For the past five weeks I’ve been driven to the brink of insanity by a seemingly harmless bodily phenomenon: the eye twitch. A little eyelid flutter is not uncommon to the human experience, and of course I thought nothing of it at first. Then it took over my life. Every morning, for weeks now, I wake up and wonder if I’ll find relief—until there it is again, a lively Mexican jumping bean dancing on my upper lid.
Following a less-than-fruitful crusade to calm the pulse—in which I pulled down my pants for vitamin B-12 shots, consumed magnesium supplements and far too many bananas (“you need potassium,” someone said), irritated my coworkers with constant twitch updates, and stopped just short of chugging tonic water, hearing that quinine (once a main ingredient) is said to bring relief—I finally consulted Dr. Craig Blackwell, an ophthalmologist in Capitola, about what turns out to be medically termed a “myokymia.”
The muscle in question is the orbicularisoculi, a circular muscle controlling the eyelid which happens to contain more fast-twitch muscle fibers than anywhere else in the body. The more extreme and rare version of eye twitch, blepharospasm, involves a forceful shutting of the eyelid, says Blackwell.
“The minor version like the one you describe is not uncommon, and seems almost always related to stress,” says Blackwell. “When stress goes away, so does the twitch.”
It’s not the response I had expected, having narrowed my suspicions down to excessive screen time. But it’s an explanation that could feasibly fit my lifestyle, where deadline looms like a guillotine over every Tuesday, and there is never enough time to make things as perfect as I’d like them to be.
“I want to ask you,” says Stuart Thompson, Ph.D, a neuroscientist and professor of biology at Stanford, “not as a physician, but if you go for a walk on the beach and you just kind of let yourself experience that, be in nature for a little bit, does the eye twitch stop?” Yes.
While the exact connection between stress and the eye twitch remains unknown, Thompson says that “play” activities like dancing, hiking, laughing with friends—you know, all of life’s good stuff—results in a very healthy chemical process in the brain.
“So for one thing, in that state you’re secreting oxytocin, you’re raising the growth factor concentrations, you’re growing new synapses. I mean, what changes is really amazing,” Thompson says. “The health benefits are very similar to what a good night’s sleep does.”
In addition to neurotrophin, or the growth of new neurons, a state of play activates the entire pathway of feel-good neurotransmitters, from oxytocin and the cannabinoid receptors to serotonin, dopamine and endorphins.
It’s almost the exact opposite of what is happening in the brain during times of prolonged stress. Of course, the chemical response of acute stress is designed to protect us in situations that require hyper-alertness and charges of adrenalin, but when the response sticks around it becomes completely counterproductive.
“Now, there are not a whole lot of things that are known to be neurodegenerative, but stress is,” says Thompson. The numerous effects of stress on the body and brain are caused by glucocorticoid hormones, he explains.
“In stress, your ability to form new synapses and remember or recall something is really heavily impacted. All of that stuff is kind of shut down by the stress hormones,” says Thompson.
The stress hormones also trigger inflammation in the brain itself, which causes the brain’s immune cells, microglia, to attack neurons and kill them, leading to a loss of brain function, says Thompson.
“There is tremendous crosstalk between immune cells in the body and immune cells in the brain,” he says. “What happens in your body affects what happens in your brain, too.”
We all react to the world in slightly different ways, says Thompson, and we all have a baseline level of anxiety, but we also come equipped with the means to lower those tensions and stresses in our lives. “I think we have a great deal of resources to improve our moods without drugs,” says Thompson. “There’s nothing as good as your own sense of well-being when you have a little oxytocin flowing … the things you get from being a human animal and enjoying it.”
In a world where being healthy often means physical exertion and dietary deprivation, I can’t think of a better prescription for a healthy brain: find the flow and zone out on walks, playing guitar, or whatever it is that takes your mind off the grind.
Every day as I return from the gym, I gaze longingly at the various contractor signs still papering the windows of Lillian’s-in-progress, on the corner of Seabright and Soquel. Soon, I tell myself. Soon I’ll be able to feast on hearty Italian food in the old historic Ebert’s space.
Luckily, we can all take our appetites over to the newly opened East End Gastropub, the twin sister of West End Tap. Well, not identical twins, as it turns out. An early look at the East End menu reveals a heightened level of ambition at the new eatery housed in the former Tony & Alba’s at 1501 41st Ave. in Capitola. Chef Geoffrey Hargrave has spun the new menu into some intriguing conceptual regions; for example, goat cheese, leeks and bacon pizza, rye pappardelle, and honey-cured pork belly with Brussels sprouts, faro and fried farm egg. Sign me up! We can expect locally-made artisan beers and lunch and dinners seven days a week. If the mega-scene that causes almost seismic activity over at the West End Tap & Kitchen is any measure, the new gastropub owned by Hargrave and partner Quinn Cormier should shake up the 41st Avenue neighborhood big time.
Thirsty Thursdays
In the quest to be ever-more welcoming to customers, the savvy conceptualists at New Leaf Community Markets will now host monthly complimentary tastings. Not simply microbrews, but also local ales and/or new craft hard ciders will be presented every third Thursday of the month. So that means that March 17, otherwise known as St. Patrick’s Day, the Leaf will be pouring SCMB’s organic Dread Brown Ale and Lavender IPA, and Surf City Cider will pour a Santa Cruz Scrumpy Hard Apple Cider (note that artisanal brews and ciders have long names). The Scrumpy Cider is both vegan and gluten-free, FYI. Yes, cider is turning out to be the new Chardonnay among aficionados of refreshing creations that contain some but not tons of alcohol. If you haven’t tried one of these shockingly refreshing, brisk, not-your-grandfather’s ciders, then get on over to New Leaf, 1101 Fair Ave., Santa Cruz, on one of these third Thursdays.
