Kathleen Hill: Mary’s goes to school, City Party food and Divewalk taking a walk...?
Mary's Pizza Shack's back to school specials
After spending buckets of money and energy on back-to-school clothes, backpacks, supplies, and haircuts, many families welcome a hearty meal at a good price. Mary's 'Back to School Specials' will look familiar to Mary's regulars, but they are still well worth seeking for a fun feast.
For $25 you can feed your family with a large pizza with two 'traditional toppings' and a large salad, or a family size spaghetti with pesto, marinara or classic meat sauce with three giant meatballs and a large salad.
You can also bring in a can of food during the months of August and September for the Redwood Empire Food Bank and get $5 off your next purchase.
As well, Mary's in Boyes offers a happy hour from 3 to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday, as does the Plaza restaurant where there is a full bar and a late night happy hour from 9 p.m. to closing Thursday through Saturday and 8 p.m. to closing Sunday through Wednesday.
The Boyes Hot Springs location is the second 'original' Mary's Pizza Shack. The original 'original' was truly in a sort of shack or little white house near the Boyes Market that is now occupied by residents. High school students used to consider themselves lucky to land a coveted job sweeping the floor at Mary's. 18636 Sonoma Highway, 938-3600; 8 W. Spain St. 938-8300. Maryspizzashack.com.
Pets at Pets Lifeline win
A sold-out crowd at Vintage Kennels came up with $200,000, a small part of what it costs Pets Lifeline, Sonoma's no-kill animal shelter, to keep deserted cats and dogs alive and well cared for until their 'forever homes' are found.
Fund-a-Need emcee Bill Jasper called every bid and kept the excitement and noise going through the salad course of sweet Bibb lettuces and savory Ranch dressing.
Next came Stellar Catering's platters of sliced Flat Iron steak, which in some cases, got consumed by those at the initial end of the table where they were placed, late summer succotash of corn, dried cherry tomatoes, Roman beans, and Shishito peppers, along with roasted marble potatoes sustained happy vegetarians. Guests started to circulate from stall to stall before dessert came and a great time was had by all. Congratulations to Pets Lifeline, executive director Nancy King, and her great team and board. Next year get you ticket early so you can visit with the goats, pigs, camels and horses before dinner.
Celebrating 20 years of the Girl and the Fig
Most of us could never assemble 600 of our closest friends to pay $75 to sit on folding wooden chairs at tables that laced Sonoma City Hall's paved 'horseshoe.' But Sondra Bernstein did just that.
Fulfilling her promise to guests, Bernstein gave 50 percent of the ticket revenue to the following nonprofits: Pet's Lifeline, $5,250; Sonoma Valley Education Foundation, $3,637; Sonoma Community Health Center, $1,425; La Luz Center, $2,287; Sonoma Valley Vintners and Growers, $1,000; and her own nonprofit Fig Foundation, $7,275.
Led by Sonoma native and chef John Toulze, her professional team of 50 chefs, cooks, and servers somehow presented hot duck confit legs to all 600 guests with grace and not one dropped plate. Let's see: 600 hundred duck legs means 300 ducks. One guest at our table suggested maybe there was an event in St. Helena serving duck breasts or several duck breast specials at restaurants around the wine country.
Bernstein's mother, Janet Bernstein, and her brother Ronald and his wife Beverly Bernstein, came from the East Coast and joined in with Girl and the Fig fans from far and wide. After boards of John Toulze's charcuterie and cheeses, with jars of olives and pickled vegetables, came fig and arugula salad, then the duck confit legs and thighs on baby lentils in a cabbage bowl, followed by loads of cookies. Suddenly servers carrying glimmering baskets of It's Its passed out the ice cream sandwiches, which have almost become a trademark of Bernstein's parties.
City Party food fun
When I asked former Mayor Ken Brown if he was mayor when for the first City Party, he reminded me that the first City Party 'wrapped up' Sonoma's 150th anniversary celebration and, as he put it, 'and we kept at it.'
'The Council ran it, then they wanted to stop,' said Brown. 'I didn't vote for it. The Community Center took it over, I helped out and then last year the city took it back. Lisa Janson, our events coordinator now heads it up.'
In the last few years the event shifted focus from facing south behind City Hall to facing north and Spain Street, to back to featuring the music and dancing in the back parking lot of City Hall last week. Without any official statistics, there appeared to be fewer attendees this year.
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