It's Friday. We're sharing five Bay Area restaurants where cooks' ideas around sustainability play out in different and delicious ways. Plus, San Francisco prosecutors threaten to pursue murder charges against fentanyl dealers. |
 | | Low fog over the San Francisco skyline in June.Nina Riggio for The New York Times |
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Restaurants provide an interesting way to survey our collective response to climate change, particularly in California, where more and more businesses use compostable takeout containers, take part in energy efficiency programs, cook with local ingredients and get involved in food waste initiatives. |
The New York Times is hosting an event in San Francisco on Oct. 12 to discuss climate change, and as the California restaurant critic for The Times, I'm suggesting some restaurants in the area. Here are a few excellent places where I think cooks' ideas around sustainability shape their menus in different and delicious ways. |
Vincent Medina and Louis Trevino's expansive, educational dinners may take place outside the Hearst Museum of Anthropology in Berkeley, but don't mistake their cooking for artifacts. Meals here are spontaneous, energetic and of-the-moment interpretations of Northern California, featuring a bounty of native rainbow trout and quail, as well as gathered rose hips, hazelnuts and berries. Dishes like venison chile Colorado and tender walnut oil cake sweetened with candy cap mushrooms reveal a style that's rooted in the past, but points toward the future. |
Made fresh every day, Steve Joo's delicious tofu is the star of this warm and unfussy Korean banchan shop in Oakland. Take the tofu back to your kitchen to incorporate it into your home cooking, or pick up a daily banchan set — my ideal everyday lunch. Here, a generous, creamy wobble of tofu is doused in an umami-rich sauce and served with a heap of rice and a variety of small, simple, intensely flavored banchan that change according to what's in season and are mostly, though not exclusively, vegetarian. |
CY Chia and Shane Stanbridge's restaurant in Oakland specializes in Chinese-Singaporean and Italian-influenced vegan food, though the playful, irresistible menu can seem almost borderless, with its renditions of head-filling jackfruit rendang, fragrant laksa and three-cup tofu. The kitchen makes most of its vegan pantry products in house. On Saturdays, look for the shaobing sandwiches tucked in homemade sesame-seed bread — this weekend's involves brined and fried tofu from Hodo Foods and a creamy, spicy slaw. |
Kayla Abe and David Murphy's Ugly Pickle Co. made the most of irregular vegetables to minimize produce sent to landfills, and their new San Francisco pizza place and wine bar also draws attention to the pleasures behind food that would have otherwise gone to waste. This might include the spent oats after oat milk production, which they use in their pizza dough, or underripe tomatoes of all sizes from local farmers, or off-cuts of meat that their purveyors are struggling to sell. Beef hearts recently made their way into a dish of warmly spiced meatballs studded with currants, on a bed of labne and herbs. |
The season for fresh local anchovies — a small, plentiful and sustainable fish that's a luxury all the same — is likely to run until the end of October. If you want to really enjoy it, you can find the fish at Stuart Brioza's San Francisco restaurant, where it's lightly brined in the style of Spanish boquerones. When those anchovies aren't around, there are plenty of other good reasons to go: the excellent clams; the oysters from Hog Island, harvested daily; vegetables from the restaurant's own organic farm; and the occasional herring special — when the fish shows up as bycatch in fishers' nets. |
 | | A child's handprints on a piece of concrete among the remains of a home after the Camp fire.Max Whittaker for The New York Times |
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- Wildfire settlement: Former executives of Pacific Gas & Electric have reached a $117 million settlement with a victim trust in connection to the 2017 North Bay fires and the 2018 Camp fire, The Los Angeles Times reports.
- Solitary confinement bill: Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed a bill on Thursday that would have restricted the use of solitary confinement in prisons and jails, The Los Angeles Times reports.
- Gold miner: A suction-dredge gold miner from California who operated in an Idaho river containing federally protected salmon and steelhead without permits required by the Clean Water Act must pay $150,000, The Associated Press reports.
- Hurricane Ian: As Hurricane Ian spun out of control in southwest Florida, one of the go-to sources for information about the storm on social media was a California teenager, SFGate reports.
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- "Gangsta's Paradise" rapper dies: Coolio, the West Coast rapper who helped define hip-hop in the 1990s with hits like "Gangsta's Paradise," has died. He was 59.
- Flag football: The California Interscholastic Federation Southern Section's council approved girls' flag football as an official high school sport, The Los Angeles Times reports.
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- Sexual harassment: Joseph Castro, the president of Fresno State, wrote at least eight letters of recommendation for Frank Lamas, a former administrator, despite knowing that he was the subject of sexual harassment allegations, The Fresno Bee reports.
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- Fentanyl: Prosecutors are threatening to pursue murder charges against fentanyl dealers as part of a new approach to San Francisco's drug epidemic under District Attorney Brooke Jenkins, The San Francisco Standard reports.
- Strike over: Food workers at San Francisco International Airport ended their strike after reaching a deal for higher pay, The San Francisco Chronicle reports.
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 | | Linda Xiao for The New York Times |
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 | | A view of Santa Cruz Island facing east toward the mainland in the distance.Jim Wilson/The New York Times |
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Today's tip comes from Marty Conoley, who lives in Santa Barbara. Marty recommends visiting Santa Cruz Island, the largest of the five islands that comprise Channel Islands National Park: |
"Channel Islands National Park is one of the least visited national parks in America, accessible only by boat or by airplane, yet it is only 18 miles from the millions of people living in coastal California. Going to Santa Cruz Island is going back in time to the way California looked and existed 150 years ago. There are plant species and wildlife species that are unique to Santa Cruz Island — island fox, scrub jay, raven. Hiking, camping, sea kayaking, research, history, few people: Santa Cruz Island has it." |
Tell us about your favorite places to visit in California. Email your suggestions to CAtoday@nytimes.com. We'll be sharing more in upcoming editions of the newsletter. |
It's officially fall. What do you love about the season in California? What are the best ways to enjoy fall in your corner of the state? |
 | | Zebras grazing in a pasture at Hearst Ranch near San Simeon.Photo by George Rose/Getty Images |
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And before you go, some good news |
Every day, dozens of drivers stop along Highway 1 in San Simeon to stare at what look like zebras grazing along the California coast. |
The animals aren't part of a zoo or safari park. They're wild — in fact, California is home to the largest wild zebra herd outside of Africa, Big Think reports. |
About a century ago, Hearst Castle in San Simeon — the ostentatious home of the newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst — had a private zoo that included American bison, Rocky Mountain elk, kangaroos and, of course, zebras. |
When Hearst died and his estate fell into disarray, the zebras were let loose into the grasslands of the Central Coast. And the animals thrived, thanks in part to some unexpected similarities between the local ecosystem and the African savanna. |
Thanks for reading. We'll be back on Monday. Enjoy your weekend. |
Soumya Karlamangla, Briana Scalia and Jaevon Williams contributed to California Today. You can reach the team at CAtoday@nytimes.com. |
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