City Folk brings together old friends for timeless tunes
The first time that Kimball Hurd met Roger Feuer, he was offered a scotch, the two got out their instruments, and they proceeded to play for a few hours—all before having a full conversation.

Twenty years later, Hurd, Feuer and longtime friend Keith Greeninger, make up City Folk, a Bay Area folk band most often compared to Crosby, Stills and Nash. On Saturday, Oct. 9 at Kuumbwa Jazz, the band intends to prove that it still puts music before all else.

In the same way that Woody Guthrie used folk music to shed light on the unjust conditions faced by working class people, the members of City Folk seek to inspire by supporting global solidarity and environmentalism.

Head for the fallout shelters, the Atomic Aces are set to ignite a fiery explosion of upbeat, down and dirty rock ’n’ roll. “You’ll want to dance to our songs,” explains Mercy Vasseur, lead singer and debutant of the Aces. “They’re a nice fusion of different things for every age group.” And there might just be something to this. Atomic Aces dissect elements of country, rockabilly, and Western swing, only to splice them together with the best parts of rock and punk. The result is a blaze of hip beats and head-nodding twang, showing the young kids something new and giving the old timers a flash of something familiar.

Editor’s note: In this week’s Poetry Corner, we feature the work of Douglas McClellan, who received his master of fine arts degree in Visual Arts in 1950.  He taught art for 37 years at art institutes, colleges and UC Santa Cruz. His art has been widely exhibited including solo shows in Northern and Southern California, and group exhibitions on the East and West Coasts, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Library of Congress in Washington, DC.  He started writing poetry seriously at age 70 and has published six slender volumes. He currently alternates between digital collage and poetry. To learn more, visit dougstudio.com. The following poems are from the collection, “Exit Lines (semi official last words from the famous and otherwise).”

Travel the world, take care of my bills and all my family’s bills. Also create an institute that would give back to everybody, like an art or a culinary institute.
Keeli Blackman
Santa Cruz | High-end Retail

Cabernet Franc and Fish and Chips
My little British group of women holds a get-together once a month and the hostess usually makes dinner. Joanna always makes typical English grub such as shepherd’s pie and hearty stews, so I was a bit surprised to find she hadn’t actually cooked this time. Instead, she had gone to the Britannia Arms in Aptos and bought everybody fish and chips – a sure-fire hit for any Brit.

With beef stew and other such concoctions in mind, I had thought a bold Thomas Fogarty Cabernet Franc (on a cold night, to boot) would be just the ticket. I have always enjoyed the wines of Thomas Fogarty Winery and imagined that this particular Cab – a 2006 Santa Cruz Mountains priced at $30 – would go well with whatever Joanna had cooked. But I wasn’t expecting fish and chips!

The nation’s best pumpkin pie is made right here in Santa Cruz

Now that it’s pumpkin month, at 45 bay area farmers markets you can find Beckmann’s Bakery’s pumpkin pies, which are the best in the country.

Beckmann’s, celebrating 25 years, sells its pies only at farmers markets, an operation run by Tony Stumbaugh and his boss Scott Adams. Stumbaugh was investigating ideas to increase sales and found the American Pie Council, an industry organization that aims to preserve America’s pie heritage. Joining the organization, they headed to Florida and the National Pie Championships.

Transporting 20 frozen pies was the first challenge. “Everyone at the airport was looking at us funny,” Stumbaugh said. “We had this giant thing packed super well with so much dry ice we were worried we were going to get arrested by Homeland Security.”

My first taste of baklava came in the kitchen of a friend’s Russian grandmother. She spoke little English, but the message she sent through those infinite layers of sweet, sticky pastry was one of true love.

Numerous peoples claim title to the inception of baklava, but it is believed to be of Central Asian Turkic origin, and perfected by the chefs of Topkapi Palace, home of the Ottoman Sultans in Istanbul. The dessert, popular throughout Greece, Eastern Europe and the Middle East is made by individually buttering micro-thin sheets of dough called phyllo, the Greek word for leaf, which are alternately layered with nuts and spices. After baking they are doused with honey.

My own attempts to prepare what has become my kids’ favorite dessert have produced barely edible results. To the rescue comes Scotts Valley’s Eva Marie Vaniotis-Tordoff who launched her line of baklava this past summer at select retail establishments. I found packages with two browned and shimmering squares of Eva’s Baklava ($2.89) at Shopper’s Corner on a baked goods rack back by the kitchen utensils.

Bookshop Santa Cruz recommends:
1. “Wolf Hall”
2. “Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk”
3. “Grace of Silence”
4. “The Food Matters Cookbook”
5. “Howl
Capitola Book Café recommends:
1. “Drood”
2. “What Is Left the Daughter”
3. “Kook:
4. “Getting Green Done”

Bay Area author Bo Caldwell illuminates the harrowing lives of missionaries in pre-Communist Revolution China
Having personal experience with missionaries—my sister is currently a missionary in Taiwan—I have an understanding of both the risks and rewards that a life devoted to serving others entails. Spiritual rejection, sleepless nights and lack of funds are merely the tip of the iceberg when it comes to challenges that must be daily faced. However, to see the smiling faces of those who would have otherwise remained hungry or sick without receiving assistance is a reward, I’m told, that far outweighs even the most difficult hurdle. So when I saw that Bo Caldwell’s newly released novel, “City of Tranquil Light,” is a tale of missionaries serving in China, I was immediately drawn in. Luminous, heart wrenching and intricately detailed, the novel—told through the eyes of both Will and Katherine Keihn—is based loosely on the author’s real life grandparents as well as on other early missionaries to China.

Is there a question you’d like to hear the city council candidates answer? Good Times would like to know. Send in your question for the council hopefuls and be automatically entered to win some stellar prizes, including dinner for two at Clouds, tickets to the Jack-O-Laughter 2010 at the Rio Theatre on Oct. 29, and a dozen cookies from Pacific Cookie Company. Your question could also be selected for the candidate questionnaire in GT’s forthcoming Election Guide. Questions will be accepted for the Santa Cruz, Watsonville, Capitola and Scotts Valley city council candidates, as well as for the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisor contenders. Just email your question to le*****@gt******.com, with “Candidate Question” in the subject line, to enter. The last day to enter is Oct. 14.