Constructing the Final Picnic Unfold on the California Coast

Not that I’ve a lot time for browsing: Thursday by Sunday at Dad’s Luncheonette, my restaurant in Half Moon Bay, my staff and I are cranking out hen of the woods sandwiches—topping the griddled mushrooms with pickled onions and a gooey fried egg—or we’re snipping herbs into seasonal salads. We’re frying potato chips by the gazillion and slamming them with a lot umami-packed dietary yeast that they style nearly meaty. We’re doing all of it in a prepare caboose parked in a strip-mall lot. Wednesdays are spent prepping for the week.

However at present’s a uncommon, sunny, summer season Monday, and I’ve two days off. My canine, Boon, and my child, Frost, are ready for me within the truck—each of them, I’m certain, consuming fistfuls of the popcorn I packed, tossed in butter and do-it-yourself furikake. Frost is a rambunctious elementary schooler with a love of highway journeys as fierce as her father’s, and we’ve got a campsite reserved at New Brighton State Seaside, simply over an hour south in Santa Cruz. We’re assembly buddies to fish, surf, and cook dinner over a campfire.

On the best way down the Pacific Coast Freeway, we’re gathering components. Like the remainder of California, the coast between the San Francisco Peninsula and Santa Barbara is weak to fires, mudslides, and different local weather crisis-induced calamities. Typically the freeway is inaccessible round Massive Sur; parts of it have fallen into the Pacific. It’s a spot we wish to take care of in its fragility, however rejoice for its energy: The Central Coast, the a part of the state I rejoice in my new cookbook, Coastal: 130 Recipes From a California Street Journey, can be a gem-studded belt of microclimates. Right here, scrappy, natural farmers have a tendency wind-blown plots, elevating vegatables and fruits so stunning and hard-won, you would weep simply slicing into them. I pack my kitchen instruments and hop within the truck. With a mouth full of popcorn, Frost mumbles, “Dude! What took you so lengthy?” We pull out of the drive.

First, we pop by Dad’s to select up the riches that Bryan Jessop has left there for me. I met Jessop, the forager behind Morchella Wild Meals, when he confirmed up on the caboose at some point with a basket of porcinis from the woods on the Monterey Peninsula. At this time, he’s dropped off tender dandelion greens and a messy load of huckleberries. I pack up the greens for a campground salad and let Frost stain herself ­purple gobbling the berries on the highway.

Midway there, in Pescadero, I discover the salad’s star ingredient. Corn isn’t simple to develop on the Central Coast—the window of ample heat is simply August and September—however Fifth Crow Farm does it proper. The moveable tractor coop is within the area at present, and the heirloom hens are inside, fertilizing the natural soil and consuming bugs. Like the opposite growers I work with, Fifth Crow’s Mike Irving, Teresa Kurtak, and John Vars consider in farming for social justice. They donate crops to gleaners, group nonprofits, and faculties.

Plus, their corn is tremendous candy. I determine to roast half of it and toss the remainder proper into the bowl to marinate together with the sugariest, tangiest Solar Golds. We seize these proper down the highway from native tomato legends Mathieu Simms and Jennifer Jepsen at Simms Organics. I’ll wait till the final minute to toss in Jessop’s bitter, younger dandelion greens, in order that they’re nonetheless crispy-crunchy after we lastly dig in.

Hopefully we’ll catch some halibut off New Brighton’s pier this afternoon, which I’ll grill on the fireplace slathered in herb butter. Whereas the fish cooks, I’ll have candy potatoes roasting proper within the embers. To high these off, we hit up Harley Farms Goat Dairy for a number of the Central Coast’s most interesting cheese. After we pull up on the barn, cheesemaker Dee Harley greets us, an Anatolian shepherd at her hip. This time of 12 months, Dee’s huge herding canines have their work lower out for them: The spring youngsters have grown into rowdy youngsters. The pasture behind the barn is a blur of adolescent goats bleating, bolting, and knocking each other down. Frost goes to pet the goats by the fence.

Only a few miles from the seashore, the briny sea fog hangs over the pasture. There’s a novel saltiness to their milk as a result of the goats eat that grass. Dee fetches a few blocks of aged feta, and I chunk  into one prefer it’s sweet: Creamy and deeply savory, it’ll style like heaven crumbled over the charred, honey-drizzled candy potatoes.

I prefer to pair hearty meals with one thing ethereal. My pals at Brisa Ranch develop elegant, emerald zucchini, good for shaving and dressing with a French dressing I made the day earlier than—aromatic with salted cherry blossoms and brightened up with puckery umeboshi. Boon and Frost run between Brisa’s strawberry rows as I chat with the oldsters who provide my restaurant with 100 kilos of Désirée pink potatoes every week for our chips. Since 2018, I’ve watched Cristóbal Cruz Hernández and his companions Veronica and Cole Mazariegos-Anastassiou develop this farm from a small patch of earth to 40 acres of row crops and orchards. Simply throughout the freeway at Año Nuevo State Park, elephant seals loll lazily on the seashore.

The solar remains to be excessive when Frost, Boon, and I climb again into the truck. In 40 quick minutes, we’re at our vacation spot. As I begin pulling out gear, the 2 of them sure out of the truck to greet our buddies, who’ve been ready for us to reach on the campsite. We’ll catch some waves, and in a couple of hours, we’ll have a fish in hand and the camp all arrange. I’ll be prepping all this stunning stuff—wrapping candy potatoes in foil for the fireplace, shucking corn, and slicing skinny ribbons of zucchini—because the ocean is bathed in an off-the-hook sundown and the farmers of the Central Coast name it quits for the night time.