Hero: Consumer advocate 7 On Your Side, a segment of Bay Area TV station KGO, helped a Marin County woman recover several hundred dollars from Visa after the company shined her on. Susan Anderson purchased Visa gift cards for friends last Christmas and delivered them in person. Months later, she learned that the cards didn’t work when her friends tried to use them. Turns out that a thief near Modesto stole and used the card numbers, which resulted in the cards having a zero balance. Visa informed Anderson that they wouldn’t cover the loss, since she had waited more than 60 days to report the issue. She contacted 7 On Your Side and the TV station went to work on her behalf. Visa finally saw the light and decided to replace the gift cards.
Zero: Approximately 290,000 gallons of public water went down the drain, thanks to vandalism at the Wild Horse Water Tank in Novato. To give that immense amount some perspective, it equates to almost 5 million glasses of drinking water, or enough H2O to flush your low-flow toilet more than 18,000 times. The trouble began when the North Marin Water District (NMWD) received an intrusion alarm on Friday, July 7, which indicated that an intruder breached the tank. Although there was no evidence of contamination, the NMWD took the precaution of draining the tank. If you have info about suspicious activity in the vicinity of Wild Horse Valley Drive from 5-8pm on July 7, contact the Marin County Sheriff’s Office or the NMWD.
ARIES (March 21-April 19): The Greek word philokalia is translated as the “love of the beautiful, the exalted, the excellent.” I propose that we make it your keyword for the next three weeks—the theme that you keep at the forefront of your awareness everywhere you go. But think a while before you say yes to my invitation. To commit yourself to being so relentlessly in quest of the sublime would be a demanding job. Are you truly prepared to adjust to the poignant sweetness that might stream into your life as a result?
TAURUS (April 20-May 20): It’s a favorable time to strengthen your fundamentals and stabilize your foundation. I invite you to devote your finest intelligence and grittiest determination to this project. How? Draw deeply from your roots. Tap into the mother lode of inspiration that never fails you. Nurture the web of life that nurtures you. The cosmos will offer you lots of help and inspiration whenever you attend to these practical and sacred matters. Best-case scenario: You will bolster your personal power for many months to come.
GEMINI (May 21-June 20): Two talking porcupines are enjoying an erotic tryst in a cactus garden. It’s a prickly experience, but that’s how they like it. “I always get horny when things get thorny,” says one. Meanwhile, in the rose garden next door, two unicorns wearing crowns of thorns snuggle and nuzzle as they receive acupuncture from a swarm of helpful hornets. One of the unicorns murmurs, “This is the sharpest pleasure I’ve ever known.” Now here’s the moral of these far-out fables, Gemini: Are you ready to gamble on a cagey and exuberant ramble through the brambles? Are you curious about the healing that might become available if you explore the edgy frontiers of gusto?
CANCER (June 21-July 22): I predict that four weeks from now you will be enjoying a modest but hearty feeling of accomplishment—on one condition: You must not get diverted by the temptation to achieve trivial successes. In other words, I hope that you focus on one or two big projects, not lots of small ones. What do I mean by “big projects?” How about these: Taming your fears, delivering a delicate message that frees you from an onerous burden, clarifying your relationship with work and improving your ability to have the money you need.
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): Spain’s most revered mystic poet was St. John of the Cross, who lived from 1542 to 1591. He went through a hard time at age 35, when he was kidnapped by a rival religious sect and imprisoned in a cramped cell. Now and then he was provided with scraps of bread and dried fish, but he almost starved to death. After 10 months, he managed to escape and make his way to a convent that gave him sanctuary. For his first meal, the nuns served him warm pears with cinnamon. I reckon that you’ll soon be celebrating your own version of a jailbreak, Leo. It’ll be less drastic and more metaphorical than St. John’s, but still a notable accomplishment. To celebrate, I invite you to enjoy a ritual meal of warm pears with cinnamon.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): “I’m very attracted to things that I can’t define,” says Belgian fashion designer Raf Simons. I’d love for you to adopt that attitude, Virgo. You’re entering the Season of Generous Mystery. It will be a time when you can generate good fortune for yourself by being eager to get your expectations overturned and your mind blown. Transformative opportunities will coalesce as you simmer in the influence of enigmas and anomalies. Meditate on the advice of the poet Rainer Maria Rilke: “I want to beg you to be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves.”
