Houston Porter and his sidekick Drea Pierotti jumped right in to help as well as some of my customers at the Mail Depot. Houston Porter brought in Nick Gordon of Petaluma Food Taxi to help. We were able to give each graduate gift certificates plus cash and a book. Paige Green took photos of each kid and we had them framed for them.
This year was a little harder as we didn't get the kids names until last week. Nick Gordon of Petaluma Taxi jumped right in to help as did Houston and Drea, who also got some help from the Petaluma Sunrise Rotary Club. We were able to give the graduates some great gift certificates to local restaurants and some cash.
Please continue to support our local restaurants who help with so many fundraisers like these throughout the year. And a giant shout out of thanks to Nick Gordon and his crew at Petaluma Food Taxi! Keep it local!”
Thank you to “Mo” for being such a great community mom and to Petaluma Food Taxi owners Nick Gordon and Kiko Rodriguez for treating connection to our community as more than just a business. And for anyone who reads her post and wants to get on the list to help out next year, I’m collecting contacts for Maureen at houston@avantlard.com.
Beware: Fake food websites
This is as good a time as any to thank Petaluma Foodies member Ashley Rader for her heads-up post about a fake food ordering website she stumbled across and accidently got caught up in. It’s members like Ashley that help make our Petaluma community such a connected and positive place to live (and eat).
This could have happened to anyone, so we thank Ashley for sharing her story. She was looking to order food from a particular restaurant, which we’ll simply call Rader’s Diner, to protect the innocent. She did a simple internet search of “Rader’s Diner order” and one of the lead listings that popped up stated, “Order online at Rader’s Diner.” The site seemed to have the diner’s full menu and so she placed her order, and paid. It was only upon arriving to pick up the food that she learned the diner had not been paid yet. Not only that, but the actual bill was considerably higher than the online order and payment she had already made. Of course, she paid the restaurant directly and then contacted her credit card company, which will surely reverse the charges.
Rader’s Diner had not participated in, contract with, nor had any idea they were listed on this particular website. This type of online ordering business was supposed to have been outlawed by recent legislation but regulating online businesses is a tricky process. This particular website was bringmethat.com, which has a lot of online complaints lodged against it, but when this one is gone, another will surely pop up, so it is more about using a reputable local (like Petaluma Food Taxi) or well-known national brand delivery service than specifically avoiding this particular site.
Fruit and nuts
Although our grocery stores have gotten better at carrying good fruit, for the most part, they are set up for volume because profit margins tend to be razor thin in the grocery business. However, for those of us that grew up eating warm fruit straight from the trees, that simply does not cut it. This is where Jupiter Foods comes into play for us. Owner Daniel Bleakney-Formby caters to selective palettes by purchasing small batches of real, tree-ripened fruit, which makes a huge flavor difference. We were actually just stopping by to pick up some almonds (more on that later) but with two of my favorite fruits just coming in season, could not resist grabbing a single apricot and nectarine for the walk back to the car (more on that later). I tend to prefer very firm fruit, because if I have to choose between two evils, I’d rather end up with a firm flavorless fruit than a mealy tasty one. However, as soon as I picked one of the apricots, I could tell it was going to taste great, even though it was not particularly firm. Sure enough, it juiced up my hand pretty good, but what a great flavor!
And the almonds. For the record, almond growers pronounce it “am-mund,” as I learned while getting my boots shined a while back in Reno, when I was joined at the shoeshine stand by an almond grower attending an almond growers convention. (Oddly, and quite a disappointment to me, he had no free samples on him, but was entertained by my request.) Pronounce it as the growers do and you will irk your friends and family to no end, if that’s your thing. But I digress. A while back, Howard, Dan’s partner, gifted me a pound of raw almonds. I didn’t really think much about it, other than that they were fairly pricey for something I can pick up at the grocery store fairly cheap. I should have known better. Not a big fan of raw almonds, I never tasted them straight but once my mother roasted them up, they were little slices of heaven. Everyone went nuts for them. As a good frugal will do, we were sure we could replicate the results with cheaper store-bought almonds but could not have been more wrong. We’ve tried half a dozen different raw and roasted almonds, even the brands we used to love, and nothing compares to the flavor and texture of these almonds, once roasted. No, I don’t remember what they are called, but when I called this past week to see if they had any, the response I got to my first mention of almonds was, “ah, the almonds,” so rest assured they will know what you are asking for.
The Holly and Tali Show
While visiting with Dan at Jupiter, he inquired whether I had been out to the Casino Bar and Grill in the town of Bodega to try the Holly and Tali Show pop-ups happening Monday through Thursday. Chef Jodie Rubin, my eyes and ears out in Bodega Bay, had just messaged me that I needed to give them a try. Dan confirmed that the food is great and of course, when served in a classic back-country dive bar like the Casino, makes for a wonderfully unique experience. I guess we’ll be heading to the town of Bodega soon. Check out thehollyandtalishow.com for more info.
The Link LonkJune 16, 2021 at 06:02AM
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