Oh, what a difference fresh za’atar makes.
When Berkeley chef Mona Leena opened the doors to her highly anticipated new restaurant, Lulu, this summer, the food was a celebration of her Palestinian heritage fused with her California sensibilities. A key ingredient: the fresh, seasonal produce from Andy Griffin of Mariquita Farm in Watsonville.
In addition to pristine fruits and vegetables, Griffin grows an ancient Middle Eastern culinary herb that is the cornerstone of Leena’s cuisine, fresh za’atar. Grown expressly for her, it shows up in salads, fresh-baked breads and more.
“It grows wild in Palestine, and they somehow figured out how to farm it here,” Leena says. “Being able to dry and grind my own is amazing. I love everything Andy grows, but this is invaluable.”
What’s the saying — behind every great chef is a skilled farmer? That’s often the case in the Bay Area, where farm-to-fork dining is the norm and supporting small local farms a priority. But the ways in which these chef-farmer partnerships are forged and operate is as varied as the veggies in a chopped salad. With the fall harvest in motion and menus brimming with that bounty, we explore how three top Bay Area restaurant chefs use local farms to inspire their menus — and how they can inspire yours, too.
Adam Rosenblum, Causwells and Red Window
San Francisco chef-restaurateur Adam Rosenblum first got to know the Tenbrink family of Fairfield’s Tenbrink Farms eight years ago, when he was a sous chef at Flour + Water. It was one of 80 fine dining restaurants that source fruits and vegetables from the farm run by Linda, Stephen and their daughter, Laura.
“They’d always invite my family up for the day,” he recalls. “I’d take my daughters for olive picking. I’ve taken my parents. They’re such an amazing family.”
So when the Maryland native was ready to strike out on his own in 2014 with Causwells, the Marina District bistro, he asked if they could take on another account. Luckily, he says, the answer was yes.
Currently, Tenbrink Farms’ blue lake beans share the spotlight with Rosenblum’s roasted chicken breast; their famous late-season tomatoes are used to braise the pork for his spaghettoni, and their squashes are already popping up in many fall soups and salads.
“They give us the best quality products around,” Rosenblum says.
Every Tuesday, the Tenbrinks send an email blast to their chef partners with a list of what’s just been picked. Rosenblum and the other chefs, who often create their menus based on that produce availability, respond with their orders by Wednesday night. And on Thursday, Laura drives into San Francisco to make the deliveries.
“Usually, they have some extras in the trunk, in case you want to do some window shopping,” Rosenblum says.
And while he does not source all his produce from Tenbrink Farms for Causwell’s or his new Spanish tapas spot, Red Window, which opened in North Beach in March, Rosenblum says small local farms are the cornerstone of sustainability and supporting them is critical. Plus, he just loves working with them.
“I enjoy them as people,” he says. “It’s just a really easy relationship.”
Linda, who has been farming since 1982, shares the sentiment. “Our relationships are strong,” she says. “Like, we love each other. And we’re really loyal.”
Manish Tyagi, Aurum
Last December, when chef Manish Tyagi opened Aurum, a modern Indian bistro in Los Altos, one of his first customers was a fellow Indian-American, clad in overalls and work boots, out for a bite with what appeared to be a post-harvest farm crew.
“The spiciest thing in Los Altos was the wasabi at Akane,” recalls Tarun Marya. The farmer, seed breeder and Mountain View native runs Luna Vez Farm, a tiny, one-acre organic farm in the Los Altos Hills. “We had to see what Aurum was all about.”
Marya, a former pastry chef, runs Luna Vez Farm primarily as a Community Sustained Agriculture or CSA membership program with four other local farms, but he also supplies a few restaurants in the area, including Amandine Lounge in Los Altos and Protégé, a Michelin-starred restaurant in Palo Alto. He liked what he tasted at Aurum — Brassica Beats, a cauliflower take on bezule, a Southern Indian street food typically made with chicken — and wanted his farm’s bounty on the seasonally driven menu.
Not long after, he returned with some organic microgreens.
“This is a gift from me,” he told Tyagi. “I used to work in restaurants. I’m a really local farmer.”
