A bevy of special lunches, dinners on the menu for Sonoma County Restaurant Week

By 1:30 p.m. Friday, the first day of Sonoma County Restaurant Week, Steve Decosse’s fledgling Acre Pizza already was racing to keep up with orders. His staff had sold more than 70 of the 260 pizzas they’d expected to make at their Barlow restaurant in Sebastopol for the day.

“This is my first time doing this, and I didn’t even know where to start,” said Decosse, hustling to serve gourmet slices and whole pies, salads and soft ice cream to hungry diners even before the dinner rush.

And there are still eight days left to go in the nine-day food fest. The county’s restaurant week, from Feb. 21 through March 1, has become a much-?anticipated winter tradition. More than 150 local restaurants offer fixed-price lunch and dinner combinations between $10 and $39 per person.

Created by Sonoma County Economic Development Board in 2010, it was designed to be an economic boost for restaurateurs during the quiet off-season.

Depending on the restaurant, meals can be as simple as a morning pastry and a cup of coffee, called a “Sweet Perk” at bakeries like Criminal Baking ($5) in Santa Rosa and Sebastopol, or as luxe as cured King Salmon with garlic compressed broccoli, watercress and bourbon raisins, ginger roasted pork loin with cashew butter and green tea panna cotta being served at Healdsburg’s Dry Creek Kitchen ($39). Lunches are typically $10 or $15, dinners are $19, $29 and $39.

Decosse’s special menu at Acre Pizza includes a Caesar salad, 16-inch pizza with mozzarella, broccoli raab, fresh mushrooms, goat milk feta, lemon zest and olive oil, plus local buffalo milk soft serve for dessert for $29.

Not into the special? Decosse, like most restaurants, is serving his regular menu, too.

“The special is enough for two to three people. We are trying to make this an affordable options for families,” he said.

At 5 p.m. Friday, the happy hour and dinner crowd start packing into Jackson’s Bar and Oven in Santa Rosa’s Railroad Square section. Though many of the patrons were ordering cocktails, burgers and wood-fired pizza off the regular menu, David and Noel Murphy, both 53 of San Rafael, said they came specifically for the $29 prix fixe meal of roasted beet salad, braised short ribs with mushroom risotto, and vanilla soft ice cream with biscotti and espresso caramel.

“We are going to the Jason Mraz concert and we found this on Open Table. It looked really cool, and I liked the menu,” Noelle Murphy said.

Finishing off his first course, David Murphy said, “It sure was a good beet salad.”

Sitting by the wood-fired oven, chef/owner Josh Silvers said the event is a way for diners to get excited about local restaurants.

“It gives us a chance to show new people what we do. I love that the county and the whole community get behind it,” he said.

At Monti’s in Santa Rosa’s Montgomery Village, the $39 special includes hummus with olive flatbread and marinated feta, Niman Ranch Pork shoulder with roasted fingerling potatoes and a Meyer lemon tart with raspberries.

“We participate in Restaurant Week because it gives people an opportunity to try restaurants they haven’t been to or to revisit one that they haven’t been to for a while,” said co-owner Terri Stark, who has participated in the event since its inception.

John Franchetti, chef/owner of Franchetti’s, who is launching a new German-style ravioli this week, summed up his enthusiasm for the event, saying, “It always fills the restaurant.”

In 2019, more than 18,000 meals were served from Cloverdale to Petaluma and everywhere in between. Restaurant week had a direct economic impact of $6.52 million for restaurateurs, plus more than $280,000 in tax revenue for the county, officials said.

“Restaurant Week continues to be a successful celebration of the incredible local restaurants throughout the county and we are thrilled to be celebrating our 11th year,” said Lauren Cartwright, program manager at the county economic development board.