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): I’ve compiled a list of four mantras for you to draw strength from. They’re designed to put you in the proper alignment to take maximum advantage of current cosmic rhythms. For the next three weeks, say them periodically throughout the day. 1. “I want to give the gifts I like to give rather than the gifts I’m supposed to give.” 2. “If I can’t do things with excellence and integrity, I won’t do them at all.” 3. “I intend to run on the fuel of my own deepest zeal, not on the fuel of someone else’s passions.” 4. “My joy comes as much from doing my beautiful best as from pleasing other people.”
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): The world will never fully know or appreciate the nature of your heroic journey. Even the people who love you the most will only ever understand a portion of your epic quest to become your best self. That’s why it’s important for you to be generous in giving yourself credit for all that you have accomplished up until now and will accomplish in the future. Take time to marvel at the majesty and miracle of the life you have created for yourself. Celebrate the struggles you’ve weathered and the liberations you’ve initiated. Shout, “Glory hallelujah!” as you acknowledge your persistence and resourcefulness. The coming weeks will be an especially favorable time to do this tricky but fun work.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): I suspect that you may have drug-like effects on people in the coming weeks. Which drugs? At various times, your impact could resemble cognac, magic mushrooms and Ecstasy—or sometimes all three simultaneously. What will you do with all of that power to kill pain, alter moods and expand minds? Here’s one possibility: Get people excited about what you’re excited about, and call on them to help you bring your dreams to a higher stage of development. Here’s another: Round up the support you need to transform any status quo that’s boring or unproductive.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): “Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.” So said psychologist Carl Jung. What the hell did that meddling, self-important know-it-all mean by that? Oops. Sorry to sound annoyed. My cranky reaction may mean that I’m defensive about the possibility that I’m sometimes a bit preachy myself. Maybe I don’t like an authority figure wagging his finger in my face because I’m suspicious of my own tendency to do that. Hmmm. Should I therefore refrain from giving you the advice I’d planned to? I guess not. Listen carefully, Capricorn: Monitor the people and situations that irritate you. They’ll serve as mirrors. They’ll show you unripe aspects of yourself that may need adjustment or healing.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): A source of tough and tender inspiration seems to be losing some of its signature potency. It has served you well. It has given you many gifts, some difficult and some full of grace. But now I think that you will benefit from transforming your relationship with its influence. As you might imagine, this pivotal moment will be best navigated with a clean, fresh, open attitude. That’s why you’ll be wise to thoroughly wash your own brain—not begrudgingly, but with gleeful determination. For even better results, wash your heart, too.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): A “power animal” is a creature selected as a symbolic ally by a person who hopes to imitate or resonate with its strengths. The salmon or hare might be a good choice if you’re seeking to stimulate your fertility, for example. If you aspire to cultivate elegant wildness, you might choose an eagle or horse. For your use in the coming months, I propose a variation on this theme: The “power fruit.” From now until at least May of 2018, your power fruit should be the ripe strawberry. Why? Because this will be a time when you’ll be naturally sweet, not artificially so; when you will be juicy, but not dripping all over everything; when you will be compact and concentrated, not bloated and bursting at the seams; and when you should be plucked by hand, never mechanically.
Homework: In what circumstances do you tend to be smartest? When do you tend to be dumbest? Testify at Freewillastrology.com.
Q: A guy friend of 20 years and I once fooled around years ago. Though he has a girlfriend, he keeps throwing sexual remarks into our conversations, sending inappropriate texts and asking me to send naked photos. I wouldn’t be interested even if he were single, and I’ve been giving subtle hints, like “ha-ha … gotta go,” right after he says something provocative, but it isn’t working. How do I politely get him to stop without ruining a very long friendship?—Upset
A: As a means of communication, hinting to a man is like having a heartfelt conversation with your salad.
This isn’t to say that men are dumb. They just aren’t emotional cryptographers. Social psychologist Judith A. Hall finds that women are generally far better at spotting and interpreting nonverbal messages (from, say, facial expressions and body language, including that female specialty, the pout).
Women tend to use their own ability for decoding unspoken stuff as the standard for what they expect from men. So, for example, the longer a man takes to notice that his girlfriend is pouting, the darker things get—with hate glares and maybe some cabinet-slamming … and then, the grand finale: “Hey, heartless! Time for a monthlong reunion with your first sex partner, aka your right hand!”
