On Monday, Sonoma County Restaurant Week began by offering prix fixe breakfasts, lunches and dinners to county dinners. However, while it is a good opportunity to check out new restaurants or return to an old favorite, through March 1, Restaurant Week falls short of directly benefiting anyone but the diner and the restaurant.
Instead, the beneficiaries are the restaurants themselves through their association with Sonoma County Tourism, SCT. It’s been able to enlist 134 restaurants, from Petaluma to Geyserville, to take part in the promotion.
Among them, 17 are in Healdsburg. These include Bistro Lagniappe, the newest tenant at 330 Healdsburg Ave., former home of Molte Amici and Campo Fina. It offers a $40 prix fixe meal that includes a choice of soup or salad, a main course choice and chocolate pot de crème dessert.
Other new-to-town restaurants taking part include Folia Bar & Kitchen at Appellation Healdsburg (with both a $25 lunch menu and a $50 dinner); Jimtown and Then Sum on Hwy 128 in Alexander Valley with a range of specially priced items; and Tisza Bistro where Single Tree used to be, at 165 Healdsburg Ave., offering both lunch and dinner event-priced menus.
The full range of prix fixe menus at all levels can be parsed at the event’s search page socorestaurantweek.org/restaurant-week-search.
Dining for Education
Raising funds or income for a nonprofit has taken on a new look in recent years as some nonprofits have been targeting diners for dollars in their fundraising campaigns. The Healdsburg Dine-Around in the late 2000s was an early local representation of the trend, to benefit the Healdsburg Food Pantry.
It was followed shortly thereafter by Jazz on the Menu from Healdsburg Jazz, a tradition that continues this year when it will be held on Thursday, March 5. Diners at four local restaurants will enjoy live music and excellent food, while supporting music in the schools. The restaurants themselves donate 25% from the night’s proceeds, For over 20 years Healdsburg Jazz has been the nexus for jazz musicians in town to find local gigs, and vice versa.
Healdsburg Jazz still directly supports the Hotel Healdsburg’s Saturday evening jazz at the Spirit Bar, and some of these same artists are playing the four venues taking part in this year’s Jazz on the Menu. It’s a one-day-only dining benefit, but unlike the industry-promoting Restaurant Week, it’s for a cause: to support free Healdsburg Jazz music education in the public schools.
This year’s participating restaurants include Baci, Goodnight’s, Spoonbar and Valette. Three of them have “been with the program” from the beginning; the newcomer is Goodnight’s, the steak house on Plaza Street. Goodnight’s is not taking part in the Sonoma County Restaurant Week, and neither is Baci.The 25% donation only works for diners between 5:30-8pm, which is the heart of the dinner hour. Healdsburg Jazz’s education programs include Latin History and Black History Month presentations for primary schools, a summer Music & Performing Arts camp, the High School Jazz collective and others. More information is available at healdsburgjazz.org/education.
