Ivy Winner: Hotel Healdsburg
Two weeks before their visit, Hotel Healdsburg guests are called and asked if they will need a ride from the airport or a dinner reservation—just one example of the staff’s desire to ensure a memorable visit to northern Sonoma.
By Kate Leahy, Senior Associate Editor -- Restaurants and Institutions, 5/1/2008
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| Dry Creek Kitchen’s dining room offers a polished but comfortable dining experience. |
“The menu is an ongoing collaboration between Charlie and myself,” explains Michael Ellis, Dry Creek Kitchen’s chef de cuisine. But Ellis says he is constantly changing the menu, too. “I have a network of local farmers,” he says. “Farmers come to the door and say, 'This is what I’m going to have this week; this is what I’m going to have in two weeks.’”
This farm-driven menu comes naturally to a restaurant advantageously surrounded by the world-class vintners, artisans and small-scale farmers of northern Sonoma County. Ellis can drive up the road and pass the peach orchards from which he buys fruit in the summer. The family that raises rabbits for the restaurant is only a 15-minute drive away. Also nearby is the farmer who supplies Ellis with a custom mix of baby lettuces.
Such celebration of the region extends beyond the menu. Dry Creek Kitchen’s wine list, overseen by sommelier Drew Munroe, is dedicated exclusively to northern Sonoma wines.
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| Charlie Palmer supports the surrounding community through local-purchasing initiatives. |
“From the restaurant to the hotel, I wanted to make it indigenous to northern Sonoma,” Palmer explains. “I wanted it to feel like when people came here, they were coming to a very special place.”
Part of the CommunityHotel Healdsburg is operated by a small ownership group that includes Palmer and partners Merritt Sher and his daughter, Circe Sher; Paolo Petrone; and John Holt. Early on, creating an outstanding food-and-beverage program was a top priority for the partners. “I was fortunate to be part of the conceptual team,” says Palmer, who had moved his family to Healdsburg prior to becoming involved with the project.
Yet getting the local community behind the partners’ plans to develop a hotel on land that was then used as a dog park (even though it was zoned for hotel development) wasn’t easy. “Initially it was a tough sell,” admits Circe Sher, now the property’s marketing director.
Local doubts diminished, however, when the restaurant opened to a receptive crowd in 2001 (hotel guest rooms opened a few months later in 2002). Palmer attributes part of the success in winning over locals to Hotel Healdsburg’s local-purchasing initiatives. “I made the commitment that we only source Sonoma-grown wines,” Palmer says. “And that set the tone for what we’re all about. No one had made that total commitment before.”
Since then, Palmer also has supported local causes. For the past three years the hotel has held “Pigs and Pinot,” a fundraiser for local schools that showcases pork dishes from top chefs and pinot noirs from local and international vintners.
Aziz Zhari moved from Palmer’s Aureole in Las Vegas to open Dry Creek Kitchen as general manager (he now manages the hotel). Looking back, he says that Healdsburg’s attitude toward the hotel has changed significantly. “[Local residents] will now tell you that it is the best thing that ever happened to this town,” Zhari says. “We take care of the community.”
The hotel not only backs the community through fundraisers and local sourcing, but also it brings in significant out-of-town business. Since the 61-room hotel opened, other restaurateurs have opened venues in the area to accommodate visitors. In response to growing demand, the hotel partners are developing a sister property nearby—a green hotel with lower room rates and a still-undecided eatery, slated to open next year.
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| Chile-glazed jumbo prawns with fried jasmine rice and bacon is one popular appetizer. |
Two weeks before their visit, Hotel Healdsburg guests are called and asked if they will need a ride from the airport or a dinner reservation—just one example of the staff’s desire to ensure a memorable visit to northern Sonoma. “People come here to relax,” Zhari says. “We have to make these people feel at home.”
Dining at Dry Creek Kitchen is no less inviting. Daniel Prentice—who worked in fine-dining restaurants in Europe for six years prior to becoming Dry Creek Kitchen’s general manager in 2007—balances a European service style with a relaxed attitude apt for California wine country. “It’s not considered casual, but the dining attire is not regulated,” Prentice says, adding, “I do not wear a tie.”
As another respectful nod to the surrounding wine country, Prentice introduced wine-based seasonal aperitifs such as a Sonoma sparkling wine with a splash of pomegranate liqueur. “It’s one of the things that I brought back from Europe. I wanted to bring something in that was more wine-oriented and more gastronomical,” he says.
Prentice also introduced tableside decanting for all red wines. “This romance is daily doings in Europe,” he says. It’s also appropriate for American wine regions: The act of decanting wine and “rinsing” wine glasses with wine before pouring from the decanter showcases regional wines in their best light.
Yet for the polished service, thoughtful dishes, and stylish surroundings, Palmer, his partners, and his staff seek to keep Hotel Healdsburg and Dry Creek Kitchen from feeling unapproachable.
“It’s not about a big-time, once-in-a-lifetime meal,” explains Palmer. “I really want to make sure it stays so that people can come again and again and again.”
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Opened: Dry Creek Kitchen, 2001; Hotel Healdsburg, 2002
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