San Diego Home and Garden Magazine – November 2009
by Phyllis Van Doren

Several years ago we were sitting in a tiki bar in Tahiti, in the old Bali Hai Hotel, and I thought, every man should have a tiki bar. So I came home and made one. Thus Jim Rock reminisces on the beginning inspiration for the remodel of the 1920s Bankers Hill home where he and his wife, Restaurateur Ingrid Croce, love to entertain.

We were in the house several years before we decided to remodel but since falling in love with the people and flavors of Tahiti, we have made about 14 trips, traveling there once or twice each year. Though each visit brings home new enthusiasms and new decor for the house, in its current state it is the perfect canyon-side setting for a casual party dressed n the colors and recipes of fall.

Festivities all start in the tiki bar, of course, just inside the front door to the right. Rock, who already played the guitar, 10 years ago took up the study of the ukulele on a prewar Martin instrument, in perfect accord with the Arts & Crafts-meets-Polynesia setting of their home. You can’t beat live music to get any gathering warmed up and we found him strumming and singing as the appointed gathering time approached.

Tikis are Polynesian gods of wood or stone and the Croce/Rock home displays several collections, large and small. Two especially large figures with riveting eyes guard the bar. Guests start ringing the bell and welcoming flutes of Veuve Cliquot champagne are poured. A Golden Ahi Poke appetizer with taro chips, which is found on the menu at Croce’s Restaurant and Jazz Bar in downtown’s Gaslamp Quarter is served on the bar Rock made of a solid piece of purple heart. The bar is faced with authentic tapa cloth brought from Tahiti.

Beyond the bar, the compact show-stopping kitchen is visible with Croce in a form-fitting red Prada dress and stiletto heels darting in and out and peering into the oven to make sure the first course, Baked Bread and Onion Soup, is bubbling to perfection. Her red dress stands out against the perfect green tile of the kitchen counter and backsplash, a long story of desire, search and find. Croce, who studied to be a potter/ceramist at Rhode Island School of Design, had the desire for a green tile tht perfectly matched the foliage seen out the window. The beautiful handmade product was finally found, through Waterworks, and is a stunning foil for the mango wood cabinet door and drawer pulls hand-carved to order in Indonesia. In another example of Rock’s relentless search for admired craftspeople, these in turn were commissioned to match the Indonesian royal tapestry cabinet that stands in the kitchen instead of the usual kitchen shelving.

A very large shell chandelier hangs in a stairwell off the bar. It’s a real conversation piece tha turns out to be functional lighting. I looked at one of these for years in a hotel in Papeete, says Rock, and after a long search finally found the person who made them – Tavana – a toothless elderly man tattooed head to toe who also is a cosume maker for dance troups. Long story short, after many months of long-distance negotiations and mistakes, Rock and Croce went to Tahiti and collected the chandelier they had dreamed of and made arrangements to ship it to San Diego. Turns out Tavana also made a second different one as a gift. It now hangs above another stairway.

Back in the kitchen, we taste a succulent Gruyere Potato-au-Gratin just out of the oven and a mouthful of the Crispy Skin Salmon. Fall is in the air and coming to the table. As guests mingle, many of them Croce’s working family from the restaurant, they naturally migrate to the deck that surrounds the canyon side of the house and winds its way down three levels to a tennis court. A bar with more champagne and wine has been set up on the deck just outside the kitchen and dining room where fellow chef and friend Bernard Guillas, the voluble executive chef of the Marine Room, holds court. Though Croce loves to entertain at home, most of her meeting, greeting and perfecting dishes is done at her restaurant, a hands-on business for her and Rock. For this party, tables are set up in the garage where prep work takes place, with Croce’s executive chef, James Clark, at the helm.

One of the founders of San Diego’s restaurant week, Croce has expanded her support of the industry with her latest venture, ingrid’s list, a consortium of restaurants in several cities offering prix fixe, three-course bargains in fine dining. In addition to heading for her restaurant in the afternoon and evening, she is wearing her publishing hat. Her latest project, The Jim Croce Anthology: 40 Songs, 40 Stories, honors the memory of Croce’s late husband, singer/songwriter Jim Croce.

Fall and winter are my favorite times to entertain, says Croce, relaxed now and surveying her happy guests as the sun sets beyond the deck. I grew up in the East and we were very into Thanksgiving. Jim and I still are. It’s the time of year we particularly treasure when you renew your ties to family and friends.

Restaurateur Ingrid Croce has announced the launch of ingrid’s list (www.ingridslist.com), the only website that provides fine dining certificates for 3- course prix fixe meals for $30, $40 and $50 at exclusive establishments year round.

ingrid’s list was created for travelers, business people and families who enjoy fine dining but would prefer to do so without spending a lot of money. As a restaurateur, Chef and co-founder of one of the most successful Restaurant Weeks in the world, Ingrid Croce’s goal is to share her experience to help restaurants and hospitality communities get through these financially difficult times and beyond.

Ingrid has owned and operated Croce’s, one of the top fine dining restaurants in downtown San Diego, since 1985. She built it as a tribute to her late husband, singer-songwriter Jim Croce, who died in a plane crash in the early seventies while topping the charts with “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown,” “Time in a Bottle” and “You Don’t Mess Around with Jim.”

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