The Best Dishes Our Food Critic Ate in July

I’ve been waiting for this. July is the month when our markets fill with local produce that’s digested the summer’s glut of photons into sugar, concentrating all of that energy into fruit that just about explodes as you eat it. (That is always preferable to food that explodes after you eat it. Many such cases now, unfortunately.) 

Accordingly, I’ve spent the past few weeks in Fruit Mode: laying jelly-like slices of salted tomatoes on toast, carefully rotating pluots and peaches to ripen on my kitchen counter, sharpening my paring knives so that they cut past the skin without bruising flesh. The sweetness I receive in return is perhaps all the more rewarding because it requires a hunter’s patience.

In this time of plenitude, these were my favorite dishes and snacks from around the Bay Area.

Calabacitas tostada by Manitas

On the third Monday of each month, Rockridge pasta restaurant Sfizio cedes the kitchen to Manitas, a Mexican-Californian pop-up. On the most recent occasion, the calabacitas tostada was the belle of the quinceañera. Built like a tier of mille-feuille, the crisp tostada base held plush squash and basil puree, juicy kernels of corn, sungold tomatoes, and a bright feather boa-like drape of cilantro salsa verde. Great technique; perfect ingredients; simple prep. Very California cuisine. Manitas is the life-affirming brainchild of chefs Nayelí Ramirez-perez and Claudia Bistrain, whose friendship blossomed in the kitchen of Berkeley’s dearly departed Standard Fare. In an interview with the Cold Summers zine, the duo calls the pop-up their “taste of culinary freedom” and a union of Californian seasonal produce with Mexican culinary traditions. 

Manitas. Check Instagram for events. 

Jerk fried chicken by the Pleasure Principle

Every week, Temescal wine shop Oakland Yard hosts a food pop-up behind the bar or out on the sidewalk. This week, I was fortunate to catch the Southern-Caribbean menu by Christina Alexis of the Pleasure Principle. (You might remember her from the piece I wrote a while back about the Black Radio Experience in Napa.) While frying jerk chicken might feel like sacrilege to some, the centerpiece of the menu was indeed fried jerk chicken ($34 for four pieces). She doused organic birds in aged jerk rub, more jerk spices, and yogurt, adding up to a dish that radiated that all-encompassing allspice energy. As I ate, hefty flakes of jerk-infused coating fell off the bird, but none escaped my grasp. It wasn’t as smoky as a grilled jerk chicken, but the novel presentation made a great pairing with Alexis’ cherry tomato chutney and the glass of Crémant I grabbed from the bar.

The Pleasure Principle. Check Instagram for events.

Marshmallow crispy cookie from Costco

OK, hang with me on this one. Soon after my sister went bonkers for this cookie (~$10 for 24) in our family groupchat, I ran into it at a backyard barbecue at a friend’s place. And I guess it’s seasonal? They just brought it back to stores this month? Unlike the horrific, TikTok-oriented sculpture cookies of makers like Crumbl, these combine texture maximalism with the Millennial urge to just have a mostly normal-looking cookie. The cookies combine a base of brown butter dough with pits of gooey marshmallow and craggy bits of puffed rice cereal, which is the perfect recipe for getting shit all up in your teeth. It’s worth the trouble. (Also you should be flossing anyway.)

Corn and cherry tomato pizza at Arizmendi Bakery and Pizzeria

The time of Arizmendi’s great cornification came and went last week. I hope you had a chance to grab some. On Friday, I plucked a corn, cheddar, and cherry tomato light bake pie from the bakery’s fridge, along with ramekins of chopped parsley and ranch dressing to finish. The combination is very Midwestern state fair cheese bread: a walking-around dish that you and your cousins might nosh on as you browse the seed art galleries. 

Arizmendi Bakery & Pizzeria. 4301 San Pablo Ave., Emeryville. Open Wednesday through Sunday, 7am–7pm.

Trini triples from SF Doubles Shop

Here's a reward for those who've chosen to read 'til the end: Very soon, Oaklanders will be able to grab some of the best Trini doubles in the Bay Area on the regular! SF Doubles Shop, the pop-up that really impressed me back when they served doubles in Dolores Park, has just joined Café Vary, the small food business guild that also hosts Town Biscuits and Fungi Foods at its location in Uptown Oakland. Founder Khadine Singh tells me that the pop-up will be appearing at the space once a month for now. At the soft opening, I stopped by for a taste of the doubles — which, in my case, turned into triples because the bara turned out a little on the smaller side. (They're still working out the kinks.) I cradled the triples like I was holding the world's biggest, briniest oyster, careful not to lose a drop of channa. You'll catch me here every month doing the exact same thing each time.

SF Doubles Shop at Café Vary. 434 25th St, Oakland. Popping up once a month; check Instagram for dates.