
Blendees Commixes Nutritional Flavors in San Diego
Monique Roussau-Stewart grew up in Chicago and came to California the first chance she got. “I dreamed of living in California while watching The Beverly Hillbillies as a young child and moved west when the opportunity came about,” she says with a chuckle. While entrepreneurship was not the impetus for the cross-country move, it eventually...

The South Meets the West at Hey Sugar! in San Diego
Cakes in mason jars and southern-style peach cobbler are stirring up the sweet scene in San Diego, California. Chan Buie, a Black woman business owner and veteran, is following her baking passion after retiring from the military and opening her first bakery, Hey Sugar! Her scrumptious sweet shop in Southern California sells varieties of individual cakes, lemon bars, cookies...

Duke Windsor’s Paintings of Juicy Burgers Inspire More Than Hunger
Maybe it was the Marine Corp that taught Duke Windsor the discipline to finish over 25 hand-painted still life scenes in just a few months for a recent art exhibit. Or it could have been his love of painting in his studio and treading into some unfamiliar territory. Born and raised in Texas, Windsor’s first...

San Diego’s Project New Village Is No Ordinary Fish Story
Pictured: N. Dian Moss | Photo credit: M’L’iss Hinshaw What do food justice and fish have in common? Plenty. San Diego, California, with its postcard beaches, has an underserved Black Indigenous People of Color (BIPOC) population in an older part of the city, and a coordinated project is serving this group from the sea to...

Booboo’s Sweet Potato Pies Bring a Taste of Home to Southern California
The Southern staple of sweet potato pie brings more to the table than pumpkin pie. And not just at Thanksgiving in San Diego. The sign, Booboo’s Sweet Potato Pies, caught my eye at the farmer’s market. Humm, sweet potato pies in Southern California? My interest was piqued, and I decided to find out more. ...

Quick Getaway Into a Different World at The Mission Inn Hotel
A bust of Booker T. Washington is prominent in the welcoming entrance of The Mission Inn Hotel and Spa located in the historic city of Riverside, Calif. California’s booming orange crops brought tourists from the East Coast and Europe where sunshine and orange blossoms made Riverside a popular destination. Only 60 miles east of Los...

San Diego’s Soul Food Finds the Right Climate
San Diego is known for beautiful beaches and year round pleasant weather, plus, yes, soul food. Soul food in this predominantly Mexican food environment is here. There was a time when many soul food and barbeque restaurants lined the streets of southeast San Diego. Today, most of those original places are gone but soul...