Napa Day 1

One of my best friends, Anthony, and I have birthdays within several weeks of each other. We don't much like buying gifts for each other, but we love eating out together, playing board games together, and generally hanging out. So this year, we planned a trip to Napa together with our spouses and other eating/gaming buddy, Mikey (essentially the same gang I spoke of going to Vegas with over the holidays). So Anthony and his wife, Wendy, found a baby-sitter (grandma), a dog-sitter (aunt + uncle), and we took off for three full days of eating, gaming, and general tomfoolery.

After a very light lunch at Crepes-a-Go-Go in Berkeley, where I picked up Mark from his office, we headed to Napa. Dinner at Ubuntu wasn't until 7:30pm, and we were already hungry by 5pm, so we headed out to downtown Napa to graze a little. Along the way to the Oxbow Public Market, we passed what appeared to be downtown Napa's newest hotel, Avia. It was the brightest, shiniest building on First Street.

We continued on over the First Street Bridge, stopping to gaze out over Napa Creek and some of Napa's new development.

We found the Oxbow Public Market across the creek.

But before I could go inside Oxbow, Mark spotted the Fatted Calf in the adjacent building, a charcuterie selling fine meats and other fine foods, with a bakery, the Model Bakery, next door. From these two establishments, we were able to put together an awesome snack of mortadella on pain epi, 4505 chicharrones (pork rinds), peanut butter and chocolate chip cookie, and apple cider.

It was the perfect meaty precursor to our dinner at Ubuntu, an all-vegetarian restaurant (slash yoga studio) that features a lot of dishes that look like a beautifully-arranged meadow.


Ubuntu is known for having vegetarian dishes that appeal to a meat eater's perspective and palate, and their "mushroom soil," which tops the dipping sauce above and the Carta da Musica forest-on-a-flatbread below, does just that. None of us at the table were vegetarians, but that mushroom soil elevated the flavor of all the greens that touched it.

The portions are small, and relatively expensive considering, well, there's no meat. For example, the carrot salad below is a double portion. However, as you can see, it is often beautifully presented, and ...

... even when it's not, some of the dishes are a revelation, they're so good. For me, the beet dish was one such amazing plate, as was the kohlrabi dish with poached "Rhode Island red" egg.

The waitress explained that the kohlrabi was represented several ways in the dish: pickled, pureed, and made into bread chunks. Who knew kohlrabi was so versatile?

Unfortunately, the desserts were unimpressive, both their looks and their taste.

We were plenty full when we left, but with little protein and carbs on the menu, I found myself snacking on mortadella and pain epi again around midnight.