First Bite

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A real, old-fashioned French restaurant charms in Marin.

Editor’s note: First Bite is a new concept in restaurant writing. We invite you to come along with our writers as they—informed, intelligent eaters like yourselves—have a simple meal at an area restaurant, just like you do. This is not a go-three-times, try-everything-on-the-menu report; rather, this is a quick snapshot of a single experience.

I’d never have guessed someone could transform a tired Denny’s into a Parisian bistro simply with some new burgundy upholstery, a long white tablecloth draped the length of the old coffee-shop counter, flickering votives on the table tops, a sign proclaiming “French cuisine” and a smattering of French dishes on the menu.

But that’s just what Pierre and Isabelle Awad have done with their new Chez Pierre in downtown Novato. Formerly Pepper’s Diner, and before that, Denny’s, it opened in January under the name Peter’s, until it occurred to the French couple last month that “Pierre’s” made a whole lot more sense for a place offering Gallic fare like escargot ($6.95) served in their shells and swimming in garlic butter.

Good move, that name change. It was the French sign that pulled my companions and me into the parking lot early on a recent Friday evening, struck with an impromptu vision of waiting out the hellacious rush hour with bowls of that savory classic soup, French onion. It ended up being a full feast.

French food isn’t the whole deal—there’s Italian and American on the lengthy breakfast and lunch list, too—but French is the real reason to come here, and at dinner in particular, when most of the magic kicks in and a dozen or so plats Française take center stage.

Pierre’s soup ($5.50) is more soothing than exciting, but good enough, bobbing with strangely pleasing crisp onion curls and a bit of toast in a thinnish broth under a slender cap of cheese. A salmon salad ($11.95), meanwhile, arrived laden with three fat rolls of smoked fish stuffed with Boursin on a bed of arugula, tomato, avocado, cucumber and goat cheese drizzled in an excellent Dijon vinaigrette. Paired with a basket of small crusty bread rounds spread with lots of butter and Pierre’s generous glass of wine ($3), it’s a meal.

There’s nothing fancy here: a simple but soul-satisfying smoked duck salad with berry vinaigrette ($7.95); a big slab of mild, sweet sole ($16.95) bathed in buttery mushroom sauce; half a moist roasted chicken slathered in Dijon herb sauce with green beans, carrots and nicely lumpy mashed potatoes.

And how often do we see chicken Cordon Bleu these days, though I can’t imagine needing to find it anywhere else ever again after the joy that is Pierre’s version ($15.95). A big, beautiful breast of bird is rolled around ham and sundried tomato, crusted in breadcrumbs, fried to a juicy crunch and ladled with rich brown mushroom sauce. The traditional cheese stuffing has gone missing but is made up for in the creamy, dreamy au gratin potatoes alongside.

Pierre’s also has a rousing tableside show of strawberries flambé with Grand Marnier and vanilla ice cream ($6.50), and homemade profiteroles ($5.50), the two oversized cream puffs stuffed with vanilla ice cream under nicely bitter dark chocolate sauce.

By the time my group wandered back out to brave the highway, it was nearly dark, and traffic had dissipated back into a merciful Autobahn. We were stuffed, sated and oh-so-happily surprised.

Chez Pierre

7330 Redwood Blvd., Novato

Open daily for breakfast, lunch and dinner

415.898.4233.



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Quick-and-dirty dashes through North Bay restaurants. These aren’t your standard “bring five friends and order everything on the menu” dining reviews.

Coco Loco

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Coco Loco

In a Nutshell: Plain old coconut joins the sizzling line-up of new so-called super fruits guaranteed to turn a fast profit.

By Lizzy Ratner

Michael Kirban, a young beverage entrepreneur, sits in the cool shade of a conference room on a recent Tuesday, clutching a box of juice. The box is decorated with a private beach’s worth of sand, surf and palm trees, which may explain the goofily tropical theme that pervades the room–from the frond-green carpeting to the small sandbox planted with two potted palms. All that’s missing is the babe in the thong bikini.

The juice box itself has a healthy dose of writing on it—bold, motivational sayings that implore the drinker to “Rehydrate,” “Rejuvenate,” “Revitalize” or simply “Fuel up. Naturally.” It is vaguely octagonal in shape, and within its angled walls sloshed 11.2 ounces of a substance that Kirban refers to alternately, reverently, as a “carbonation vacation,” a “vacation in a bottle,” a “natural isotonic” and a “hangover cure.” Sometimes he simply calls it by its given name, Vita Coco.

“It’s coconut water!” says Kirban, 32, with a salesman’s enthusiasm. “It’s got 15 times more electrolytes than the leading sports drink and two banana’s worth of potassium per serving, which is why we’re not marketing it as just a juice. If it was just a juice, I don’t think it would sell like it sells.”

Kirban has been marketing, and selling, Vita Coco for nearly three years, offering it to the thirsty masses as one of the latest self-help power liquids. He cofounded and runs the business with his friend, Ira Liran, 29, who covers the production and export side of things in Brazil. By their own admission, it is nothing more (or less) than coconut water, the clear if slightly spoogey substance that tropics-dwellers have been slurping from coconuts for centuries. Repackaged as a super beverage, coconut water is a powerful rehydrant, a hangover cure, a genie in a loud, beachy bottle.

