Berkeley + Chez Panisse Cafe

Combining a work trip with vacation, we took a trip out to San Francisco/Napa for just shy of a week. Since we needed to get from San Francisco up to Napa, I was able to score a reservation at the Chez Panisse Cafe. Josh picked me up from SFO and we set off on the road to Berkeley, not knowing what we would do when we ended up there hours before our reservation. Happily, the gods of food smiled down on us. As we pulled past Chez Panisse and started looking for parking, we came upon what we thought was a fair with blocked off streets, but it ended up being the Berkeley Farmers Market, just setting up for its 3-7pm run. As you can see, they block off a small street and fill it with farm stands, bread, ice cream, meat, oysters, fish, ... A truly wonderful experience. We were shocked at the extreme bounty available so late in the year and at how much each farmer brought with him. We chatted with the nice man at the market info tent and found out that this is the smallest of all the three Berkeley markets, but we were impressed nonetheless.

The number of pictures I have is extreme, but I felt I had to capture (and share) all they had to offer. They are mostly ordered alphabetically based on my naming scheme. Hee.

A few major stalls are not pictured: one guy who brought boxes of avocados and another stall dedicated just to asian pears and plums. They were incredibly delicious and unlike any plums I have ever had before. I am jealous of these Californians.

Each farm stall was about this size and had the same amount of bounty. Some of them seemed to specialize, a couple had many different selections.

It was amazing the diversity and beauty of everything that was presented. Here we have beets and turnips.

I know these are turnips so they go against my naming scheme, but I saved the file as beets. :)

They don't look so exciting, but I got pictures of just about everything, even these boring-looking cauliflower and broccoli.

Carrots!

Colorful chard.

Cucumbers, Armenian cucumbers, and one type called "World's Best". Nice marketing on that one.

Dogs aren't allowed within a certain distance of the raw food stalls, and this doggie was well behaved and hanging out on the side.

Beautiful eggplants.

There was one stand just for mushrooms. This stand made me wish that we were cooking while we were there.

Beautiful chanterelles.

I am not really sure what kind of mushrooms these are...

King oyster mushrooms. Josh was drooling over these.

The boxes were still being filled when I took my pictures but check out these gorgeous matsutakes!

Yum, shitakes. So much meatier-looking than the ones we can get here.

Lots of padron peppers. This was one thing that we have here that look better than the ones we saw at the market!

Colorful selection of peppers and tomatoes.

It's fall!

Radishes! Who knew they had radishes that look like carrots?

A nice selection of bag-'em-yourself salads. And edible flowers.

Pretty looking squashes. Here they call pattypan squashes "flying saucers".

Purty.

So many strawberries! And they smelled divine.

There were so many tomatoes available.

If you look at the top right box, it says San Marzanos.

Tasty looking.

What a beautiful selection of heirloom cherry tomatoes!

Heirloom tomatoes.

Pear-shaped tomatoes!

Hog Island Oysters were there with a stall, too. You can buy oysters, clams, etc.

We got some oysters from the Hog Island raw bar. Here, we have a dozen Sweetwaters. Every farmers market should have raw oysters...

There was also a stall for meat. They came on the late side. All their meat was vacuum-sealed.

And also fish. They also came late and I couldn't get close enough because of the long line to really see what they had to offer.

Here was our loot from the market. Three containers of strawberries, a handful (or two) of avocados, two pretzels, and asian pears. These are the asian pears that I grew up with, which they told us at the stall are pretty hard to grow. I guess that's why I can't seem to find them anywhere anymore.

After we spent a good amount of time at the Berkeley Farmers Market, we walked down to Chez Panisse so we could scope out the parking situation. As we walked, we passed the Cheese Board and stopped in to get a look at their wares. As you can see from their cheese board, the Cheese Board has a really impressive collection. A nice lady walked us through their most popular items.

We liked this wall art at the Cheese Board. We walked away with a Fromager d'Affinois, a brie-like double creme which was sooo good, a piave, and a free baguette since it was our first visit. What a great shop!

And on to dinner. The entrance to Chez Panisse is pretty easy to miss. I say that because we missed it a few times. But proof that we were really here!

I had struggles with my camera for some of the trip, and it started here. Plus, I had to use my DSLR here instead of the little point-n-shoot I usually use for food, so I had focusing/distance problems too. I'm still learning!

We started off with the garden lettuce salad. At a place like Chez Panisse, how could you start with anything else? The lettuces were so delicious and luscious. The dressing was simple -- olive oil, lemon, s+p -- but a little inconsistent. I have to admit that I was a little disappointed in how it was dressed. Perhaps my standards were just too high.

For my main, Liberty Farm duck leg and pork belly cooked in the wood oven. What a beautiful fall dish. The duck was so tender, it seemed like confit. The pork belly was beautiful -- unctuous and so tender throughout, which is actually had to find, with a crispy crust. And then the veg: potatoes and delicious sauerkraut.

Josh got the Grilled Cattail Creek Ranch lamb leg with roasted parnsips, carrots, fried onions, and tapenade. Beautifully cooked, beautifully prepared.

I didn't take pictures of dessert because I'm lame. Josh had a luscious buttermilk panna cotta with Filoli Garden quince and pear compote which was probably the best panna cotta we have ever had, and that's saying something. The flavor was exquisite, the texture was like dofu fa, a softness that's hard to achieve. For me, I had Bob's wine grape sherbet with Prosecco and langues de chat. Tasty. And also, the server brought us two bahri dates from the Flying Disc Ranch in Thermal, CA. They were the most delicious and sweet dates I have ever had.

We had a nice CDP with dinner.

After dinner, I asked about the copies of the cookbooks sitting on the bar. They were autographed. Sine I already had a copy of The Art of Simple Food, I picked up a copy of "In the Green Kitchen".