Dining - Alameda, California

It’s not as if Alameda needs more charm. But from its self-effacing name to its cozy parlor-like interior, the Little House Cafe infuses a healthy new quotient of enchantment.

My wife, Kathy, and I are helping lead the floating University of Zinfandel around Cape Horn from Chile to Argentina, conducting seminars on our traditional California grape, Zinfandel.

Cooking

Some vegetables fascinate me because of their unusual appearance—their exotic color or other unique characteristics.

Hip Sips

In December 2007, Alameda’s St. George Spirits became the only American company since 1912 to sell absinthe in the United States.

I have few preconceived notions about what a great burger should be. I just go by my gut.

Many folks picture a typical winery as one that grows its own grapes from which it then makes the wine.

A week after the Little House Café opened, the lunchtime lineup of hungry patrons stretched to the door.

Today, Alamedans are blessed with more than a few top-notch restaurants to please their palates, including Pappo, C’era Una Volta, Asena, Angela’s, Ching Hua, Angel Fish and Dragon Rouge, to name a few.

Flowers are nice, and candy is dandy, but wine is mighty fine when we’re talking about your valentine.

After eating at Central Vegetarian Cuisine, a new restaurant on Park Street, I could easily convert from my carnivore ways.

Those little critters we call yeast are very important to some of mankind’s greatest achievements.

Havana has attracted the young and the hip with its extensive mojito cocktail menu as well as with its food.

“I think it’s presumptuous of a chef to say, ‘this is the signature dish.’ That’s something you must wait for customers to tell you."

If you haven’t ventured along Webster Street—the West End’s main drag—lately, you are in for a surprise.

There are many reasons to celebrate in the wine business, and two of the best are the beginning of harvest and the end of harvest.

This time of year, grapes in California are getting ripe, and it’s time to think about harvesting them and turning them into wine.

It seems the folks at the Hobnob thought of it all—and got it right.

It’s lunchtime in Alameda and what do you crave? A sandwich, of course.

When my wife, Kathy, and I first moved to California a few years ago, say about 1970, we had no idea that people actually drank wine at the beach.

This mall of culinary delights is filled with shops run by local merchants selling delicious, organic and ultimately healthy foods to taste and eat.

The restaurant replaces Chin’s Garden, at this location for some 30 years before the Huangs took over.

In the mid-1990s, a young South African–born chef, Jeremy Borg, wanted to learn how to make wine.

It’s not apparent when you first enter Dragon Rouge, the fine new restaurant on Encinal Avenue, that the three proprietors are young.

Fresh fruit smoothies and traditional Chinese ginger milk custard are two of the many delights on the menu.

The wine business is a very cyclical entity that depends less on economic ups and downs and more on the size and quality of the yearly grape crop.

Restaurant Feature

It’s very difficult to find a restaurant that simultaneously appeals to multiple tastes, moods and dining ambiences. Luckily, there’s a perfect solution to any dining dilemma, just a hop and a skip across the Park Street Bridge along Oakland’s nearby Embarcadero.

Dining on Encinal Avenue just got more cosmopolitan.

Cravings

C’era Una Volta pastry chef Patrizia Scanlon was inspired by the famous volcano that rumbles and sparks in Naples, Italy, where she grew up.

Over the last 20 years, there have been an amazing number of studies showing that wine consumption is good for your health.

In choosing kid-friendly outlets to highlight, I’m focusing on full-service restaurants—places where a family can go inside, sit down and be served.

Taste of the Town - Otaez

Cravings

Bananas Over Bananas

Hip Sips

If You Like Piña Coladas...

Are the holidays too hectic? Here’s a bit of food advice for navigating Thanksgiving, Christmas and the New Year.