“We’re trying to rehydrate the world one coconut at a time,” declares Liran, speaking from his adopted city, São Paulo, Brazil.

Now, with a shiny new sales contract with megaretailer Target, the duo are also hoping to hydrate their business prospects–perhaps even get lucky someday like Glacéau, the New York–based maker of Vitamin Water, which recently sold out to Coca-Cola. The price tag for the Glacéau deal was a mouth-watering $4.1 billion. But its real significance may have been the affirmation, even apotheosis, of functional beverages, those performance-boosting super drinks that lure consumers with that most American of all promises: consume your way to a better you.

Back in the drink-deprived mid-’90s, when Snapple still seemed like some kind of exotic ambrosia, the life of a juice peddler, or even a juice magnate, would probably have held little allure for the likes of Kirban and Liran.

But in the intervening years, something strange happened. Aspirational Americans discovered aspirational beverages, ambition-driven drinks with names like Smart Water, Guru and, yes, Playboy Energy Drink. First one brand then another popped up on store shelves, promising brains, beauty, health, energy, sex, stamina or whatever else today’s urban striver could possibly desire. So when Pepsi and Coca-Cola began snapping up some of the bigger brands like Naked Juice and Vitamin Water last fall, an unmistakable frisson of expectation ran through the beverage sphere.

Of course, even in this age of post–Vitamin Water hype, a company like Vita Coco still has to grapple with some serious challenges–beginning, perhaps, with the fact that coconut water can be an “acquired taste,” the kind of product that requires “customer education,” as Kirban calls it.

Still, the two have managed to “educate” a critical mass, and the beverage will soon take up residence on shelves at 400 Target stores; if it sells well, it will go out to 1,100 more.

The story of Vita Coco begins, as all good stories should, in a bar. In February 2003, our fearless twosome were out for a night of drinking and carousing at a Jewish-Latin salsa party in Manhattan’s East Village.

“I was like a kid in a candy store,” Liran remembers.

Among the bonbons that caught his eye was a pretty blond lass with an alluring Latin flair. Overwhelmed by the sense that she was the One, Mr. Liran approached and, after several hours of concerted charming, managed to seduce a spark from her. Two months later, he hopped a plane and followed her to the land of pubic grooming and coconut water: Brazil.

At the time Liran arrived, two trends were spinning simultaneously, but separately, in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. The United States was in the early grips of the enhanced-beverage craze, while Brazil was in the throes of a passionate coconut-water mania. Liran knew little about beverages, but he knew a trend when he saw one.

Thus was the Vita Coco brand born in all its splashy glory. From the first, Kirban knew that he wanted the promotions staff to wear green-rimmed soccer jerseys, etched with Brazilian superstar Pelé’s number 10. He also knew, as did Liran, that coconut water’s “life-enhancing” qualities had the potential to be a marketing goldmine–a fact the two continue to celebrate with such inspirational juice-pack text as, “Brazil is a passionate place. And Vita Coco is pure passion fuel. . . . Vita Coco gives you the fuel you need to compete, to love, to do whatever it is you do. With passion.”

As for those frigid customers who have no need for passion but enjoy the occasional giggle now and again, there is Vita Man, an 8-foot-tall inflatable Vita Coco box with legs, arms and, occasionally, played with sweaty fervor by Mr. Liran’s 15-year-old brother, Orin. Vita Man is on his way to California towns of youth and colleges, where Kirban and Liran hope that coconut water’s reputation as a hangover cure, among other qualities, will earn it some loyal customers.

“I can tell you from personal experience,” Liran says of Vita Coco’s hangover-helping properties, “that’s definitely a valid claim.”

At the end of the day, though, Vita Coco’s most enduring success might be one that is not yet splashed across the bottle: the birth in August of Liran’s first son with a certain Jewish-Brazilian blond.

Better living through Vita Coco, indeed.



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Quick dining snapshots by Bohemian staffers.


Winery news and reviews.


Food-related comings and goings, openings and closings, and other essays for those who love the kitchen and what it produces.


Recipes for food that you can actually make.

Hook & Ladder Vineyards & Winery

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09.19.07

Many would-be casual wine tasters may not realize this, but one of this region’s most compact and accessible wine roads is only two miles west of Santa Rosa, on a short stretch of Olivet Road. At least a half dozen family-run wineries are practically within stumbling distance of each other, but then I wouldn’t recommend stumbling down Olivet Road in the middle of harvest. Even with a designated driver, the passengers would have to be champs to make it through an afternoon of the world-class wines this country back road has on tap. If I was writing for tourists, I’d say it’s one of those authentic back-road spots where the locals go. Writing for locals, I instead recount that it’s a convenient, quiet area that most tourists haven’t found.

But Hook & Ladder is easy to find. Just look for the old fire truck parked out front. The label seems obscure at first, perhaps having something to do with pirates–until you’re reminded that “hook and ladder” is slang for a fire truck. Owner Cecil De Loach retired from 16 years as a fire captain to smoosh grapes full-time. The same De Loach who helped to bring international recognition to Russian River Valley wines? The very same. Having sold the brand to a Burgundian clan (see Swirl ‘n’ Spit, July 11, 2007), the De Loach family reorganized their operation at their original Barbieri Ranch, retaining some 400 acres of vineyards. Both wineries release some vintages from the same vineyards, as with the Gambogi Zinfandel.