Cookie of the Week
The supple—nay, tumescent—almond orange cookie, dusted with powdered sugar and weighing in at a reasonable $3 at Cafe Ivéta took my breath away last week. I have never been able to get past the outrageous gluten-free fudgy cookie, packed with bittersweet chocolate chips, but somehow the almond orange number finally got my attention. The tension of flavors, intense almond pushing against the tangy citrus, is enough to make anyone’s afternoon (pair with jasmine green tea for a serious bliss event). But I was utterly unprepared for the texture; “chewy” is too poor a word for the succulent effect of teeth on cookie. The exterior seemed to melt, while the interior offered a wonderful moment of resistance. Now I have to confess that I adore this cookie as much as the mighty fudgy cookie. Can it be possible? Ivéta has two divine cookies on its mouth-watering pastry counter. 2125 Delaware Ave. on the Westside of Santa Cruz.
Wine of the Week
Santa Cruz Mountain Vineyard 2014 Grenache. Jeff Emery just can’t stop making appealing wines, and his 2014 Grenache, from Hook Vineyard in the Santa Lucia Highlands, underlines his skill. The wine’s 14 percent alcohol delivers a steady abundance of red berries, white pepper, bay leaves, and complex spiciness. Refreshing acidity amplifies the versatile effect, thanks to the cool climate of the chosen vineyards. $18.99 at New Leaf.
Now that Santa Cruz City Councilmember Micah Posner has admitted to renting out a unit in his backyard that was unpermitted for housing, some of his former supporters are feeling betrayed.
“I put an addition on my house, and my husband and I haven’t had a vacation since 2008, and we’re paying for it, because we enjoy it, but we did it legally,” said Sarah Nash, who voted for Posner four years ago, at a hearing on Posner’s violations on March 8. “And I can’t tell you how totally upset I am.”
Nash, a retired federal employee, stressed that it wasn’t personal—she would be “pissed” at any of the other council members if they had broken such laws, as well—even saying that she felt she was probably going easier on Posner because he’s her neighbor in the Lower Ocean area.
“But I don’t just want my neighbors to put something in their shed and think they can get away with it,” she added, her voice trembling. “I didn’t even think about getting away with it.”
Others told the council they felt it was unethical that Posner had presided over regulations around accessory dwelling units (ADUs)—some of which passed on narrow votes—while skirting the rules on his own.
Posner supporters spoke as well, outnumbering critics 4 to 1 at the meeting. They called his since-abated unit a valuable piece of affordable housing in an increasingly expensive town, and praised Posner for apologizing. Some suggested the council’s whole hearing was part of a larger crackdown on poor and liberal community members—like Keith McHenry, who has been charged with vandalism downtown, and Leonie Sherman, a former council candidate who was called an anarchist by a police officer in 2014.
“This, to me, is one of the final straws,” activist Grant Wilson said.
The council voted to censure Posner, issuing a formal reprimand that has no effect on his ability to serve. Council members also voted unanimously to have City Attorney Tony Condotti send a formal letter to the Fair and Political Practices Commission (FPPC) notifying the group that they are now aware of Posner’s actions.
Upon inspection, the staff found that the unit did not have a bathroom, a foundation, heating, or permits for electricity and plumbing.
Posner voted for the motion, too, saying he understood and respected the council’s decision.
Councilmember Pamela Comstock says she hopes that the letter will relieve the city of any possible legal responsibility should the FPPC decide that Posner did anything seriously wrong. “It’s about the impropriety, and I want it to be airtight in our statement that we didn’t do anything wrong,” Comstock said at the meeting.
Councilmember Don Lane, who in the meeting called Posner’s violation “embarrassing,” says the censure should help the council put this whole thing in the past. “I felt like it was important for the council to make a statement on this and move on,” he tells GT.
Community members were packed into the council chambers benches so tightly that they overflowed into the aisles and lined the back wall. The meeting was at times intense, with people clapping with those they agreed with and yelling at those they didn’t. As Lane described the ethical problems he had with Posner’s actions, one person blurted out, “That’s enough, Don.”
Condotti said that he did not think Posner’s votes on ADUs presented any conflict of interest because the council member’s unit was in a multi-residential zone where such units aren’t allowed anyway.
Posner has taken heat for not disclosing the income from his back unit on his form 700 through the FPPC. He has since updated the paperwork, and at the meeting he provided his tax returns showing that he had reported the income on his income taxes.
A confidential housing complaint about Posner’s house had tipped off city planning staff about the violation. Upon inspection, the staff found that the unit did not have a bathroom, a foundation, heating, or permits for electricity and plumbing, city planning director Juliana Rebagliati says.
Posner has stressed that it would have been difficult to afford the fees for a remodel, but Rebagliati says that staff works with homeowners to try and bring buildings in violation up to code and that there is a way to waive all fees, as long as landlords make their units affordable to renters. “There was no discussion of that. There is a process to waive the fees,” she tells GT. Under the plan, homeowners also must pay a prevailing wage for the construction labor.
Posner, who hasn’t decided yet whether he’ll run for re-election this year, says it would have been impossible to bring the building up to the city’s housing code for a second unit. He and his wife Akiko Minami would like to build a second unit using those same provisions to waive fees, but he says it has been a lesson in permitting. “Essentially I’m starting over, and I’m excited to learn how it works,” he says.
In his remarks last week, Posner said he understands and agrees that public officials should follow the rules and that he especially regrets the impact this has had on his colleagues at the city.
