Around the Bay.
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125 places
Rooms you can walk into, ranked the way I would send you.
Key: what the badges mean
★ Michelin star · Bib Bib Gourmand · Green ★ Michelin Green Star · Michelin in the Michelin guide, no distinction · J Jeff's own note · Jeff ★★★★☆ 2019 his own rating out of five, and the year he gave it · new the venue itself opened recently · just added recently added to Jeff's list, whatever its age · 2◆ independent chef/industry recommendations · ! hygiene caution in force · ? no current public hygiene record, not a caution · keep walking Jeff has been and would walk past it · the line under a name says when to go: Destination (plan around it) / Solid (the dependable send) / Listed (on the radar). Under it, where the entry states one: how the room takes bookings, and the date I last checked the entry.
Go here first.
Where I'd actually send you first: the rooms I'd put a visitor in on night one, in town rather than an hour down the highway, spread so six cards are six different answers. Producers, markets and the rest of the city are below.
Chez Noir★
Destination · Restaurant · Carmel-By-The-Sea · $$$$
booking essential
Jonny Black ran Atelier Crenn as Dominique Crenn's first executive chef, then took a Craftsman house in Carmel and put a four-course menu of abalone, skate and dry-aged fish in the front room.
Madcap★
Destination · Contemporary Californian, Asian influence · San Anselmo · $$$$
booking essential
Ron Siegel cooks a prix fixe five nights a week in San Anselmo, and it holds one MICHELIN star.
MaligneBib
Solid · Restaurant · Seaside · $$$
book ahead
Klaus Georis wraps beets in cheesecloth and smokes them two days before he slices them thin and rolls them into cigars.
Sushi RanMichelin
Solid · Japanese, sushi · Sausalito · $$$$
booking essential
Forty years of nigiri in a Sausalito bungalow, run by executive chef and partner Takanori Wada.
Sante Adairius Rustic Ales
Solid · Brewery · Capitola · $$
walk-in
Tim Clifford and Adair Paterno brew saison in a Capitola industrial park on used dairy tanks and a kettle built out of a Lipton machine.
Humble Sea Brewing Co.
Listed · Brewery · Santa Cruz · $$
walk-in
The cans are surf-kook nonsense and the lagers are decoction-mashed in copper and lagered horizontally.
Somewhere tonight.
One tap hides everything shut today and everything that needs a booking, then sorts the rest by how close it is to you. I don’t publish opening hours, because they go stale faster than anyone can check them. Check the door before you go.
The dependable sends
Good cooking needs no occasion, and these are the ones I hand out on a normal Tuesday. 8 here.
Tomales Bay Oyster Company
Oysters, shellfish · Marshall · $$
walk-inthe room’s own account
Live Pacific oysters straight off the farm at Marshall, sold unshucked, since 1909.
Gizdich Ranch
Producer · Watsonville · $
walk-inthe room’s own account
Vincent John Gizdich came out of Croatia and bought five acres of apples on Peckham Road in 1937.
Stillwater
New American, cocktails · Fairfax · $$$
walk-in
David Ruiz left Junior in the Mission, moved to Marin and opened a cocktail restaurant in Fairfax during the pandemic. Cameron Myers cooks.
La Bicyclette RestaurantMichelinjust added
Restaurant · Carmel-By-The-Sea · $$$
book ahead
The Georis family opened La Boheme on this Carmel corner in 1974, one prix fixe dish a night with the month's menu taped in the window.
Heidrun Meadery
Sparkling varietal mead · Point Reyes Station · $$
booking essentialthe room’s own account
Gordon Hull ferments honey by its flower and finishes it in bottle the champagne way, on a Point Reyes dairy farm replanted as bee forage.
Passionfish
Restaurant · Pacific Grove · $$$
book ahead
Berk Guvenc bought this room in July 2024 and wanted bream on the menu. Bream is not on the fully sustainable list, so it is not on the menu.
On my list
These are on my list; I haven't been yet. 111 here.
Alvarado Street Brewery
Brewery · Monterey · $$
walk-in
Mai Tai PA took gold at the 2015 Great American Beer Festival in the international-style pale ale category, against a field of about 6,000 beers.
Happy Girl Kitchen Co.
Provisions · Pacific Grove · $$
walk-in
Todd and Jordan Champagne spent a summer on a family fjord farm in Norway, milking the cow and putting up the garden, and came back to California to sell five pickled vegetables under the name Fearless Pickles.
Big Sur Bakery
Californian, wood-fired · Big Sur · $$$
booking essential
A bakery counter from 8am, lunch five days, and dinner on two nights only, all of it built around a wood oven.
Aptos St. BBQ
Restaurant · Aptos · $$
walk-inthe room’s own account
Local kids built dirt jumps behind the Aptos post office in 1986 and the course went world-known.
Cafe Brasil
Restaurant · Santa Cruz · $$
walk-inthe room’s own account
Cocota is toasted white flour let down with milk and cut with Tabasco and Worcestershire, poured over two soft poached eggs.
Crow's Nest Restaurant
Restaurant · Santa Cruz · $$$
book aheadthe room’s own account
Two rooms in one building on the harbour mouth: a dining room downstairs that starts serving breakfast at eight and takes bookings, and the Breakwater Bar & Grill upstairs that takes none and runs to live music at night.