Hook & Ladder is a favorite; I’ve been there three or four times in the past year. Maybe because it’s the straightforward tasting room in the plywood-paneled barrel room, a step from both the lavatory and the laboratory to the right of the wood-plank-across-some-barrels tasting bar. Folks there are friendly, and if they’ve discovered a litter of kittens in the case storage area, they’ll let you see them (sorry–they’ll have long been spoken for). Furthermore, here’s a place where they’ll proudly serve up estate-grown white Zinfandel.

This is the pink stuff that you’ll want to bring to dinner with that relation who just loves white Zin instead of uncompassionately trying to convert her into a connoisseur of extracted, eminently cellarable reds. The best darn white Zin you’re likely to find, off-dry, not cloyingly sweet, a pastel mouthful of strawberries and cream–and it’s $10. The 2006 Estate Grown Sauvignon Blanc ($22) similarly has a broad, creamy aroma, but is dry and astringent, with a fruit corollary of white peach.

I found the 2005 Estate Grown Chardonnay ($16) preferable to the reserve version, for its nut and caramel aroma, hint of hard cider and the special effect of dropping to the bottom of the palate like a dollop of honey. The 2004 Estate Zinfandel ($22) seems to greet the nose as if with beads of raspberry rubies spiraling out of the glass. The 2005 Gambogi Ranch Zinfandel ($30) is somewhat of a blackberry version of the former, drier while juicer. Simpler but somehow brighter and more lip-smackingly raspberry-bright is the bestselling 2004 “Tillerman” ($16). This blend of Cab, Cab Franc and Sangiovese, none of my favorite flavors, comes together in a crowd-pleasing mélange. Might even win over your white Zin sipper.

Hook & Ladder Vineyards and Winery

Address: 2134 Olivet Road, Santa Rosa

Phone: 707.526.2255

Price: No tasting fee

Hours: Tasting room open daily, 10am to 4:30pm

Quick dining snapshots by Bohemian staffers.

Winery news and reviews.

Food-related comings and goings, openings and closings, and other essays for those who love the kitchen and what it produces.

Recipes for food that you can actually make.

Review: José González ‘In Our Nature’

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Review: José González ‘In Our Nature’

09.19.07

Swedish golden boy troubadour José González’s sophomore effort, In Our Nature, due to be released Sept. 25, takes a hard look at the costs of success while trying to shake off some of the inevitable Nick Drake comparisons. Gone is the easy sheen of 2003’s Veneer with its slow ballads and sweet Kylie Minogue cover; on album opener “How Low,” González talks of hustlers and becoming a monster “in shit up to your knees,” signaling that if we were looking for an album of easy comforts, we’ve come to the wrong place.

Given the amount of critical praise deservedly heaped on González for the excellent Veneer, it’s inevitable that In Our Nature will suffer a touch in its wake. “Killing for Love” is vague in an interesting way (is he playing with the idea of fundamentalists killing for God?), bolstered up by some fantastic acoustic guitar playing.

The second side fares far better than the first. Massive Attack cover “Teardrop” is a standout cut on this curious offering; González is most masterful when handling other artists’ material. Because of the haunting lilt in so many of his best songs, one suspects he’s in earnest even when he may well be taking the piss.

Less immediate than its predecessor, even slightly jarring at times, In Our Nature clocks in at under 33 minutes; only its brevity and slight samey-soundingness can be pointed out as shortcomings. One somehow suspects that José González, a critical favorite with room to grow, is here to stay.


On the Walls

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09.19.07

On a beautiful late summer Sunday afternoon, the Sonoma Valley Museum of Art packed a crowd into its modern indoor gloom. Nibbling on chicken satay sticks, fresh spring roll wraps and sipping the museum’s own brand of wine, hundreds of people massed in to hear sculptor Linda Fleming give a personal tour of her one-woman retrospective, “Refugium,” showing through Oct. 21.

The 52nd exhibit since the SVMA opened its doors 10 years ago, “Refugium” gathers together 30 years of the sculptor’s work, including the drawings and maquettes that precede the birth of a full-fledged three-dimensional piece. Large-scale steel sculpture that is characterized by lacey, curvy, biomorphic design that both grants and denies access, Fleming’s work is informed by science and cosmology. Her own home furniture is scattered throughout, allowing visitors the opportunity to relax in a comfortable living room chair while contemplating the work. Fleming variously referred to her sculpture as being “smokelike,” “sinuous, vaporlike constructions” and “cosmological structures,” and described how they, coupled with the comfy chairs, are intended to evoke that moment when one is at home and naturally enough begins to contemplate the particulate structure of the universe. “These are diagrams of thoughts that you might be having in your regular life,” she instructed.Not everyone was thinking such lofty thoughts. Some of us began to wonder how it is that the SVMA can regularly command such a crowd smack amid a gorgeous Sunday packed with other pleasures on the North Bay’s calendar. Their own wine label, their lavish food, the Sonoma Palette appetizers cookbook that the museum is due to release on Oct. 4, the impressive effort of mounting a serious retrospective of a living, nationally acclaimed artist like Fleming: Why is such good cultural news happening in the Sonoma Valley and where is the rest of it? SVMA, 551 Broadway, Sonoma. 707.939.7862.