“It’s been a month of apologies, and I think that’s reasonable,” Posner said. “I am a public official, and I understand why the council would want me to speak about this matter and frankly to publicly apologize. So, I want to do that.”
Isaac Nieblas’ world changed when he signed up for a Chicano Studies class at Santa Clara University.
The son of Mexican immigrants, Nieblas grew up for a time in Arizona, where ethnic studies were banned from the public school curriculum during his sophomore year of high school. He never had the opportunity to learn about Mexican-American history, politics or literature, which created a disconnect he felt for his course material until he attended college—the first time in his life that he began learning about his own people.
“I felt I was studying who I was as a human,” says Nieblas, now a junior. “Learning about the Chicano revolution in the 1960s made me feel as though my concerns, my issues, my humanity were legitimate.”
Nieblas’ experience with ethnic studies is far from unique, but for the first time it’s being quantified. New research out of Stanford University shows clear academic benefits to ethnic studies.
Thomas Dee, a professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, recently tracked more than 1,400 ninth-graders enrolled in a pilot ethnic studies program in the San Francisco Unified School District. The students were enrolled in the course if they had a GPA below 2.0 the year before, meaning they were considered at-risk for dropping out.
Dee found that the students who took the ethnic studies courses, which focused on issues such as social justice, discrimination, stereotypes, and social movements in U.S. history, saw a boost in overall academic performance compared to their peers—and not just in the ethnic studies course itself. Ethnic studies students increased their attendance by 21 percent, credits earned by 23 percent, and cumulative GPA by 1.4 points, elevating them from failing grades to the B-minus/C-plus range. Some of the highest GPA gains were made in math and science.
“Learning about the Chicano revolution in the 1960s made me feel as though my concerns, my issues, my humanity were legitimate.”
While there have been many qualitative studies on the value of culturally relevant pedagogy, this is the first quantitative one.
“I’ll confess that when we first generated these results, I was incredulous,” Dee says. “If I was reading a study saying that taking the course increases GPA by 1.4 points, I would not believe that.”
While the results seem clear, the reason for the benefits may be less so. Dee attributes the value of ethnic studies to pedagogy. “It’s about having instruction that corresponds with the out-of-school experience of these kids,” he says. “It’s simply going to fit them better and promote academic engagement.”
Another explanation is what’s known as the stereotype threat, which theorizes that minority students underperform in the classroom because of anxiety stemming from the expectation of negative stereotypes. But through buffering, either by forewarning against stereotypes or providing external examples of the challenges people of color face, students can overcome the stereotype threat.
“When I look at the ethnic studies curriculum,” Dee says, “it has many of the active ingredients of these light-touch psychological interventions.”
Here in Santa Cruz, Eric Porter, a professor with UCSC’s newly created Critical Race and Ethnic Studies department, says the basic findings “make sense.”
“It provides a sense of self worth to students, understanding of how their groups exist in the world,” Porter says of ethnic studies.
The study has made an impact in Sacramento, too. Last month, California State Assemblymember Luis Alejo (D-Salinas) introduced legislation that would require California high schools to create ethnic studies programs. Alejo, who also introduced similar legislation two years before, cites Stanford’s new report as newly minted support for the cause.
Despite the newly identified advantages to ethnic studies, the field has faced political challenges since its inception in the 1960s. Even though Santa Clara has one of the oldest ethnic studies programs in the country, Anna Sampaio, director of ethnic studies at Santa Clara University, says it still hasn’t been granted departmental status, and it still can’t offer a standalone major to undergraduates.
UCSC, meanwhile, has had a major for over a year, but no department. All of the major’s professors and staff share responsibilities with other disciplines on campus, like history or Latin American and Latino Studies. The first two critical and ethnic studies students are applying to graduate this quarter, and 12-18 will by the end of the year. Porter hopes to regularly graduate about 40 students per year in the major soon.
The seemingly sluggish embrace of ethnic studies is not entirely surprising. “Ethnic studies completely shifts the learning rubric,” Sampaio explains. “It says the center of the universe isn’t just rich, white, well-educated men. It can also be poor, working-class communities of color or women of color, and their voices have validity.”
Last year, Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed a bill authored by Alejo that would have required the California Department of Education to develop an ethnic studies curriculum for public schools.
Alejo notes that some laws he’s written—like the minimum wage increase and a bill to provide driver’s licenses for undocumented immigrants—were carried for years by previous lawmakers before they finally passed and received the governor’s signature. Alejo is optimistic Californians won’t have to wait decades for the governor to sign an ethnic studies bill into law.
“We’re building a broad coalition—teachers, university scholars, teachers, labor unions and legislators—to convince the governor to do it,” Alejo says.
Santa Cruz City Schools don’t currently have an ethnic studies program, per se. The district does, however, support a Heritage Language class at all three high schools providing Spanish language instruction with history and culture studies for students whose first language is Spanish.
Elsewhere in California, some school districts are working to implement ethnic studies on their own. In 2014, Los Angeles approved plans to make ethnic studies a high school graduation requirement, and San Francisco and Oakland school boards voted to mandate that all high schools offer ethnic studies.
Nieblas argues that, given his own experiences, ethnic studies should be required starting in elementary school.
“I’m one out of 87 in my kindergarten class to make it to university,” he says. “If those other 86 could have seen themselves in the books—if they knew there was an Angela Davis, a Malcolm X, a Cesar Chavez—I think it could have made a ton of difference.
“I could be at this university with all of my childhood friends.”
As I’m handed a pea green waffle, I’m reminded a little bit of Dr. Seuss. The warm, toasted pastry is almost savory, with a delicate sweetness, and Blanca Madriz, who co-owns the Green Waffle with her husband Martin, explains that it contains just five ingredients: egg whites, oats, banana, and spinach, with additions of either blueberry, yam or cauliflower.
