Outstanding in the Field. . . or Warehouse

After a long and filling day meeting bloggers and eating lots of yummy food, the Foodbuzz festival attendees were treated to yet another culinary delight, an Outstanding in the Field dinner in the Greenleaf Produce Warehouse.

We all met up at the Hotel Vitale and were bussed to a warehouse district of San Francisco. It was a little bit shady. . . Once inside, however, it was absolutely enchanting. A long, winding series of tables dressed in white tablecloths and set with mismatched plates and chopsticks awaited us. Randall Grahm from Bonny Doon Vineyard was pouring wines all night, and started us off with a crisp albariño. Baskets of spicy shrimp crisps arrived on each table, and servers passed tonnato on crostini. Somehow I still had an appetite from the tasting pavilion. That’s what happens when I run in the morning!
                                                              With Andrea and Mardi
I spent a lot of time talking with so many bloggers whose blogs I had never read, and I am quite excited to start reading them. I have a stack of blogger business cards as well as a ton of recipe cards to start in on as soon as I have time. Once we sat down, we were treated to quite a feast, starting with plates of pickled vegetables. Kimchi deliciousness, I could eat it all day long. The first course was a mushroom dashi with maitake, shimeji,and enoki mushrooms.

It was followed by grilled calamari with a brown butter ponzu reduction with cucumber, kaiware, frisee, and yellow pear tomato with chojang and sesame vinaigrette served over udon noodles. The thick noodles paired well with crunchy cucumber, sweet tomatoes, and ocean-y calamari.
Seltzer water from The Seltzer Sisters was flowing throughout the meal in old fashioned seltzer containers. Anyone who knows me knows my love of fizzy water, and the containers, which were fun to use and cute to look at, kept it fresh  extremely bubbly, just the way I like it. There was also mushroom risotto with koshikari rice and crispy maitake mushrooms and sea trout baked with dashikombu, fried garlic, and Japanese curry powder.

It was served with the most amazing Brussels sprouts I have ever had.
They were roasted with ponzu fried garlic, guanciale, and bonito flakes. Salty, caramelized, and to die for delicious, I could have eaten the entire serving bowl. Brussels sprouts have such a bad rap, but I would guarantee pretty much anyone would love this dish. Believe it or not, I also bravely consumed soy braised beef cheeks with baby carrots and fingerling potatoes, OB beer, and denjang demi. Foodbuzz is for adventurous eating, and this beef was melt in your mouth yumminess. The evening ended with koshikari rice pudding with cookie crumble and warren pear which was served with a 2008 Bonny Doon Vinferno, a sweet, almost syrupy dessert wine that paired well with the creamy rice.

 
We capped the night off with prosecco in the Hotel Vitale.
What an incredible evening! All of the food and wine was locally sourced and scrumptious, and sharing it with new friends made the night fly by. Thank you to everyone who contributed: GreenLeaf Produce ABS Seafood Bonny Doon Vineyard County Line Harvest EO/Small World Trading Company Frog Hollow Farm Far West Fungi Iacopi Farm Marin Roots Farm Marin Sun Farms The Seltzer Sisters Totally Bamboo And of course all of the amazing chefs from Namu, Hog Island, and Walzwerk, and Outstanding in the Field who are truly outstanding. I came away from this night with such an appreciation of farm to table cuisine and a desire to cook a lot more. I have to say that there were definitely things on the menu that I had never heard of before, and I can’t wait to learn more!