The Marin Museum of Contemporary Art, opened last month in the newly reclaimed Hamilton Field area, has been paying attention. Marin MOCA has gone so far as to snag the assistance of Sonoma painter Chester Arnold, a College of Marin instructor who was influential in the birth of the SVMA, an institution that has clearly kept its supporters engaged and excited—a decade-long experiment that the Marin MOCA is avid to emulate. “People are frustrated that, in the richest county in the U.S., they don’t have a fine arts museum,” Arnold says. (Not strictly true, as the very wonderful Bolinas Museum has heretofore been the only fine arts museum in Marin, a great distinction—if, of course, you can find it.)

Begun modestly in 1991 by the 11 members of what was then the Indian Valley Artists collective, the group changed in 2005 to become the Arts League of Northern California. Already charged by the city of Novato to spearhead an arts renaissance in northern Marin, the League pondered the future. “We were already doing the criteria for a noncollecting museum,” says volunteer Ronile Valenza of her group’s leap from collective to institution, “and we thought, why not just do it?” Their first exhibit as the Marin MOCA, a national juried show, ends Sept. 23. Their second formal show, “Re-Newal,” a national encaustic exhibit juried by Santa Rosa painter Bob Nugent, opens Sept. 29. Marin MOCA, 500 Palm Drive, Hamilton Field, Novato. 415.506.0137.

Meanwhile, the Sonoma County Museum, reeling from the recent health-related resignation of well-regarded executive director Ariege Arsguel, gears up for its new exhibits, “Obsession: Art and Artifacts from Sonoma County Private Collections” and, in the project space, “Be(e)ing,” an installation by Napa apiarist and artist Rob Keller, both opening Sept. 22. The main exhibit is designed and installed by Napa artist Lewis DeSoto (himself featured at the Di Rosa Preserve’s “3 X 3” show through Sept. 22) and draws from 15 private collections ranging from Henry and Holly Wendt’s antique cartography cache previously hung at the museum to Civil War artifacts, Native American walrus ivory carvings, Ansel Adams photos, Petaluma artist David Best’s funk works, hair from Abraham Lincoln’s fatal head wound and more. The idea of the exhibit is that the private obsessions of those who long to amass reveals something that is both personal and universal, involves the desire to instill order in an otherwise chaotic world and reflects the compulsion to find higher truths in small acts.

Keller plans to use the museum’s former vault to install a Victorian model dollhouse filled with bees that freely vents to the outdoors through a tube. Given the museum’s “Where Land Meets Art” ethos, Keller works to reflect the interdependence between humans and the hard-working pollinators who sustain us, allowing visitors to have a better understanding of the marvelously complex apiarian world. Sonoma County Museum, 425 Seventh St., Santa Rosa. 707.579.1500.

Also collector-driven, the spanking-brand- new SRJC Art Gallery kicks off the semester with an unusual gathering of textiles from Central Asia and Turkey loaned by area owners. “From Tent to Palace” opens Oct. 4 and is co-curated by SRJC instructor Donna Larsen with San Francisco State humanities professor Carel Bertram. The exhibit will not only encourage flat-out admiration for the handiwork on display, but illustrate what a bride might bring to her husband’s yurt or what the use of paisley means to different peoples across the Asian diaspora. SRJC Art Gallery, Frank P. Doyle Library, 1501 Mendocino Ave., Santa Rosa. 707.527.4298.

Short List

Other exhibits that have got us thinking

Painter Richard Standard tackles nothing less than the I-Ching with his new series, “Order out of Chaos,” opening Sept. 24 at the Pelican Art Gallery. Using Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle as his model, Standard takes the horizontal plane forward and backward, referencing Mark Rothko and obscuring and allowing sight in a stirring geometry of emotion. . . .

Emerging artists Frank Ryan and Allen Marshall, both recent graduates of Sonoma State University, share a love of narrative painting that flirts with illustration but pulls back just at the right moment. They show at the A Street Gallery through Oct. 27. 312 South A St., Santa Rosa. 707.578.9124. . . .

We are piqued by the work of Native American historian Frank LaPena, who opens his multimedia show “There Is No Dance Without a Song” on Sept. 22 at the Hammerfriar Gallery (see image, p40). LaPena explains his approach and the mythology he draws upon when drawing on Oct. 5. 139 Healdsburg Ave., Healdsburg. 707.473.9600. . . . The Northern California Center for the Photographic Arts makes its first foray on Sept. 20 featuring a cross-section of fine art photographers. Visionary Glen Graves expects to establish a permanent gallery space and a teaching center in the North Bay for the photographic arts. The initial show is slated for the Energy Plus Lighting and Design, 999 Airway Court, Santa Rosa. www.nccenterphotoarts.com. . . .

The Sebastopol Center for the Arts sponsors a “block party” on Oct. 4 from 6pm to 8pm that includes Sculpture Jam—now in its 10th year—new work “Drawing the Line” at the library and the wood furniture of designer Carol Vena-Mondt at her eponymous gallery. For details, go to www.sebarts.org. . . .

