Petaluma’s Free Range celebrates diversity with colorful salad

In honor of Inauguration Day, on Friday, Jan. 20, Free Range will celebrate all the colors of the rainbow with their Rainbow Crunch Salad.|

In honor of Inauguration Day, on Friday, Jan. 20, Free Range will celebrate all the colors of the rainbow with their Rainbow Crunch Salad. Crafted by hand and heart, it consists of organic quinoa, millet, red cabbage, cabbage, beets, carrots, red pepper, kale, arugula, apples, almonds, sunflower seeds, mint, cilantro and parsley with preserved lemon honey poppy seed salad dressing. Salads are ready-to-go, or space permitting, you can dine in for lunch.

I recommend purchasing your salads in advance ($12) as Free Range always sells out quickly. Proceeds will benefit the champions of the environment, 350.org and Natural Resource Defense Council to help insure future generations can continue chasing rainbows.

Free Range Closing Sale

Sadly, the Rainbow Crunch Salad will be the last we’ll see from Free Range’s brick and mortar location. Owner Suzanne Alexandre has decided to move the shop online so that she can concentrate on other local ventures. Alexandre was pivotal in bringing farm-to-table exhibits to both the Petaluma and Sonoma County Fairs, was the executive director of Farm Trails during its infancy, and is always working to help develop and promote local agriculturally focused events, such as the first Freestone Fermentation Festival. Because of all this, I’m excited to see what her next project will bring us, as everything she touches seems to turn to gold.

If you love Free Range’s products, Alexandre invites you to visit her shop for her clearance sale, from Friday, Jan. 13 through Monday, Jan. 16.

The rumors are a croc

Contrary to the rumor mill, Crocodile is not closing. Nor has their chef quit. Co-owner Moira jokingly informed me that the chef can’t quit as he is not only the co-owner but is Moira’s husband, and neither of his contracts are currently up for negotiation.

There may have been some confusion caused by Moira and Michael’s absence over the holidays. They took a long-planned and well deserved holiday vacation to Scotland, Moira’s homeland, which may have thrown some people off. Yes, we are used to seeing our restaurant owners on hand, and admittedly, without Moira and Michael there, service may not have been up to par, but they have fallen in love with Petaluma and have no plans on leaving or closing up shop.

In fact, their popularity is growing by leaps and bounds and they are currently planning their grand opening celebration.

As Petaluma’s local food writer, I am often confronted by readers who may not have been so happy with a recent dining experience. Of course, in Petaluma, the person to tell that to is the owner of the restaurant because they will fix what ails you, but I digress. Anyway, it is the rare restaurant that receives only good reviews from my readers, but Crocodile is doing just that. Every single person I’ve spoken to about Crocodile not only loves the food, but reports back that Moira and her staff really do go above and beyond to make sure their dining experience is a great one.

Artisan cheese

Point Reyes Farmstead Cheese Company’s Felice Charlton has been elected to the Board of Directors of the California Artisan Cheese Guild. Charlton lives in Petauma with her family, where she is active in the North Bay specialty foods industry, along with being the National Sales Director for Point Reyes Farmstead Cheese Company.

For those who haven’t ventured into your local grocer’s cheese section in a while, Point Reyes Farmstead Cheese Company is the award-winning dairy and cheese producer owned by the Giacomini family which produces my two favorite Blue Cheeses, the Original Blue and Bay Blue.

The California Artisan Cheese Guild is a nonprofit that supports educational outreach for the California artisan cheese community. Members include cheesemakers, professionals and enthusiasts. The CACG oversees the California Artisan Cheese Festival, which is held in Petaluma, as well as the San Francisco Cheese Fest.

Tickets just went on sale for the California Artisan Cheese Festival at www.artisancheesefestival.com The event will be based out of the Petaluma Sheraton again this year, March 24 to 26. Tickets, especially for the farm tours, sell out quickly, so act now.

