Chez Panisse Cafe 30th anniversary dinner
Just returned from the 30th anniversary of the Chez Panisse Cafe. Brilliant prix fixe meal--prosecco and pistachio nuts, greens and pissaladiere (sp?), asparagus and yellow beets and hard-cooked egg, spring cassoulet w/ duck and fava beans and baby turnips and carrots, mandarins and dates, meyer lemon and mandarin orange and vanilla ice cream bombe, chocolate covered hazelnuts. Every single thing perfect. Menus gorgeously designed. Great service. Folks from other restaurants milling about, getting up to dance (live accordian-ist, who, like the maitre de, was dressed as in a Panol film). Alice was holding court, accepting congratulations, going table to table, dressed in a fabulous funky sequined sleeveless dress, looking beautiful and happy. Great fun.
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Chez Panisse
1517 Shattuck Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94709
