I am so glad to have Jeff and Joan Stanford, authors of Dining at the Ravens and owners of the Stanford Inn Eco Resort (a plant-based Inn!), on my blog today! The Stanfords moved to the north coast of California in 1980, when they discovered Mendocino. They converted a bare-bones motel into an American Automobile Association Four Diamond inn and eco-resort dedicated to living sustainably. Believing that personal transformation most easily begins in the kitchen, they opened The Ravens Restaurant, serving vegetarian food, and later made the menu completely plant-based. Knowing that they could not do it all, the Stanfords developed a model of a co-creative kitchen. At The Ravens they encourage everyone— from servers to bussers, cooks to dishwashers—to taste and suggest changes to a dish or offer completely new dishes.
Both Jeff and Joan are active in promoting healthy life choices and created the Mendocino Center for Living Well to offer classes including Creative Playshops and cooking, as well as experiences like wildlife river tours and mushroom foraging to both the community and the inn’s guests.
It was so fun sitting down with the Stanfords to ask them about their inspiration. Read on to get to know them.
You run the Stafford Inn, a historic farm, plant-based Inn, and eco-resort. What gave you the inspiration to start this business venture?
The inn began as a redwood lodge/motel, The Big River Lodge. We moved here with help from friends and family and the owners of Big River Lodge. We came from Carmel, where we had first experienced inn keeping.
Joan and I had chosen to live on the North American west coast—either in Canada or the United States. We had an opportunity to move to Carmel to help my parents with an “inflation hedge“—a small motel. They wanted us to manage and modernize it. I am an anthropologist and had just presented my thesis and Joan was a youth worker. We jumped on the opportunity as a stepping stone for finding jobs in our fields on the west coast.
We had been looking for a way to live and work in a rural area in an integrated way, much like small farming communities in the Midwest where we were from. The desire to live what we believed to be more holistically grew from two related activities—the practice of active meditation and my research as an anthropologist into the human potential movement, shamanism and neo-shamanism (my adviser’s primary interest).
We discovered that innkeeping could provide an opportunity to live in a more integrated manner. We could live and work on the property; raise our children; provide a home for others (now developed into defined internship programs); conduct a business from a “place of mindfulness“—not the mindfulness that has been popularized, but a deep and thoughtful, active meditation. An aside—for many practices thought is often considered a impediment to being in the present moment. It is our relationship to thought that is the impediment.
This is a vague answer but it is essential to understand that we have to look at our lives with brutal honesty. Here, that led us to creating a vegan inn that has cost guests. An example: We love animals. From the very first day of innkeeping, we accepted pets—and not just dogs, but also cats, iguanas, birds, pigs, and maybe others. We can’t eat them—any of them. We had been eating meat, and when the dichotomy became clear, there was no choice. We quit eating animals. However, some guests usually with a dog in tow don’t want to know, don’t want to change, and become angry at us because of their cognitive distress. In other areas, running a vegan inn just adds to costs—the products we use to clean rooms are not tested on animals, and they do not harm the environment; we source fair-trade, organic food rather than commercial.
About the historic farm aspect of the Inn, the Inn is on property that was called the China Gardens before the turn of the last century. These gardens provided produce for loggers and were formed in defined plots, each managed by Chinese immigrants who lived across Big River. This farming seems to have been abandoned by 1911. We began farming here in 1985, adjacent to a pond that is fed by the same spring that provided water to the Chinese farmers.
What is your goal and mission with the Inn?
Providing guests with an experience rather than just an overnight stay. We want them to leave here enlivened, recharged, and excited to go home to their regular life with an ability to see with fresh eyes.
We also want to demonstrate through the Inn that living mindfully is joyful. One doesn’t need to be off the grid in a hay bale or rammed earth cabin, but can be at a highly rated resort. That being in nature is joyful and healthful. That vegan is easy.
We often hear, “if I could eat this way, I would be vegan.” We look at statements such as this as opportunities.
What sort of health and wellness services do you offer at the Inn?
Yoga, Tai Chi, nutrition classes, cooking classes, gardening classes, creativity workshops, meditation classes, Chinese medicine, acupuncture, massage in the forest with a full menu of spa treatments, canoeing, kayaking, bicycling, internship programs, nature tours such as mushroom/forest; tidal pools; biolumenscent algae tours; wildlife tours.