The Di Rosa Preserve hosts its annual fundraising auction Moon Proof Madness on Oct. 20 and gears up for winter with a remarkable one-woman exhibit by sculptor Gay Outlaw opening Nov. 3 that promises to be the must-see exhibit of the winter. . . . The must-see exhibit of right now remains the Masami Teraoka exhibit at the SSU Art Gallery, a shatteringly excellent 40-year retrospective. Check these pages next week for your how-to cheat-sheet on “reading” the Teraoka show.


Museums and gallery notes.

Reviews of new book releases.

Reviews and previews of new plays, operas and symphony performances.

Reviews and previews of new dance performances and events.

Preview: The Kronos Quartet

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Preview: The Kronos Quartet

09.19.07

s if any further proof were needed that Kronos Quartet are the most cutting-edge string ensemble on the planet, the Bay Area&–based collective have just announced the program for their upcoming Redwood Arts Council performance in Santa Rosa on Sept. 28, and holy hell, is it ever out of this world. When Thelonious Monk is the only household name on the list of the scheduled program’s composers, it’s a sure bet that Kronos will live up to the promise of “works without boundaries.”

The globe-spanning lineup includes compositions by Xploding Plastix, a jazzy electrofunk duo from Norway; Aleksandra Vrebalov, a Serbian composer with an eastern European vision of musica universalis; and Indian saranghi master Ram Narayan, whose years of working in Bollywood lend a buoyant quality to interpretations of traditional ragas.

Along with Clint Mansell (whose Requiem for a Dream score is a timeless provocateur of chill) and an entry by current New York avant-gardist Scott Johnson, Kronos Quartet also delve into America’s past with two seemingly opposite composers. Harry Partch hopped trains and utilized graffiti as libretto, while Raymond Scott’s pioneering compositions are linked most in the public ear to classic Bugs Bunny cartoons. Both, however, designed and built their own instruments and toyed with musical forms with innovative vision.

More to the present day, there’s the rock music of Mexico’s Café Tacuba (arranged by noted Argentinean composer Osvaldo Golijov) and the blistering strangeness of Manhattan iconoclast John Zorn. But the program’s most current composers are the reason the kids might be asking to tag along. Sigur Ros, a hip Icelandic band who sing in a language of their own design, are a perfect complement to Brazilian-born DJ Amon Tobin. Tobin’s released seven albums of staggering sound mutations on renowned U.K. label Ninja Tune; his layering of disparate effects and polyrhythms tilts towards the cusp of a new language in the digital age.

And to think, the last time Kronos Quartet were here, 25 years ago, they were playing songs by moldy-fig composers like Jimi Hendrix! Don’t miss the latest wave of the Bay Area’s avant-garde jewel in a very special appearance on Friday, Sept., 28, at the Glaser Center. Their next area appearance is at the massive Shoreline with the massive Mr. Waits at the Bridge School Benefit.

547 Mendocino Ave., Santa Rosa. 8pm. $10&–$25. 707.874.1124. www.redwoodarts.org.


Letters to the Editor

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September 19-25, 2007

Vaz Iz ‘Meeting Mode’?

Last night I read your article on cell-phone/text-messaging addiction (“Crack 2.0,” Sept. 12). There were some things in it that I didn’t know, but I wasn’t surprised when I read about them. I currently work in a Verizon Wireless store and have heard about people who send up to 600 text messages a month. It seems we can’t control appetites. I also remember seeing a fender-bender where a guy in a van tried to make a right turn in the center lane and hit a pickup truck in the right lane. He was talking on his cell phone at the time. I also notice that some people still drive while holding a cell phone, despite the new law against it. Is it any wonder there are bumper stickers reading, “Hang up and drive”? One simple way to avoid being distracted is set your phone to meeting mode—that way you won’t be distracted at work.

John B., San Jose

Phone Porn

Thanks for the very real laugh on p17 of the Sept. 12 issue. In the middle of the article “Crack 2.0” was a full-page ad for Verizon smart phones, ready to do for the consumer what the article had discussed. Was that meant to be porn for the gadget lover or was it like placing a beer ad in the middle of an article about alcoholism?

Michael Hazen, Cotati

You gave us a very real laugh, because, regrettably, the brains in editorial never even noticed this until you pointed it out.

Alarm!

I am so tired of hearing the lies coming out of Washington. When are we going to wake up? How many more young men and women need to die?

Jimmy Newell, Glen Ellen

An ill system

Have you needed the services of a hospital? No one seems to plan to, if they can help it. The fact the medical care in our culture has become a corporate endeavor is at the root of the problems facing healthcare. I imagine my fellow nurses being heartsick over the idea of a Sutter strike, yet languishing in increasingly difficult positions: being legally responsible for untrained or poorly trained unlicensed staff, for instance; and working in positions hazardous to their own and their patient’s health with not enough staff—not to mention doing work family members would not even do for their own—at wages not keeping up with the economy. I have seen the changes over 30 years and can attest to the fact that, since medicine became corporate, quality of care has deteriorated. If you want to change the system, take informed action. Watch the documentary The Corporation, not to mention Sicko, take a hanky to catch your tears and write our senators.