There’s also a major sex difference in how males and females speak. A body of research finds that from childhood on, males tend to be direct: “Gimme my truck, butthead!” Females tend to be indirect: “Um, sorry, but I think that’s my Barbie.”
Psychologist Joyce Benenson points out that these conversational sex differences line right up with evolved sex differences in our, uh, job descriptions. Men evolved to be the warrior-protectors of the species. This is not done with coy hints: “Oh, Genghis, you look so much more tan and handsome while invading our neighbors to the north.”
Women’s mealy-mouthing, on the other hand, dovetails with a need to avoid physical confrontation, which could leave them unable to have children or to care for the ones they’ve already had. However, in women’s self-protectively not quite saying what they mean, they trade off being understood—especially by men.
Making matters worse, research by evolutionary psychologists Martie Haselton and David Buss on the “sexual overperception bias” in men suggests that the male mind evolved to be a bit dense to a woman’s signals that she isn’t interested. Basically, men seem evolutionarily predisposed to make errors in judgment in whether to pursue or keep pursuing a woman—erring in whichever way would be least costly to their mating interests.
In other words, in giving this guy “subtle hints,” you aren’t being polite; you’re being wildly ineffective. Yank off the marshmallow fluff and tell him: “I need you to kill all the sex talk. Immediately. And yes, this includes requests for naked selfies.” If he really is a friend, he’ll continue being one. He might even become a better one—the sort you can call anytime, day or night, from the coldest place on the globe, and he’ll say, “I’ll be there with the sled dogs pronto,” not, “Text me a shot of your boobs before you die of hypothermia!”
Q: I love how my boyfriend smells, but I hate his new cologne. The smell literally makes me queasy. Is it even my place to ask him to stop wearing it? How do I tell him I don’t like it without it being mean?—Plagued
A: Try to focus on the positive: You find him extremely jumpable whenever he isn’t wearing a $185 bottle of what it would smell like if sewage and verbena had a baby.
Unfortunately, it seems that his cologne and your immune system are poorly matched. Biologist August Hammerli and his colleagues find that a person’s fragrance preferences correlate with their particular set of infectious intruder-tracking genes, called the “major histocompatibility complex.” So, in not liking your boyfriend’s cologne, it isn’t that you think he’s an idiot with bad taste; it’s that your … I dunno, great-great-grandma got it on with some hot peasant with the “verbena smells like dead, rotting chickens” gene.
The science is your way in: “Sadly, your cologne does not play well with my genes.” Cushion the blow with something sweet, like, “I know you love it, and I wish I loved it, too.” Suggest that you shop together for a new cologne for him (ideally something that makes you want to get naked, and not just down to your World War II gas mask).
Paul Thorn is not the type of guy to get stuck in the past. The Southern roots-rock and blues songwriter has crafted a career of prolific creativity and constant touring, resulting in a discography more than a dozen albums long and a die-hard fanbase that stretches from coast-to-coast.
Yet, this summer marks a particularly special milestone for Thorn: The 20th anniversary of his debut album, Hammer & Nail. To commemorate the occasion, Thorn and his band will perform Hammer & Nail in its entirety on Saturday, July 22, as part of a weekend residency at Rancho Nicasio.
“It was my first record, and it was a different world,” says Thorn from his home in Tupelo, Mississippi. “For one, record companies were still record companies.”
A&M Records signed Thorn in 1997 after he was discovered playing in a local pizza joint. As it turns out, Hammer & Nail was his only release with A&M, and since that debut album, Thorn has self-recorded and self-released 13 acclaimed albums.
“It’s the day of the independent artist,” Thorn says. “I’m thankful I put the time and the work in, because things are going well. These past 20 years have been fruitful.”
When Thorn debuted on the Americana scene in 1997, he was praised for catchy roots melodies and clever lyrics, and his tireless work ethic has made him one of the most consistent entertainers working today.
“I still don’t know what’s going to happen in the future,” he says. “In any business, you want it to grow, and it’s growing.”
With eyes ever on the horizon, Thorn is also aware that Hammer & Nail continues to resonate with many of his fans, and the album’s songs are still highly requested.
“It [the album] is special to my heart,” Thorn says. “I’m excited that people are still interested in the record. It’s very nice that it will last; things all went by so quickly.”
