Monarch Butterflies in Monterey Bay

During the colder dreary months of winter, you may be inclined to think you should escape to sunny beaches in Florida or Hawaii or Mexico for your vacation. But, I would argue that this is the time to head to California, particularly Monterey Bay. Besides the famous Monterey Bay Aquarium, these months are also the best time for viewing the Monarch Butterflies in Monterey Bay. November to February is the monarch butterfly migration season as they migrate from places that freeze and rest in coastal groves. It’s a very unique experience along Central Coast California as they migrate between Canada to Mexico.
Monarch Butterflies in Monterey Bay Monarch Butterflies in Monterey Bay

Pacific Grove is one of the locations that have the perfect conditions for the monarch butterflies to rest on their migration path: you can see other locations here along Highway 1 between the Bay Area and Los Angeles. These groves offer the balance of not too cold, but also not too hot, protection from wind and moisture from fog. Of the locations, the Pacific Grove one stands out to me as a do-able day trip from the Bay Area (1.5 hours from San Jose for instance), and has the bonus of the Monterey Bay Aquarium also nearby, or visit on your way to Paso Robles and visit Sensorio in the evening and/or stop in wine country, etc. so you can easily plan multiple diverse activities on your itinerary.

You can track the latest monarch butterfly counts at the Pacific Grove website or on their Instagram. the numbers were depressingly low the past few years, dropping from the millions into the thousands. The numbers are starting to rebound as people (including you!) can follow the call to action to help preserve them – they still desperately need your help. Until they recover, you may need to temper your expectations of how many butterflies you may see – thus checking the counts before your trip. During my trip, the count was around 15-16,000 during the first weekend of December.
Monarch Butterflies in Monterey Bay Monarch Butterflies in Monterey Bay

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Travel Tuesday: Visiting The Barlow in Sebastopol

Continuing from my last post where I was on a tour with the Artisan Cheese Festival in California, after a cheese seminar with a blind tasting and visiting Bohemian Creamery, we headed over to The Barlow.  It is a walkable area in downtown Sebastopol that is composed of more then 30 tasting rooms, restaurants, and stores all by local makers in several industrial buildings that used to be the Barlow apple production facility, now re-purposed. We would have our last 3 stops out of the 5 on the tour here while visiting the Barlow in Sebastopol – a lunch showcasing cheese, visiting another cheesemaker, and tasting at a distillery.

lunch with zazu kitchen + farm. Bohemian Creamery's bodacious cheese with a red wine pear, paired with Bucher Pinot Noir RRV 2014, part of the Artisan Cheese Festival tour visiting the Barlow in Sebastopol Wm. Cofield Cheesemakers, part of the Artisan Cheese Festival tour visiting the Barlow in Sebastopol downtown in the North Bay area, California. We had an opportunity in our cheese tour to enter the cheesemaking room and the aging room
Wm. Cofield Cheesemakers, part of the Artisan Cheese Festival tour visiting the Barlow in Sebastopol downtown in the North Bay area, California
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Travel Tuesday: Artisan Cheese Festival Tour

As some of you may have seen in my Instagram and which I posted briefly about here on the blog, I went to visit one of my sisters who lives in the San Rafael/Bay Area recently. The specific event we had in mind to enjoy together was the California Artisan Cheese Festival, now in its 12th year, that celebrates California cheese with tours, seminars, tasting events, and a cheese market. Here’s a look at my review and recap of my experiences, divided among several posts. First I’ll start with my favorite activity during the festival, the Artisan Cheese Festival Tour.

I took off an extra day, Friday March 22, to enjoy the first full day of this 3 day, weekend cheese festival. The first day was devoted mostly to artisan tours to cheesemakers and local artisans via a bus with a group of 25-30 people. The tour I selected was called “Sensory Sebastopol”, which is basically the area 30 minutes away from Petaluma that our tour stops were concentrated on. The tour included a cheese seminar, a visit to 2 cheesemakers, a cheese lunch, and a visit with a distillery. I will cover the cheese seminar and the first cheesemaker, Bohemian Creamery, in this post.
Artisan Cheese Festival tour 2018, a visit with owner Lisa Gottreich of Bohemian Creamery showing us and telling us the story behind the scenes of an artisan cheesemaker. Here are some of the Bohemian Creamery cheeses. In the front, you see a bloomy rind cheese, the triangle soft cheese is a washed rind, and that in the back the harder aged cheeses of different aging periods are examples of natural rind cheeses. Artisan Cheese Festival tour 2018, a visit with owner Lisa Gottreich of Bohemian Creamery showing us and telling us the story behind the scenes of an artisan cheesemaker. We were able to also visit the 3 aging rooms as you see here.
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Travel Tuesday: Museum of Ice Cream in San Francisco