Pamela Lewis, RN Sebastopol

Sociology 101

Good work on “Stand Up Time” (The Bigotry Tour, Aug. 29), but why are articles like this still necessary? Don’t we all know that racism, classism, ethnicism, homophobia and sexism are wrong?

I suggest two reasons for the persistence of those attitudes. First, suspicion of and aversion to the “other” are deeply programmed into all animals. “They” may be trying to move in on “us” and take what is “ours,” so “they” must be resisted.

Secondly, and particular to humans, certain members of “us” owe their relatively high status to the prevalence of definitions of “them” as inherently inferior and unworthy, fit only to be exploited. These members work relentlessly to inculcate and keep current negative stereotyping about “them.” This is actually fairly easy to do, just ask a Latino or an Asian person what terms come to mind when thinking of black people, generally.

Of course, this is all Sociology 101, because the principles have been around for such a very long time. And why is that? Because we mightily resist the lesson they present. Why again? Because negative stereotyping answers so many interaction questions so easily. The need for reflection, for thinking, is minimized. Can’t get much better than that.

Don MacQueen, Santa Rosa


Casa Verde

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09.19.07

Amid the clutter of my desk rests a biodegradable to-go container, inside of which I have a biodegradable drinking straw, one business card that reads “The Compost Club,” and pieces of recycled wine-bottle glass and broken terracotta pot that have been tumbled in a cement mixer until their edges have gone thick and soft.

When I recently drove to Kenwood in order to take a tour of the Vineyards Inn restaurant, it was not in search of these treasures, it was to see compost, and I did see compost. I also ate the best ceviche I have ever had, but that’s another story.

Steve Rose and his wife Colleen have owned the Vineyards Inn for 27 years, and their menu and green business practices have been evolving over the decades. The food they serve is local, with vegetables from their nearby organic farm, and organic meats, organic dairy and local fresh fish brought in almost daily. The atmosphere of the restaurant is friendly, relaxed and unpretentious. I’m instantly impressed, but I’m here to see the compost, not ogle the menu.

Steve begins our tour of the restaurant but quickly moves on to the source of my interest, a machine called the Earth Tub. The Roses purchased the Earth Tub about 10 years ago, when Sonoma County made an offer to local restaurants, grocers and schools that it would shoulder half the cost of this $6,000 piece of pure beauty. It is to here that almost all of the pre- and post-consumer waste from Vineyards Inn, including food waste, those nifty biodegradable drinking straws, place mats, cocktail napkins and shredded paper, are toted and dumped.

A gorgeous monstrosity, the Earth Tub holds and creates, in a mere six to eight weeks, mountains of nutritious compost, which the Roses then use to feed their organic farm. Steve Rose is so into composting that he serves on the board of directors for the Compost Club, a nonprofit that helps schools and businesses set up composting systems. The Roses do a lot of impressive things like this—so many that it’s difficult to keep track of them all. They have chickens and doves. They use garbage bags and to-go containers made from compostable corn product.

When they added an addition to the Vineyards Inn, they built it to accommodate the existing grape vines, and these vines now envelop the ceiling and drip with grapes that fill the dining room with a scent so intoxicating I want to curl up in there on a cot and have a nap. The farm and vineyard are certified organic, and the Roses are actively working to gain their biodynamic certification.

Steve’sRose tour continues to a recently acquired six-acre vineyard and the couple’s newly built green home and adjacent one-room B&B. I thought I came for compost and some Basque-inspired food, and I end up seeing the most amazing piece of green architecture that I have ever witnessed.

Everything Steve shows me is recycled or reclaimed: the gravel, the fencing, the gates, the beams, the sub flooring, the gutters, the sinks, cabinets, doors, granite, brick . . . everything. Even the insulation is made from recycled denim. At one point, I hold a sample of the insulation in my hands and take a sniff. It’s quite pleasant. All of the wood finishes are free of volatile organic compounds, and the entire house has this smooth, soothing smell, so different from the chemical tang usually associated with new houses or freshly painted rooms.

The landscaping is drought-resistant and fed with reclaimed water. The solar panels provide power for the house, with enough left over to feed back into PG&E’s grid, earning electrical credits for the darker months. The Roses only pay about $50 a year in electric bills. Their house is so ingeniously built that it can practically maintain the perfect temperature unassisted. It’s almost like it’s alive.

The fact that every door, sink, cabinet and countertop is created from reclaimed materials gives this house a sense of character that leaves me ready to uproot and move in permanently; for those interested in staying for a night or two, the Roses B&B, Casa Verde, is open for business, serving organic breakfast and a gorgeous view.

By the time I leave Kenwood, I am stuffed (did I mention the ceviche?) and oddly elated. It takes me until I am almost home to figure out that the feeling is relief. I have been reminded that there are people in our community who have the vision, the means and the ability to facilitate change for our environment, and that they are doing so. I’m awash with what could only be called a sense of hope, that penetrates my cynical soul. My mission has become clear. I must find others who are doing the same, if only so that I can feel this good again.

For information on the Compost Club call 707.922.5778 the Vineyards Inn, 707.833.4500; Casa Verde, Phone 707.833.2143.


