Weekend 2: Napa Valley's Best Baked Goods

Our trip to Napa was largely motivated by a visit to Bouchon Bakery, a well-known bakery for which I now own the cookbook! (Thanks, David!) We were super excited and definitely went a bit overboard ordering everything! 

But first things, first. We started with the sticky bun and the butter croissant.

David really enjoyed the sticky bun - I'm not much of a sticky foods person, but I did try a bite and thought it was very well executed. The croissant in my opinion was not quite up to my expectations. It was very good, but it didn't have the buttery, flaky texture I look for in croissants (unlike Emily's Bakery from last week in Santa Cruz)

Next we tried the fruit tart,

the eclair,

(Look at that chocolate!!!) 

and the macaron.

The fruit tart was awesome. I had tried to make one out of the recipe book myself just a few weeks earlier, but couldn't quite get as much of the almond-y flavor in the pastry cream. The eclair was perfect for a chocolate fanatic, and the macaron was probably great for macaron lovers, but as it turns out, we just aren't that into them. 

Lastly, we tried the chocolate chunk cookie which is about as big as my face.

Lastly, we grabbed a loaf of olive bread to take with us on our hike. 

The scenery and bread were both awesome!

For dinner we went to a small Italian place in St. Helena called Cook. We started with some grilled octopus on a bed of fingerling potatoes and topped with grapefruit and onions with some vanilla bean aioli.

For our main dishes we had gnocchi in basil pesto with maitake mushrooms and trout on a bed of string beans and cherry tomatos in a vinegar-y sauce. 

Since all the food was so good up until then, we had to try the panna cotta for dessert. 

Overall, we loved Cook. While there are many other awesome places to try in Napa Valley, we definitely hope to return here someday. 

In two weekends, read about our adventures in Point Reyes!

Weekend 1: Santa Cruz's Best Hot Chocolate

Our first weekend adventure was filled with hiking, kayaking, beaching, and of course, eating. We woke up early saturday morning for a pre-hike breakfast at Emily's Bakery. We wanted to try everything, so we ordered enough food to hold us over until dinner.

A chocolate croissant, a spinach and cheese croissant, a carrot muffin, and a piece of cherry pie.

My favorite was the chocolate croissant. Look at these insides! 

We were nice and full for our hike along the coast. 

After some hiking and beaching, we decided to go to dinner at the hip new place in downtown called Assembly (thanks to a recommendation from the Kopito's). The place was into the local food and community style meals in typical Santa Cruz fashion. We started out with some padron peppers with heirloom tomatoes, avocado, and red onion. While we really like each individual piece, the overall flavors didn't necessarily complement one another. For our main dishes, I had the salmon while David tried the pork belly. 

Both were delicious but slightly overpowering in their flavors. We decided to skip desert and go get hot chocolate at my favorite place, Chocolate, just down the street. 

Overall, we liked Assembly, but gave it a "recommend to a friend" rating, as it was a fun experience, but not necessarily somewhere we would return.

At Chocolate, we chose two of the seven different hot chocolate choices. I had the Victoria, a bittersweet Venezuelan hot chocolate, while David tried the Belga, a hazelnut hot chocolate. 

Yumm!!

Next up, Napa Valley!