It’s that time again for our annual year in review series, when we look back on the year of writing that was, and share some of our favorite stories with readers.
I always like to start with the raw data. Just like last year, I’ll be clocking in at around 130 stories for the Santa Barbara Independent by the time the calendar hits 2025, and I’d guess that at least 45 of those are my Fully Belly Files that come out every Friday. (Sign up for them here if you’re three years late to the game.)
In addition to that, I wrote about two dozen features for Wine Enthusiast magazine while also logging more than 2,000 wine reviews. I also penned a few freelance pieces here and there as well for 805 Living and (maybe?) others.
I’ve organized my highlights into categories below. Happy revisiting!
Chris Potter
My year started off on a tragic note with the sudden death of my good friend, landscape artist Chris Potter. Here’s my story about his passing, and here is more of a heartfelt piece on what he meant to so many of us.
Restaurants
A primary part of my job here at the paper is to write features about restaurants, most of which have recently opened, but not always.
I am most proud about the December 12 cover story I did about Acme, Companion, and Good Lion restaurant/bar groups, which explained their rise to prominence from a behind-the-scenes perspective. I collaborated with Roger Durling on another hospitality cover story, this one about Santa Barbara’s Beloved Bartenders. (We still have some folks to add to the list.)
I did a few anniversary stories this year. My faves were this piece on bouchon celebrating 25 years (which was as much about housing as food) and a look back at 10 years of Empty Bowl Gourmet Noodle Bar.
And then there were a lot of openings that I covered, from Lama Sama on Upper State and Dang Burgers in Carpinteria to Jonesy’s Fried Chicken in Old Town Goleta and the Santa Barbara Fish Market Cafe further out past Camino Real.
Food & Farming
I sometimes write about food and farming beyond the restaurant context. In that vein, I enjoyed reporting these stories on Luretik Olive Oil from the Santa Ynez Valley; about Kevin Reimer’s rare fruit orchard and company (actually, here’s another one on him); and about celebrated chef Justin West turning into a meat salesman.
Wine
Yea, there’s a lot of wine in my life, most of it spat out.
This list could be much longer, but I was most excited to introduce readers to Ojai Mountain’s towering terroir; Marbeso’s ocean-influenced wines; and Dave Phinney’s Our Lady of Guadalupe Vineyard.
I got some unique angles on a few stories, including this piece about Chris Hammell leaving Bien Nacido Vineyard, with the undercurrent that much up there is changing; and this one about tasting a vertical of Brewer-Clifton and Mail Road wines from Mt. Carmel Vineyard.
And I was stoked to share some good news from the fallout that was Vintage Wine Estates. Longtime winemaker Eric Hickey was able to buy Laetitia, while Andrew Murray pulled Qupé out of Vintage’s bankruptcy wreckage.
Travel
I manage to get out of town quite a decent amount, both for work and fun. This year’s best travelogues were certainly my Mexico City adventure with buddies and my family’s spring break trip to Charleston and Savannah. Our trip to Spain and France was cool too.
This piece was more memoir than travelogue, but I was happy to reconnect with my 2004 trip to Nagorno-Karabakh, a land that no longer exists.
Books & Arts
Occasionally I break out of the food & drink lane. This year, I clicked with the artist Pedro de la Cruz to pen this cover-length piece on his life and art, which I think contains some of the better writing of my year if not career. I also met up with an early mentor and inspiration of mine, our former publisher George Thurlow, who wrote a book about getting shot in El Salvador during that country’s civil war. On the museum front, I announced the Chrisman California Islands Center in Carpinteria with this cover story to kick off the first issue of 2024.
Wine Enthusiast Work
My Wine Enthusiast highlights would be this feature about eating roadkill with fine wine in Arkansas; a profile of winemakers doing sustainable things across California; how white wine is taking hold in the red wine scene of Paso Robles; a chat with these pioneers of the Armenian wine renaissance; and, most personally, this story about how making my first wine during my dad’s last year on earth.
I wrote a series of tasting room roundups for a bunch of regions, which were kind of hard to wrangle but are proving popular and useful. They include: Paso Robles, Santa Barbara, the Santa Ynez Valley, Temecula, Lodi, Arizona, Carmel Valley, and Carmel By The Sea.
Another series that I actually started, though it wasn’t my idea, pits different grapes against each other. So far, I’ve done “Pinot Noir vs. Cabernet Sauvignon” and “Chardonnay vs. Sauvignon Blanc,” and I’m the hook for another one in which Champagne battles Pet Nat.
