SF Chronicle talks to Alex Bury, of Sparks in Guerneville

[Guest guest]

Chef Alex Bury, Sparks bring vegan warmth to

Guerneville

Friday, November 23, 2001

San Francisco Chronicle

 

Add it to your only-in-Guerneville list: Sparks, one

of

the county's only vegan restaurants, is gearing up for

one of its busiest periods of the off-season: Leather

Weekend. " Guerneville is such a weird town, " says Alex

Bury, co-owner and chef of Sparks. " We had this big

Lazy Bear Weekend not too long ago, and we thought

none of them (bears, a subculture of hirsute gay men

who generally value masculinity) were going to eat at

a vegan restaurant. But we were packed. And now

Leather Weekend at the vegan restaurant. " She laughs,

shaking her head. " I know. " Taking a break from her

afternoon prep work, the 31-year-old Bury speaks with

pride about the diverse clientele that has emerged

since Sparks opened on Main Street in August. " There

are some nights when we're full and there's not a man

in the restaurant. And then other nights, like on a

weekend, every guy is up from the city. We get a lot

of older people who just changed their diet, then we

get a lot of young punks from the city. It all works. "

Guerneville works on other levels as well for Bury and

her four business partners -- active partners Erin

Wheeler and Melissa Ward along with Sabrina Alonso and

Steve Wells -- who retrieved the Sparks name and

concept from the now-defunct Inn of the Beginning in

Cotati. All of the owners live in Guerneville and

besides, the rent's cheaper. More importantly, says

Bury, the locals have really stepped up to the plate.

" People here really want us here. In Cotati there was

always a lot of suspicion about the Inn of the

Beginning. It never really worked, " says Bury, who,

along with Wheeler, ran the popular but short-lived

Sparks inside the bar from September 2000 to January

of this year. " The bar and the restaurant

were always butting heads. We'd have to close the

place early to get ready for a frat party. " Now that

Bury and her colleagues have considerably more

latitude in scheduling, they've filled their

calendar with their kind of events: community Solstice

celebrations, monthly vegan cooking classes with

seven students crammed into the server station and

galley kitchen, and a vegan Thanksgiving banquet that,

on the menu at least, feels pretty festive.

" People do expect 'centerpiece food,' but we can't

do Tofurkey (a tofu product shaped and flavored to

resemble turkey) because Erin hates it, " says Bury.

" There are vegetarians who won't eat it,

because it tastes too much like turkey. I love it for

the name, because it's so fun. So we decided to

stuff acorn squashes with corn bread and pecan

stuffing, and that'll be 'The Thing.' Then we have all

the traditional dishes, mashed potatoes, cranberry

sauce, blah, blah, blah. The thing is to get a good

stuffing. And the gravy is important. Erin's is

great, a cashew-shiitake thing with miso. " Gravy,

fries, mashed potatoes, pizza, polenta . . . comfort

food is a key component of the Sparks menu, because

the owners are trying to reassure, rather than shock,

their customers, many of whom know nothing about

veganism or are just getting started. " Food is so

emotional for people, " Bury says. " When you ask

someone to change what they grew up eating, what

their mom made them, what's familiar to them, and they

don't change overnight, well, you probably didn't

either. " Bury also pays extra attention to desserts,

as an antidote to the stereotypical vegan

food-equals-health food equation. The simple but

decadent

dessert menu is the product of years of work on her

part. " That took me a while. Now it's so easy, but I

remember that first year I had some real flops. " Bury

is still experimenting -- earlier this month she tried

a disastrous lemon meringue pie using vegan egg

replacer -- but mostly she's found success in using

high-quality ingredients such as organic fruits and

good chocolate. Part of the challenge in cooking

vegan is adjusting to the vegan shopping cart, says

Bury: " It's like learning Thai or Indian. You have

to become familiar with the ingredients and

fundamentals. " Fortunately for Bury, who graduated

from the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park,

N.Y., in 1991, the techniques at least are much the

same. " A saute is the same whether you're doing meat

or tofu, braising is the same, stock principles are

the same. That makes everything easier. " These days

established cooking schools, including Bury's alma

mater, are expanding their vegetarian and vegan

curriculum in response to growing consumer interest,

industry awareness, and student demands for

vegan-friendly course requirements. But back in Bury's

day, she felt pressure to taste it all, and

so she did, reluctantly giving up vegetarianism for

the two-year program and for her pre-CIA trip to

Paris. " There I ate everything, " she laughs. " I was

eating raw meat and veal and baby lamb brains. Any

disgusting thing, if it was gross I ate it. And at the

CIA it was the same way. " After graduating,

Bury returned to her home state of Alaska, and for a

time made a go as a private chef in Anchorage. But

she found the politics a tad repressive -- " You can't

even put a bumper sticker on your car up there " -- and

three years ago made the move to Guerneville, where

the climate is decidedly easier on vegetarians and

other progressive causes. And by this time the tide

had turned in the vegetarian movement itself,

providing

a ready outlet for the kind of vegan advocacy that

Bury and her partners wanted to do. " We'd rather

give someone a cookie than go to a protest. We can

show people that vegan food is easy, delicious, it's

fun. It doesn't have to be a big negative thing. "

 

Dish appears twice a month, alternating with local

restaurant reviews. Send information at least two

weeks prior to an event to Dish c/o Marin-Sonoma-Napa

Friday, The Chronicle, 901 Mission St., San Francisco,

CA 94103. Or fax to (800) 340-5940.

 

 

 

 

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