Super Hyphy R.I.P.

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Super Hyphy R.I.P.

09.19.07

In 2005, I asked Super Hyphy promoter Daniel Gelotte a question that, at the time, was on everyone’s mind: What, exactly, is hyphy? His tip-of-the-iceberg answer was indicative of the wide-openness of the new phrase, the new genre, the new lifestyle. “Hyphy is driving your car backwards, running from the cops, being out of control, whatever,” he riffed. “Some guy getting beat up by his girlfriend, you could say that’s hyphy–really, hyphy is anything you want it to be.”

Now, as he and DJ Amen’s successful and culturally defining Super Hyphy concert series comes to a climactic end next weekend, he’s got a different answer: Hyphy is over.

“Hyphy’s kinda dyin’,” he says. “Everybody’s making it, and a lot of people are making it poorly, and I think that’s really watering it down.”

Indeed, slowly diminishing ticket sales for the last few Super Hyphy shows have been an indicator of waning interest in ghostridin’, thizz-facin’ and bird-dancin’. Not one to go out with a whimper, Gelotte’s booked a farewell bash on Sept. 29 with the return of E-40, the legend who has single-handedly defined hyphy for the rest of the nation.

“We gotta pay him a few thousand more dollars now,” Gelotte shrugs, “but you know, he’s E-40. He’s the biggest artist in the Bay Area, without a doubt.” Is hyphy dead? The question almost seems silly to ask. Bay Area rap overall thrived for decades before the hyphy craze, and there’s no reason at all to suspect that it will die anytime soon just because a high-profile phenomenon has run its course.

Most importantly, if hyphy is indeed dead, then it means that the hip-hop scene will be forced into new creativity, daring and innovation–three keys that the late Mac Dre embraced in his time on Earth that directly spurred the Bay Area’s rap scene to new heights.

The very first Super Hyphy show in August 2005 was a palpably mind-blowing display of anthropologic mayhem. A wall-to-wall crowd jammed Petaluma’s Phoenix Theater, chanting along to choruses by Keak Da Sneak, Mac Mall and Mistah F.A.B. with an energy usually reserved for national touring acts. At one point, jacked on adrenaline, someone grabbed the mic to joke that Jay-Z was in the building; for all the unbridled, hormone-driven excitement in the room, hell, he may as well have been.

Never before had Bay Area rap been so celebrated by its own in the North Bay. There’d been one-off shows before, like the notorious Mac Dre appearance at the Phoenix Theater in 2001. (He showed up an hour late and delivered an uninspired set, rapping along to his own CD and causing a certain broom-wielder outside to remark in embarrassment that “this is the worst thing I’ve ever had on the stage.”) But Super Hyphy, with its unified energy, was clearly a thrust not for any single rapper but for the entire Bay Area.

In the ensuing months, the inaugural Super Hyphy North of the Gate turned into Super Hyphy Reloaded, then Super Hyphy Halloween and Super Hyphy Holiday–all of them packed. By the time E-40, the aptly christened Ambassador of the Bay, headlined Super Hyphy 5, all hell was due to break loose. E-40’s “Tell Me When to Go” had just hit the airwaves with tremors that would soon shake the world.

Flanked by groupies, fans and aspiring rappers, I watched E-40’s SUV pull into the backstage parking lot before his set, all of us crowding for a glimpse through tinted windows at its heavyweight passenger. One fan, a young girl, explained in no uncertain terms what she would do to be let into the car; another, a skinny kid, begged for a verse to bolster his upcoming album. Both were brushed away by security, left to stand outside a theater so overly sold-out that its doors were blocked by police.

“Sprinkle Me,” “Sidewayz,” “Captain Save a Hoe”—all the old classics–paled next to “Tell Me When to Go.” At the deep bass-drum intro, a flood of fans blitzed the stage on cue, going apeshit and mimicking all the video’s moves: the gas-brake-dip, the shaking dreads, the thizz face. The show was over, but a movement had officially begun, and for better or worse, it was dubbed hyphy.

In the next few months, media outlets coast to coast became obsessed with Bay Area rap, running columns about the dangers of ghostriding the whip, tips on the flyest stunna shades and offering tortuous translations of hyphy slang. Sales of all things relating to hyphy’s crown prince, Mac Dre, skyrocketed into the stratosphere (you’ve never lived until you’ve seen a flossed-out, iced-up baller drop $25 on a Mac Dre toy doll). Suddenly, everyone and their mother was in on the secret.

To accommodate the clustering crowds, Super Hyphy 6 moved to the Sonoma County Fairgrounds and its larger 1,200-person capacity venue to feature legendary Oakland pimp-stylist Too $hort. A cop car pulled up backstage, a bad sign for a rap show. Turns out the cop just wanted to get Too $hort’s autograph.

Hoping to get a taste for the future of hyphy, I showed up early at Super Hyphy 9 to check out the opening acts. Would they bring anything original to the plate? Each act got three or four songs–boom, boom, on, off–and I winced as each one played out variations on the same hyphy trademarks and phrases utilized by the tried-and-true Super Hyphy headliners.

