Determined not to repeat past mistakes, Vernon and Charlene ran New Sammy’s by themselves for the first few years: Charlene did all the cooking while Vernon waited tables. They toiled from nine in the morning to eleven at night, cutting back only during the theater’s winter off-season. Charlene worked through treatment for breast cancer, and Vernon waited tables after surgery for a detached retina. His doctor had reservations for the following evening, says Vernon: “I told him, ‘If I don’t get checked out of this hospital, you’re not getting dinner tomorrow!’ ”
Once the restaurant had built a following, they added waiters, and Charlene found an ideal prep cook in Heather Hoskins—someone who could meet her standards and stand her style.
“I’m really tough on people in that position,” Charlene admits. “I can’t help it, I just ride them because I want things done the right way.”
As tough as Charlene can be in the kitchen and bakery (New Sammy’s Cowboy Bakery provides bread made with wild yeast for a number of local markets), the more easygoing Vernon is equally precise in the dining room. Glasses line up, napkins are straight and pressed—but the two waiters who now work with him are informal and informative. “Customers know they’ve had good service when they leave here,” Vernon says, “but they can’t say exactly why.”
Where the New Boonville was light and spacious, New Sammy’s, which was built years ago as a gas station, is far more intimate (there are only six tables). But the food, say both Vernon and Charlene, is part of a continuum. “We’ve always been interested in organic food; that’s always been our concept,” says Vernon. “It just tastes better.” Indeed, the dishes on the menu during my visit—a blue cheese flan the consistency of a soft-boiled egg, beef short ribs falling off the bone into a gazpacho of garden-fresh vegetables—are extraordinary, on a par with L.A.’s Campanile, if not Chez Panisse. In summer, Charlene grills squid marinated with rosemary and layers it on garlic toast with sautéed bitter greens and green garlic mayonnaise. A slice of chicken liver terrine is placed on a pile of crumpled cress and giant purple orache that’s been grown on the property. “People will come in here and not know we’re connected to the Boonville Hotel and they’ll say, ‘This tastes a lot like that food we had fifteen years ago,’” says Vernon.
“It’s kind of depressing that my food hasn’t changed that much in all that time,” Charlene counters with a laugh. Giving me a tour of the restaurant’s young garden—three kinds of lettuce, herbs, onions, broccoli, leeks, cardoons, and beans (garbanzo, romano, cannellini, and green)—she reinforces the sense that this world is their refuge. “The most important thing about the restaurant is that we live here, on the property,” she says, walking around a giant fig tree, and pointing out plantings of apples, persimmons, quince, and at least five other fruit varieties. “Our son is home-schooled; everything we do is right here.” As in Boonville, where Charlene’s father regularly tended bar, New Sammy’s is also a family affair. Young Sammy washes dishes, and Charlene’s brother delivers bread.
In the kitchen that evening, Charlene covers the range the way Elvin Jones plays the drums: eight skillets going at once, all by herself, with flawless precision and timing. Vernon entertains the theatergoers in the front of the house, walking them through the menu—first courses from spring green salad to giant chive and goat cheese ravioli with smoked ham, sugar snap peas, and basil; main courses such as wild Columbia River sturgeon grilled and served with polenta in a saffroned shellfish broth with poached sea scallops and a ragout of a mile-long list of vegetables; three pages of teas, a list of around 2,500 wines. (In summer, Vernon was partial to Château Thivin Côte de Brouilly Beaujolais and Bandol rosés, Drappier Champagne, Bugey Cerdon, and J.J. Prüm’s Wehlener Sonnenuhr Kabinett ’89 and ’92.) The rest- room’s walls are a collage of wine labels, with little room for addition. “These are only wines that Charlene and I drank together,” Vernon says, pausing a beat. “We didn’t drink ’em all at once.”
A tour of New Sammy’s is like a travelogue of the Rollinses’ life. There is a satirical painting of the Tintin comic book character; there are photographs of les gardiens, the French cowboys that New Sammy’s salutes; but most importantly there are menus from restaurants that inspired the couple: Auberge du Beaucet, La Table du Comtat, and, of course, Chez Panisse.
Vernon is pushing 60, and Charlene is just a few years younger, but they feel like they’re at their stride. For Vernon especially, this squat wood building with its rainbow of pastels and an arrow of bulbs flickering like a movie marquee, as mysterious to the naked eye as any stop in an episode of The Twilight Zone, is an embodiment of their romance. “It’s love,” he rhapsodizes. “It’s just what it’s all about. It’s how to preserve love. You’ve got to find that one person in your life and you’ve got to make it work. It works for us because we have this joint venture, we built this thing together.”
Pinterest
