San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
DISCOVER NAPA’S HOTTEST NEIGHBORHOOD.
Napa used to be the Wine Country town that day-trippers bypassed on the way to chic St. Helena. Today, Napa Valley’s namesake boasts a bustling retail hub that many visitors don’t want to leave.
That’s due in large part to the development, over the past decade, of Napa’s Oxbow neighborhood. It has evolved from an eyesore into a tourist magnet and community hangout, the vacant lots and fixer-uppers giving way to hip venues for Napa’s preferred sports: eating and drinking. On many itineraries now, Oxbow is where a visit to Napa Valley begins. Anchored by the Oxbow Public Market, the neighborhood has developed enough of a profile that locals have unofficially branded it the Oxbow district — albeit without any firm sense of its borders. Most of the restaurant and retail activity lies inside the public market, or within a couple of blocks of it on First Street, making it possible for pedestrians to get a fix on the area in two to three hours. With the Napa River as a backdrop, and the grassy Oxbow Commons for strolling, the area offers more open space than the city’s downtown and a more compact collection of places to shop, sip and dine.
Here’s how to start exploring:
Eat
Start your day early in the queue at Model Bakery, a mother-daughter endeavor and pastry emporium. Yes, you have to choose. Plump blueberry scones? House-made English muffins? A breakfast sandwich with bacon, avocado and local eggs? If you’ll be wine tasting later, go big. Late risers will miss some of the gluten abbondanza, but by late morning, Fatted Calf, next door to the bakery, has set out heaps of warm porchetta sandwiches. Call ahead if you’re intent on this peak pork experience; the sandwiches go fast.
Allow an hour or two to nosh your way through the public market’s main building, a high-class food court that can approach human gridlock on weekends. Stock a picnic basket with artisan Cheddar and fig jam at Oxbow Cheese Merchant. At Whole Spice, poke your nose into glass jars of house-made spice rubs, truffle salt and Turkish chiles. The store’s chocolate dukkah is life changing.
Drink
Drinking in Napa Valley used to mean only one thing, but Fieldwork Brewing, with its popular taproom in the public market, is helping to change that. Craft-beer enthusiasts don’t have to walk far for round two: Trade Brewing’s taproom is just across the street, with about a dozen brews on tap daily and a menu of beer-friendly snacks.
Wine enthusiasts can dive deep without leaving the neighborhood. The Wine Thief, a collective tasting room, pours several low-production, high-scoring wines by the glass. Nearby, at Feast It Forward, 16 small wineries share tasting-room space in a remodeled former farmhouse, part of a hybrid enterprise that also includes a demonstration kitchen for celebrity-chef classes and events.
Cocktailians will want to check out the bitters, tonics, syrups and shrubs at the market’s Napa Valley Distillery, an enabler for the ambitious homebar chef.
Learn
The Oxbow district got its big break in 2015, when the Culinary Institute of America purchased Copia, the long-shuttered wine, food and art museum championed by Robert and Margrit Mondavi.
Reopened a year later and rechristened the Culinary Institute of America at Copia, the building now offers cooking and wine-tasting classes for amateurs and professionals. Skip class, if you must, but don’t miss the Chuck Williams Culinary Arts Museum on the second floor, a jawdropping display of tureens, toasters, pudding molds and pans collected by the founder of Williams-Sonoma. In the store downstairs, you’ll find cookbooks and culinaria for your own collection, including the soughtafter ceramics of Napa Valley potter Amanda Wright.