
Profiles
The Naked Eye
Pamela Anderson dropped her robe for him, Paul McCartney bought one of his pieces, and Claudia Schiffer tried to have his nude painting of her lounging on a hot dog destroyed. Oh, and one of America’s greatest artists says he’s better than Andy Warhol.
Great New Places to Eat
There’s a saying that when one door closes, another one opens. Last year was tough on local eateries, but some very exciting restaurant doors have opened in the past few months, including one inspired by a food truck, another by a 56-foot-long bunny, and others by cuisines ranging from French to Mongolian and Indian to Southern (grits, anyone?). So feast your eyes on our favorite new spots, and you’ll see why we think the food scene is looking very sunny-side up.
The Tastemaker
He’s been called the Indiana Jones of the culinary world and the man who “knows more about food and wine than anyone else in America.” How did the son of a Sacramento mayonnaise salesman become a buttoned-up grocer while leading a double life as a globe-trotting gourmet? Just who is Darrell Corti and why do so many important people think he has the planet’s greatest nose for quality?
The Hollow Man
As the top pick for the 1968 49ers, Sacramento’s Forrest Blue was a giant. But after a career of impressive stats, the one that counted most was the one nobody wanted to discuss—the concussions he sustained on his path to glory.
Game Boy
Mark Otero built a gaming company that brought Silicon Valley to Sacramento. Here’s how rolling some very funny-shaped dice paid off in a big way. And how it almost didn’t.
Best of the City 2011
Summer cocktails, lime-soda mocktails, mobile food trucks, jazzy Fridays, a sweet riverfront suite, a cupcakery that delivers, a King-sized rally, and a whole lot of purple. Here are a few (dozen) of our favorite things about this place we call home.
La Dolce Biba
Martha Stewart helped make her a national treasure and Darrell Corti says she makes the single best dish in town. Biba Caggiano has served up Sacramento's most authentic Italian food for 25 years.
Where She Was From
On the eve of her 77th birthday, Sacramento’s native daughter Joan Didion reflects on the untimely deaths of her husband and daughter, the difficulty of parenting, and why, as a teenager, she really wanted a job at the California State Fair.
Waiting for Superwoman
She barely sleeps, has preternaturally thick skin, wears patent leather boots that put Wonder Woman’s to shame, and is so tough that she’s been known to eat bees (and the occasional elementary school principal). In a few short months, the most controversial public school reformer in the country will move to Sacramento where, in an order known only to her, she plans to launch a national education initiative, raise one billion dollars, forever change the face of schools in America and marry our mayor. Who is Michelle Rhee and why can’t anyone agree if she’s a superhero to our kids or just one very smiley villainess?
A Walk on the Wild Side
In 2005, while tethered to a robotic arm 220 miles above the surface of the Earth, Sacramento native and UC Davis grad Stephen Robinson made one of the most famous—and dangerous—spacewalks inhistory. His mission: to remove debris from heat tiles on the belly of the Space Shuttle to prevent the craft from burning up on re-entry. On Feb. 7, our hometown astronaut returns to space for his fourth, and likely last, NASA voyage. He’s living proof why, yes, sometimes it really does take a rocket scientist.
The Life and Deaths of Dorothea Puente
It’s been 20 years since Sacramento’s most notorious murderer, Dorothea Puente, buried seven bodies in the garden of her F Street boardinghouse. Now 80, she speaks out in a series of rare interviews on her crimes, her “relationships” with the Kennedys and the Reagans and why—in the end—the person she really wanted to kill was herself
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