Happy Birthday, Café Chez Panisse!

Berkeley, April 2, 2012—

THIRTY-TWO YEARS is a long time for an upstairs restaurant to survive, I suppose; and while I'm clearly biased I have to say this particular restaurant seems to me to have flourished, not merely survived. I think it keeps getting better; and I say this having dined here several times in every one of those years, and thirty-two times or more in other restaurants in the last month.

My toast lacked crab, of course; I don't eat crustaceans. Instead it was covered with a soft, focussed fava-and-leek confit, and I was happy. The salad was a perfectly calculated homage to the baked-goat-cheese that's become a signature dish in the Café, a dish I virtually never order: again, I was happy.



What made me even happier, though, was the plat principal. Duck à l'orange is a cliché rarely encountered these days — surprising, you'd think it would be a "Californa Cuisine" standby. This version was deep and satisfying, a tribute to the classical dish but — thanks perhaps to the rosemary — a distinctly local edition.

Dessert — well, Lindsey's chocolate cake: I know it pretty well, and am always glad to taste it. I never do, at home.

We were lucky to find a friend who imports wine at the next table: he sent generous tastes from his own carafes. We began with a Pouilly-Fumé of the very top drawer: Silex, Didier Dagueneau, 1993. The wine showed age, of course: but it was complex, full, rich, and generous, a lovely thing. Next came Pommard Pezerolles, 1er Cru, Hubert de Montille, 1990: reminding me of the magnificent old-style Naudin Burgundies we took almost for granted back in the 1970s, deep, complex, plenty of violet aroma, big and rewarding. Finally a Volnay, Clos des Chenes, 1er Cru, Domaine des Comtes Lafon, also 1990 — to my mind a little less ample, a little less forthcoming than the Pommard, a little guarded, but a magnificent thing to contemplate. Thanks, Michael!

• Café Chez Panisse, 1517 Shattuck Avenue, Berkeley; 510.548.5525