Hello Friends,
Is protein a hot topic in your world? As with many things in life, my protein awareness changed slowly and then all at once. For years, I followed the maxim of eating roughly a third of my daily calories from protein, penciling out to about 30-40 grams/day in a mix of veggie and meaty sources. Ten years ago – more? – I watched protein, especially whey, penetrate the sports and fitness industries. Last year, I noticed a major uptick in consumer packaged goods companies adding protein to literally everything. (Read my review.)
in recent months, my doctor told me it was time for me to up my protein intake to support bone and muscle health. I needed to increase from 30-40 grams/day to 100 grams/day. What!?!? That’s nuts, right? That’s six chicken breasts a day, as a friend told me. It seemed overwhelming. (Nerd out on what’s driving the “more protein” trend.) I have since started on the 100 grams a day path. I text friends pictures of protein powders and collagen powders. They tell me their GLP-1 successes and failures. (I am not on GLPs but it feels like everyone else is.)
Some days, it is easy to achieve the 100 grams. Those days tend to be workout days or days when I cook dinner for the family. Other days, it’s more challenging. I’ve had to rethink snacking, from foods with protein and fats, to foods with mostly protein and fiber. Fiber is the piece that is hardest to fill when eating that much protein. Unless you eat legumes which have enough protein and fiber to satisfy the fussiest nutritionist. Ha. (Please send suggestions, if you have them, of what’s worked for you.) My search for plant-based protein and fiber led me to this month’s podcast interview, Matt Levey of Defender Bar. (More on that, below.) I don’t need reminding of the deleterious effects of consuming double (triple!) the amount of animal protein and am very much looking for non-animal protein sources to fill my daily bucket.
Hitting 100 grams feels like a heavy lift. Why? I’ve always optimized eating. I work as a food writer. I can’t eat cow dairy or gluten. Bird eggs and I have an iffy relationship. I’ve modified and re-modified what I eat as I’ve aged. As my gut health has changed. As I’ve gotten married and had children. But this challenge, to stuff functional protein into my daily eating, is pushing me in a different direction. I’m not sure yet where I’ll end up or if this change will prove beneficial.
I just want to make sure that I don’t forget that food can be fun. Celebratory. Enjoyment. When eating becomes purely functional, that joy can be lost. I’m willing to try. For now, at least.
What’s Hot:
These are just a few of the food and food-adjacent events that have caught my attention in April.
Chef Gustavo Rios of Solage’s Head Tilt Tasting
Turntable Returns to Wolfsbane (April 14-18)
$312 per person
Make a Reservation for Turntable Featuring Julio Martin Baez
Head Tilt Tasting at Picobar (April 14, 21, 28….)
Mexican cuisine, served as an eight-course, omakase-inspired experience, has proved so popular over the years that Chef Gustavo Rios at Calistoga’s Solage hotel is bringing it back for a third run. Held only on Tuesdays through the summer months, and limited to just 12 guests, the omakase begins with poolside canapés and a glass of bubbles, before transitioning to the hotel’s Picobar.
Highlights include:
- tuna and caviar flautas
- huitlacoche quesadillas with truffles
- mushrooms al pastor
- squid ink tacos
- uni and crab tostadas
Notes from the Underground: Mushrooms (April 15)
Mushroom nerd alert! A veritable feast of mushroom-focused food and futurism, courtesy of forager extraordinaire Maria Finn, is a one-night only happening at Heron Arts in San Francisco’s SoMa neighborhood. I’m told that the evening will utilize every one of your five senses to explore the emerging science of mushrooms. A sensory “foraging for fungus” experience, kind of like a progressive dinner, the organizers tell me.
Begin the evening gazing upon the works of artists Britt Henze and Joshua Rampage while enjoying Grilled Shio Koji-cured King Trumpet Mushroom and Artichoke Skewers (GF, VG) featuring native white truffles found in Marin County, and Pão de Queijo with Oregon white truffle butter (GF, VG). Continue by listening to “mushroom music” from Scott Kildall of while dining on a main course of KM Mushrooms & Stinging Nettle-Miso Risotto (GF, VG) and wild/local seasonal salad.
A dessert of Candy Cap Cookies, Oregon Black Truffle Panna Cotta and fresh fruit is paired with a discussion from special guests: Dr. Jessica Snyder from NASA Ames Research Center is a bioprinting pioneer studying how fungi could help produce medicines, recycle waste, and support closed ecological systems for human life beyond Earth. And Dr. Lynn Rothschild is a NASA Ames Astrobiology & Synthetic Biology leader in developing fungal biocomposites; i.e., living building materials that could allow astronauts to grow habitats on the moon and Mars.
$75 includes dinner and one drink. Additional beverages available.
