Best Sacramento-area restaurant meals I ate in February | Food reporter’s notebook
Creative doughnuts topped with sugary treats. Heaping Philadelphia cheesesteaks from a North Highlands sandwich shop. Chewy Salvadoran pupusas in a south Sacramento strip mall. Coffee-braised short ribs at downtown bistro.
These were the best meals that I, The Sacramento Bee’s food and drink writer, ate in February 2025.
Each review was first published in my free weekly newsletter on Sacramento-area food and drink happenings. To sign up, visit https://www.sacbee.com/newsletters?newsletter=sacramento_food_drink_newsletter.
BAD Bakers
In 12 years, BAD Bakers has grown from a single doughnut shop to five capital region locations, with a sixth to come in Woodland and a Southern California outlier in Orange County. While Kate and Vincent Tiuseco’s ever-evolving doughnuts come with cereal toppings, fruity centers and side syringes of syrup, other baked goods quietly showcase Filipino and American tried-and-true favorites.
Bakers at each location mix up batters, load into hoppers and fry doughnuts ($2.25-$3.75 apiece, or $38 for an assorted dozen) every morning, from chocolate old-fashioneds and maple crullers to Puppy Chow (a cronut topped with peanut butter icing, Muddy Buddies and a chocolate drizzle). My favorite of a half-dozen was the Love You Berry Much, which piled powdered sugar, chopped strawberries and white buttercream atop a pink, strawberry-flavored ring.
Those topping-laden creations can be difficult to cut, as I learned in The Bee’s newsroom kitchen. If sharing with a large group, I recommend a box of Staxx ($9.75/15 pieces up to $39/60 pieces), BAD Bakers’ name for señorita bread. The oblong Filipino twists with buttery, sugary middles are easy to wolf down, especially when hot, and ube-dyed purple versions are available on Friday and Saturday for a tad more.
Lone Star State transplants missing kolaches ($3.75) can find the soft, savory Czech-Texan pastries at BAD Bakers (they’re technically klobasnek, but “kolaches” has become an all-encompassing term). While some versions are stuffed with jalapeños and cream cheese or extra-lean ham, the classic features a hot dog between two rivers of American cheese and a crusty skirt on top.
Address: Locations in Sacramento (1140 Exposition Blvd.), North Natomas (2101 Natomas Crossing Drive), Elk Grove (8403 Elk Grove Blvd.), Roseville (1420 E. Roseville Parkway) and Folsom (195 Placerville Road)
Hours: 7 a.m.-7 p.m. daily at most locations. Roseville location opens at 6 a.m. during the week and opens at 8 a.m. on Sunday, along with the Folsom store.
Phone: 916-571-2118 (Sacramento); 916-900-4788 (North Natomas); 916-647-9151 (Elk Grove); 916-883-2253 (Roseville); 916-790-8042 (Folsom)
Website: badbakers.com
Drinks: Bottled teas, juices and coffee drinks
Vegetarian options: Most items are vegetarian, a few are vegan and mochi doughnuts are gluten-free.
Noise level: The small stores can feel bustling during a rush, but aren’t artificially loud
Outdoor seating: None, nor inside
Phat Jerry’s Phillies
Still celebrating the Philadelphia Eagles’ Super Bowl win? Phat Jerry’s Phillies is your place for the City of Brotherly Love’s famous sandwiches, albeit with 49ers scarves, paintings and signs on the walls of the North Highlands dive. You can also track down Phat Jerry’s food truck at local breweries, where it stays well into dinner time.
Hesitate when ordering, and Jerry Mogannam will pounce. You want the super Philly ($13), he’ll tell you, a 10-inch cheesesteak with 50% more cheese and meat than the original ($9 for a seven-inch, $11 for a 10-inch and $16 for a footlong). “Trust me, I’m fat,” he’ll say.
He’s not wrong — about the cheesesteak, at least. Chopped top sirloin or broasted chicken spill onto the red plastic basket’s yellow paper, while the sauteed onions and hot or sweet peppers stick a bit more to the layer of melted American cheese. The bun, a soft hoagie roll, is toasted on one side to offer a bit more crunch and structural support.
You can add bacon, garlic or spinach for another dollar apiece, but most options simply supplement the original. The pizza deluxe ($10/seven-inch, $12/10-inch and $17/footlong) adds a bit more with its mushrooms, provolone and surprisingly spicy tomato sauce, resulting in a sandwich that’s the love child of a meatball sub and a cheesesteak.