Paul Thorn Band, Saturday and Sunday, July 22-23, Rancho Nicasio, 1 Old Rancheria Rd., Nicasio; Sat., 8:30pm; Sun., 4pm; $35-$40; 415/662.2219.
Ever since Patrick Barlow unleashed his farcical version of The 39 Steps in 2005, the show has made box offices hum at theaters large and small around the globe. In addition to delighting audiences, it has also garnered critical accolades that include Broadway Tony Awards and London’s prestigious 2007 Olivier Award for Best New Comedy. No doubt a strong case can be made that The 39 Steps and Michael Frayn’s antic Noises Off represent the gold standard of modern comic dramaturgy.
With such a glowing record, you might conclude that Barlow’s play would be an easy choice for ending Ross Valley Players’ (RVP) 2016-2017 season—a decision that is strategically important because it sets the tone for selling subscriptions for the coming year. But farce, particularly English farce, is a risky proposition. It requires a combination of skills by the performers and director that few American theaters can muster. Luckily, to a degree that is remarkable for a community theater, RVP delivers in every area.
The 39 Steps (a fictitious code phrase for British intelligence operations in the early days of World War I) began life as a 1915 spy novel by the then-popular Scottish writer John Buchan. It was one of a series of books that Buchan called “shockers” because they pushed readers to the edge of credulity by combining realism with unexpected fantasy. Gradually, as the story was retold in numerous adaptations by other writers for stage, radio and film (Alfred Hitchcock’s 1935 movie is the most famous of these), the realistic element gave way to magic and humor, until we now have the wildly popular, played-for-laughs pastiche by Patrick Barlow that debuted in London in 2005 and then went on to acclaim on Broadway and at theaters throughout the U.S.
Unlike the modern era’s most famous spy-chaser James Bond, who revels in being an amoral sybarite, Buchan’s hero, Richard Hannay, is a self-sacrificing patriot (Scottish, of course), whose only wish is to serve “God and Country” when he accidentally discovers an enemy plot to expose the British Secret Service. Ross Valley Players has found the perfect actor to fill that role in lanky, clean-cut Michael Monagle. A model of gentlemanly decorum when we first meet him, he quickly morphs into an agile man on the run as he pursues a nefarious foreign spy ring, while simultaneously dodging police who mistakenly want him for a murder he didn’t commit. Robyn Grahn is utterly credible as the three attractive women (not present in Buchan’s novel) who enter his life; especially Pamela, who is as innocent in the ways of the world as he is.
Although Richard and Pamela generate plenty of laughs when they are forced into an unwanted intimacy while trying to escape the criminals and police while handcuffed together, the show’s essential comedic drive comes from the antics of Sean Garahan and Andre Amarotico—designated in the program simply as Clown #1 and Clown #2—who open the evening with a music hall routine and then engage in a series of lightning character changes (allegedly around 150 in total) that is beyond any I’ve witnessed in my years of reviewing. As if that’s not enough, when they aren’t shifting accents, donning wigs, dresses and whatever else it takes to transform their identity, they morph into stagehands moving props and scenery.
All of this depends on exact timing and blocking, the province of RVP’s director, Adrian Elfenbaum, who also adds many creative touches to the staging.
It may seem like hyperbole to call the result a triumph, but that’s what it is.
NOW PLAYING: The 39 Stepsruns through August 20 at the Ross Valley Players’ Barn Theatre, Marin Art & Garden Center, 30 Sir Francis Drake Blvd., Ross; 415/456-9555; rossvalleyplayers.com.
The morel mushrooms of summer are here. These charming growths upon the forest floor look like gnomes from a magical land, creatures that would have fabulous stories to tell if only they could talk. But cooking is the only way to hear them. This shouldn’t be a problem, because morels are extraordinarily delicious. But too many people are intimidated by them, and don’t even give it a shot. And then there are the fearless chefs who add morels to already busy dishes, like a spicy coconut curry or lentil soup, where nobody will taste it.
That kind of attitude will get you in trouble if you’re out actually trying to find a morel, a practice that consists of wandering through a burned forest (most commercially harvested morels are from burns), up and over blackened ridges, trying to avoid getting bopped on the head by a standing burned tree, called a widow maker, that may decide to fall. I’ve been chased by moose, lost, dehydrated and run out of food, all while hunting mushrooms. Picking them is no picnic.
