Calicraft Rooftop Bar Opens Friday
Calicraft Brewing Co. is on track to unveil its new rooftop bar in downtown Walnut Creek this Friday. Calicraft Upstairs marks a departure for the hometown brewery, as rather than a sprawling beer garden, it is being billed as a neighborhood cocktail bar. Perched atop Va de Vi Bistro and Wine Bar overlooking Mt. Diablo Boulevard, Upstairs will offer, yes, 20 taps pouring Calicraft beers. But there will also be a signature cocktail program with a curated spirits list that includes house-made vodkas and gins concocted weekly in an onsite micro-still. Masterminded by brewmaster Thomas Vo, drinks will include a Japanese-influenced Tokyo Cosmo and a “Caprese” featuring Calicraft tomato and basil vodkas mixed with clarified tomato water and garnished with a caprese skewer (think a clear bloody Mary). The food program from culinary director Jeffrey Amber will consist of “fun small plates” that include roasted shishito peppers served with miso aioli; Foxy Nachos with kettle chips, salami, olives, peperoncini, fontina, aged balsamic, and Parmesan; and a variety of savory sourdough waffles, including a corn-dog waffle served with smoked cheddar, beer cheese, and mustard.
Calicraft, which started as a contract brewery before launching its taproom and beer garden in Shadelands in Walnut Creek in 2016, is in full-on expansion mode. In addition to acquiring Heretic and its Fairfield brewing, distilling, and taproom facilities last year, Calicraft recently debuted a massive new beer garden in Davis and is in the process of launching an expansive new Shadelands HQ, complete with sweeping covered outdoor seating and a two-story facility with a bar, restaurant, and barrel-aging room that’s set to debut in April. Meanwhile, the downtown Walnut Creek project hints at Calicraft’s ambitions to be more than just a local brewery, but a bigger player in the Walnut Creek (and beyond) drinking and dining scene, says founder Blaine Landberg.
“I think this is the transformative project that starts to express our original vision for Calicraft,” he says. “What I hope the vibe is and that people take away from it is that our brand is about inclusion, creativity, and pushing things forward: This is our big leap beyond just craft beer. … And this location specifically plants our Calicraft flag in the middle of Walnut Creek. Being right in the center of downtown has such meaning for us, not just as a brand but [for] what we want to bring to the community at large.”
The French Spot Debuts in Walnut Creek/Concord
A couple weeks after it looked like its debut would be delayed to next year, artisan bakery and pastry shop the French Spot unexpectedly launched its first East Bay location over the weekend. Husband-wife team Vincent Attali and Maria Zapata have run their acclaimed flagship in San Francisco for several years but have wanted to expand to central Contra Costa County where they live and raise kids. Their second shop is located in Oak Grove Plaza near Trader Joe’s on the Concord-Walnut Creek border, and will offer the pair’s pastries, pies, cakes, sandwiches, and popular lineup of croissants that includes plain, ham and cheese, and ube mochi–filled Ube Mochicro varieties. The Concord location will also have more of a focus on fresh-baked breads—including baguettes, sourdoughs, and country loaves—as well as an expanded lineup of pies and custom cakes by Zapata. When we spoke earlier this year, Attali—who has worked at Las Vegas’s three-Michelin-starred Joël Robuchon and New York’s two-Michelin-starred Daniel, among other high-end restaurants and pastry shops—told us that unlike many bakeries and coffee shops, the French Spot will bake throughout the day to ensure a fresh product whenever you come in.
“You’ll be getting a croissant from an hour or so ago; we stagger our bread, so you’ll get a nice fresh loaf of bread,” he says. “All those sweet, buttery smells of a bakery—that’s all happening when you walk in there.”
Soft opening hours this week will be Thursday and Friday (8 a.m.-2 p.m.), and Saturday and Sunday (8:30 a.m.-2 p.m.). Also look out for the French Spot’s upcoming Christmas preorder menu, which will include a homemade bûche de Noël yule log.
