 What's a holiday without tradition? Chief among the events that mark the Fourth of July in our family — aside from the fireworks — is the annual Kiwanis Pancake Breakfast.
My father-in-law, John, has been a member of the local Carmichael Kiwanis chapter for about 15 years, and we often join him at the weekly chapter meetings when we're in town. Big events, like that breakfast, are fun enough that we'll actually plan trips around them. Annually. It's tradition.
This year I offered to help with the breakfast. They're massive affairs, but I figured I could handle it, having managed restaurant kitchens and catered events. No problem.
I checked in a few minutes before 6 a.m. Chris, a retired naval master chief, organizes the chapter's cooking events. Known simply as "Chief," he runs his kitchen as if he's still in the service. He handed me a 5-gallon bucket and electric drill mixer and showed me how to make the pancake batter. Then I was handed another 5-gallon bucket for more batter. These would get us started, Chris said as he wet a bandanna and tied it around his head martial-arts style. Hmmm....
Breakfast began at 7. By 8:30, we got "the rush." The tiny kitchen was outfitted with three portable griddles: two for pancakes, one for sausage. We hustled as the line wound out the door: Chris and I each manned a pancake griddle while other Kiwanis members rotated at the sausage station. Chris effortlessly cooked 18 pancakes at a time at his station; I was able to manage 14. (I swear my griddle was smaller.) We made more batter whenever there was a lull.
The rush lasted until 10:15. By the end of breakfast at 11, we'd done 550 orders and raised $2,100 for charity. Maybe I'm not as quick as I was in my restaurant days, but what fun! And everyone in the kitchen — Chris especially — was wonderful. I've already asked to help out at the next pancake breakfast. Guess I'm starting another tradition.
— Noelle Carter
Photo by Noelle Carter
A couple of months ago, I wrote a story on the latest round of restaurant openings in Vegas. The best bargain I found as part of that story was the elegant buffet breakfast at Payard Pâtisserie in Caesars Palace — $16 for coffee, fresh-squeezed juice, as many of the exquisite morning pastries as you could eat, plus cereals, yogurt parfaits and house-smoked salmon with all the fixings.
However, it seems as if the management at Payard felt that petit déjeuner was too much of a bargain. A reader alerted me soon after that the price was now $22. OK, it was underpriced at $16, but isn’t that the definition of a bargain? Still, a $6 hike seems a bit steep.
In another change, the bistro is no longer serving its dessert tasting at night, which is a real shame. I guess they never developed enough of an audience.
Payard Pâtisserie & Bistro, Caesars Palace, 3570 Las Vegas Blvd. S., Las Vegas; (702) 731-7110. Open daily 6:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. for breakfast; 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. for lunch.
— S. Irene Virbila
 I was up in Sacramento recently visiting the in-laws and decided to check out Denio's Farmers Market and Swap Meet in nearby Roseville. The market, open since 1947, sits near Roseville's rail yard, a historically significant transport hub for agriculture from the Central Valley.
Denio's is a massive marketplace -- sprawling almost 70 acres -- with aisles and aisles of fresh produce and local food products. You name it: tons of fresh fruits and vegetables (I sampled my first fresh cherries of the season), local honeys (I loved the blackberry) and cured olives, as well as stands carrying vegetable plants and herbs for the garden. The swap meet component (by far the larger part of the operation) contains everything from clothing and antiques to tools, machinery and parts for almost anything. (Need a part for your John Deere? Odds are you'll find it.)
 Across the street from the market, you'll find the Roseville Livestock Auction. The bidding starts at 9:30 every Saturday morning for general livestock, including pigs, goats and sheep. (The cattle auction starts at 12:30.) The facility auctions poultry on the first and third Sundays of the month; horses and tack the second Saturday of the month.
If you're like me and fantasize about the farming life, it's a great place to go. You can score some tomato plants for your garden along with your dinner vegetables, or go crazy and buy a chicken or two. Now I know where to get that pet pig I've always wanted...
-- Noelle Carter
Photos by Noelle Carter
On a trip to the Central Coast I wanted to check out a new wine shop in Templeton I’d heard about — which also had carri ed a couple of our wine-of-the-weeks. Templeton is a sweet, little old-fashioned town just south of Paso Robles on the 101. I’d been there in the summer for the farmers’ market held on a grassy square in the middle of town and so I assumed 15 Degrees C (named for the ideal cellar temperature) was right there. Wrong. It’s over in a new complex anchored by Trader Joe’s.
As I headed toward the shop from my car, a guy pushing a shopping cart toward Trader Joe’s called out, “Great little wine shop. I’m so glad it’s here.” Anybody’d be happy to have this place in their neighborhood.
Opened by Ali Rush Carscaden and Allison Dominguez, both Cal Poly alumni with a strong history and interest in food and wine, 15 Degrees C is both a wine bar and a wine shop stocking the shrewdest selection of both local and imported wines around. This is exactly where to head to put together a wine country picnic, too.
They sell Fra’ Mani salumi, a nice array of cheeses, olives, baguettes, chocolates for dessert and much more, including Riedel and Eisch stemware. I picked up some of the Olea Farms arbequiña olive oil they sell in bulk. (Either bring in a bottle or buy one for $2.50) and some bomba rice for paella.
Next door is local favorite Joebella Coffee Roasters, serving their own organic certified and fair-trade specialty coffees. Road warriors who can’t live without checking their e-mail, please note that Joebella’s has free wi-fi.
15 Degrees C Wine Shop and Bar, 1121 Rossi Road, Templeton, (805) 434-1554.
Joebella Coffee Roasters, 1121 Rossi Road, Templeton, (805) 434-2479.