“They can be eaten as breakfast waffles with honey and fresh fruit,” she explains. “They can also be eaten as sandwiches with egg and cheese, regular cold cut meats, or vegetarian. We have even made green waffle pizza.”
Madriz and her husband launched their business just a few months ago, but it almost didn’t get off the ground.
“Neither of us had any experience in starting a business or in the food industry, we just knew we had an idea we truly believed in. In the beginning, we got our own location, but it did not pass the city inspection. We thought that was it, that it was over, because we were out of all the money we had to invest. We did not have PRICKLY SITUATION El Nopalito Produce bought 100 cases of cactus per week from area farms last year. Here, the cactus is trimmed and shaved by hand.
very much to begin with.”
Luckily, a friend recommended they check out the incubator in Watsonville, where they live. Martin rushed to their office and filled out an application the same day. Now, nine months later, their product is available in four locations, including Staff of Life in Santa Cruz and Aptos Natural Foods.
“We think that if the Kitchen Incubator did not exist we would not be in business right now,” says Bianca. “We would either have abandoned the idea all together or be working to save up money to reinvest, which would have taken a long time.”
Start Me Up
Since its launch three years ago, the Kitchen Incubator program has nurtured at least 30 food start-ups. As the newest incubator program from the El Pájaro Commercial Development Corporation (CDC), a nonprofit based in Watsonville, its goal is to help underserved entrepreneurs in Santa Cruz, Monterey and San Benito counties by lowering the costs of their initial investments and providing them with technical training. Entrepreneurs apply to share a commercial kitchen facility for $10 to $30 an hour, depending on their equipment and energy needs, which significantly lowers their start-up costs by tens of thousands of dollars by removing the need to rent or build their own kitchen.
The CDC also offers a 13-week technical assistance program to applicants, where they work with consultants to put together a business plan, figure out which federal entities will oversee their production, and obtain a ServSafe certification and the correct permits.
“That’s a big part of what we do,” explains Cesario Ruiz, who manages the Kitchen Incubator and works closely with all of its start-up clients. “We bring in new people who want to use the facility, and often times they don’t even know where to start. Once we collect those documents—business plan, the identity of the proper entity that’s overseeing them, and ServSafe—then we move into local permits, insurance for your business and obtaining a business license from the City of Watsonville.”
Only after all of this initial training, which takes three to six months, do clients finally move into the Kitchen Incubator, which sometimes poses its own set of challenges for new entrepreneurs, many of whom have never worked in a commercial kitchen before. “Some people come in with experience and they don’t take very much time,” explains Ruiz. “Others have no idea how to use a commercial oven or commercial stove.”
The need for a commercial kitchen space had been apparent to the CDC for more than a decade. Of the 200 or so clients that visited the CDC every year, at least 40 percent of them wanted to start a food business, but were prohibited from doing so due to lack of start-up capital and commercial space. According to labor statistics from the Employment Development Department of California, at 10.9 percent Watsonville has the highest unemployment rate in Santa Cruz County, more than double the national average of 5.4 percent. By opening the Kitchen Incubator, the CDC hoped to provide support for potential entrepreneurs, who would create new businesses and jobs to build on the strong food and farming traditions in the region.
The number of kitchen incubator programs, both nonprofit and for-profit, has grown enormously nationwide over the last decade, from virtually none to more than 200, due to booming demand from “foodpreneurs” and a call from consumers for local, fresh, artisanal products. As the CDC began to take concrete steps toward bringing a Kitchen Incubator to Watsonville, they worked closely with La Cocina Kitchen Incubator in San Francisco, operating since 2005, which follows a similar business model. Early reports on this new trending industry show that incubators that provide business training, as the Watsonville Incubator does, are much more likely to succeed by ensuring the success of their clients.
Carmen Herrera, executive director of the CDC, says business training is essential for many of the entrepreneurs they work with.
“I love what I’m doing because I see a huge change in the food industry in the area, and I want to be a part of that future,” says Ruiz. “Yes, we hear bad news, sad news, coming out of Watsonville, but that’s not the only thing that’s happening.”
“People have a dream, and sometimes they have savings, and it’s very important to us that they don’t invest their time and savings in something that they don’t understand,” explains Herrera. “Our clients don’t always know what kind of questions to ask, or what kind of due diligence is required to negotiate a business deal, and that’s the kind of thing we help people with. It takes so much effort before people are ready to apply for a loan, and to get a good interest rate, but the rate of success for people who receive this kind of assistance is much higher when they have received the kind of support we’ve offered to them, than when they haven’t.”
Cultural Shift
Ruiz, who recently won a local NEXTie award for Entrepreneur of the Year, is one of these success stories. In 2013, with 17 years in the food industry under his belt, including five years at Gayle’s Bakery & Rosticceria in Capitola and five years as a manager at New Leaf Community Markets, he left to launch his own product, My Mom’s Mole, a sustainably sourced mole powder based on his mother’s recipe.
After several fruitless weeks looking for a commercial kitchen, Ruiz was introduced to Herrera through a friend, who invited him to come look at the facility.
“When I come in here and she opened those doors, my jaw just dropped at how beautiful the kitchen was,” Ruiz says. “Everything was so shiny, sparkly, new … unopened boxes of cooking equipment were everywhere. It took me about 10 minutes to recover.”
