Panera Bread Bakery Cafe to open in summer 2011

In January of this year we learned Target Corp. had struck deal to open a big store (expanding the existing 117,000-square-foot building to a 140,000-square-foot building) on 40th Street near the Emeryville border.

The actual location of the Target's new store (formerly a Home Expo site) is in the Oakland portion of the East Bay Bridge Shopping Center. About two thirds of the retail complex is in Emeryville, and one-third is in Oakland. The two cities share the revenue that the center generates.

Today we learn Fancher Development Services Inc., is attempting to build a 4,000-square-foot building to house a Panera Bread Bakery Cafe with a drive-thru, at the corner of 40th and Horton Streets currently Target’s parking lot for the East Bay Bridge Shopping Center.
 
The developer will go before Emeryville’s planning commission on Thursday night for a design review of the building, which could be up and running in summer 2011.

Once again, the two cities (Emeryville and Oakland) have an agreement under which Emeryville is responsible for the planning permits and Oakland is responsible for building permits for the site.

For those not familiar with Panera Bread, they are a quick service restaurant that is part cafe, part bakery and has close to 16 stores in the Bay Area including San Francisco, Fremont, San Rafael, Millbrae and Antioch. Once open, the restaurant will have 30 to 40 employees.

To see their menu, click here.

Source: San Francisco Business Times

Oakland: A Restaurant Destination

Oakland's restaurants find strength in numbers

A number of restaurants touted as cool and hip — and offering delectable fare — have sprouted lately in Oakland, especially downtown.

"This is part of the surprising evolution of the restaurant industry in Oakland," said Mark Everton, executive director of the association.

Roughly 20 to 25 restaurants have opened in Oakland during the last 18 months, estimated Everton, who is also general manager of the Hilton Garden Inn in Emeryville.

"You are seeing an influx of cutting-edge restaurants in downtown Oakland," Everton said.

Restaurants that have opened in Oakland in recent years include Bocanova, Brown Sugar Kitchen, Camino, Encuentro, Flora, Geisha, Miss Pearl's Jam House, Ozumo and Pican.

"Oakland has become a Mecca for restaurants," Joseph Haraburda, chief executive officer of the city's Chamber of Commerce, said this week during a lunch presentation before a business group.

"One of the keys to life is to have a great meal, a great family event, to have a quality dining experience," Everton said.

The new restaurants are drawing patrons from a broader area than just Oakland or the East Bay, said Michael LeBlanc, owner of Pican. As much as a quarter of Pican's patrons live in San Francisco, LeBlanc said, and many others live in Mill Valley, Orinda, Lafayette or Moraga.

"People come here to dine and they are surprised," LeBlanc said. "They ask 'This is Oakland?' It's starting to be a destination."

Other estimates suggest that 60 percent of the patrons for restaurants in downtown Oakland come from San Francisco or travel through the Caldecott Tunnel.

Similarly, the bumper crop of new restaurants are becoming one of the ingredients that provide space for Oakland's economy in a unique way.

"We are changing the perception that people have about Oakland," restaurant owner LeBlanc said.

Read more at the Contra Costa Times

 In Oakland, Innovation Is on the Menu

Jack London Square has been reborn. The area on Oakland’s inner harbor was developed in the ’70s, and the city had hoped that the waterfront space would have a quirky, independent appeal. But chain restaurants soon moved in, and both local residents and tourists largely stayed away.

However, changes are afoot. The chain restaurants are largely gone, after their leases were not renewed in an effort by developers to reinvent the square (a plan approved by the city). In came a cast of big-name chefs — as well as a new six-floor, 72,000-square-foot farmers’ market scheduled to open later this year.

In fact, the effort to refashion Jack London Square reflects a larger trend. Unlike San Francisco, its sister city across the bay, Oakland hasn’t been known for its innovative menus. But in the last few years, a number of noteworthy restaurants have opened, some led by chefs who have fled San Francisco’s high rents, and a few of whom put in time at the legendary Chez Panisse in neighboring Berkeley. Michelin raised the stakes when it awarded a star to an Oakland newcomer, Commis. But, as a recent survey of its Oakland brethren showed, Commis is not alone.

COMMIS

The talented chef James Syhabout, who has logged time in acclaimed international kitchens like the Fat Duck, outside London, and El Bulli, plays with textures and flavors in a masterly and deeply satisfying way.

Commis has the feel of an almost-secret experiment in progress. The name of the restaurant, which means “apprentice chef” in the parlance of French kitchens, is nowhere to be found on the floor-to-ceiling windowed facade. Inside, splitting a spare 30-seat dining room and surrounded by a counter and stools, is the open kitchen, where Mr. Syhabout and his sous chefs quietly go about their work.

