Christina Waters

The coffeehouse is new - but the building isn’t. That’s Lulu’s @ The Octagon, a sparkling new palace of caffeine sleekly tucked inside the 19th century Hall of Records building, corner of Front & Cooper Streets.

Already doing a brisk business with espresso-lovers and fans of exotic tea, Lulu O’s is a clever pastiche of contemporary lines, and antique setting. Banquette seating lines six of the eight walls, and from the top of the dark wood wainscotting walls continue upwards in buttery yellow tones all the way up to the skylight in the center. Under the skylight sits a central island surrounded by polished granite counters. Granite the color of café au lait. Open Sun-Thu 6am-8pm, and until 10pm on Fri & Sat, Santa Cruz’ newest Lulu’s has it goin’ on. Besides, you can go from caffeine to wine, thanks to Vinocruz around the corner. Both pretty watering holes embrace the Museum of Art & History. You could plan your day around this particular corner of the world.

The walls will sizzle at UCSC’s Mary Porter Sesnon Art Gallery, with a rare selection of work from UCSC faculty, entitled FUSE. The selected work explores the influence of digital media and technology on the artists’ practice. Work from FUSE will travel to Japan as FUSE / FURERU in collaboration with two university art galleries: Zokei Gallery and University Museum, Tokyo Zokei University; and Gallery AUBE, Kyoto University of Art and Design. In exchange, the Sesnon Gallery will host an exhibition of faculty work from the Tokyo and Kyoto universities in fall 2008. The FUSE show at the Sesnon will showcase arts faculty, including Jimin Lee, whose haunting digital etching, Shadowy Locus, is shown here, plus work from Frank Galuszka, Jennie McDade, Dee Hibbert-Jones, Lewis Watts and others. A provocative glimpse at faculty creativity, FUSE runs April 11-May 12, with an opening reception tonight Wednesday, April 11, 5-7pm. Also, check out the panel discussion, Tuesday, May 1 at the UCSC Media Theater with Jimin Lee, Norman Locks, E.G. Crichton and Ed Osborn. The Gallery, located at Porter College, is open Tuesday-Saturday noon - 5pm.

Exemplary Contemporary 2007: ‘The Sea Around Us: Depictions and Imaginings.’ Long title, but lots of great images fill this year’s Exemp Contemp exhibition. Artists from UCSC and the Central Coast will show prints, sculpture, and painting all riffing on the theme of the sea. Included are works by Salal Moon Rinaldo (etching shown here), Brian Rounds, Tom Maderos, Cheryl Doering and many others. The show runs from April 15 - June 5, 2007, at the Smith Gallery, Cowell College, UCSC - with a chichi opening reception this Sunday, April 15 from 2-4pm.

Regular Gallery hours: Tues. - Sun., 11am - 5 pm
Free parking available on weekends.

Outside Blake’s Window, directed by Tandy Beal, with music by Jon Scoville, opens April 12-15 in Salt Lake City on the elegant Repertory Dance Theatre at the new Jeanne Wagner Theatre. Original cast members from Santa Cruz, (Paula Bliss, singer, Rock Lerum, fire juggler, Ronn Reinberg, technical consultant, Ellen Sevy, rehearsal director and Erik Stern as Blake) join the Company. Also joining the cast is Aloysia Gavre (long time Cirque du Soleil aerialist) who began her circus work in the Pickles under Tandy’s direction.

Here’s what happened at our breakfast table this Easter weekend — an explosion of chicks hatched out of one of our soft boiled eggs! Egg-xactly.

Thank God! After years of waiting for something more like the Westside’s old Aldo’s Cafe (brainchild of the original Sestri chef), our waiting is over. Bistro Al Mar specializes in tapas so authentically Old World we thought we were in Madrid last week, sharing a little teaser of fava beans and diced feta, washed down with Spanish white wine.

In the place of the former Xin noodle shop (841 Almar, at the end of the Almar Center strip), Bistro Al Mar has a lively menu wandering the Mediterranean waterfront from Marseilles and Nice, to Genoa and Barcelona. There are even a few North African dishes on offer. The place looks smart, with sensuous fedo and Catalan pop music in the background, and a simple long lace curtain adding privacy to the central dining room. Open for dinners Tuesday - Sunday, Al Mar is already attracting inquiring grazers who like the low prices and sexy menu. I also liked the service — smart and on-the-ball, our server offered to pour samples of wines when we weren’t sure what we wanted. That’s always a sound restaurant practice.

We began our small courses with a large plate of outstanding Catalan semi-dry garlic and pepper sausage “Fuet de Vic” ($7), and a $2 basket of “unlimited refills” focaccia. Yes, Al Mar has your number. A country Rusa potato salad, mixed with peas, carrots, tuna, egg, red peppers and capers in an aioli dressing arrived in a glazed pottery ramikin ($7), and my trio of grilled baby lamb chaps, done rare — perfect lamb is always very pink, as far as I’m concerned — came on a generous sea of Tuscan white beans and topped with a fresh sprig of sage ($11). This was a knock-out! Joined by a glass of Ridge Three Valleys Zinfandel 2004, this was a meal to get out of bed for. You know what I mean.