A measure of caution is surely warranted with morels, both in the field and in the kitchen. The flavor must be coaxed out gently, with butter, onions and wine, and little else.
At first bite the earthly origins are clear. A morel tastes of all things forest, with hints of decaying wood, deer poop, minerals and moss. The story they would tell would be a complex tale, of morel spores everywhere, deep in forest floors, waiting for a fire to sweep through the trees above so they can fruit prolifically on the forest floor. The first wave of morels to grow in a burn are called black morels, which are actually brown. The same burn will usually have another flush later in the summer, filled with the so-called gray morels, which are darker than the blacks, and the stems are double-walled. And then sometimes there will be a third wave of so-called green morels, aka “pickles,” which look almost the same as the grays but have three walls. But that is more than anyone but the morel nerds need to know.
Cooked properly, morels are the great outdoors incarnate, wild and bold, like the crew of mushroom pickers I joined in Alaska in 2006. It was the summer after six million acres burned, along the Taylor Highway between Tok and Chicken. Many of the things that went down at Camp Happy Mosquito, and in the blackened forests, brown rivers and smoky saloons in the vicinity, will have to remain where they occurred in order to protect the guilty.
But I’ll give you this instead: Go buy some morels that somebody else picked, ideally straight from the picker, for a taste of wild forest distillate. Pump some money into an industry that runs on hard work, sweat and risk, and depends on healthy forests—as buying wild salmon supports conservation in coastal watersheds. This time of year, wild morels are available at farmers’ markets throughout the West, and grocery stores everywhere. When you have your morels in hand, try this recipe and enjoy.
Morels
Ingredients:
1 cup morels, either whole or sliced. Note: You can stretch out your morel supply by adding regular, button mushrooms to the morels.
¼ cup heavy cream
1 tablespoon butter
Zest and squeeze of ¼ lemon
½ medium yellow onion, minced
Pinch of nutmeg
Salt and pepper to taste
¼ cup dry sherry or white wine
Melt the butter in a heavy bottom pan. Add onion and fungus. Cook together until onions are translucent and the morels start to give up their moisture—about 10 minutes. At the slightest hint of a dry pan, add sherry, and more butter if it needs it. Add nutmeg, zest and a squeeze of lemon. Cook a moment and add the cream. Cook five more minutes, season with salt and pepper and serve.
What you serve it with doesn’t really matter. You could toss them with noodles or heap them alongside meat or vegetables, or atop a hunk of good bread, which should be involved so that every last drop of sauce can be enjoyed to the max. After all, a lot of ecological processing and human effort went into it.
And when the season ends and we’re left with dried morels, they can be easily rehydrated and cooked the same way. Heat up some water or stock, about a quarter cup at a time, and when it starts to simmer, pour it on the morels. Toss and cover. If they absorb all of the liquid, repeat, tossing them gently whenever liquid begins to pool. Wait an hour, adding as much liquid as they will take, but not too much.
‘Make hot sauce great again’ is the hashtag that Hector Saldivar uses to promote his brand new product that launched just four months ago. The Tiburon resident, originally from Monterrey, Mexico has bottled his mother’s beloved spicy recipe and named it Tia Lupita. The condiment’s label—which features a hand-drawn image of a woman with a pink curler in her hair, glasses and a big smile on her face—brings a fresh sensibility to a category overcrowded with hyper-macho images.
“If you look at the hot sauces on supermarket shelves, they all have pictures of the devil, flames or raging bulls. I wanted to lighten it up and bring in a different side—mom’s home cooking,” says Saldivar, who describes how his mother would send her hot sauce from Mexico to remind him of home.
Even though Tia Lupita is a new venture for Saldivar, he’s no stranger to the food industry. He spent his career working for distributors—initially in Sacramento as a territory sales manager selling soft drinks. He moved on to Nestlé, focusing on emerging markets and expanding Hispanic brands. Eventually he went to Diamond Foods. Along the way he learned about distribution channels, supply chains, cost structure and so much more that would all become invaluable when he set out on his own.
“Our model started out online—direct to consumer,” explains Saldivar, who was surprised by the instant success. “We were selling 12 bottles daily for the first three months.”
With so much interest, Saldivar decided to take his product to Woodlands Market—where “they gave him a shot.” Soon he was selling a case every week. From there, Driver’s Market in Sausalito, Mollie Stone’s and others quickly followed.