If you have seen my Instagram posts, you know I’m still a little giddy from my visit to the Museum of Ice Cream in San Francisco with my mom (who normally lives in in hometown of Chicago) and my sister who lives in San Rafael. Both my sisters and my mom had also visited the Museum of Ice Cream in Los Angeles, but I hadn’t been able to join in, so I was happy to hear that they were opening up a second location of this pop up museum in San Fran.
Museum of Ice Cream in San Francisco
Museum of Ice Cream in San Francisco, cotton candy
The tickets sold out in a flash but I was super lucky in not only getting into the website but getting the perfect weekend when my mom would be in town and one of a few weekends my sister didn’t already have booked until 2018 (seriously, her schedule…). And, we got tickets for the first entrance at 11 AM (they are timed tickets) which incredibly let our group of the first 12 ticket holders in line be the first into every room and almost felt like a private visit since other groups didn’t catch up to us.
Museum of Ice Cream in San Franciso

If you haven’t heard of the Museum of Ice Cream (or MOIC) before, it started out its initial incarnation in New York, and then closed and opened up in Los Angeles. While the Los Angeles run is still going on in LA after several extensions, a second location in San Francisco also opened, and is the newest incarnation. Each location is a little different, though the theme always includes lots of samples of ice creams and a sprinkle pool. When it comes to each individual room themes and how they are set up and what sweet artwork they feature though, they may vary.
Museum of Ice Cream in San Francisco Museum of Ice Cream in San Francisco

Here’s a look at the rooms in the San Francisco version. Be aware that if you come, you must already have purchased tickets ahead of time (none are available at the door). There is only one restroom area and it’s in the middle of the museum, and when you go through the museums you can only go forward, not back to any rooms you have previously left.
Museum of Ice Cream in San Francisco

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Visiting Gekkeikan Sake

Last week I highlighted in Folsom checking out the Folsom Prison Museum. This time I’m highlighting another local sight – and it’s free! This stop is to do a self-guided tour of the sake brewery and enjoy free limited sampling of the sake at Gekkeikan Sake. Located at 1136 Sibley Street in Folsom, they are open 9 AM – 4:30 PM Monday through Friday and 11 AM – 3 PM on the second Saturday of the month. A visit will probably take about an hour or less.
Gekkeikan Sake USA was founded in Folsom in 1989, its first brewing facility outside of Japan and you can do a free self guided tour of the brewery and try sake samples here. This is located at 1136 Sibley Street in Folsom

Gekkeikan was founded in 1637 in Japan, though the name Gekkeikan was not established until 1905. Gekkeikan USA was founded in Folsom in 1989, its first brewing facility outside of Japan. Folsom was selected because of its access to quality air and water from the American River and rice from the rice fields in the Central Valley and nearby Sacramento Valley.

To do the self guided brewery tour, you will have to walk through the first building because the door to the brewery is in the second building in the back. You will turn around to retrace your steps and walk back this way to visit the sake tasting room on the way out back to the parking lot. Restrooms are also located only in this first building. In this hallway, you can get a quick overview of the brewing process – both the traditional way in a display case with figures and on the wall a summary of the high level manufacturing process.
Figures showing the multiple steps in the process of brewing sake, in a display case when visiting Gekkeikan USA in Folsom Figures showing the multiple steps in the process of brewing sake, in a display case when visiting Gekkeikan USA in Folsom Gekkeikan SakeUSA was founded in Folsom in 1989, its first brewing facility outside of Japan and you can do a free self guided tour of the brewery and try sake samples here. This is located at 1136 Sibley Street in Folsom

Between the two buildings outside, you can enjoy some of the atmosphere of the landscaping with reflecting pond and koi pond before entering the brewery building.
A look at the peaceful setting at Gekkeikan Sake USA in Folsom with the landscape and koi pond A look at the peaceful setting at Gekkeikan Sake USA in Folsom with the landscape and koi pond A look at the peaceful setting at Gekkeikan Sake USA in Folsom with the landscape and koi pond

