We caught up with a few old MIT Sloan business school buddies at Incanto, a restaurant where Chris Cosentino, of “The Next Iron Chef”, is the executive chef. The restaurant features offal cuisine, dishes like lamb neck or heart and calf brains. Very tasty food indeed, though it may be a bit too adventuresome for some!
Paso Robles is a wine region that has come a long way. You will find wines from the region on menus in many restaurants up and down the California coast if not beyond California. Paso is on the way from Los Angeles to San Francisco, just off of the 101 highway about 1.5 hrs north of the Santa Ynez/Santa Barbara wine region.
Here you’ll find excellent Rhone blends (Grenache, Syrah, Mourvedre), Zins, and Cabs from more well known wineries like Justin who make the Isosceles wine, to small boutique wineries like our favorite, Ecluse Wines, which gives you a more intimate and educational wine tasting experience, not to mention great wines at very reasonable prices. If you do go to Ecluse, make sure to mention us! And, if you ever need any advice on which wineries to visit or places to eat, we can give you some advice on that!
After passing through Paso Robles, we headed north to Carmel and Big Sur. Carmel itself is a sleepy/touristy town. You’ll find tons of art galleries, real estate offices, and nice restaurants. So, that means you’ll find a lot of people walking around with a lot of money – typically ones with more “experience”. 🙂
Big Sur is to the south – if you ever go to Carmel, definitely take a drive down the 1 for the beautiful views. We love the area and got engaged near Carmel at Point Lobos State Park almost 3 years ago.
Here we are at Passionfish in Pacific Grove (north of Carmel) on my 33rd birthday. It’s one of our favorite restaurants in the area, featuring sustainable seafood dishes, and a modest 1.5x mark-up on wine, a portion of which is donated to a fund for saving bluefin tuna. Definitely a must-try if you are in the area.
Next up, we visit the Bay area to catch up with some old friends and decadent dining experiences.
Cambria is a sleepy little town on the central coast of California on the way to Hearst Castle. From L.A., drive up the PCH, connect to the 101 at Oxnard, stop off for a wine tasting or two in Santa Ynez before heading up to Cambria. Take the PCH 1 from San Luis Obispo that will take you through Morro Bay, Harmony, and finally to Cambria. This time of year everything is very green, very reminiscent of pictures I’ve seen of Ireland with random rock outcroppings that seem out of place but comforting.
We’re staying at the Moonstone Landing Inn which features ocean view rooms with fireplace, next door to the Sea Chest restaurant which has old school board games that you can play while enjoying a glass of wine or beer. Here you can walk along the boardwalk and sit on a bench and meditate while listening to the waves shuffle in. For dinner, head in to town on Main Street and make sure to try Robin’s, a restaurant featuring an eclectic “global cuisine”. You’ll find dishes from Mexican to Indian to Asian fusion to Italian, all at pretty affordable prices.
Next up, Hearst Castle with lots of pics, hopefully prior to the incoming storm.
Today, we turned in our keys, put our last few things in storage, and started our road trip up to San Francisco to see some old friends. We were reminded how unpleasant it is to move out – it’s like playing whack-a-mole where you’ll pack some things and throw some things out, but MORE stuff seems to show up out of nowhere. And it seems endless, we packed and purged for 3-4 days straight and we thought we were pretty “modest people.”
It makes you think about how much garbage you probably have and how you really don’t need it. We brought at least 15 bags of “stuff” to the Salvation Army. And it wasn’t stuff we really needed, typically things we hadn’t worn, touched, or looked at in the past year. Take a look at your own closets this Spring and purge, my friends.
Here’s a snapshot of our storage unit where we put most of our stuff – it’s a 10×10 unit, about 75% full – our lives are stored in less than 100 cubic feet, and could probably stand to be less.
Now, we’re off to Cambria – a sleepy town on the Central California coast. Read on!