Our favorite stores for stocking up on gourmet food and wine include:

Summer Thyme’s offers a box lunch with any sandwich and deli salad, a cookie and cold drink for $9.95. The deli makes all of its menu items on site, often using fresh, local produce. It also provides patio dining, as wel l as a new store at BookTown in downtown Grass Valley.

Newcastle Produce, just two minutes off of I- 80 in Newcastle, is a “one- stop” shop for a gourmet picnic. It offers a deli, fresh fruits and vegetables and local wines.

BackPorch Market has a deli but also sells three “Picnics for Two”: The “Yuba,” the “Tuscan” and the “Parisienne.” They are complete picnics in a box, with plates and napkins. Just add a cold drink or a bottle of wine from the store’ s varied, affordable selection, and you’re off to the wilderness.

Our favorite picnic spots include:

Auburn State Recreation Area
The 20-mile long park on two forks of the American River is situated south of I- 80, stretching from Auburn to Colfax. The main access is from Auburn, either on Hwy. 49 or the Auburn-Foresthill Rd.
530- 885-4527 and free movies on Wednesdays. 530-583- 3348

Empire Mine State Historic Park
Tours of historic facility, and picnic area outside grounds.
10791 E. Empire St., Grass Valley
530-273-8522

Scott’s Flat Lake
Swimming, fishing, hiking, beach, playground and picnicking.
23333 Scotts Flat Rd., Nevada City
530-265-5302

South Yuba River State Park
Swimming, fishing, hiking, picnicking and a nature museum.
17660 Pleasant Valley Rd., Penn Valley
530-432-2546

Endurance cyclists get their energy from healthy eating: grains, legumes, fresh fruits and vegetables, fish and meat — but not too much. They eat plenty of carbohydrate-rich food, such as pasta, bread and rice.

The best foods for cyclists are “whole foods” — ones that are natural and unrefined. Here are some examples and where you can get them:

BackPorch Market: For a natural “carbo load,” the fine food store, located along the Amgen bike route in Grass Valley, offers items including home-made meatballs, which can go on top of the store’s fresh pasta and sauces.

BriarPatch Market: The store offers an extensive selection of bulk foods, including staples-grains, beans and more. BriarPatch also carries organic and natural meats and poultry. Seafood is sustainably farmed. It carries local eggs seasonally, always cage-free.

Caroline’s Coffee Roasters: Cyclist often is synonymous with “java junkie.” Caroline’s has been roasting and selling coffee since 1988. All fair-trade coffees guarantee that the farmer gets a a fair wage for the green coffee. Their coffee is all organic too.

Nevada City Seafood: This fresh-fish store has now opened a second location at 115 South Pine St. in downtown Nevada City. Owner Eric Jewell sends his custom refrigerated truck to San Francisco four times a week to bring fresh seafood back to the Foothills.

Nevada County Free Range Beef: Owner Jim Gates’ grass-fed beef is available year-round at the BriarPatch and Diego’s Restaurant in Grass Valley, also along the Amgen bike route. It also is available as “freezer beef” by the quarter, half or whole.

Bike racer ice cream
Treats ice cream at 110 York St. in Nevada City plans to name some of its flavors after the Tour of California bike race.

Examples include Paceline Praline, King of the Mountain Mint Chip and Sprinters Strawberry Sorbet. The flavors will be made by owner Bob Wright using local organic ingredients whenever possible.

The Truffle Shop at the New York Hotel Shops at 408 Broad Street will offer its famous Ice Cappuccino to race-goers.

(photo credit: Lisa Redfern)

Enter Bryan Frost and Debra Hynson, who opened the Back Porch Market in Grass Valley three years ago. This pair of gourmands is bringing artisan cheeses, fresh pasta, a charcuterie, exceptional wines and gourmet take-home meals to the foothills.

The Back Porch is the one of the foothill’s most complete speciality food and wine markets and kitchens, rivaling the best big-city speciality delis.
“We have things for cooks, as well as for people who don’t like to cook,” as Brian puts it.

You can find saffron, serrano ham from Spain, Israeli couscous, Italian tomatoes, French mustards, black truffle oil and fresh semolina pasta, among other specialty items.

Asian cooking items include hoisin, plum and jade peanut sauces.
The store sells more than 40 kinds of artisan cheeses, from France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Australia and Switzerland, as well as U.S. producers such as Cowgirl, Cypress Grove and others.

Best of all: You can sample any cheese before buying it. The store also keeps a box of index cards for customers—a “cheese tracker”—where you can jot down your favorites, just in case you forget the name for next time.

The charcuterie includes Prosciutto di Parma, Molinari and Fra’mani Salume, Spanish Chorizo, Pancetta and Diestel Farms smoked turkey breast.

The store’s taste-tested wines come from the United States, France, Italy, Spain, Australia and South America. “We always search out bargains that satisfy and don’t drain the bank,” is the store’s motto.

The Back Porch’s take-home meals are delicious: examples that change daily include pork tenderloin with mission figs and balsamic, Tri-tip and salmon filet .

The store offers comfort food, too: lasagnas, chicken pot pie, pizza dough and meatballs.

It’s reasonable, too. The big home-made meatballs—which can go on top of with the store’s fresh pasta and sauces—cost $1.50 each.

The food is cooked in a kitchen that Debra and Bryan built from scratch and was meant to be visible from throughout the store.

Customers appreciate the open design. “It’s sort of like hanging around the kitchen at a dinner party,” Debra says.

The couple helped launch the Back Porch at the Nevada County Growers
Market—an increasingly common practice for the area’s speciality food merchants.

People were gobbling up more than 60 pounds of their fresh pasta every Saturday.

For their storefront, Brian and Debra settled on a handsome building on Colfax Avenue in Grass Valley, whose benefits include parking and a bright window display that is updated regularly.
The breadth of the store’s selection comes from the couple’s own passion for food, as well as their customer’s suggestions.

“Lots of people who go on vacation visit art galleries,” says Debra. “We check out food, wine and cheese shops.”