Best of Santa Cruz County food & drink events, March 14-20

Here, find a curated list of the best food and drink events in Santa Cruz County for the coming week. At the top, I share my picks of unmissable local happenings.

Chef Scott Clark of Dad’s Luncheonette in Half Moon Bay – you know, the one in the train caboose just off Highway 1 – is popping up at Bantam restaurant in Santa Cruz this Saturday starting at 5 p.m. Clark is cooking up dishes from his new cookbook, “Coastal: 130 Recipes from a California Road Trip.” This event is co-hosted by Bookshop Santa Cruz, and they’ll be onsite selling hard copies of the book, which highlights Central Coast cuisine and regional ingredients like seafood and wild mushrooms. No tickets or reservations needed – it’s first come, first served.

The memory of now-closed downtown Santa Cruz pub The Poet & The Patriot, and the community of regulars it inspired, is alive and well at Santa Cruz Cider Company in Watsonville. Saturday is the fourth annual Pub Day, which celebrates friendships and Poet traditions with darts, photos and live music. Santa Cruz Cider owners Natalie Henze and Nicole Todd served some of their first kegs of cider at the Poet more than 10 years ago, and will pour special ciders in its honor. The event goes from noon to 8 p.m.