Saldivar is clearly excited about his product and thrilled by its early success, but for him it’s about much more than simply selling hot sauce. “Peel the onion one more layer; it’s not only a product that is my own, but it’s also a tribute to my mom.”
Daniel Tellez, executive chef of Sausalito’s Copita Tequileria y Comida, tries to visit his home country of Mexico at least twice a year. Traveling between Mexico City, Puebla, Jalisco, Oaxaca and other spots, he always makes sure to visit some of his cousins. That’s quite the itinerary, since Tellez has 52 of them. In the beginning of 2016, Tellez decided to channel all of that family love into the new menu at Copita, launching a weekly specials program dedicated to his cousins and their culinary preferences.
When Tellez joined Copita in the beginning of 2016, it was with a goal to refresh the menu. Born and raised in Mexico City, he’s worked in a number of restaurants in Rome and his hometown, tapping into Michelin-starred establishments and collecting, on his route, awards and recognition from Bocuse d’or, the New York City Wine & Food Festival and more. Despite all of this glitz and résumé markers, family and tradition are enormous inspirations for Tellez.
“Growing up in Mexico and being surrounded by all of my family and a lot of friends brings back a lot of wonderful memories,” he says. “Whenever I visit, there is always some kind of special feast happening. Of course, I love to do most of the cooking and it’s also a fun time for the rest of my family to get involved and help out. I really love and miss that.”
Taking all of that longing and adding fresh local ingredients, Tellez is now on the 30th week of his tongue-in-cheek, elaborate 52 Cousins menu journey. After all, family is where passion for cooking was ignited within him.
“I grew up only a few blocks away from my grandmother’s house,” he recalls. “She always called on all of her grandchildren to help her in the kitchen. I was one of the youngest grandchildren and I always loved
Copita Executive Chef Daniel Tellez has 52 cousins who inspire his culinary creations. Photo courtesy of Copita.
watching her cook. I was also very eager to jump in and help out as much as I could!”
In his cousin-celebrating menu, there’s something for everyone, with plenty of dishes rarely seen on typical Mexican-Californian menus. Week 31, running from July 18-23, is dedicated to cousin Cassiana, who grew up in Zacatecas, one of the six known birthplaces of the famous pozole dish. Her week will feature Pozole Rojo de Pollo, a rich chicken stew with hominy corn, lettuce radish, oregano and chile de arbol.
“Though her mother had made it with pork, she told me she preferred chicken, as it offers a much lighter flavor profile,” Tellez says.
Next, Week 32 (July 25-30) will shine a spotlight on cousin Julio, a cactus grower and “one of the leading voices in the debate on whether cactus may become the world’s next kale.” To honor Julio’s healthy outlook, Tellez created an Ensalada de Nopal, with Nopal cactus, tomatoes, onion, lettuce, and panela cheese. In the following weeks, customers can expect Mexico City Street-Style Esquites (off-the-cob white corn with epazote, queso fresco lime and chili powder), Chile en Nogada (poblano chile filled with Mexican picadillo meat and nogada sauce), Crab Taquitos (fried crab tacos in tomato and serrano broth with chipotle aioli) and other regional Mexican delicacies.
When it comes to Mexican cuisine in the Bay Area, this approach—looking back to lesser-known classics and incorporating old family recipes—is exactly the right way to innovate and keep things interesting. In his cooking, Tellez, who oversees all of Copita’s gluten-free menu, combines the family rarities with news fresh from Mexico.
“I am constantly in contact with my chef friends in Mexico to hear about the latest trends and I also get a lot of inspiration during my trips to Mexico,” he says. “My vision has always been to continue to evolve Mexican food without losing its roots, and using high-quality ingredients.”
The cousins, on their end of things, welcome the tribute.
“When I came up with the idea, I let them know about it before I started putting together the menu and they seemed really happy and excited,” Tellez says. “It’s my way of saying thanks to them and to relive some of the memories we have from growing up together.”
Copita Tequileria y Comida, 739 Bridgeway, Sausalito; 415/331-7400; copitarestaurant.com.