Ruiz confesses that Herrera was alarmed that he had quit his job to start his business, which is something they never initially recommend to the clients who visit the CDC. “I thought it was going to be easier,” admits Ruiz. Herrera offered him a job on a part-time basis as manager of the facility while simultaneously running his mole business, and he started a week before the Kitchen Incubator opened. He’s been there ever since, and says he’s inspired daily by the work he does helping other entrepreneurs.
“I love what I’m doing because I see a huge change in the food industry in the area, and I want to be a part of that future,” says Ruiz. “Yes, we hear bad news, sad news, coming out of Watsonville, but that’s not the only thing that’s happening. We have so many community leaders who are committed to changing the culture and changing what we’re doing for the good of the community. I’d much rather be a part of that and focus on that to continue changing that vision that most people from North County have about Watsonville.”
Slow Cook
The Incubator was far from an instant success. Ruiz says that when the doors opened, they started with four or five clients, and it took about a year and a half to really get the word out about the new IT TAKES A KITCHEN From left to right: Martin Madriz of the Green Waffle; Rhiannon Henry of Kitchen Witch Bone Broth; Carmen Herrera, director of the El Pajaro Commercial Development Corporation; and Cesario Ruiz of My Mom’s Mole.
facility. Those they did take on, however, had been practically pounding on their door to get in. One such client was Vicente Quintana, who had been in desperate need of an affordable commercial kitchen in order to sustain his growing cactus business, El Nopalito Produce. Quintana was receiving his training from the CDC at the time, but without a commercial kitchen he wasn’t able to obtain any of the permits needed to legitimize his business. Although his product had been steadily gaining a client base, until the Kitchen Incubator opened everything had been under the table.
Ruiz translates for Quintana, who emigrated from Mexico and moved to Watsonville in 2009: “Technically, it wasn’t OK, but what was he going to do? He couldn’t go back to the fields, the work was too difficult for him, and he had a family to feed. That was the easiest solution at the moment. But once his competition saw him coming into the markets, they knew who he was and started to call the police on him. Every time he went to make a delivery, he would get pulled because the competition would call him out,” Ruiz says of Quintana’s struggle to get his business off the ground.
Quintana scraped by for eight months before finally moving into the facility as soon as it opened in 2013. Now, his business produces 7,000-8,000 pounds of cactus out of the Kitchen Incubator every week and supports six full-time employees. His cactus—which is trimmed, peeled and cut by hand to preserve, as he says, “the integrity of the cactus”—is available in more than 30 markets from Salinas to the Bay Area.
Quintana admits that without the availability of the Kitchen Incubator as a resource, it’s likely that he wouldn’t have been able to reach this level of success. With the federal officials pursuing him, it was only a matter of time before he faced a huge violation write-up that would have prevented him from selling again.
Besides enabling him to support his family and employees, Ruiz adds that Quintana’s business has helped local cactus farmers, as well. “There is a cactus farmer in Los Banos who has six acres of cactus. This farmer used to take four or five cases of cactus to sell at farmers markets, and sometimes he’d have to return it all to the farm. Last year, Vicente bought all of his production, about a hundred cases a week, and it’s generating a positive impact in that community,” Ruiz says. “So, you kind of see how the good intentions just keep rolling and affecting people in a positive way.”
It’s also clear from stories like Quintana’s why the Health Department is a big supporter of the Kitchen Incubator, and refers clients to them who are working under the table. “They love the facility and the way we take care of clients, because we’re trying to take businesses out of the shadows who are risking people’s health by producing in a way that they shouldn’t be producing,” says Ruiz.
Community Kitchen
While the training entrepreneurs receive is key to the success of their fledgling businesses, participants in the program say that working in a shared facility has other benefits. Newcomers Amanda Pargh and Chase Atkins, owners of Burn Hot Sauce, started working out of the Kitchen Incubator just a few months ago and were thrilled at the support they found from the other participants.
“Being in such a large facility has really given us the growing room we didn’t even know we would need.”
“It’s an honor to be in there because you’re surrounded by such good vibes. It’s not like you’re in another hardcore kitchen where no one talks to each other; it’s a really good community,” says Atkins. “They are some of the most unique and inspiring people because they’ve been through it all—breaking the glass, flooding the kitchen …” “Everyone is willing to help each other. If you’re going through something, someone will say, ‘I just went through that. Here’s what I did.’ It’s really nice,” adds Pargh.
Missy Woolstenhulme, who co-owns Kitchen Witch Bone Broth with partners Magali Brecke and Rhiannon Henry, says she shudders at the thought of where their business would be without the incubator, which they have been using for the past two years. The CDC agreed to let them bring in a large steam kettle, which takes up valuable kitchen space but has allowed them to greatly expand their business. “They have been instrumental in our growth in countless ways. Carmen has always been open to helping us grow by allowing us to purchase and bring in our own equipment and renting us more space when we have needed it,” says Woolstenhulme. “And Cesario is one of the most genuinely helpful and awesome human beings you can meet. He has always had advice to help us learn and grow into the food industry and when we have stumped him on a question, he goes looking for the answer.”
Kitchen Witch Bone Broth has gone from producing about 150 jars of their nutrient-rich broth every two weeks to nearly five times that every week since their early days at the Incubator. Says co-owner Henry, “Being in such a large facility has really given us the growing room we didn’t even know we would need.”
The value of the interpersonal resources at the Kitchen Incubator isn’t lost on Herrera, who says, “The facility is amazing, it’s beautiful, but at the end of the day the thing that makes the big difference from other commercial kitchens is the amount of support that people get when they’re accepted to the program. It happens formally, through our programs and assistance, but also organically when they share knowledge and ideas with each other. It’s a community.”
