make some changes in the way we consume them.