We plan to work our way, slowly and with relish, through the entire Bistro Al Mar menu. See you there!

For those of you who’ve been emailing me, the answer is Woodstock’s Pizza, Inc. That’s what’s going in to the old Erik’s Deli space on Front Street. . . . And hold the April 22 date: Santa Cruz’ own irrepressible, culinary performance artist Jozseph Schultz is wok’ing on the wild side again. This time it’s a reinvention of the benefit dinner involving aerial choreography, Persian New Year’s festivities — and authentic cuisine thanks to ethnographer-chef Schultz (the co-founder of India Joze restaurant for SC newbees), to be held at the bohemian 418 Front Street. The benefit bit is to save the luscious old hardwood floors in the alternative arts space.

You’ll be hearing more from me on the Persian New Year extravaganza, but for now save up $50-$75 per, for tickets and that date again is April 22. Find out more about Gail Rich awardee Schultz, at www.indiajoze.com and learn about the 418 concept at www.the418.org.

will be open by the time you read this! So rush out and take a look at the wrap-around banquettes, the central espresso hearth and the spiffy revival of Santa Cruz’ original, old Hall of Records building, corner of Cooper & Front Streets. The new Lulu’s will be the perfect place to wait for those DNA test results from the Bahamas.

We’ve been busy test-driving the new glut of designer chocolate bars popping up faster than wannabe fathers of little Daniellyn. We’ve been swilling the outrageous 60% cacao dark chocolate with orange from Chocolove for the past year. And it still rules. however, there are serious competitors out there — and I feel an obligation to taste (often) and bring back the results of my fieldwork for readers everywhere.

The Endangered Species folks have got a nifty little number consisted of dark bittersweet chocolate laced with currents and hazelnuts that will do bouncy things to both your tastebuds and your endorphins. and I have always loved, and continue to love, the Lindt dark chocolate truffle bar in the thick, blue package. Okay, so it’s sweeter than the classic, hardcore dark chocolate — but I admit I am deeply devoted to its combination of decadent mouthfeel (truly naughty) and sweet/bitter/chocolate synergy.

But here’s our new find — Dolfin Chocolat: an incredibly packaged dark (noir, in French) chocolate smoothly inflected with crystallized orange peel from Belgium. At around $3.50, it’s pricey, but so is, well, use your own lustful analogies…..There’s not a trace of soapiness that often compromises very high cacao-content chocolates. Impeccable mouthfeel, intensely chocolate flavor and aroma, plus the bitter orange finish — seriously, this bar has it all. You can’t walk across the street in California without tripping over some new, deeply flavorful, gorgeously packaged designer chocolate. So there’s no need to suggest possible emporia. Just go on and get yours!

I’ll be taste testing chocolates as a continuing feature of my column, and to help expand your own appreciation of chocolate terminology and tasting, please check out this excellent (and exhaustive) guide to chocolate terminology (another tip from my buddy Donna Blakemore who clearly has too much time on her hands. Or maybe it’s just chocolate on her mind?)

As in Stokes Adobe, in old Monterey. From my seat in one of the many rooms of this lumbering old adobe — each room with three-foot walls, each room with its own fireplace — I could spit on a half dozen of the oldest buildings in California. Those would be the original adobes that comprised what was for a brief period the anglo capitol of California. I’ve been to more than my fair share of dinners, wine-tastings and other special events in this architectural gem — the central staircase and interior balcony makes it feel like one of those stagecoach stops in an old Western movie. But more to the point last week was the fact that Stokes is a very reliable contemporary stop for lunch, dinner or fashionable cocktails.

My companions had never visited Stokes, so they were, well, stoked over a menu that spans regional California specialties and stresses fresh, seasonal ingredients. Also, it looks like the Kobe beef burger is a hot new trend. Both the guys in our quartet jumped at the chance to grab a big burger — on soudough bun topped with crystals of sea salt — served along with a passle of fries and pretty salad. Mustard and ketchup arrived in their own designer serving trays. No matter how classy the joint, no burger should ever arrive without mustard and ketchup. My lunch of duck leg confit, with warm spinach and garlic vinaigrette, was voluptuous. Two softly boiled eggs, halved and topped with paprika, decorated the larger plate. All the food was beautiful, seriously tasty and served on soft linens by people who knew when to bring bread, butter, water, and when to remove dishes.

Anyone heading toward Monterey should add Stokes Adobe Restaurant to their dining list. It’s large enough, with a large suite of dining rooms, that you can always get a table — no matter how busy the action. Just sitting in a slice of the old West is fun enough all by itself.