They hit it off, sharing a passion for farm-to-table Indian food — Marya used to work as a line cook at a Bay Area Indian fusion restaurant — and even a hometown. Tyagi grew up in the city of Dehradun, near the foothills of the Himalayas, the same city that Marya’s mother is from.
Tyagi loved the microgreens, but was only doing take-out at the time. When Aurum re-opened in the spring, however, he called Marya for more, including mizuna, which he uses to garnish his heirloom tomato salad. This winter, he plans to use Marya’s oranges for his citrus prawns.
Marya now grows microgreens specifically for Aurum. In the short time they have been working together, the professional arrangement has warmed into friendship.
“We joined hands pretty quickly,” Tyagi says, adding that Marya understands his mindset as a chef because of his own restaurant background. “We meet in person every day. Now and then, I give him a taste of my food. Then he understands.”
Bruno Chemel, Baumé
As a French-born chef and restaurateur, Bruno Chemel has farm-sourcing in his veins. When he first opened Baumé in Palo Alto in 2010, he worked for a short time with a vegetable supplier in Gilroy, who would bring Chemel his very best harvest whenever he made his way north.
After a while, it became harder to connect with the Dutch farmer, who had two small children and could no longer make it up to Palo Alto. And it was impossible for Chemel, who runs a two Michelin-starred restaurant with a 10-course tasting menu, to trek to Gilroy. Baume’s intimate dining room never did the volume for the arrangement make sense financially.
“It was like buying gold,” Chemel says.
Then in 2015, when Chemel and his wife Christie let their entire staff go — even the dishwasher — to become a true mom-and-pop, Bruno added farmers market shopping to his to-do list. He loved the informal nature of breezing by the stands and the freedom it gave him when writing his menu.
“It gives me the ability to get what I want without much trouble,” says Chemel, who might pick up cauliflower for his signature Golden Osetra caviar and calamansi dish, celeriac to pair with goat cheese or leeks for salmon mousse. “And it’s fun blending with the population.”
It has worked well for Baumé. On Sundays, Chemel hits the farmers market in Cupertino and picks up whatever he didn’t find on Saturday at the Palo Alto farmers market. He typically goes early, before they open to the public. And by now, he has his favorites: third-generation family-owned Borba Farms from Aromas, Happy Boy Farms in Watsonville and Pinnacle farm in San Juan Bautista, all certified organic.
“The customers go to the same farmers markets and see me or recognize the produce I use, so that’s been kind of fun, connecting with them like that,” he says.
And because of the reduction in business during the pandemic, he only buys what he needs.
“We used to do 25 or 30 people a day,” Chemel says. “Right now, it’s just two to four per day.”
Public farms, CSA boxes
You don’t have to be the chef at a fine dining restaurant to score produce grown by these small local farms. Here’s how to get your hands on your own Michelin-worthy ingredients.
Mariquita Farms: This Watsonville farm offers more than 30 shopping options, from a Mystery Box of produce ($38) to a half-flat of Rainbow Cherry Tomatoes ($18) and jars of Meyer lemon marmalade ($8), with weekly pickups available in parts of the East Bay and on the Peninsula; www.mariquita.com.
Luna Vez Farm: This outfit partners with four other small farms to create small ($35) and large ($50) CSA boxes filled with 10 seasonal, organic fruits and vegetables. Membership is monthly, pick up is weekly, and delivery is free to Los Altos and nearby cities; https://lunavez.com.
Borba Farms: Medium ($30) and large ($50) bags of organic vegetables and jars of handmade preserves ($6) are available for weekly pick up at farmers markets in the East Bay and Peninsula. https://borba-farms.myshopify.com
Happy Boy Farms: This Watsonville organic farm does not offer a CSA box, but you can shop its farm stall at weekly farmers markets in Walnut Creek, North Berkeley, San Mateo and Campbell; www.happyboyfarms.com
Pinnacle: Shop apple varieties, peppers, leafy greens and a slew of other fruits and vegetables at the San Juan Bautista farm stand from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. every Saturday or at 10 weekly farmers markets in cities from Oakland to Santa Cruz; www.pinnacleorganic.com.