Make a Reservation for Notes from the Underground: Mushrooms
Feria de Abril at Macarena (April 21-26)
The beloved Andalusian spring festival of food, music, and community arrives in Palo Alto and also marks the Spanish restaurant’s 1-Year Anniversary.
For the Feria, a limited-time menu of specials will highlight classic regional flavors:
- Salmorejo Cordobés ($14) – Chilled tomato and garlic soup topped with egg and Ibérico ham
- Calamares Fritos ($20) – Crispy Monterey squid served with aioli
- Tocinillo de Cielo ($16) – Caramel custard bites paired with orange sablé
Pair these dishes or anything on the menu at lunch or dinner with:
- Rebujito ($16) – A spring-like blend of fino wine and lemon soda
Make a Reservation for Feria de Abril at Macarena
Where to Read My Work
Yes, my website and newsletter rebrand are still rolling. The glitches are mostly worked out now – yay! – but there is always more to do. Ping me, please, if anything still looks weird to you.
In other writings:
If life gives you lemons, and also gives you grapes, plums, celery root, tomatoes and 80 other edible crops, what do you do? If you are Amon and Jenna Muller, members of the second generation of the farming family behind the Capay Valley–based Full Belly Farm, you make do. And by making and doing, a cookbook is the natural outcome. The Full Belly Farm & Kitchen: Recipes and Stories from a Family Farm shares Muller Family recipes derived from four seasons worth of working the land, farm harvests and gatherings.
I know you know how many times I had to spell-check “Muller.” Gah! It just does not write easy without the “e!” No matter, the cookbook a great find for anyone who likes to cook with the seasons. Read my full review on the Edible Marin & Wine Country website.
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I received the nicest note from the Marin-based restaurant after I penned “Is There a Secret Sauce to Restaurant Picco’s Success? Here’s to 20 Years of Tuna Tartare and 96-Hour Pizza” for Marin Magazine in partnership with The Marin Dish. Decide for yourselves if it is the “best written copy I have ever read…it’s epic, just like Picco.” My writer’s beating heart is going pitter-pat, pitter-pat!
Aaaaand, more next month!
Added bonus? My listeners can enter code EATDRINK15 at https://defenderbar.com/ or on Amazon to get 15% off orders of any size. You don’t even have to listen to the podcast to receive the discount. But please do. (Please!)
Where to Eat: 7 Places to Eat Now
Opera Cake with almond chiffon and espresso syrup at Little Saint in Healdsburg
Now that my new website is launched and most (but not all) of the glitches sorted, I’m putting my restaurant coverage – Where to Eat and Best Bites – there.
For April, I consider Gwyneth Paltrow’s takeout-only concept, GOOP Kitchen, Michelin-recommended TIYA, and Chef Tu David Phu’s wine bar-slash-restaurant Gigi’s in San Francisco. I had fun eating in the Wine Country town of Healdsburg, including at Spoonbar, Little Saint, and Bistro Lagniappe. And, also in Wine Country, I dig in on what to eat at Bottega.
Read my April Where to Eat column on my website. Read 2025’s Best Bites.
What I’m Reading
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s 2006 book is not explicitly about food. It is, in fact, about the Nigerian Civil War of the 1960’s and ’70’s, fraught with layers of difficulty found in any book about war (insert list of atrocities here) and the individual human struggles and deprivations that inevitably result.
I found the descriptions of what the characters ate to be evocative. Perhaps because of my limited knowledge of the cuisines of Nigeria – I reviewed
Chop Chop: Cooking the Food of Nigeria in my 2025 Cookbook Guide and AfriCali in 2024’s Cookbook Guide – I wondered about the flavors of pepper soup and garri, so often cited in meals taken by the characters. How spicy was the soup? Did it pair with the garri, which seems to be so bland?
While reading, I often found myself thinking about my parents’ experience during and after World War Two – of their incessant hunger, of the rationing of goods, of the health problems that resulted from insufficient nutrient intake. This book captures the joy and the sadness of the experience of eating. How easily the simple act of breaking bread can be transformed into something else. It was a reminder of how plush my food writer life really is. And a reminder that food writing can take many different forms. Read more and find the book on goodreads.
About That Image
I chose the Pescatarian tasting menu at a recent dinner at San Francisco’s TIYA, Of the nine dishes that crossed my palate, my dish of the night was the Barramundi Kizhi. Soft/tender yet firm when I pushed down with a fork, the texture was incredible. Green mango in the Alleppey curry was downright thrilling and delicious. What I know about the flavors of the Indian subcontinent would fit into my little finger but after this thrilling meal, I hope to learn more about the chefs and brothers Sarkar and their culinary gifts. What a night!
Thanks for reading and be in touch.
Christina