Another sausage

Eastside Road, August 17, 2016—

YES, YOU MIGHT SAY we've come to depend on Franco Dunn, Sonoma County's master salsiccieria, if that's the word: maker of artisanal sausages. I would like to know him better, to hang out with him, to shop and read and listen and learn. I know very little about him, considering that I exchange a few words with him most every Saturday I'm home.

I know he's widely read; that he knows a good many foodie heroes, that he respects traditions, that he's traveled a good deal if only, sometimes, second hand, that he apprenticed to a master in Italy, that he seems to be generally even-tempered, that he enjoys life and its pleasures.

I know that he makes consistently good sausages. At the Saturday market in Healdsburg you can usually count on three different cased sausages from him, ranging from traditional Toulouse to complex north African mixtures. They run around eleven or twelve dollars for four, which seems very reasonable to me; two sausages make a dinner for us.

From time to time you'll find something else. Rillettes, perhaps, or a paté, or occasionally guanciale or something of the sort. But there are always the cased sausages, and we've come to depend on them.

Tonight, on the side, summer squash and zucchini, and white and purple potatoes cooked with a little oil, a little salt, a little garlic, a little marjoram. Delicous. Green salad afterward, and gelato al limon, and a little chocolate.

Rosé, La Ferme Julien

☛RESTAURANTS VISITED, with information and rating:  2016   2015