Local Vines Opens Wednesday Highlighting Local Lamorinda Wines
It’s been a long time coming, but Local Vines debuts in Lafayette this Wednesday, fulfilling the vision of local winegrowers for a venue that highlights fruit from the Lamorinda American Viticulture wine-growing area. The tasting room, located on Mt. Diablo Boulevard near the Headlands Brewing taproom, primarily pours wines and ciders from local Lamorinda producers, of which there are a surprising number, including Crane Terrace Winery, Deer Hill Vineyards, Los Arabis Vineyards, Meadow View Winery, Mount Diablo Cider Company, Raisin d’Être Vineyards, Rancho Del Hambre Vineyard, Reliez Valley Vineyards, Stag Hill Vineyards, and Thal Vineyards. It was the owners of the latter, Larry and Esther Thal, who spearheaded the project and started work on transforming the former NAPA Auto Parts site into Local Vines more than six years ago.
The couple, who started growing grapes 30 years ago “purely accidentally” as a way to mitigate erosion on their Lafayette hills property, are emblematic of the area’s kind of homegrown, backyard winemakers organized through the Lamorinda Wine Growers Association. The tasting room, says Larry Thal, is a way to platform these wineries, whose smaller production size and inventory makes it more difficult to find placement in restaurants and grocery stores. In addition, Local Vines offers a complete 2,500-square-foot winemaking facility in the basement, with two dedicated veteran winemakers in residence, to help make the leap from quality grapes to quality wine. The hope, Thal adds, is that the venue will help facilitate more of the 100-plus grape growers in the region to become bonded wineries, thus further increasing the profile of a fledgling Lamorinda AVA with acres of potential.
“Our weather is very similar to Napa and conducive to producing consistently good wine,” says Thal. “One of my personal favorites up in Napa is Hall vineyards. We would aspire to make wines as good or better than they do at significantly less cost. We’ll never produce the quantity that they do, but that’s the high standard that we want to achieve.”
For food, Local Vines will offer standard light wine-tasting fare such as charcuterie to start. However, one half of the venue will soon be occupied by Germinate Kitchen, a commercial shared kitchen set to open in the first quarter of next year. Once it arrives, the kitchen—separated by a glass wall and run by two experienced restaurant industry vets—will be able to provide additional food for the tasting room as well as afford opportunities for private events, classes, and one-off food and wine experiences. Local Vines will be open from 2 p.m. to 7 p.m., Wednesday through Sunday, with expanded hours and an official grand opening likely in the new year.
Small Bites from Around East Bay
The San Francisco Chronicle goes in-depth on Cafe Ohlone’s new café project inside UC Berkeley’s Lawrence Hall of Science. ‘Ammatka Cafe will offer dishes such as “rose hip jam sandwich with smoked duck and Mt. Tam Triple Cream cheese; a sundried tomato wrap with pesto made from watercress grown at the university’s indigenous community learning garden; and a brownie made from pattih, or chia, flour.”
A look inside Berkeley wine pioneer Kermit Lynch’s first new wine shop in 53 years in Larkspur’s Marin Country Mart.
Standard Fare is shuttering later this month; however, it will be replaced in west Berkeley this spring with Bolita, a Mexican pop-up known for its artisan masa made with heirloom nixtamalized corn.
Two new Asian eateries are coming to Pleasanton’s Stoneridge Shopping Center: Maruwu Seicha, a modern Japanese matcha café known for its matcha soft-serve ice cream and gelato, and Korean street food specialist Master Shin.
Berkeley’s Latin-inspired chocolatier Casa de Chocolates is expanding to Park Boulevard in Oakland, while Jungdon Katsu—whose Danville location was shuttered following a fire in October—just debuted a new brick-and-mortar restaurant in Emeryville.
Shemroon Cafe, a Persian café with Turkish coffee, Persian tea, and Middle Eastern sweets, opened in Orinda Theatre Square.