Commis, http://www.commisrestaurant.com/

BOCANOVA

One of the first restaurants to land in the new Jack London Square last September, it is run by the chef Rick Hackett, one of those Chez Panisse alumni. Unlike MarketBar, Mr. Hackett’s Mediterranean restaurant in the recently revamped ferry building in San Francisco, Bocanova looks south. The menu, it turns out, was inspired by a family meal — the restaurant staff dinner shared before service — at MarketBar. A couple of staff members made dishes from their South American homelands; Mr. Hackett was impressed and Bocanova was born.

Bocanova, http://www.bocanova.com/

CAMINO

Another former Chez Panisse chef is also doing his part to reinvent Oakland as a dining destination. Russell Moore, who spent 21 years at the venerable Berkeley restaurant, was the produce buyer for much of his tenure.

Later, I asked Mr. Moore why he settled in Oakland, and he said he hadn’t intended to. “We were looking at spaces in San Francisco for three years and used three different Realtors but we found nothing,” he said. “So we just decided to have a look around Oakland and we stumbled upon this place.”

Camino, http://www.caminorestaurant.com/

ADESSO

Up the street from Commis is another new restaurant that has set local foodies’ taste buds ablaze. Adesso is a laid-back Italian wine bar that cures its own salumi. With a book-sized wine list that covers all 20 regions of Italy and a two-page list of 40-plus salumis, eight pâtés and six panini, the restaurant is an Italophile’s dream.

Adesso, http://www.dopoadesso.com/

BOOT AND SHOE SERVICE

The Bay Area has been going through something of a pizza revolution recently. And it arguably started when Charlie Hallowell — yet another chef to have spent time at Chez Panisse — opened Pizzaiolo in Oakland five years ago. Last December, Mr. Hallowell opened a spinoff, Boot and Shoe Service (the name is a holdover from the previous tenant).

Boot and Shoe Service, bootandshoeservice.com

Read more at the New York Times

Brown Sugar Kitchen sweetens West Oakland

By Dave Newhouse, Oakland Tribune columnist

Dan Levi enjoys Brown Sugar Kitchen so much that he drives 250 miles from San Luis Obispo to West Oakland to have breakfast there every other weekend.

Well, he doesn't drive straight through. He stops first in San Jose to pick up his lady friend, Amber Thames, so they can dine together at Brown Sugar Kitchen.

It's always breakfast, and Dan and Amber show up at 2534 Mandela Parkway by 10 a.m. on Sundays to beat the crowd. But one day, they must try lunch, because there is no finer breakfast-lunch diner in Oakland or the East Bay.

Amber discovered Brown Sugar Kitchen last May after seeing the diner profiled on television. She checked out Tanya Holland's creative cuisine immediately.

"It's extremely good food, and I'm a picky eater," Amber said Wednesday. "I love soul food, but she does it in a healthy way. I love the veggie egg scramble, with the best potatoes in the Bay Area — a real potato that's not full of grease.

"The biscuits are also amazing, and she has homemade jam, which is to die for."

West Oakland became a dining destination two years ago when Holland opened Brown Sugar Kitchen. Like Dan Levi, folks who appreciate quality food come from all over, and Los Angeles is farther away than San Luis Obispo.

"A prestigious food writer from Gourmet magazine wrote that it was worth coming 400 miles from Los Angeles for our waffles," said Phil Surkis, Holland's husband.

I've been sampling Holland's breakfasts and lunches for months. The cornmeal waffle with brown sugar butter and apple cider syrup is, indeed, amazing. My wife loves the poached eggs, and I prefer the egg and bacon sandwich on a wheat roll. The pulled pork sandwich and the smoked chicken & shrimp gumbo are lunchtime winners.

Holland, 44, is receiving rave reviews for a onetime engineering student at the University of Virginia. That's where the food light clicked on after she cooked for schoolmates who were existing on macaroni and cheese. Her parents had taught her as a child in Rochester, N.Y., how to cook in diversified ways.

"I always wanted to do something creative," she said Tuesday.

So she switched from engineering to advertising, and after graduation went to New York but continued looking for a future sign. After becoming office manager for a catering company, she realized her life's path.

Eventually, she ended up in France at a cooking school in Burgundy. She stayed 15 months, living off her Visa card and becoming versed on the "mother sauces," as evidenced by the thickener in her gumbo.

