Welcome to Lily Belli on Food, a weekly food-focused newsletter from Lookout’s food and drink correspondent, Lily Belli. Keep reading for the latest local food news for Santa Cruz County – plus a few fun odds and ends from my own life and around the web.
… Cat & Cloud is the latest Santa Cruz-area coffee shop to unionize – and workers were able to do so without an election. Only two days after they sent a formal letter to the owners of the Santa Cruz County coffee chain, announcing their intention to unionize, their union heard from the owners’ attorneys, telling them that Cat & Cloud would recognize the union.
The union will include around 70 café workers in the county and would be part of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 5, the largest private-sector union in Northern California. Read the story from my colleague Max Chun here.
… The restaurant industry is a tough business, especially in the first year. But just a few months after opening The Salty Otter in downtown Santa Cruz, owner Rachael Smith faced an unusual challenge. She said her dreams were dashed not by economic realities, but a controversy over how she created the bar’s smiling otter logo with the aid of generative artificial intelligence.
Smith, who said she has 26 years of experience in computer graphic art, as well as 34 years in the restaurant industry, admitted she used AI to create the initial design, then colored and finalized the logo herself. “This is not a logo where someone just keyed in some words and pressed a button,” she said.
But after months of criticism, Smith admitted defeat, and replaced the colorful river otter on a surfboard with plain white text over a black background. “A lifelong dream has been crushed by a lot of locals,” Smith wrote in a post on The Salty Otter’s Instagram page on Friday. Here’s the story.
… A national vegan outreach group is aiming to promote plant-based cuisine at Santa Cruz County restaurants for the month of April. The Santa Cruz Vegan Chef Challenge invites chefs to add meat-free menu items for one month, and diners have an opportunity to explore and share the vegan options. This is the first time the national event will be held locally, in collaboration with the Santa Cruz Area Chamber of Commerce and the Downtown Association. It’s sponsored by New Leaf Community Markets.
So far, six restaurants and pop-ups have signed up, with plenty of room for more. See the full list at veganchefchallenge.org/santacruz/.
… Humble Sea Brewing Co. will reopen its seasonal outdoor beer garden on the Santa Cruz Municipal Wharf for the third year in a row. The spot, which features rotating food trucks and cozy fire pits, will welcome guests mid-March through October.
ON THE MENU
I might have been on vacation for the last two weeks of February, but I still ate some killer treats and dishes at the beginning of the month – more than enough to share with you in my new monthly story, the Best Things I Ate. Watch for the Best Things I Ate in February this week.
EVENT SPOTLIGHT
If you like to bake or just have a sweet tooth, mark your calendars for the Santa Cruz Bake & Gather on April 25. This inaugural event aims to bring people together through a shared love of homemade cakes and pies – no competition and no pressure. The free event runs from noon to 3 p.m. at the Midtown Community Center in Santa Cruz.
LIFE WITH THE BELLIS
My family’s 10-day trip to the North Shore on Oahu, Hawaii, was utterly dreamy, full of sunny beach days, occasional downpours, long mornings, swimming and surfing, and near-daily shave ice. Instead of going out, we cooked most meals at the house we rented, and since we got there a few days before our friends did, I decided to make kalua pork for dinner the night they arrived. I asked our neighbor if I could cut some of the banana leaves off her tree to wrap the pork in before I slowly simmered it on the stove, and she recommended that I also take a few long, slender ti leaves to layer with the meat. Both plants added a wonderful earthy flavor, and it felt so special to have access to these ingredients right out our front door.
FOOD NEWS WORTH READING
➤ These days, are dining critics too nice? Reviews of all kinds – film, books, TV, you name it – are dwindling nationally, and those that remain clearly skew toward the positive. But where does that leave readers and restaurants? In this story, one critic advocates for tough love. (D Magazine)
➤ Federal changes to Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Benefits went into effect in five states earlier this year, and will continue to roll out nationally over the next several months. New restrictions on categories like soda and candy are already causing confusion on the ground, with lemonade and granola bars now among off-limits items. (Civil Eats)