Dish from Serendipity Farms/Happy Girl dinner: charred little gem lettuces with fresh chevre, roasted beets & celeriac
For the May 15 event, Pilarski is cooking with four kids from MEarth, and the meal will incorporate lots of produce from the MEarth gardens (see menu below). The sous chef for the event is Matt Millea, the executive sous chef for popular restaurant Sierra Mar at Post Ranch Inn. MEarth (pronounced Me-Earth) is a nonprofit located on the grounds of The Hilton Bialek Habitat, a 10-acre environmental education center established in 1995 through a partnership with the Carmel Unified School District.
Tickets begin at $55 (dinner only), and they increase depending on how much money you choose to donate to MEarth. Buy tickets online for $55, $75, or $100. Dinner starts at 6pm at the Happy Girl Kitchen Co café and shop (173 Central Avenue, Pacific Grove). Note that it’s BYOB (feel free to bring beer or wine). For more information, call (831) 373-GIRL (4475).
In 2008, MEarth was established as the Bialek Habitat’s nonprofit in order to inspire students of all ages to understand, appreciate, and protect the natural environment. Every year thousands of students, teachers, neighbors, and volunteers from across Monterey County experience and learn with MEarth at the Habitat. For more information, visit the MEarth web site at http://www.mearth.info/.
Happy Girl Kitchen leads workshops in topics like tomato-preserving, and sells organic treats like pickled vegetables online http://happygirlkitchen.com/ and at a kiosk in the San Francisco Ferry Building. Workshops are held at locations including Live Earth Farm in Watsonville.
Happy Girl also runs a Pacific Grove café and sells products at select stores (including Food Bin in Santa Cruz) and Farmers’ Markets (Saturday at Ferry Building, Sunday in Palo Alto).
Here is the tentative menu (think of it more as an “outline” – it’s subject to change depending on what’s available the day of harvest):
• Good Mother Stallard beans, preserved tomato
• Spring onions with almond, dried strawberry and saffron
• Asparagus, spring vegetable vinaigrette with green strawberry
• Roots, raw and roasted, with fava goddess dressing
• Pumpernickel bread, buckwheat honey butter and farmer’s cheese
• Fresh “Little ear” pasta with peas and green garlic broth
• Lettuces & herbs
• Strawberry tart with lemon hibiscus marmalade
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