The Bay Area in the Seventies

What we ate. Where we ate. Also, the world's best citrus is now in season.

They arrived in the middle of a snowstorm. No gift has ever been more welcome. Alice Waters had sent me a box of tiny kishu tangerines from Tangerinemanstore.com in Ojai. I’ve been addicted ever since. (I wrote about them here.)

They are, in my opinion, the best citrus fruit in the world. They’re tiny — the largest are the size of golf balls — seedless, juicy and easy to peel. Each one is a little flavor bomb. Children adore them.

The season is short and the supply limited. But to me they’re something to anticipate, like the first strawberries of summer. The shipping makes them very expensive, but if you live in a cold climate and crave instant summer, this is your chance.

On another note, I just got an order from the people at E-Fish. They ship extraordinary seafood (live Dungeness crabs, petrale sole, spot prawns) nationwide. If you want to give them a try, they’re offering subscribers to this newsletter $15 off any E-Fish purchase of $75 or more. Use discount code LABRIFFE15. And please, let me know what you think.

It’s been almost exactly 44 years since I wrote this review. It was the second I wrote during my trial period at New West. After I handed it in I had second thoughts; after all, it was more a short story than a restaurant review. In a panic I called the editor, Jon Carroll, and tried to talk him out of reading it.

“It’s too late,” he said. My heart thumped; I was certain I’d blown any chance of becoming a restaurant critic. There was a long pause and then Jon added, “American restaurants are growing and changing. The writing about them should change too. The job’s yours.”

Thanks Jon.

And speaking of the Bay Area in the seventies…. here are a couple of menus from the wonderful Bay Wolf restaurant, which opened in Oakland in 1975 and had a very long run. The restaurant closed in 2015.

In contrast, this is what we were eating at my very crowded Berkeley house back then. We’d taken the lessons of Diet for a Small Planet to heart, and were valiantly attempting to avoid meat. As we cooked our way through the book, we adapted this recipe (to make it cheesier) and ate it with great pleasure.

CON QUESO RICE (Adapted from Diet for a Small Planet)

1 cup black beans
1 ½ cups white rice, uncooked
1 teaspoon salt
3 cloves garlic, peeled and diced
2 small onions, chopped
1 4-ounce can green chiles, chopped
1 fresh jalapeño, chopped
1 pound jack cheese, shredded
1 pound cottage cheese

Soak beans overnight in water to cover. In the morning, drain and cook beans in 4 cups fresh water for about an hour or until tender. Cool.

Meanwhile, cook rice: Bring 3 cups of water to boil, add rice and salt, cover and lower heat to simmer. Cook about 20 minutes or until water has evaporated. Cool slightly.

Mix rice, drained beans, garlic, onion and chiles in a big bowl. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Butter a large casserole. Spoon in a layer of the rice-and-bean mixture. Cover with a layer of jack cheese, then some cottage cheese.

Put in another layer of rice and beans, and keep layering until all the ingredients except for the final ½ cup of cheese are used up. End with a layer of rice. Bake for 30 minutes.

Add the remaining cheese and cook 5 minutes more.

Serves 6.

Click HERE for printable recipe