Very few chefs have shaped Napa Valley dining quite like Cindy Pawlcyn. Over a career spanning more than four decades, the chef and restaurateur behind Mustards Grill, Cindy’s Backstreet Kitchen and numerous other Bay Area restaurants has helped define what wine country cuisine is today.
Pawlcyn joins Wine Spectator Napa Bureau Chief MaryAnn Worobiec to discuss her Midwestern upbringing, launching a catering business at age 13, learning the restaurant business in Chicago and eventually helping put Napa Valley dining on the culinary map. She shares the origins of iconic dishes like Mustards’ Mongolian pork chop, paper-thin onion rings and towering lemon-lime tart.
“I wanted a place you can come in in jeans and a T-shirt,” says Pawlcyn of Mustards Grill. “A lot of guys come in with their sample bottles of wine you know and they’re tasting things. I just wanted a place, like a neighborhood joint…we needed something with a burger or a really nice dinner for a celebration.”
Host James Molesworth also talks with Wine Spectator’s senior editor for news, Mitch Frank, to take a closer look at Napa tourism, how wineries are evolving the tasting room experience and the upcoming 50th anniversary of the historic 1976 Judgment of Paris tasting.
And don’t forget, there’s always more free content at WineSpectator.com.
A podcast from Wine Spectator
Marvin R. Shanken, Editor and Publisher
Host: James Molesworth
Guests: Cindy Pawlcyn, Mitch Frank, MaryAnn Worobiec
Head Producer: Gabriela Saldivia
Assistant Producer: Elizabeth Redmayne-Titley