Back in the U.S., she trained at various restaurants, including Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill in New York City. And she landed one of the early cooking shows on the Food Network, which lasted 2½ years. Then, needing a new direction, she relocated to Oakland, where her parents, Annette and Hollis Holland, had met, and where Tanya wrote a cooking book.

When the Island Cafe became available, she bought the diner — after marrying Surkis the year before. They live in West Oakland. Surkis, 42, handles workers' compensation claims for UC Berkeley and assists his wife at the diner, even choosing its background music.

The biggest compliment from diners?

“‘These are the best waffles I've ever tasted,' " Holland said. "People also are amazed by the diversity of the crowd. They're like, 'The staff is great, the vibe is great.' "

Surkis said West Oaklanders have told him, “‘Thank you for being here.' It's community love."

Holland will expand her diner by 20 seats this spring with an outdoor eating area. And she's hoping to open a dinner-only bistro in Jack London Square by summer. Can't wait to taste her sweet-potato frites.

Dan and Amber will be by Brown Sugar Kitchen again today. Can't stay away.

Become a fan of Brown Sugar Kitchen (Facebook) http://www.facebook.com/brownsugarkitchen

Also this weekend on the Food Network, Guy's Diners, Drive-ins and Dives Tailgating California-Style which features Oakland.

Neighborhood Interactive Map

Looking for something to do?

Click on this Oakland neighborhood map!

And check out this Calendar of Events

Eat Real Festival August 28-30, 2009

...a mostly free celebration of sustainably produced street food,

coming to Jack London Square, August 28-30.

Time: Fri, 4PM - 9PM, Sat, 10 AM - 9PM, Sun, 10AM - 5PM

Eat Real shares similar local, sustainable values with the slow food movement, but it also focuses on accessibility and affordability.

Eat Real will mix restaurant-driven, trendy food carts like the crème brulée truck and sexy soup lady with the traditional taco trucks and barbeque outposts that have been feeding city workers for years.

A comparable number of farmers and food artisans from nine Bay Area counties will set up stalls inside the Jack London Market where they will sell and sample products. There will also be 40 Northern California microbreweries in the beer shed.

Oakland restaurants participating in the event include Camino, Pizzaiolo, Brown Sugar Kitchen, Miss Pearl’s Jam House and Radio Africa.

Several new Jack London Square businesses, including Bocanova restaurant and Miette Patisserie, will open in conjunction with the festival.

Attendees must pay for beer and food, but vendors agreed to keep their food offerings under $5, and an eight-beer tasting costs $20 in advance.

Proceeds from the event will benefit La Cocina, People’s Grocery and Buy Fresh, Buy Local, three nonprofits that support food entrepreneurs.

How do I get there? It's easy to get to the square by ferry, train, bus, car, bike, or BART—the Lake Merritt BART stop is only six blocks away.

SF Business Times sduxbury@bizjournals.com / (415) 288-4963

Best of the West (POPna Neighborhood)

The readers of the East Bay express acknowledges POPna neighborhood amentities:

BEST URBAN PARK

Middle Harbor Shoreline Park
Middle Harbor Rd. / 7th St., Oakland
510-272-4810

Name a place in the Bay Area where you can hear the lonely tolling of a harbor bell, watch a squadron of pelicans fly by, see San Francisco sparkling Oz-like in the distance, and listening to the crashing, clanging, and electronic chirping of ILWU workers zipping around on forklift trucks unloading container ships. Can't?

Try Middle Harbor Park. Located smack dab in the middle of Oakland's dockland, the park is a little oasis of Zen-like calm in the midst of the shuffle and hustle of one of the West Coast's busiest ports. The park is a thin strip of green along the water's edge, based on the outline of a huge Navy warehouse that once shipped out supplies to troops stationed all around the Pacific. It is now a restored marsh and wetlands.

The soaring picnic area shelters' jagged triangular shapes are a deliberate reminder of the warehouse's old shape. If you tire of gazing out across the Bay, watch huge container ships rumble by and marvel at the carefully choreographed ballet of containers flying on and off their decks. Cast your eyes closer, check out crab fishers on the end of a pier, or hang onto the fence, or just sit there on the dock of a bay legs, dangling over railway ties that once carried commuters onto the ferries to San Francisco.

This park is a must for urban explorers.

Other notable awards:

BEST OFT-TOLD EAST BAY URBAN LEGEND

The Oakland Cranes

BEST CHICKEN AND WAFFLES

Brown Sugar Kitchen

BEST BLOGGER (my personal favorite!)

V Smooth — A Better Oakland