The self guided tour of the brewery is essentially just one long hallway, with windows and signs next to them looking into different parts of their equipment and process sequentially, from first starting with the uncooked rice all the way down to the bottling and packing for shipment. Here are a few photos from that tour.
Hallway for the free self guided tour with windows and signs next to them looking into different parts of their equipment and process sequentially, from first starting with the uncooked rice all the way down to the bottling and packing for shipment at the Gekkkeikan Sake Brewery in Folsom While self touring the brewery facility at Gekkeikan, you learn about the koji making process. Part of the steamed rice is used to make koji by cooling the steamed rice to 80 degrees, then spreading aspergillus oryzae which is fed into a state of the art computer controlled koji making machine to adjust temperature and humidity to optimal conditions. Within 2 days, the koji will be produced. In order to make sake, two highly effective micro-organisms are utilized- aspergillus oryzae and yeast. The former is used to produce a saccharifying enzyme which converts rice starch to dextrose.

There are certainly a lot of similarities to beer brewing. Like beer, sake is fermented multiple times (for instance, wine is fermented only once) to convert sugar to alcohol. Both are grain based (rice for sake obviously vs barley and other grains like rye, etc. for beer) and yeast is needed to convert dextrose into alcohol. However, to get dextrose, for sake brewing koji is used to produce a saccharifying enzyme which converts rice starch to dextrose.
Free self tour of the sake brewing process at Gekkeikan Sake in Folsom - this portion is the seed mash process, where a large quantity of yeast is needed to convert dextrose into alcohol. Seed mash is made by adding water, steamed rice, and koji to a small amount of yeast Free self tour of the sake brewing process at Gekkeikan Sake in Folsom - this portion is the lab where they are testing and doing quality control

I was mesmerized by the bottling – lining up and riding along to where they get filled, capped, and then labeled to then be put in boxes.
Bottling process for the sake that can be seen during the free self guided brewery tour at Gekkkeikan Sake in Folsom, California Bottling process for the sake that can be seen during the free self guided brewery tour at Gekkkeikan Sake in Folsom, California Bottling process for the sake that can be seen during the free self guided brewery tour at Gekkkeikan Sake in Folsom, California Bottling process for the sake that can be seen during the free self guided brewery tour at Gekkkeikan Sake in Folsom, California

This short video is the first part of the line with the empty bottles in the front but in the back you can see the line loops back around in a U and the sake workers are preparing to package them

Here’s a video where I zoom in a bit and you can see the empty bottles lining up then being filled with sake, and then as it goes into the second circle it gets capped!

Then return to the tasting room where you can see choose 5 of their sake portfolio to sample and look at other Japanese decor.
After the free self tour of the sake brewing process at Gekkeikan Sake in Folsom return to the tasting room where you can see choose 5 of their sake portfolio to sample and look at other Japanese decor. After the free self tour of the sake brewing process at Gekkeikan Sake in Folsom return to the tasting room where you can see choose 5 of their sake portfolio to sample and look at other Japanese decor. After the free self tour of the sake brewing process at Gekkeikan Sake in Folsom return to the tasting room where you can see choose 5 of their sake portfolio to sample and look at other Japanese decor. After the free self tour of the sake brewing process at Gekkeikan Sake in Folsom return to the tasting room where you can see choose 5 of their sake portfolio to sample and look at other Japanese decor. Tasting room at Gekkeikan Sake USA in Folsom. Kagami-biraki is a ceremony performed at celebratory events in which the lid of the sake barrel is broken open by a wooden mallet and the sake is served to everyone present. Kagami refers to the lid of the sake barrel and biraki means to open. Because of the round shape, the kagami is a symbol of harmony and kagami-biraki represents an opening to harmony and good fortune

Gekkkeikan Sake is one of I think a dozen US locations of sake brewing in the US. If you are a fellow Oregon citizen like me right now, you can also tour and taste at Sake One in Forest Grove, but otherwise you might be able to visit a couple others in California. Not all sake breweries are open for tours or tastings. For another way to try tasting a lot of sakes, I also want to encourage you to look into Sake Fest PDX– I wrote a post about last year’s Sake Fest earlier this year, and expect another post next year about how the 2016 Sake Fest experience was a bit closer to its date for 2017, June 11, 2017 5:30-9 PM at the Oregon Convention Center!

Finally, one of my favorite things I learned while sampling sake is that their website has a free Gekkkeikan sake cookbook with recipes! During Thanksgiving a Japanese guest brought rice cooked with sake and mushrooms and we loved it, and I can’t wait to do a little more cooking with sake soon.

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