
Neighborhood Favorite: Naija Cuisine
Sacramento’s only Nigerian restaurant gets a boost from TikTok
Fufu is a West African staple food made from boiled, pounded
cassava or other starches, and it’s trending on TikTok.

Silver Linings
The pandemic has crushed most of the tourism industry, but some businesses have defied the odds
While many small and not-so-small businesses were roiled, some
have seen a windfall with people desperate to hop in their cars
and do something, anything, besides cook another dinner at home
and watch more Netflix.

Hooked on Hot Chicken
A confluence of food-business trends is behind Sacramento’s fried chicken fad
Sacramento has been invaded by Nashville-style hot chicken.

Flour Power
Long-term wheat research undertaken by UC Davis combats food insecurity
A 20-year study led by a UC Davis scientist and his
colleague at the University of Haifa in Israel was
recently recognized by the U.S.-Israel Binational Agricultural
Research and Development Fund.

Neighborhood Favorite: South Area Market
Neighborhood Favorite is a new monthly web column that profiles
independent restaurants around the Capital Region to showcase the
diversity and resilience of our local food entrepreneurs. In the
first installment, we visit one of Sacramento’s longest-standing
Lao restaurants.

Taste of Normalcy
Placer County’s mandarin orange growers are having another bountiful season
As farmers and event organizers adapt to climate change and the
ongoing spread of the pandemic, mandarin oranges have offered a
bright taste of normalcy during grim times.

Businesses on the Brink
What do basketball, ballet and parties have in common? All 3 live-event industries are in trouble
As pandemic shutdowns intensify, more than a third of jobs in three California industries that rely on events — sports, performing arts and catering — have already disappeared. And they’ve been slower to recover than the state workforce as a whole.

Promise for New Proteins
Advancements in the alternative-protein space ignite in the Sacramento area
In September, UC Davis was awarded the first federal funding
given to a university to research cultivated meat, positioning
the Capital Region to serve as a hub of the advancing
technology.

Brand of Brothers
Jonathan and Matthew Burgess are rebuilding a family legacy — and helping other food entrepreneurs start their own
As they talk up their brands from Cambridge to Nashville, the
brothers are working to build generational wealth for their
families — and to reclaim the value that might once have been
associated with the Burgess name.

Startup of the Month: Unfold
Breeding seeds for vertical farms
The future of vertical farming begins on the genetic level. That’s the philosophy of Unfold, a Sacramento-based startup focused on innovating fruit and vegetable seeds to better serve indoor growing facilities.