I was either the best or worst waitress (according to handwritten notes on my check receipts). My status depended entirely on circumstances because even the most skillful waiters could not pull off a triple seating on a Friday night when you’re understaffed and you got assigned the one busser who just started. To make everyone […]
Eats
Riverbench Winery and God’s Country Provisions team up on doughnut and wine tasting
This is way more doughnut than I bargained for. Four full-sized doughnuts are placed in front of me. Blueberry, apple, vanilla, and chocolate cake. Each is iced in frosting infused with the wine it will be paired with. Riverbench 2017 Bedrock Chardonnay pours into an etched wine glass. I gently tear the Blueberry Chardonnay Cake […]
From beer-wine hybrids to grazing tables, recent trends show a lot of Central Coast character
This past year was all about alternative milks and nut butters.� Cannabis and/or CBD-infused food and beverages.� Flower flavors and bitter plant fronds in cocktails.� Salads, collagen-pumped foods, prebiotics, avocado toast, açai bowls, and antioxidants.� Real butter is back, and we all seem to be comfortable cooking with ghee and coconut oil. That was 2019 […]
Revisit some of Northern Santa Barbara County’s tastiest, newsiest food happenings of 2019
What’s most worth remembering about the past year? Think about all of your senses and what might deserve revisiting or at least savoring the memory of. We at the Sun want to help you remember some of the most delicious places and meals of 2019 so you can relish those “oh yeah, that happened last […]
A Christmas tradition that starts in the kitchen
“Seriously?” I exclaim under my breath. Exasperated, I realize now—after what feels like my millionth trip to the grocery store this weekend—that I don’t have any baking soda. It’s an essential for making Nestle’s chocolate chip cookies. And so was the granulated sugar that I had just brought back from the grocery store five minutes […]
Central Coast chef’s classes help take the fear out of cooking
I was fortunate to catch up with chef Debbie Duggan before one of her famous appetizer classes recently. We met at her gorgeously remodeled teaching kitchen on Parker Street in an industrial sector of San Luis Obispo, right around the corner from the Nautical Bean coffee shop. Her kitchen is designed in a Tuscan style, with […]
New Orcutt boutique inn offers guest chef opportunities and serves up a wide beverage selection, house-made light bites
It’s all in the name at the Wine Stone Inn: The brand-new boutique hotel features a Vintage Room with a wine option for everybody. But Wine Stone isn’t just serving up local and international wines to their guests—as General Manager Lauren Wise told the Sun, a stay at this Orcutt inn is “an experience from […]
Just a short trip up the 166, a visit to the Cuyama Buckhorn Restaurant and Bar will leave you feeling all kinds of autumn
Since its establishment in 1952, the Cuyama Buckhorn Restaurant and Bar has been serving meals to locals and travelers passing through alike. But this fall season, the New Cuyama staple is switching things up with its first seasonal offerings: the Fall Harvest Menu. “There’s going to be a huge culinary focus on connecting the food […]
The Garagiste Wine Festival gives sippers the chance to take in fine, small-batch wines without the pomp
Yves Simoneau attended The Garagiste Wine Festival in Paso Robles with a planned itinerary, but he took a “delinquent” turn down a row of intriguing mystery vines and fresh new labels. He was pleasantly surprised by the wines of Hayseed and Housdon, from winemaker Enrique Torres, who also makes Enrique Torres Wines and the hand-crafted […]
Santa Maria couple’s new frozen treat shop has options for every dessert lover
For Santa Maria-based couple Natalie and Victor Bryson, ice cream has always been a shared love in their relationship. “My husband loves ice cream; I love ice cream. Our first date we actually ate ice cream and talked about ice cream,” Natalie told the Sun. So when the Brysons were thrift shopping one day, they […]
Cured and Cultivated online deli now delivers gorgeous meat and cheese ‘tables’ to Central Coast foodies
About the same time their 15-month-old daughter, Zoia, took her first steps, Anatoly and Katherine Vorontsov launched the most happening cheese and charcuterie business around, Cured and Cultivated. And now, just in time for the holidays, the couple recently began offering online ordering and delivery of their boxes, boards, and “tables” of imported wares up […]
A frugal look at the prices of organic milk, butter, eggs, and bread at local grocery stores, in the face of rising gasoline prices
If you’re like me, you look to the gas pumps to decipher what you’re going to spend on your food essentials—the simplified reason being that high oil prices contribute to soaring food prices. Since today’s gas prices are something out of a horror film, and AAA reports that Californians are paying the most expensive gas […]

