I was at the mc cloud mushroom festival. I bought some from a woman selling them at a booth. She said they were picked in the Shasta forest. Some of the best I have ever had.
I love cotechino. They made it once at A Cut Above, and then tried it again from this butcher shop that made a fantastic version in Santa Cruz. Wish they would ship!
Now I get it at https://www.guidimarcello.com/ in Santa Monica.
They have one that takes 20 minutes in boiling water to prepare, and then we pressure cook the lentils for a fast, easy dinner.
Just had cotechino again tonight. With okra and tomatoes and rice. I know we all hate this term — “MOUTH FEEL” — but that’s a huge part of it. We kept moaning while eating
Chris is the owner . He is blazing a trail . They called him the sausage maker. I waited for his shop to open in Santa Cruz . It’s a must stop if your in town .
When we go north, we generally have our dogs, and Santa Cruz is a hard town to stay in with dogs. The places that allow dogs aren’t the nicest places to stay and the few that do are a bit out of town. My husband is a banana slug and he taught me to love the place.
Unfortunately, most of the places in the city have very bad reviews on Yelp, regarding noise, safety, etc. When my husband was doing randonnée biking (races that last days) we had to stay in Santa Cruz and I spent a long time searching for nice place for me to stay with the dogs. If anyone does have a nice dog, there is a great place in Bonny Doon that takes dogs, but we tried with our two and for whatever reason, one of the inn’s owners’ dog started to pee in their house when our dogs came near and the other growled, so I don’t think we will be welcomed back.