NewLu’s

NewLu’s

coffee.jpgWhen Joseph Schultz tells you, “this place has the best coffee in town,” you tend to pay attention. The founding chef/ethno-gastronomer for the late, great India Joze Restaurant was referring to the new Lulu Carpenter’s housed in the new/old Octagon across from Gravago in downtown Santa Cruz. And frankly he could be right.

At least that’s how my deep, rich, dark-roast coffee tasted yesterday morning. And that was nothing compared to Joze’ incredible triple espresso with a float of whipped cream. I took a sip. It should have been acidic at that wattage, but it wasn’t. Not the least bit bitter. Incredible. The secret to all of this might just lie in Felton, at Coffee Cat, where Lulu’s beans are custom roasted.

I am about to make a field trip up to the mountains to find out. Stay tuned.

Aptos Au Midi

Aptos Au Midi

The Chocolate Creation of the Year: Yearning for some authentic French cooking? You will want to sample the handiwork of chef Muriel Loubiere, who along with husband Michel has opened Au Midi, a small, charming place devoted to a small menu of French culinary hits. (Although the restaurant announces itself as “provençal” the current menu doesn’t back that up.)

Our quartet sampled two appetizers and four entrees — all delicious and a bit retro with their impeccable sauces and fastidious handmade presentation. But it was the desserts by skilled pastry chef Loubiere that knocked us out.

Destination Chocolate! And I’ll go further. If you can only enjoy ONE chocolate dessert this year, it has to be the “Bergamot” creation at Au Midi ($8.25). Let me try to explain (too bad the low lighting prevented me from taking a good shot).

Imagine a shining dark chocolate hemisphere, say 3 inches in diameter, sitting on a crisp wafer-thin chocolate biscuit. Next to it is a filigree spun sugar “basket” containing orange slices. Next to that is a little bowl of crème Anglaise. Add a few perfect rosettes of unsweetened whipped cream.
Now go back to that dark chocolate dome. (more…)

December Dining: Cantinetta Luca

December Dining: Cantinetta Luca

Last week we were all over the map – Luca in Carmel, Soif for appetizers, and Au Midi for dinner. All wonderful stuff in general, with scallops, root veggies and wintry natural meat dishes showing off nicely.

bread.jpgAcross Dolores Street from Winfield Gallery, Luca sits between Ocean and Seventh, in a contemporary re-design that moves from the intimate front bar seating, past the wood-burning pizza ovens, into a huge back dining room. Heavy beamed ceilings in the front room, brick barrel vaulting in back, attest to the vintage of this attractive space, masterminded by Mirabel Hotel and Restaurant Group entrepreneur David (Bouchée) Fink.

speck.jpgThe lunch menu created by Executive Chef Jason Balestrieri (formerly of LA’s Patina) was instantly appealing, and our quartet ordered glasses of earthy Sardinian Cannonau to go with a shared arugula, pecorino and pear salad, a pizza Margherita, another pizza topped with caramelized onion and wild funghi and a shared salumi plate of artisan-made salametto and speck. I could admire the view of large slabs of hams and cured salumi hanging in a glass aging chamber from my spot on the banquette.

Every flavor was sparkling, from the delicious, ungreasy meats to thelucapizza.jpg perfect pizza. Crisp crust, chewy delicious dough, buffalo mozzarella and San Marzano tomato topping. The arugula salad — inflected with beets and thin slivers of pear — was generous enough for us all to enjoy. Even the opening salvo of crusty bread was terrific, served with an addictive olive oil and balsamic mixture filled with chopped olives.

Put Luca on your list next time you’re in Carmel – open for lunch (during the week) and dinner daily – 831/625-6500.

Time Trip Across the Universe

Time Trip Across the Universe

The exact youthful energy, yearning innocence and reckless abandon that Babyjim_sturgess3.jpg Boomers brought to the world-altering ’60s is packed into Across the Universe, Julie (Frida, The Lion King) Taymor’s deceptively complex romp through the dawning of the age of counter-cultural awakening.

Ambitiously rife with imagination and spunk, the film takes Boomers on a magical mystery tour through the soundtrack of their coming of age.
That would be the Beatles, whose songs are re-awakened by the young cast who sing their way through a slender tale of boys and girls, hippies and wannabes, worlds colliding and tripping into the psychedelic fantastic. For any viewer old enough to remember all the lyrics, this film will more than reward its overly-long (and sometimes hokey) feast of sights and sounds.

Joe Alexander is brilliant as Max (above left), whose sister Lucy (in the sky with …played by Evan Rachel Wood) falls in love with a young Liverpudlian Jude (Jim Sturgess, above right). (more…)