Sarah’s Eats and Sweets

Sarah’s Eats and Sweets opened their doors this past Monday at the shopping center at the corner of S. McDowell Blvd and Casa Grande Road. They plan to serve breakfast and lunch in a casual atmosphere where guests are invited to eat-in or take-out.

Soups, salads, sandwiches and baked goods are all made from scratch with high quality ingredients. They roast and smoke all their sandwich meats in-house and make their condiments fresh daily. Their house specialty is a signature tri-tip pastrami served on marble rye or grilled in a Reuben. What they can’t make in-house, they source from local artisans, like Full Circle Bakery, Sonoma Brinery, Retrograde Coffee Roasters and Sonoma Spice Queen. Their freshly baked sweets have been a hit at all the Petaluma farmer’s markets, so it is great to see them opening up a brick-and-mortar shop.

New Thai

Mark Urenda, of Road Butler, is one of my best assets when it comes to new places opening around town. This week he tells me that the new Thai place that was rumored to be going into Thai Isaan’s old location already has new signs up. The new name is Tup Tim, and if I’m right, I think John Ton of Petaluma Sign Company did the signage for them.

Thistle Meats Classes

For those that enjoy Thistle Meats’ plethora of great hand-made products, you can now learn to make such great creations yourself. Thistle Meats offers sausage making (Jan. 20, Feb. 10), whole hog butchery (Jan. 23) and poultry butchery (Jan. 12, Jan. 26) classes for those that want to take their adherence to mindful consumption to the next level. Or, maybe you just want to see how it’s done, so you’ll have a greater appreciation the next time you are enjoying a great sausage, cut of pork or breast of chicken.

Visit www.thistlemeats.com for more info.

Drawing Board

I have great news regarding Drawing Board. Co-owner Rosie Wiggins was kind enough to invite me into the shop earlier this week and I was not only impressed with what I saw, but was even more impressed with her plans for how she is going to utilize the space.

Contrary to popular belief, Drawing Board is not a veggie restaurant, nor are they looking to force some sort of paleo diet down our throats. These rumors may have gotten started because Rosie does plan to work directly with local farmers in order to help them deal with veggie overruns and is also looking to offer a menu with as few processed foods as possible. This means things like using honey instead of sugar.

Drawing Board will hold their soft opening in the next week or two, shortly thereafter followed by a grand opening. They will start with bar bites and shared menu items, before rolling out affordable prix fixe dinners. So, although they will be veggie driven, they have even this ardent meat-eater pretty excited about their opening.

Fernet about it

Jamison’s Roaring Donkey hosts a Fernet throw down on Wednesday, Jan. 18. Fernet Branca is sponsoring the event and is putting their Fernet up against all the other Frenet brands, with plenty of schwag, a Fernet wheel, and a lot of other cool giveaways and tastings.

For those unfamiliar, Fernet is an Italian herbal liqueur, similar to a bitter. It’s also one of those boozes where companies compete with each other for the coolest and most artistic label. Fernet is often used in mixed drinks, and is quite popular in Argentina, where it is mixed with Coca-Cola. In fact, Argentina used to claim the only Fernet distillery outside of Milan, Italy, but as we often do here in Northern California, we can’t resist creating our own unique version.

Considering the huge Italian population in the Bay Area, plus our penchant for distilling our own interesting boozes, Fernet Francisco is distilled locally and claims to have bottled “The Spirit of San Francisco.” Fernet is definitely an acquired taste, so this event is a great way to try something new, without committing to buying a whole bottle of something unfamiliar. Plus, events at the Roaring Donkey and are always fun to attend.

Andy’s Sushi

I have heard that Andy’s has gone back to regular hours. Rumor has it this was spurred on by complaints from his “regular” customers. If this is true, I would caution Andy that many a restaurant has failed because they listened to “regular” customers instead of looking at their bottom line.

Le Bistro

It looks like I jumped the gun a bit when I last reported that Le Bistro had closed their doors. Although the restaurant was dark on some unusual nights, like a recent weekend, it appears that chef Corey hasn’t quite thrown in the towel yet.

(Contact Houston Porter at houston@avant-larde.com.)

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