Packing Up
The next step for the Kitchen Incubator is to install co-packing services. Currently, all of the businesses operating out of the Kitchen are packaging by hand, which impedes their ability to expand. “For many of our clients, they have a great product and are showing amazing growth, but they won’t be able to support themselves full time unless they sell a lot more, and the only way to do that is to package differently,” explains Herrera. “We don’t want to start making businesses that are just going to go away because they want to expand, you know?”
Local farmers would also benefit from access to a facility that would allow them to make “value added” products like jams, sauces, and pickles from leftover produce and sell them at farmers markets instead of returning the unused produce to their fields.
Currently there are no co-packing facilities for small businesses in Santa Cruz County, and Herrera has heard of farmers exporting their co-packing out of state in order to find a more affordable option. “There are many people that will benefit from this and we’ll attract other people. It will create jobs, because the lines have to be managed by people that we’ll hire. It’s a win-win for everybody,” says Herrera. The preliminary design for the co-packing facility is already in place, with plans to open in early fall.
Herrera’s experiences growing up helped to shape her belief in the long-term benefits of nurturing successful small businesses. Her mother and father opened a bakery in Mexico 53 years ago, which her sister runs today. “If my parents struggled at the beginning, they did very well later. Because of that business, everyone who wanted to was able to go to college,” says Herrera. “That’s also the vision that I have for our clients. Not only self-appointment, but that they’re able to build some assets for themselves, send their kids to college, buy a house … We have a quote that we sometimes say, ‘Believe in the transformational power of entrepreneurship.’ Because it does.”
Ask Greg Brown what he’s been doing the last few years and you’ll likely get a few mumbled words about how he’s old and tired and worn out.
Though not particularly old, the 66-year-old singer-songwriter is one of the elder statesmen of contemporary folk music, having laid down a lot of songs, years and miles. These days though, he’s happy to have more time to relax at home.
“I’m just sitting around, looking at the sky,” he says, explaining that he’s looking forward to some spring fishing in his favorite streams. “I go and do gigs, but not nearly as many as I used to.”
When asked if he picks up his guitar very often, Brown perks up. “Oh yeah,” he says, “I’m still writing songs. I’ll probably do another CD here before too long.”
Such is the life of Greg Brown—a weary traveler with little tolerance for bullshit, who also happens to be one of the most talented songwriters of our time. Beneath his gruff disposition lies a tender heart and a keen ability to tap into the universal through tales of everyday life and simple pleasures like fishing, love and old friends.
In concert, Brown sits on stage, looking and sounding like a big, ornery bear, telling stories and jokes. He’ll then launch into a song full of such emotional insight that eyes well up in the audience. Then the tune ends and the bear resurfaces.
In his song “The Poet Game,” from the album of the same name, he explores the beauty and struggle of the poet’s life, spent crafting tales about the sadness, joy and the beauty of it all. In one verse, he references his grandparents’ young courtship singing, “She’d been cooking, ashamed and feeling sad / she could only offer him bread and her name / Grandpa said that was the best gift a fella ever had / and he taught me the poet game.”
On “Kate’s Guitar,” a song that pays tribute to the late Kate Wolf, Brown captures the gentle, enduring strength of the legendary songwriter and gives a nod to Wolf’s friend and collaborator, Nina Gerber, who now plays Wolf’s guitar: “I know why we live, I know why we die / I know why we laugh, I know why we cry / But I don’t know how this color of sky invites the evening star / I don’t know how such peacefulness found a home in Kate’s guitar.”
Brown has more than 30 albums to his name now, but he didn’t buy in easily to the idea of a music career. He gave it a shot in his late teens, but the business didn’t agree with him.
“I got into it for a while,” he says, “then I thought, ‘man, I don’t really care for this stuff’—8×10 glossies and all that—so I quit for four or five years.”
Music and writing run deep in Brown’s family, though. His grandfather and mother were both musicians, and his father was a Pentecostal minister. Despite his best efforts, the urge to write songs and play guitar was strong, so he returned to the musician’s life.
“I wanted to be a lawyer,” he says with a laugh, “but I was forced by circumstance to become a singer-songwriter.”
These days, Brown is still surrounded by music. He and his wife, singer-songwriter Iris DeMent, play music together at home—and when his daughters, including celebrated singer-songwriter Pieta Brown, are around, they’ll join in, too.
A favorite of local audiences, Brown has been performing in Santa Cruz for decades. On March 19, he plays the Rio Theatre, joined by singer-songwriter Karen Savoca and guitarist Peter Heitzman, two old friends Brown regularly performed with in the ’90s.
When asked if he has any advice for young singer-songwriters considering a career in music, Brown simply says, “Run.”
True to form, however, his growl is followed by warm insight.
“If you can find something that you really love to do, and that feels natural to you, and you feel like you’re putting something good out, stick to it as far as you can,” he says. “We’re not here long and if you can find something that really fills you up, just hang on to it.”
Greg Brown will perform at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 19 at the Rio Theatre, 1205 Soquel Ave., Santa Cruz. $32/general, $42/gold. 423-8209.
Gray whales and elephant seals can’t vote in elections, but if they could, these charismatic wild animals would do away with national borders and regional conflicts. Their understanding runs much deeper. They’re part of an interconnected web of life that migrates along sweeping natural corridors.
If acclaimed nature photographer Florian Schulz has his way, these corridors will become the focus of wildlife conservation moving forward. In his new book, The Wild Edge – Freedom to Roam the Pacific Ocean, stunning images and passionate essays erase political boundaries. Along with scientists, writers, and environmentalists, he documents the journey taken by gray whales from the birthing lagoons in Baja up the coastline to the high arctic, where they feed during the summer months.