— S. Irene Virbila
Photo by S. Irene Virbila
 Bordier butter ... butter so good it makes me cry. I went to fairly great lengths to bring some back from France. I had to freeze it before I got on the plane so that there was some hope of it surviving the trip back to L.A. But it worked. (Yes, I was a little worried about freezing it but figured it would be OK -- better than not having any at all, so I didn't have much choice. And I do keep butter in the freezer at home so that I always have some on hand for baking.)
Breton Jean-Yves Bordier makes beurre de baratte; at a certain temperature it's worked (sort of beaten) with two small wooden paddles to its optimum texture. For different restaurants, he makes different shapes. The ones pictured here are from Hélène Darroze in Paris. I love the salted (demi-sel) butter, on the left; on the right is the unsalted, sweet (doux) butter. I brought back slabs of it that I bought at the Grande Epicerie at the Bon Marché -- the demi-sel, doux, smoked sea salt and seaweed. The seaweed butter is so beautiful, with flecks of seaweed throughout (great on slices of toasted brioche or tossed with spaghetti).
I spread pats of the demi-sel butter on pain de mie from Breadbar every morning -- or if I'm especially lucky, sourdough bread freshly baked by my colleague Amy Scattergood. I'll even eat a little bit plain and just let it melt on my tongue -- worth the effort and the space in one's carry-on.
-- Betty Hallock
Photo by Betty Hallock
The first day of fall isn't always high season in Oak Glen, the small, family-friendly apple country just north of the Redlands and Yucaipa area, maybe because most mid-Septembers bring hot weather. But this past weekend brought a perfect change -- clear skies after a long-needed rain -- and the U-Pick and U-Buy-Pie apple ranches in Oak Glen were bustling with people who'd had enough summer fun and wanted a hit of cool weather, autumn harvest and fall feeling. 
Apples are the main order of business, of course, and after tasting some of the dozens of varieties grown in the area -- Spartans and Jonagolds and Crispins, say -- visitors were loading half-bushel boxes into their SUVs and enthusiastically lugging bottles of cider. Kids and their parents and grandparents were heading off into orchards and berry patches for apple- and raspberry-picking sessions.
But day-trippers do not live by apples alone, and there were a few other specialties sending come-hither aromas into the crisp, bracingly fresh mountain air. 
The grilled tri-tip and corn on the cob at Los Rios Rancho had folks lined up at lunchtime and for hours afterward (the pie there is also terrific -- full of several kinds of thickly sliced just-tender apples, deeply cinnamony and not too sweet). And at Snow-Line orchards, teenage doughnut makers in a rustic exhibition kitchen man a mini-doughnut machine that not only sends out enticing smells but is also fun to watch as you wait. For an afternoon snack of hot doughnuts and cold, fresh cider, of course.
-- Susan LaTempa
Photos by Susan LaTempa
After a few days vacationing in San Diego recently (boogie-boarding, Shamu), en route to the Wild Animal Park, my kids and I decided to stop for a little civilization in the form of tea and dessert. Not just any dessert, either, but the cakes and confections at Karen Krasne's sugar palace, Extraordinary Desserts. It was a place I'd heard about (in reverential tones) from foodie friends and pastry chefs but had never visited.
Krasne , who holds a Certificat de Pâtisserie from Le Cordon Bleu in Paris, opened the original Extraordinary Desserts near San Diego's Balboa Park 19 years ago; a second store opened in 2004 in Little Italy, near downtown. We hit the original location, where we found tranquil tables alongside cases filled with a vast selection of beautiful cakes and tortes and tarts --many of which were decorated with edible flowers Krasne gets from a local organic farmer.
While my daughters sipped cups of Mariage Frères tea and I knocked back a double cappuccino (Seattle-based Zoka beans), we stared at this stunning creation, a Pavlova filled with white chocolate cream, studded with fresh berries and flowers, and napped with an elaborate painting of raspberry, blackberry and strawberry sauces. I thought it looked too pretty to eat. My daughters, however, had no aesthetic qualms and demolished it. Along with a Valrhona chocolate (both dark and milk) pot de crème and a bowl of nougatine ice cream (they'd just run out of salted caramel, much to the girls' dismay). Armed with a substantial sugar high, we set off north, taking a lemon bar (shortbread crust, candied lemons, more flowers) for the road.
Extraordinary Desserts, 2929 5th Ave., San Diego, (619) 294-2132, and 1430 Union St., San Diego, (619) 294-7001.
-- Amy Scattergood
Photos by Amy Scattergood
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What's a holiday without tradition? Chief among the events that mark the Fourth of July in our family — aside from the fireworks — is the annual Kiwanis Pancake Breakfast.
noelle.carter@latimes.com
Betty Hallock is assistant Food editor and joined the Times in 2002. She formerly worked at the Wall Street Journal in New York. betty.hallock@latimes.com
Susan LaTempa is the Times' acting Food editor. susan.latempa@latimes.com
Rene Lynch is a Times Web deputy and staff writer. rene.lynch@latimes.com
Russ Parsons writes "The California Cook" column for the Times' Food section. He is also the author of “How to Read a French Fry” and the newly published "How to Pick a Peach." russ.parsons@latimes.com
Amy Scattergood is a Times staff writer and “The Saucier” columnist. Scattergood grew up in Iowa, has degrees in theology, poetry and cooking, and, when she isn't writing about food, is trying to get her two young daughters to cook it themselves. amy.scattergood@latimes.com
S. Irene Virbila is the Times' Restaurant Critic. virbila@latimes.com