Food adventures are an essential part of the trip. “Local seafood and white wine everywhere, this place is like heaven”, I said a couple of days ago and the girls could nothing but agree. Here are some of the best restaurant experiences, as requested by Heidi and Salla. 🙂

The Catch, Castro, SF. The perfect holiday start with some cava and fresh salad. Even a plain green salad tastes awesome, when the leaves are fresh and its combined with a delicious champagne-vinagrette dressing.

Scoma’s, Fisherman’s Wharf, SF. Okay, the wharf was tourist trap in every meaning. But we followed a guidebook that my colleague had lent me and found a quite classic and decent restaurant on one of the piers. Their crab with garlic and olive oil was heavenly! And girls’ choices, the fresh halibut and ”can’t-remember-the-name-but it-was-made-Sicilian-style” were also delicious. (Not to mention the sour margaritas…).

Anchor Oyster Bar, Castro, SF. If you pass a restaurant on a relatively remote part of a street on a late Monday evening and there’s a queue in, it makes you curious. It wasn’t a disappointment! They only served seafood, so – I suppose – that’s why my Boston clam chowder (the soup) did not have any bacon in it, as it usually has. And Miss H’s combination seafood salad was to die for. On the top of this, we could see that the vegetables that accompanied Orvokki’s halibut filet were decently fried… 🙂

Duarte’s Tavern, Pescadero. What a fun place close to Highway 1. This restaurant has been in the family since 1890’s, and it met all our expectations for a traditional American tavern in the middle of nowhere (the population of the village is 500), including the über-tacky Easter decoration on the wall. The food was superb.

I tried the fresh oysters and found out that horseradish works fine with them! Local favourite, artichoke, was another hit: boiled, chilled, with aioli – you name it. Did you know that Marilyn Monroe was crowned Miss Artichoke before she got famous? This vegetable is a big thing around here! 🙂 After ”catch of the day” we finished the meal with olallieberry pie. It looks like raspberry but tastes more like lingonberry. Yummy with vanilla ice cream.

(As you can see, we usually test each others dishes and share the desserts – in that way you get to taste much more! 😉

Alanmies would ask where Burger King, Taco Bell and fast food is?

We’ve been to Burger King once. I dont’ like it back home, I don’t like it here.

And we tried a local taqueria in San Francisco once, when we were tired and just wanted to grab something quick and comforting on our way to the guest house. Unfortunately the chicken in Miss H’s chicken burrito was almost raw. Needless to say that since then, every Mexican food related discussion makes Miss H’s face turn gray. ”Yääk!” Actually, almost anything that reminds us from Mexico has the same effect, which doesn’t make our life too easy considering the extensive Spanish-speking culture here in Southern California. 😉 And orvokki hates parseley – so we all have our deteste objects.

Tomorrow will be dedicated to wine. Our wine taxi (of course we have booked a taxi!) will pick us up by our hotel here in Santa Barbara in the morning and we’ll visit some wineries in the Santa Ynez Valley. The only sad thing is that Miss H has caught cold and is sneezing and snuffing – not much a taster. 🙁 Let’s hope she feels better after a good night sleep.

-laura

P.S. We went to Hearst Castle today and got a glimpse of old Hollywood charm. I need to post some pics later. But now good night to us – and good morning to Europe!

P.P.S. Alanmies will be happy to know that Orvokki has teached us to appreciate minigrip plastic bags and free napkins. 🙂