The Chef, My Friends, Is Blowing to Los Alamos

It's called George Eats, not George Writes, but you know that, of late. After all, it's not George Monetizes (and has there ever been an uglier word for an uglier thing? it's practically onomatopoetic), so all the stuff I need to do to make some money has sort of taken up the time that I'd love to use instead to be doing this. But there is a lot of news, isn't there....

Starting with the big changes at two of my favorite places (just ask Visa) to eat in the county--Hollister Brewing Company and Full of Life Flatbreads. As you might have read elsewhere, after a couple of years making HBC not just a beer mecca both a food one, too, Dylan Fultineer has moved on to Full of Life Flatbreads, and the weekend meals there are as luscious as ever, with flatbreads combining the best of the market (a recent one with grilled to perfection peaches, grilled chicken, and arugula knocked me out) and special apps and a main course the table next to us gushed about. So, the rich just get richer. There's just two too bads: 1) Los Alamos can seem far away, especially given the wine list is so fine, and 2) it's only a restaurant on weekends. But here's to all the best success for Dylan up in Wine Country, especially as he and his wife start a family.

We don't need to be too sad here at Hollister, though, for Dylan's trusty aide-de-camp Mike Coan is now executive chef. Coan moved west with Fultineer from Blackbird in Chicago to open the SB Hungry Cat, went up to San Francisco for seasoning at ace places like A16 and Delfina, but he's been back at HBC for awhile and ready to step into the lead position. Based on some recent HBC visits, we've all got nothing to worry about, and not just because the glories of the latest delicious batch of Eric's Hippie Kicker IPA smooth out the edges of anything wrong in one's day.