A step up from TV dinner: North Highlands-based business ships Sacramento restaurant food
People across the western United States can enjoy gumbo from Del Paso Heights soul food star Tori’s Place, beef sukiyaki udon from Binchoyaki in Southside Park or lamb curry over rice from Sacramento-area chain India Oven.
How? Cräveble.
The two-year-old business in North Highlands orders specific dishes in bulk from locally-owned restaurants, blast-chills them, then ships them to individual customers in seven Western states.
Cräveble is not really designed for Sacramento-area residents to order Sacramento-area dishes the way they would through DoorDash or Uber Eats, founder Darren McAdams said. McAdams previously founded a local competitor to those businesses, FoodJets, which was acquired by Raley’s in 2021.
Instead, Cräveble was conceived as a giftable way to enjoy “tastes of the nation” from well-regarded restaurant scenes. Dishes need only three minutes or less in the microwave before they can be served, and all can be for later use.
All currently affiliated restaurants are in greater Sacramento or the Bay Area, but Cräveble will begin carrying Los Angeles restaurants’ food in January, followed by choices from Seattle and Dallas. Customers must order a minimum of six dishes per box, and the $9.95 shipping is waived if they order eight or more.
Cräveble plans to open a Midwest warehouse in about a year to serve customers in that region and on the East Coast. Once that happens, it will expand to include restaurants in New York City, New Orleans, Chicago, Miami and Kansas City. The goal is eventually to offer food from 150 restaurants in 15 different markets, McAdams said.
“You can have a meal from New York, from LA, from Miami, Seattle in one box in your fridge from a hidden gem, if you will, type restaurant from those cities,” McAdams said. “The overall vision for the company is to provide local restaurants from neighborhoods not near you to the nation.”
Participating area restaurants, catering companies, food trucks and bakeries include:
Sacramento: Sampino’s Towne Foods, Maydoon, Grateful Bread Co., Bennett’s American Cooking, Nola’s Kitchen, Tori’s Place, Delta Hand Pies, Gondo Fusion, Koja Kitchen, Cilantro’s Mexican Kitchen, Burgess Brothers BBQ, Binchoyaki, Asian N’ Cajun, Gordito Burrito, Anthony’s Italian Cuisine and For the Love of Malta.
Sacramento County: Better Than Brittle (Gold River), Bear West BBQ & Soul Food (North Highlands), Felipe’s Mexican Restaurant (Citrus Heights), My Healing Chef and Fat Mike’s Pizza (Elk Grove).
Placer County: La Fornaretta and Newcastle Produce (Newcastle), Wally’s Cafe (Rocklin), Kazoku Teriyaki & More, Gursha Ethiopian Kitchen and My Thai Kitchen (Roseville), Crumb Pies (Lincoln), Divine Desserts by Aguirre (Loomis).
Yolo County: Vientiane Restaurant (West Sacramento).
El Dorado County: Lovett Catering (El Dorado Hills).
Multiple locations: India Oven, Pita Pit, Ikeda’s and Falafel Corner.
What I’m Eating
Los Nopales Carniceria & Taqueria’s name is only half true: there’s no meat market attached to the hole-in-the-wall Mexican restaurant, and you won’t find much in the way of nopales (cactuses) either.
Michoacán natives Flora Cortez and Arturo Martines-Alvarez opened Los Nopales in 2016 between a liquor store and a hair salon on Fulton Avenue in Arden Arcade. It’s a place for handmade tamales ($2.50-$2.89) and velvety refried beans served on paper plates, as well as ice cream sundaes and fruit cups.
Few if any other Sacramento-area restaurants make camarones a la Huichol ($17.89), a seafood dish native to the coastal Mexican state of Nayarit. The red marinade’s chile-lime flavor washed over the medley of shrimp, blackened onions and peppers, all served over white rice.
A veritable vat of bright red pozole ($15) stood out for its tangy flavor as much as its toothsome hominy and giant chunks of fatty pork. Red was also the color of the pambazo ($5.89 for one, or $9.99 for two), a small sandwich filled with chorizo and (mostly) potatoes on bread that had been dipped and fried in a guajillo chile sauce.
Los Nopales Carniceria &Taqueria
Address: 3106 Fulton Ave., Sacramento.
Hours: 10 a.m.-11 p.m., seven days a week.
Phone number: (916) 489-3592.
Website: www.instagram.com/los_nopales_carniceria/
Drinks: Beer, sodas and aguas frescas.
Vegetarian options: Tamales, chiles rellenos, quesadillas and chilaquiles.
Noise level: Loud.
Openings & Closings
▪ Yi Long Dumpling is now open at 1500 W. El Camino Ave., Suite 8 in South Natomas. The Chinese restaurant specializes in xiaolongbao (soup dumplings), pan-fried dumplings with a crispy skirt and Taiwanese beef rolls.
▪ Curries & Biryanis opened Monday at 157 Iron Point Road in Folsom, according to a Facebook announcement. An Indian lunch buffet is supplemented by à la carte egg masala, kadai shrimp and pongal (basmati rice and lentils cooked in milk) at the restaurant across from Folsom Premium Outlets.
▪ Takumi Izakaya will close for good on Saturday, the Japanese restaurant in downtown Sacramento announced on Instagram. Opened in 2016 at 826 J St., it served sushi, ramen and kitchen dishes such as oyster mushroom carpaccio and uni-topped bone marrow.
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