Tell us a bit about your plant-based nutrition philosophy at the Inn.
Our philosophy regarding food is evolving, as are we. Originally, we sought to produce cuisine that simply rivaled the finest restaurants in the country. Then we decided to go far beyond with the wellbeing of our guests our goal. The underlying philosophy is that the foods that early humans and their biome evolved with are the healthiest for modern humans (and the environment). And we are taking that to the dining room with cuisines that are no longer designed to replace some animal-based dishes.
Do you find that you attract more than just plant-based eaters to the Inn?
We don’t attract that many plant-based guests to the Inn; the vast majority of our guests are neither vegan nor vegetarian. Wandering through the dining room, my guess is that perhaps, on average, one or one couple person a weekend is vegan. And that person or couple may not be staying with us. We are happy when a guest approaches, telling us that he or she is vegan and sought us out, noting that they are having a wonderful time not having to worry about food.
Tell us about your own personal wellness lifestyle?
We walk to work since we live on the property, eat as we teach, practice as we preach, workout, talk to our kids, walk the dogs, clean up the cats’ litter box, read journals (Joan reads novels, too), counsel (we work with people that have nothing to do with the property), and develop new dishes for the restaurant. We changed the entire menu last year and are continuing changes now. We could write, “repeat”: we have approached innkeeping and personal wellness in the same way throughout they years.
Do you have any tips for those who want to dive into a plant-based diet, but they don’t know where to start?
Small steps. It is hard for many people to make wholesale changes. And that’s not bad. Make the commitment and develop an approach that consists of small steps. We have help for that. First, for self-help, Sid Garza-Hillman’s, Approaching the Natural: A Health Manifesto. Sid is both director of the Stanford Inn’s wellness center and a nutritionist. His approach to wellness is to make wellness approachable and fun. This book is short, doable, and a kick. Second, come to the Inn!
Would you mind sharing a favorite plant-based recipe that you prepare for your guests?
Joan’s favorite is our breakfast enchilada, which provides energy for her busy mornings overseeing the check-outs, guest services and guests, and bookkeeping.
This is a relatively simple dish made up of organic corn tortillas steeped in Chipotle Sauce, rolled and filled with quinoa (the staple of the Incans) and steamed spinach, and topped with Salsa Cruda. Steamed spinach offers much of the same consistency as melted cheese.
Ingredients
Scale
2 cups Chipotle Sauce
4 organic corn tortillas
1 cup warm, cooked quinoa
2 cups fresh spinach, steamed
1/2 cup Salsa Cruda
Chipotle Sauce
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 small yellow onion, diced
1/2 tablespoon chopped garlic
2 teaspoons finely ground dried chipotle peppers
1 tablespoon dried oregano
1/2 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 (14.5-ounce) can organic diced tomatoes
1/2 tablespoon salt
3/4 cup water
Salsa Cruda
3 pounds Roma or saladette tomatoes, diced
1 medium red onion, diced small
3/4 bunch (about 3 ounces) cilantro, chopped
1/2 jalapeno pepper, seeded and diced
1 tablespoon salt
Juice of 2 limes
Instructions
Enchiladas:
Bring Chipotle Sauce close to a boil in a skillet. Place tortillas one at time into Chipotle Sauce, turning to coat completely. Leave in skillet until soaked, about 3 minutes.
Remove tortillas and lay flat on a plate. Place 4 tablespoons of quinoa along the center of each tortilla, followed by a spinach layer. Create a roll by folding one side of the tortilla over the spinach and quinoa, then rolling over the other side to form a flap.
Place 2 filled tortillas side by side on a plate. If the tortillas are not “saucy” enough, sparingly spoon on a small amount of additional Chipotle Sauce.
Finish the enchiladas by topping with Salsa Cruda (about a 1/4 cup over 2 enchiladas).
Chipotle Sauce:
In a medium stockpot, heat the olive oil over medium heat, add the onion, and sauté until translucent, then add the garlic, sautéing for 2–3 additional minutes.
Add the chipotle peppers, oregano, sugar, and pepper. Combine well and continue to sauté another 2 minutes.
Add tomatoes, salt, and water. Simmer over medium-low heat for 20 minutes.
Lightly blend the mixture with a hand mixer or in a blender. Add more salt to taste.
Salsa Cruda:
Combine all ingredients in a large mixing bowl and mix together.
Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator until ready to use.
