"Cannery Row is a poem, a stink, a grating noise, a quality of light, a tone, a habit, a nostalgia, a dream. Cannery Row is the gathered and scattered, tin and iron and rust and splintered wood, chipped pavement and weedy lots and junk heaps, sardine canneries or corrugated iron, honky tonks, restaurants and whore houses, and little crowded groceries, and laboratories and flophouses."

So begins John Steinbeck's Cannery Row, written in the 1940s. Mr. Steinbeck would not recognize Cannery Row today. The only "stink" is from the Monterey Bay Aquarium's exotic sealife. Steinbeck's "little crowded grocery stores" are still crowded but now sell bubble tea, Ghirardelli chocolate, frozen yogurt, and jellybellies.


1940s Cannery Row



Monterey Bay Aquarium, formerly sardine factory







I feel like a curmugeon: old things are better, new things lack authenticity. Another instance of progress nudging original character out of the way and misplacing soul in the process. We stopped for a photo-op, had a cuppa Joe, dodged a few strollers (human and wheeled), and headed back to Santa Cruz for my birthday dinner.

Bob and John Steinbeck







We spent two days of Bob's meal per diem for dinner at the Paradise Beach Grill in Capitola. A strange chop salad garnished with rubbery fried onions for starters, grilled skirt steak with mature green beans and fingerling potatoes for me, and "Sweet & Spicy" roasted salmon for Bob. Service was quick and efficient, (I do wish, though, that servers would not ask me, "Are you still working on that?" It makes me feel like a field hand). We left to incoming banks of fog that had followed us from Monterey and were home in time to watch Sunday Night Football. Oh, the joys of a regular life.







Here's a recipe for cioppino that I've polished and adjusted over the years. 

Cioppino

• Olive oil
• 1 onion—diced
• 1 bulb fennel—thinly sliced
• Reserve feathery fennel leaves for garnish
• 1 Tbs. minced garlic
• 2 tsp. fennel seeds
• 1/2 tsp. red chile flakes
• 1 tsp. dried oregano
• 1 tsp. dried basil
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 can diced in juice tomatoes
• 1/2 small can tomato sauce
• 2 cups chicken broth
• 1 cup fish stock or 1 small bottle clam juice
• 1 Tbs. minced anchovy
• 1/2-2 lbs. firm fish—snapper, cod, halibut, perch cut into pieces
• 1/2 lb. peeled shrimp
• 1/2-1 lb. clams, mussels or combination
  
  Heat olive oil in large pot, then saute onion, garlic, fennel, herbs, and chile flakes over medium low heat for 3-5 minutes. Add tomatoes and cook down for 5 minutes, then add tomato sauce, and chicken broth. Season with salt and pepper to taste and simmer for 30 minutes.
  
  Add clam juice, anchovy, fish, shrimp, and shellfish. Simmer covered 5-10 minutes or until fish is firm. Garnish with Parmesan cheese and fennel leaves.