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EAT THIS: BRIE AND APPLE SANDWICH ON FOCACCIA AT PRETTY GOOD ADVICE
Since it opened in 2019, Pretty Good Advice has become a local pillar of both vegetarian cuisine and fast food – no easy feat – for loaded breakfast sandwiches, black bean burgers layered with cheese and special sauce, and seasonal salads with organic produce.
But in addition to using fruits and vegetables grown at his farm in the Santa Cruz Mountains, chef and owner Matt McNamara earlier this summer decided to up the ante at his two PGA locations, in Soquel and downtown Santa Cruz, and offer sandwiches on bread baked in-house.
The sandwiches are packed with fresh vegetables and complex condiments that bridge the craving between a cheeseburger and a salad. The High Horse ($13) is a vegan sandwich with oomph, featuring rainbow layers of vegetables on deeply brown slices of sourdough focaccia, while the tofu banh mi ($13.50) in crusty torpedo-shaped French rolls offers a spicy umami kick with every bite. Dunkable French toast sticks and, occasionally, bread pudding were also added to the menu. (The stores don’t have the capacity to make their burger buns quite yet, McNamara told me.)
My personal favorite right now is the brie, honey and apple ($12.50) sandwich, a rich, autumnal creation layered with crisp apples, a creamy schmear of cheese, a delightful pop of pickled mustard seeds and arugula on that wonderful, savory focaccia.
The bread is baked by Stefan Trifunovic, who previously worked at Saraghina Bakery in Brooklyn, which specializes in traditional slow fermentation. Trifunovic moved to McNamara’s farm from New York earlier this year with his girlfriend, McNamara’s sister Kylie McNamara, who also does all of the eye-catching black-and-white graphics for Pretty Good Advice.
Having Trifunovic on the Pretty Good Advice team has been an “instant game-changer,” McNamara told me. “Both of them moving back here on the PGA farm with me has been really great for the growth of these restaurants.”
BEST OF THE WEEK AHEAD
Below, 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.
NEWS OF THE WEEK
ICYMI – here are food news stories from Lookout that you might have missed.
- Verve Coffee to pay nearly $200K to San Francisco workers after city probe finds health fund violations (Lookout)
- ‘A very challenging time’: SNAP cuts and lost funding deepen food insecurity in Santa Cruz County (Lookout)
- ‘Cheers to Watsonville’: Nonprofit craft brewery Watsonville Public House plans to close after this weekend (Lookout)
- Historic Davenport Roadhouse gets a gentle reboot with new owners and new menu (Lookout)