Address: 4332 Watt Ave., Suite 30, North Highlands
Hours: 10 a.m.-5:45 p.m. Monday-Friday; 11 a.m.-3:30 p.m. Saturday; closed Sunday
Phone: 916-487-4677
Website: phatjerrysphillies.com
Drinks: Sodas and bottled teas
Vegetarian options: A loaded veggie sandwich with spinach, mushrooms, grilled onions and peppers plus side salads, fries, baklava, cookies and chips.
Noise level: Somewhat quiet
Outdoor seating: None
Pupuseria La Familiar
Colorful paper lanterns, Dodgers paraphernalia and a print of Frida Kahlo decorate Pupuseria La Familiar, Ruben Rugerio and Elva Polanco’s Salvadoran-Mexican restaurant in south Sacramento. Located next to a liquor store in a Florin Road strip mall, it’s short of frills but long on charm — and hours.
Pupuseria La Familiar is open for huevos rancheros breakfasts through chicken fajita dinners, plus catering gigs off-site. Customers order at the orange counter before settling in at one of the five tables, soon to be joined by a complimentary plate of tortilla chips, beans and salsa.
The 17 varieties of pupusas ($4-$5 depending on filling) are made with dense, chewy masa and grilled on a flat-top until their cheesy interior liquefies. My favorite was the nopales, studded with slippery cactus meat and served with red salsa and the ubiquitous Salvadoran pickled slaw curtido.
Pupuseria La Familiar also has seven soup season-appropriate options, starting with caldo de res ($16). Purple-tinted beef shanks stood out from the surrounding cabbage, potatoes, carrots and zucchini in the Mexican soup’s pleasantly vegetal broth.
The plato de carne asada Salvadoreña ($19) combination plate is the rare Pupuseria La Familiar dish accompanied by more than plastic cutlery. A steak knife slices through a thin, marinated strip of beef, plated alongside rice, refried beans, a salad, a slab of queso fresco and a snarled swirl of tangy chorizo.
Address: 8164 Florin Road, Suite D, Sacramento
Hours: 9 a.m.-8 p.m. Monday-Thursday; 8 a.m.-8 p.m. Friday-Sunday
Phone: 916-386-0982
Website: pupuseria-lafamiliar.com
Drinks: Sodas, Mexican beers and aguas frescas
Vegetarian options: Pupusa fillings including spinach, cactus, mushrooms and potatoes, along with a few larger plates.
Noise level: Loud
Outdoor seating: None
TableVine
Tucked away under an apartment building just south of the state Capitol, TableVine is equal parts cozy and upscale intimate, a worthy Valentine’s Day option in downtown Sacramento. Dan Sneed’s wine country-inspired bistro deploys stacks of corks as decor and has bottles from $30 (a merlot from Skyfall in Eastern Washington) to $4,000 (a 2000 First Growth Bordeaux from Chateau Lafite Rothschild).
Sneed was Ella Dining Room & Bar’s opening general manager and owned Garden Highway restaurant Pearl on the River (now closed) before opening TableVine in 2016. It’s only advertised as open for an hour and a half during lunch and dinner, but those times actually refer to the final seating.
TableVine’s fries ($10), of all things, get one of my heartiest endorsements. Fried twice, liberally dusted with salt and pepper and served with a ramekin of garlic aioli, a plate of these golden-brown beauties can easily sate three or four people as a starter.
Much of TableVine’s menu turns over seasonally, and the winter selections tend to be heavier options such as braised beef short ribs ($29). Chef Kenneth Druley brines the meat overnight, then braises it for four hours in a mixture of guajillo chilis, coffee, mirepoix, red wine, tomatoes and honey. Plated with mashed potatoes, steamed broccoli and braised red cabbage, it’s a nicely complex centerpiece.
Address: 1501 14th St., Sacramento
Hours: Seatings offered 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. and 5:30-7 p.m. Monday-Friday and 5:30-7 p.m. Saturday; closed Sundays.
Phone: 916-942-9599
Website: tablevine.com
Drinks: There’s an espresso bar and house cocktails, but wine is the main focus, with options at all price points.
Vegetarian options: Current menu includes a heart of palm/walnut/orange salad, a Moroccan chickpea stew with basmati rice and a rich mushroom risotto with truffle oil.
Noise level: Quiet
Outdoor seating: Small patio