(Or burn, perhaps, in the courtroom. Mistah F.A.B.’s video for “Ghost Ride It,” which lifted trademarks from the song and movie Ghostbusters, received a cease-and-desist for copyright infringement, and his Atlantic Records deal for hyphy’s great hope, Da Yellow Bus Rydah–an all-star album originally due out last year–seems all but dead in the water. Likewise, the Federation’s radio hit “Stunna Glasses at Night” was shut down for uncleared samples.)Here and there, new styles still arrived, from performers both new and old. A young high school group, the Pack, delivered a sparse, high-hat-driven hit (“Vans”) which sounded fresh and unlike anything else, while Ray Luv, deep in the game for almost 20 years, surprised a Super Hyphy crowd by showing up with a live heavy metal band and freestyling over a crunch-guitar version of Mac Dre’s “Thizzle Dance.”

Even at Super Hyphy 13, in November 2006, audiences were still wild, to say the least. While Keak Da Sneak polished off a night at the fairgrounds, a twenty-something couple to the side of the stage gyrated and grinded on each other, stripping off almost all their clothes and drawing a rabid crowd of video cameras and cell-phone snapshots. Before security came and the dust settled, she’d gotten down to nothing but a tiny thong, her legs wrapped around his hips, body arched backward in a naked rhythmic dry hump.

Despite such abandon, something strange happened in the last six months: the public suddenly became discriminating. In the beginning, people had bought tickets for Super Hyphy without any idea who was appearing; it was always an event. But as months wore on and repeat headliners failed to draw interest, attendance for Super Hyphy spiraled–last month’s Super Hyphy 19 drew less than half the ticket-buyers of its heyday.

So where are we now? Unfortunately, the phrase “hyphy” carries a paltry percentage of the impact it once proudly brandished. But the artists who created and nurtured it, many of them active and innovative before the word came into being, are still dropping rhymes over beats. As long as they can remain undaunted by the biters, players and copycats who have driven hyphy into the dirt, they’re perfectly capable of rising from its ashes to create a new future for Bay Area hip-hop.

As the rollercoaster that has been Super Hyphy grinds to a halt next weekend, it’s imperative to look among the celebration, among the commemoration, among the covert blunts and indiscreet dry-humping, toward some sort of vision for that future. It’ll be called something different, sure; but the thrust of energy that propelled that very first Super Hyphy two years ago remains. And the party anthems, the street raps, the crazy flows and the choice beats will be tight as ever.Shit, man, we’re the Bay. It’s how we always do.

Super Hyphy 20 with E-40, San Quinn, Turf Talk, Dem Hoostarz, Berner and Hot Dollar completes the journey on Saturday, Sept. 29, at the Phoenix Theater. 201 Washington Blvd., Petaluma. 8pm. $30. 707.762.3565.


News Briefs

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09.19.07

Planning Ahead

Thick bureaucratic documents that will shape the North Bay for years are being crafted in ongoing but separate processes in Marin, Napa and Sonoma counties. Each is revising its general plan, a state-mandated document which is the basis for all land-use decisions. Sonoma is also creating a separate strategic plan to set priorities on a wider range of issues affecting the overall delivery of county services.

While the dry nature of these documents might be daunting and the meetings may have the potential for trivia and tedium, the overall impact of these final guidelines will be significant.

Municipalities periodically update portions of their general plan, but only occasionally review and revise the entire document. It’s just a coincidence that Marin, Napa and Sonoma counties are pursuing this process simultaneously, says Kristin Drumm of Marin County. “We all have different issues,” she explains. Marin began its general plan update process in 2000. The planning commission recommended a draft version

_in July, and the board of supervisors will discuss final details Sept. 25 and Oct. 16, with an eye to approving the new _general plan on Oct. 23. For details, visit www.co.marin.ca.us/depts/cd/main/fm/index.cfm.

Napa County adopted its current general plan in 1983, and a new version is expected to be approved some time next year. The plan-update steering committee meets Sept. 26 and Oct. 10 and 31, followed by a series of public hearings before the planning commission and the supervisors. The comment period has ended for the plan’s environmental impact report, but the public can comment on the revised general plan up until its final approval. Documents and calendars are at _www.napacountygeneralplan.com.

The Sonoma County Board of Supervisors holds its next general plan update hearing on Sept. 26. Written comments on the proposed revisions must be submitted to the county by Sept. 28. The county’s current plan was adopted in 1989. The revision process started in 2001, and the new version is expected to be OK’d by the end of this year or early next year. Details are at www.sonoma-county.org/prmd/gp2020/index.html.

In a separate move, Sonoma County is also creating a strategic plan (www.sonoma-county.org) to shape future spending on programs and services. This document is not required by the state, but will give the county a blueprint to follow on a wide range of issues. Community meetings on this strategic plan are set for Sept. 20 in Sebastopol, Sept. 25 in Sonoma and Sept. 27 in Petaluma.


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Super Hyphy R.I.P.

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News Briefs

09.19.07 Planning Ahead Thick bureaucratic documents that will shape the North Bay for years are being crafted in ongoing but separate processes in Marin, Napa and Sonoma counties. Each is revising its general plan, a state-mandated document which is the basis for all land-use decisions. Sonoma is also creating a separate strategic plan to set priorities on a wider range...
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