Hero: Whales are making a splash this summer. Whether watching a pod breach near the Golden Gate Bridge, spotting them feeding inside the Bay or viewing them off our coastline as they migrate north, Marinites are enjoying the increased activity of these magnificent animals. Experts attribute the large number of sightings to humpback whales coming close to the shoreline to feed on anchovies and krill. You can learn about getting involved in whale watching and citizen science at a fascinating presentation by the American Cetacean Society-San Francisco Bay Area (ACS-SF Bay), a vital nonprofit that protects whales and their habitats through public education, research grants and conservation action. Join the ACS-SF Bay at the Bay Model in Sausalito on Tuesday, July 25 at 7pm. For more info, visit acs-sfbay.org.
Zero: Novato police are asking for your help to find the zeros responsible for a gasoline theft at the Novato Unified School District bus yard last Wednesday at about 11:15pm. A custodian observed two thieves siphoning gas from underground storage tanks used to fill school buses. Although they skedaddled before police could nab them, the custodian snapped photos of a white Ford Econoline box van or similar vehicle. A California license plate reading 7BQK347 was on the rear of the van; however, police believe it may have been stolen. The driver is described as a bald Hispanic male, in his 30s, with a medium build, and the passenger is described as a white female, blonde and heavy-set. Please call the Novato police at 415/897-4361 with any info.
By Nikki Silverstein
Hero: Consumer advocate 7 On Your Side, a segment of Bay Area TV station KGO, helped a Marin County woman recover several hundred dollars from Visa after the company shined her on. Susan Anderson purchased Visa gift cards for friends last Christmas and delivered them in person. Months later, she learned that the cards didn’t work when her...
By Rob Brezsny
ARIES (March 21-April 19): The Greek word philokalia is translated as the “love of the beautiful, the exalted, the excellent.” I propose that we make it your keyword for the next three weeks—the theme that you keep at the forefront of your awareness everywhere you go. But think a while before you say yes to my invitation....
By Amy Alkon
Q: A guy friend of 20 years and I once fooled around years ago. Though he has a girlfriend, he keeps throwing sexual remarks into our conversations, sending inappropriate texts and asking me to send naked photos. I wouldn’t be interested even if he were single, and I’ve been giving subtle hints, like “ha-ha … gotta go,”...
This week in the Pacific Sun, our Food & Wine Issue features the chef behind Copita's creative "cousins" menu, Tia Lupita hot sauce, which pays tribute to the founder's Mexican mom, and a recipe for morels. On top of that, we've got a review of 'The 39 Steps' and an interview with songwriter Paul Thorn, who will be performing...
By Charlie Swanson
Paul Thorn is not the type of guy to get stuck in the past. The Southern roots-rock and blues songwriter has crafted a career of prolific creativity and constant touring, resulting in a discography more than a dozen albums long and a die-hard fanbase that stretches from coast-to-coast.
Yet, this summer marks a particularly special milestone for Thorn:...
By Charles Brousse
Ever since Patrick Barlow unleashed his farcical version of The 39 Steps in 2005, the show has made box offices hum at theaters large and small around the globe. In addition to delighting audiences, it has also garnered critical accolades that include Broadway Tony Awards and London’s prestigious 2007 Olivier Award for Best New Comedy. No doubt...
By Ari LeVaux
The morel mushrooms of summer are here. These charming growths upon the forest floor look like gnomes from a magical land, creatures that would have fabulous stories to tell if only they could talk. But cooking is the only way to hear them. This shouldn’t be a problem, because morels are extraordinarily delicious. But too many people...
By Tanya Henry
‘Make hot sauce great again’ is the hashtag that Hector Saldivar uses to promote his brand new product that launched just four months ago. The Tiburon resident, originally from Monterrey, Mexico has bottled his mother’s beloved spicy recipe and named it Tia Lupita. The condiment’s label—which features a hand-drawn image of a woman with a pink curler...
By Flora Tsapovsky
Daniel Tellez, executive chef of Sausalito’s Copita Tequileria y Comida, tries to visit his home country of Mexico at least twice a year. Traveling between Mexico City, Puebla, Jalisco, Oaxaca and other spots, he always makes sure to visit some of his cousins. That’s quite the itinerary, since Tellez has 52 of them. In the beginning of...
By Nikki Silverstein
Hero: Whales are making a splash this summer. Whether watching a pod breach near the Golden Gate Bridge, spotting them feeding inside the Bay or viewing them off our coastline as they migrate north, Marinites are enjoying the increased activity of these magnificent animals. Experts attribute the large number of sightings to humpback whales coming close to...
