Sondra Bernstein / John Toulze, girl & the fig, Sonoma

Sondra Bernstein / John Toulze
girl & the fig Restaurant

Artisanal wines integral to a gracious table: it is our inspiration. One such gracious table offering Havens Napa Valley Syrah is the girl & the fig restaurant in Sonoma, California. Its inspiration, evidenced not only by its fig-friendly menu, but atmosphere, wine list, and service, is country food with a French passion. Havens is proud to be selected for the restaurants’ unique “Rhone Alone” wine list. (click on the image above to visit the girl & the fig restaurant website)

Sondra Bernstein opened the girl & the fig in 1997 after years of combining world travel and food passion that finally led her to a fig tree in Sonoma. With ironically little fig history on her palate, Sondra would pass by the tree on daily walks with her dog and occasionally pluck a ripe fig for a treat along the way. As she discovered Sonoma for the place of soul and spirit it is, Sondra soon came to honor her figs for more than just the simple purity of nourishment and taste. The fig, symbolic of passion and abundance, to Sondra became a vision to translate the local bounty of Sonoma artisanal foods so accessible in their freshest, most flavorful state into soul-satisfying food memories for others.

While selecting ingredients from the local bounty is a key element to the “country” part of the girl & the fig vision, the French passion part, according to Sondra, aims at the tradition of the afternoon meal that the French (and many Mediterranean cultures) have in their eating and café life. Long, lingering conversation, sharing of ideas, and, most especially, good wine.

So, why Rhones only? When Sondra and chef/partner John Toulze sat down to decide which wines to choose for their new restaurant, they wanted to extend to the wines what they were doing with food: educate the palate of the patron who was coming for a unique experience. They also just wanted to do something different that would complement their menu. “At first we got a lot of requests for Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon, but when we asked people what they liked about those wines, we could offer them a Rhone-style wine with similar characteristics and, voila! They discovered something new they like,” said John.

John has made his home in Sonoma to “live his dream in which food takes center stage.” (It doesn’t get much more convincing than that to get food lovers in the door.) “It is the simplicity and overwhelming quality of life (in Sonoma) that I have always tried to put into our food and is the centerpiece of my approach to cooking,” he said. “It is a humbling experience to work with the artisanal foods that individuals have poured their souls into. The best I can do is to transport it to the plate in its truest form.

“Havens wines, according to John, reflect their terroir or what happens in the vineyard more than anything else. So, foods that also focus on place offer an exciting pairing experience.”

Jeff Back, Manager and Wine Buyer for the girl & the fig agrees: “Havens’ Syrah gives us that wonderful Napa earthiness and concentrated fruit that complements the fresh, living earth ingredients of Sonoma so well. It is the fruitful, earthy tobacco and leather qualities that you find in Northern Rhone wines that Havens brings to our menu.”

Sondra and John offer their grilled pork chop and mustard sauce recipes to pair with Havens Napa Valley Syrah. An inspired pairing, given our Syrah’s lush fruit and brooding earthy complexity that holds its own with a hearty pork tinged with grilling’s smoky char. Turns out, too, that the signature high-toned spice of our Syrah favors the little mustard seed, whose intensity in this sauce is softened by a little honey, rosemary, and cream.

the girl & the fig cookbook
In the way she came to discover figs and the artisanal bounty of the rural wine country, Sondra’s new cookbook might be called A Fig Tree Grows in Sonoma. But instead she named it after her beloved restaurant, the girl & the fig. Located on the quaint Sonoma square, renowned for its historic buildings alongside cheese, wine, and many-things-culinary shops and surrounding a small park full of ducks, small ponds, and benches, the girl & the fig restaurant evokes all that Sondra endeavors to offer her patrons there: fresh, French-country food in a rural setting that invites leisure and lingering among friends and family. To order a copy of Sondra’s the girl & the fig cookbook, click here.