A Day on the American Riviera
A Day on the American Riviera
Santa Barbara doesn't announce itself so much as unfold — red tile roofs and white stucco walking you block by block from a Spanish mission hilltop down to the harbor. We came for a day, and it gave us six very different stops: pastry, wellness, history, a food hall, and finally, the ocean.
A Little History
Long before Santa Barbara had a name on any map, the Chumash people lived along this coastline, fishing the channel in wooden plank canoes called tomols. Spain arrived in 1782, when Governor Felipe de Neve and Father Junípero Serra founded the Royal Presidio, a military fort meant to protect Spain's hold on the California coast. Four years later, Father Fermín Lasuén founded Mission Santa Barbara — the tenth of California's 21 missions, and the only one never abandoned. Its twin bell towers earned it the nickname "Queen of the Missions."
In 1925, a major earthquake leveled much of downtown. Rather than rebuild however they pleased, city leaders — led by civic planner Pearl Chase — required every new building to follow Spanish Colonial Revival style: white stucco, red tile roofs, wrought iron balconies. That single decision after a disaster is why the whole city reads as one continuous piece of architecture today.
Lilac Patisserie
Our morning started at Lilac Patisserie, a dedicated gluten-free bakery and café — "dedicated" being the operative word, since there's no shared kitchen and nothing on the menu, from bread to birthday cake, touches gluten at any point. The bakery cases were stacked with New York and hazelnut cheesecake, tiramisu, and key lime tart, while the savory menu leaned into California brunch: smoked salmon plates, avocado toast with blistered cherry tomatoes, and a pesto-and-ham grilled cheese on their own house bread. They even sell the flour and cookie mix by the bag, so the bakery can come home with you.
Downtown Santa Barbara
From breakfast we let the city do the talking. Downtown is threaded with "paseos" — Spanish for walkways — covered breezeways and courtyards like Paseo Nuevo that connect shops and restaurants without a sidewalk in direct sun. Strings of colorful papel picado hang overhead year-round, and in summer the district gears up for Old Spanish Days Fiesta, the city's biggest celebration of its Spanish and Mexican heritage. Every storefront follows that same red-tile-roof rule set after 1925, so strolling State Street feels less like an American downtown and more like one long, deliberate building.
Salt Cave Santa Barbara
Midday, we ducked into the largest Himalayan salt cave in North America. In 2010, Pam McCaskey set out to build a nurturing wellness space in town, and convinced her geologist husband Mike to import over 60 tons of pink crystalline salt from the Khewra Salt Mine in Pakistan. The cave walls and ceilings are 45 tons of backlit, Jurassic-age salt block; the floor is crushed salt you can walk or lie directly on. We settled into zero-gravity lounge chairs and floor cushions to breathe salt-carried air for a while — a practice called halotherapy — phones down, city on pause.
Himalayan Salt, Off the Wall and Onto the Plate
The same pink salt lining the cave is also one of the most versatile ingredients a cook can reach for. It forms from ancient sea beds that evaporated roughly 200–250 million years ago, and its trace minerals — magnesium, calcium, potassium — give it a milder flavor than table salt, along with that signature blush color.
- As a cooking surface: a solid salt block can be heated to about 450°F and used in place of a skillet, holding heat evenly while seasoning food from the outside in.
- As a serving surface: chilled instead of heated, the same block becomes an elegant cold plate for sushi, cured meats, or cheese.
- As a curing agent: thin slices of fish or beef laid on a chilled block will slowly cure right on the surface.
- As a finishing salt: ground coarse and added at the very last second — over a steak, an avocado, even salted caramel — for texture and a flash of color rather than a wall of salinity.
Santa Barbara Public Market
Lunch was the Santa Barbara Public Market, a food hall opened in 2014 by Marge Cafarelli — the first space of its kind in the city, a single roof shared by a dozen independent kitchens instead of one restaurant with one menu. We tasted our way across three of them: Seoulmate Kitchen for Korean fusion, dolsot bibimbap and gochujang mac and cheese; Little Bird Kitchen for coastal American wooden-bowl salads and smash burgers; and Corazón Cocina for tacos and ceviche. It's a build-your-own tasting menu, no single cuisine required.
Stearns Wharf & Santa Barbara Seafood Co.
Our last stop was Stearns Wharf, California's oldest working wooden wharf, built in 1872 by John P. Stearns. Steamships called there for over four decades before the railroad arrived; it survived storms in 1878, closed to pleasure use during WWII, and was fully restored by the city in 1980–81. Right on the wharf, Santa Barbara Seafood Co. sent us off with a classic Crab Louie, a cup of chive-flecked clam chowder, and — the adventurous bite of the day — an uni shooter with quail egg. Then, finally, feet in the sand.
The dish that summed up lunch on the wharf. A California coastal classic, believed to have taken shape up and down the Pacific coast in the early 1900s, built around whatever local crab was running that week — for us, fresh Dungeness.
Crab Louie Salad
Ingredients
- 1 lb fresh Dungeness crab meat, picked over
- 6 cups mixed baby greens (butter lettuce, radicchio, arugula)
- 1 cup shredded carrot
- 2 hard-boiled eggs, quartered
- 1 avocado, sliced
- 1 cup cherry or grape tomatoes, halved
- Lemon wedges, for serving
- Louie dressing: ½ cup mayonnaise, 2 tbsp chili sauce (or ketchup), 1 tbsp sweet pickle relish, 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce, 1 tsp lemon juice, pinch of paprika, salt & pepper
Directions
- Whisk together all Louie dressing ingredients in a small bowl. Chill while you prep the salad.
- Divide the mixed greens between four plates or shallow bowls, and scatter the shredded carrot over top.
- Mound the crab meat in the center of each plate.
- Arrange the egg quarters, avocado slices, and tomato halves around the crab.
- Drizzle with Louie dressing, or serve it on the side for dipping. Finish with a lemon wedge.
- Serve chilled — no cooking required beyond the eggs.
The Royal Presidio, then Mission Santa Barbara four years later.
An east-west coastline gives Santa Barbara its sheltered, Mediterranean climate.
Lilac Patisserie, downtown, the salt cave, the Public Market, and Stearns Wharf.