“I wanted to look at animals that really stand for the need to roam,” he says, “and the need to protect these places on a larger scale. We can’t think about conservation by drawing a line around an area and saying it’s protected. Even elephant seals will swim all the way up to Alaska and feed.”
The history of open space in the U.S. inspired Schulz’s thinking decades ago. He came here as a 16-year-old exchange student, and his first book to explore wildlife corridors, Yellowstone to Yukon, evolved out of the uniquely American concept of national parks. “You created the first one with Yellowstone in 1872,” he says. “Imagine if a new vision of wildlife corridors, which are essential to maintaining the fauna and animals in an area, could spread around the world.”
He isn’t surprised by the recent uptick in wildlife sightings and encounters in Monterey Bay. “It’s a special area,” he says. “There are deep canyons with cold water masses and algae blooms that later set up a food chain along the coast. But also, because food is scarce in other areas, it brings animals right to near shore waters.”
Other ecosystems have not been so lucky. He points out dramatic changes in the arctic because of climate change. “Sea ice is gone much earlier and doesn’t return until much later,” he says. “This results in major erosion in areas essential to animals like walruses that now have to swim further between foraging and have been seen hauling out on beaches in great numbers due to the absence of ice rafts.”
But Schultz tempers the overwhelming nature of climate change by focusing on opportunities. “We can protect habitat, and if we give animals the possibility to use natural coastline, to get a break from over-fishing, and to have reserves and other areas where they can retreat and take refuge, they’ll be more resilient and resistant to factors challenging them.”
His career in photography began 28 years ago when his father gave him a manual Praktica camera with a slide zoom and lenses that had to be screwed on. “The beauty of it was that I had to really learn photography, because each time you wasted a roll of film with bad exposures or out of focus images, it was expensive.” By now, the choice of a lens or settings is second nature to him, but the key to his passion for the art lies in a strong sense of place. “I love developing images in my mind before I take them,” he says, “so I return to locations again and again. I look for ways to be out in the wild. The longer I’m out there, the more special images come forward.”
Florian Schultz will speak at Bookshop Santa Cruz on Wednesday, March 16 at 7 p.m. Free.
His reaction to the digital revolution in photography was complicated, but ultimately gave him piece of mind. “I worried about the value of it when everyone can snap a picture,” he says, “but there have been pens and pencils around for ages. It doesn’t make everyone a writer.” He also worried about the ease with which digital photography could be manipulated. “For me it’s about being out there. I want to live that moment and see something real. If I started manipulating my photographs, I couldn’t tell the story of how I got them. There would be no joy for me. When I stay true to what I do, people pay attention. They see that it’s real, and it puts me at ease.”
Book talk and presentation at Bookshop Santa Cruz – 1520 Pacific Avenue – 831-423-0900 Wednesday, March 16th @ 7:00pm – Free
On a wine-tasting trip to Carmel Valley, we stopped at the Holman Ranch tasting room and sampled some beautiful wines, including their estate-grown 2012 Pinot Noir.
Fruit-forward with soft tannins, this everyday wine pairs nicely with pork, veal or chicken. A warm layer of characteristic earthiness rounds out this well-made Pinot ($26), which is abundant with aromas of strawberries and cherries. Flexible and easy-drinking, this wine paired nicely with some turkey breast and potatoes I sautéed in olive oil and served with a simple spinach salad.
Tucked away in the beautiful hills of Carmel Valley, the 400-acre Holman Ranch, established in 1928, is a stunning spread of property. It is home to stables, horse trails, a historic hacienda, olive groves, and perfectly tended vineyards. Weddings, retreats, private parties, and corporate and wine events are held in this bucolic setting. And this is where longtime winemaker Greg Vita ages Holman’s wines in “The Caves,” a 3,000-square-foot underground facility which is kept at a constant temperature of 58 degrees Fahrenheit. The Caves contain four 750-gallon tanks, four 1,200-gallon tanks, and four open-top tanks that hold up to two tons each. Vita also maintains 100 French oak barrels year-round.
On a recent tour of Holman Ranch, I noticed some impressive old photos of movie stars—Charlie Chaplin, Theda Bara and others—who favored this amazing place as a regular retreat.
Two levels of wine club membership are available, but the perks of joining the Grand Estate Club include a complimentary two-night stay on the property in one of Holman Ranch’s hospitality cottages, as well as two free tickets to the annual Fiesta de los Amigos in September, which is also a benefit for the Alzheimer’s Association. Holman Ranch Tasting Room, 19 E. Carmel Valley Road, Suite C, Carmel Valley, 659-2640. holmanranch.com.
Step Into Fashion
This California designers’ sale comes with a boxed lunch ($15) or without ($10), and wine will be available for purchase. The event comprises 30 designers selling clothing, handbags, accessories, jewelry, and more at affordable prices. Proceeds benefit the Palo Alto Medical Foundation’s Cancer Care and Survivorship programs. The event is from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, April 2 at the Elks Lodge, 150 Jewell St., Santa Cruz. For tickets contact Sigfrid at PAMF by March 23, 458-6391.
Making Mexican food can be easy—at least that’s what Melissa Palacios’ cooking class, Melissa’s Mexican Made Easy, promises.
She started teaching at the Westside New Leaf Market in Santa Cruz a year and a half ago, after a decade of showing friends how to make tamales. Her next class is on April 23, on tacos al pastor. Palacios shares her secrets for making Mexican easy. GT: Where do you get your recipes from?
