A Napa Valley landmark and classic, enjoy $100 Mustards Grill Gift Card

Mustards Grill was named for the wild mustard flowers that bloom in the vineyards every spring, which help to nourish the soil. Mustard is an integral part of Napa Valley's wine growing diversity, makes for one heck of a condiment, and doesn't look too shabby in the springtime either!

Mustards Grill has been of feeding Napa Valley and its visitors since 1983, and is still the hub of the food and wine community, where winemakers lunch with truckers and chefs come to dine on their night off. Alternately known as the fancy rib joint with way too many wines, Mustards is still the place to go for a heaping plate of honest American fare with worldly sophistication, washed down with a glass of the valley's finest.

Menus and more at mustardsgrill.com.

Mustards Grill Napa Valley Cookbook, Hardcover – by Cindy Pawlcyn (Author), Brigid Callinan (Author), Laurie Smith (Photographer)

Mustards Grill is an institution in the wine country -- the friendly restaurant where locals first started going for a full plate of inventive, delicious food and a glass of Napa's finest. Chef-owner Cindy Pawlcyn, founding chef of San Francisco's original Fog City Diner, put down her roots in Napa over 15 years ago, and ever since then, Mustards has been affectionately known as the fancy rib joint with way, way too many wines. This cookbook is full of the best, most enduring recipes from Mustards Grill -- ones people consistently ask for and ones to enhance any home cook’s experience in the kitchen.

"Mustards is universally loved by local residents and tourists alike for its smoky, tender, spicy baby back ribs; cornmeal-coated fried green tomatoes; tasty Asian-marinated flank steak; Chinese chicken noodle salad; and, of course, Mustards' always-crisp tangle of deep-fried onion threads. The enduring vitality of this place comes from the fact [that Cindy Pawlcyn] put all the dishes she loved on the menu: country dishes transformed by her sprightly offbeat style and sparkle."
—FOOD LOVER'S GUIDE TO SAN FRANCISCO

Author + Founder Cindy Pawlcyn

One of my earliest memories is of sitting in the backyard garden in Minneapolis with a salt shaker while my dad picked perfectly ripe tomatoes hot off the vine. I can still taste the fresh, warm red flesh seasoned with a sprinkling of salt...

My passion for seasonal, farm-fresh flavors has never waned. Through all those years in school, college, training in France, stints in other chefs’ kitchens, a transplanting in the West, and all the sweat and tears of running my own restaurants – I'm still just a kid in a tomato patch.

For the past 30 years, I've cultivated gardens and restaurants in California's San Francisco Bay Area, setting deep roots in Napa Valley with Mustards Grill, Cindy’s Backstreet Kitchen and my newest sweetheart, Brassica. Helping people create unforgettable celebrations is a natural (and joyful) extension of what we do, and serving as Culinary Partner for the Monterey Bay Aquarium (and their important Seafood Watch program) is a very special honor.

Thanks to the wonderful teams at my restaurants, I've also been able to nurture the part of me that seeks out distant corners of the world, bringing home flavors at once exotic and familiar. I've managed to write five cookbooks - Mustards Grill Napa Valley Cookbook, Fog City Diner, Big Small Plates, Cindy Pawlcyn’s Appetizers, and Cindy’s Supper Club: Meals from Around the World to Share with Family and Friends - bring the flavors I love to kitchens far and wide.

Each endeavor is distinctly different, and I love them all equally. Just like kids.

Learn more at cindypawlcyn.com.