Eats

There’s a solid chance that most of you reading this have no idea how good you have it. There is so much top-notch Mexican food in Southern and Central California that it kind of becomes a fact of life. Any town big enough to have more than one restaurant is going to have at least […]

California is great at a lot of things, but by and large, Italian food is not on that list, much to Chicago native Dante Stefono’s dismay. He landed on the West Coast a few decades back as an Air Force veteran and made a life here working as a painting contractor, but he kept finding […]

Look. I’m not a doctor. I’m not a nutritionist. I’m not even in particularly good shape. I’m just another doughy dude lumbering his way into middle age and hoping for the best. But I’ll tell you this: After sampling a few things off the menu, it sure feels like I’d be an Adonis in no […]

It was April 20, but the cloud of smoke that hung over Pioneer Park wasn’t coming from some hippie’s reefer bong. It emanated from the smoldering embers of a dozen pitmasters locked in a technically bloody but actually quite friendly battle to prove definitively who really knew how to handle the meat. The Kiwanis Club […]

Freshly baked bread hits my nose as soon as I open the door to my house on April 9. It’s unusual considering I live alone, worked all day, and then went to class. But my cousin Parisa Amini has been staying with me for the last couple of weeks, and she’s become obsessed with baking. […]

I need to start this column off on a somewhat bittersweet note and tell you all that this will be my last Eats column for the Sun. It’s been a great ride getting to know the food of our community and the people who provide it to us, in so many different ways. I realized […]

Great news, everyone: I can see into the future! OK, that’s probably a bit (very) inaccurate. But I had so many future puns and jokes ready for this column this week I couldn’t pass that one up. While I may not be Kreskin, I have had the opportunity to sample some wines in a unique […]

I love poke bowls! That’s not a confessional or anything; it’s just a bold declaration of my giddy love for one of the best food items in the world, which you can get at several places here in the greater Santa Maria Valley. I’ve been meaning to write this story forever, so hallelujah, let’s talk […]

The first thing you’ll notice when you walk inside Angeles de Puebla in Santa Maria is how cozy the restaurant feels. The Mexican venue, which serves a variety of authentic dishes and some American food as well, is settled in an unassuming quiet spot just off Broadway, between Bettaravia and McCoy. It’s small and you […]

Every once in a while I fall back in love with a good syrah. As much as we like to taste and experiment with wines, sipping recently released blends and getting talked into bottles of new brands and varieties we’ve never had before, eventually we all become creatures of wine habit. Some people settle into […]

I have an unabashed love for ugly produce. For decades, Americans have been trained by commercials and mass marketing to believe that the best vegetables are the ones that look like they walked off a Chanel runway—marked by bright exaggerated colors, flawless skin, and a shape most bikini models would envy. But we know that’s […]

I had the exciting opportunity a few weeks ago to sit down with a brewer and talk about one of the many aspects of beer making—hops. If you spend enough time around fans of microbrewing, you will probably hear people say, “I love hoppy beer,” enough times for you to lose count. But have you […]