MELISSA PALACIOS: I’m Mexican-American, but these aren’t even my family’s recipes. They got too Americanized by the time I came around. I came up with recipes from a cooking school I went to in Mexico, in a state that I had never even heard of called Tlaxcala. They’re really easy and traditional, and what I liked about them is they’re all whole foods. We’d go to the market and get our produce. None of our sauces were out of cans. I thought this is good for Santa Cruz because everybody’s into the whole farm-to-table movement. I don’t change the recipes at all. I teach them exactly like I was taught. What are some misconceptions about Mexican food?
Mexican food gets a bad rap. It’s really fresh. Some of it is really simple. We have a house in Cozumel, Mexico. Tacos there are the complete opposite of what tacos are if you go to a Mexican restaurant here in California. The tacos there have soft, warm tortillas, freshly made by hand, and they’re little. They have the meat in them, and usually that’s it. Some of the meats have been marinated in different sauces and then grilled. What makes the taco is the different sauces on the table, like habanero. In Cozumel, it’s an avocado sauce. You have a couple of tacos, and they’re like 80 cents each. You leave feeling good. You don’t feel all greased out. There’s no cheese or sour cream. How much food can people expect to eat at one of your classes?
A full plate of food. I usually make three dishes. There’s usually a main dish, and I make a rice dish. I just had a tamale class, and they got two tamales and a salad. We usually make agua fresca or jamaica. We didn’t make any rice this time. They also got to take home six tamales. The other classes they don’t usually take home food unless there are leftovers. It’s definitely a good-sized lunch. 251-5640, melissasmexicanmadeeasy.com.
Even if you don’t think you understand or like opera, you might find yourself drawn into the lush world of Master Class, a sharply observed drama about opera and life that’s the third offering from Jewel Theatre Company in its new home at the Tannery’s Colligan Theater. Written in 1995 by Terrence McNally, the play imagines a voice class conducted by iconic diva Maria Callas during her tenure as guest lecturer at the Juilliard School in New York City in 1971-72.
Yes, a few snippets of operatic arias are sung during the course of the play, seeded in for maximum effect at crucial emotional moments, and delivered by a cast of excellent singers in the roles of Callas’ Juilliard students. But fear not; it doesn’t matter if your Italian is a little rusty. Callas herself—beautifully played con brio by Patty Gallagher—is onstage throughout to talk us through the passion conveyed in the words. And the way these words reflect the deep passions of La Callas’ life, gradually revealed in brief moving monologues, drives the drama forward.
The production is impressively directed by Susan Myer Silton as a chamber piece for five: Callas, three of her nervous, starstruck voice students, and her piano accompanist (the ever-reliable Diana Torres Koss)—or six, if you count a couple of comic appearances by a surly stagehand (Lucas Brandt). The action takes place over real time, with Mark Hopkins’ minimal set of wood-grain panels suggesting an academic lecture hall.
Into this low-key milieu strides Gallagher’s imperious, larger-than-life Callas, exuding wry wit, banked fire, and disingenuous modesty. (“We are not here to talk about me,” she reminds us constantly.) From her very first entrance, she takes the audience into her confidence, addressing us throughout the play as if we were all students in the lecture hall auditing her class. She dispenses random advice (“Get a look!” she exhorts us, or “Don’t act. Feel!”), and provides often waspish commentary on the students brave enough to meet her onstage.
Fresh, innocent, eager-to-please soprano Sophie (Jennifer Mitchell), sings the sleepwalking scene for Lady Macbeth from Verdi’s Macbeth—as soon as La Callas finally allows her to proceed past the opening syllable, “O …” The next soprano, Sharon (Aubrey Scarr) is so cowed by Callas’ criticism that she flees the stage. Handsome tenor Tony (Mete Tasin) is chastised for wanting to be famous. But his impassioned delivery of a love aria from Tosca leaves Callas speechless—and mesmerizes the audience.
In counterpoint to these student-teacher dynamics, and the name-dropping reminiscences of her famous life “in the war” or “at La Scala” with which Callas regales the auditorium, another theme creeps in: Callas’ life as an artist and a woman, and the struggles and sacrifices she’s endured to follow her art. Twice in the course of the play, the action onstage fades into the background, and the voice of the real-life Callas, recorded live in concert, flows through the speakers.
In these moments, the play’s Callas, driven to emotional peaks and valleys by the music she’s known so well, relives in monologue the moments of her greatest triumphs and tragedies, onstage and off. When Sharon at last musters the grit to return and sing another aria for Verdi’s Lady Macbeth—in which she convinces her husband to murder the old king—it’s the catalyst for Callas’ most heartrending memory.
Onstage “students” Mitchell, Scarr, and Tasin are all veteran performers with credits from the Bay Area to New York City to Europe, and their singing fills the Colligan stage to gorgeous effect.
And kudos to Hopkins’ lighting design, recreating (among other things) an impressionistic view of La Scala from the stage, and a rain of giant white roses during Callas’ monologues.
McNally’s vibrant play is itself something of a master class in stage writing (it won a Tony), and pursuing a life in the arts. And this JTC production delivers it with verve.
The Jewel Theatre Company production of ‘Master Class’ plays through April 3 at the Colligan Theater, Tannery Arts Center. 425-7506, jeweltheatre.net.
Every day as I return from the gym, I gaze longingly at the various contractor signs still papering the windows of Lillian’s-in-progress, on the corner of Seabright and Soquel. Soon, I tell myself. Soon I’ll be able to feast on hearty Italian food in the old historic Ebert’s space.
Luckily, we can all take our appetites over to the newly...
Ask Greg Brown what he’s been doing the last few years and you’ll likely get a few mumbled words about how he’s old and tired and worn out.
Though not particularly old, the 66-year-old singer-songwriter is one of the elder statesmen of contemporary folk music, having laid down a lot of songs, years and miles. These days though, he’s happy...
