Found Treasure: Sweet Reba’s and the ‘Jelly D’

May 20, 2022 – Soon a rockslide of reggae-rockers, hip-hop stars and peaceful pilgrims will perform in Monterey at the California Roots Music and Arts Festival over Memorial Day weekend.

For my calories, the top of the lineup involves food, namely Sweet Reba’s and Casas de Humo, along with several other local vendors.

Arriving performers like Ice Cube, Sean Paul, Sublime with Rome, Slightly Stoopid and Damian Marley are great acts, but at some point you gotta eat. 

Seaside’s Amy Sheehan is operations manager for Cali Roots parent company, Good Vibez, which she runs with her husband Dan. She recruited Reba Wilson of Sweet Reba’s Bakery in Carmel for the festival after tapping her talents for family birthday cakes. 

“The first year she had a booth, she was so overwhelmed she said, ‘I’m never doing this again,’” Sheehan remembers. “Now she’s caught the crazy festival bug with us.”

Wilson laughs at the recollection. “I was definitely thinking, ‘This is crazy, we can’t do this,’ but by the time we’re packing up after three days, I’m already saying, ‘We can do this better and that better,’” she says. “I love the atmosphere.” 

For 2022’s installment, she’s prepping favorites like triple-chocolate brownies and oatmeal cookie cream sandwiches.

Back at the day job, Wilson can boast a mean sweetie game—featuring ever-changing cupcakes, snickerdoodles, cinnamon donut muffins, gorgeous custom cakes that leap off her IG feed, and more. 

She also does killer savory items like made-to-order breakfast burritos from an unposted locals menu—“The secret is tater tots,” she says—and constantly rotating sandwich and soup specials. 

But her place slips under the radar, perhaps because of its semi-hidden Crossroads location. 

She says it’s important for her and her fiance Mike Abbruezze to serve locals well, and that they’re responding enthusiastically.

“So many businesses go after the almighty tourist dollar,” she says. “It was really important to Mike and I to do stuff for the people who live here all year. And we’re way busier than we ever anticipated, so that’s a huge point of pride. We’ll take tourist money too, but we want to do right by locals.” 

She’ll be joined on the Cali Roots food front by a bunch of tastemakers.

Casas De Humo BBQ out of Salinas will smoke up festive fare like brisket nachos and one of the most over-the-top items of the weekend: the Jelly D, a pulled pork sandwich with raspberry glazed jelly donuts—fresh daily from Kristy’s Donuts in Salinas—as buns. 

Jorge Casas loves being able to work the festival with his wife and two kids. “We like seeing people’s faces, seeing all the smiles, and giving them a good meal,” he says. “We like being together and being out there together feeding the community.  The good vibes are contagious, and we’re excited to hear this music too.” 

On top of that, Central Coastan Pizza will sling wood fired pizzas. Pupuseria Nathalia will craft handmade authentic Salvadoreño pupusas. India Gourmet will wrap its tasty curry with fresh naan. Maha’s will unleash habit-forming organic Lebanese fare. Strictly Vegan will do animal-free Jamaican. NitroCycle831 will also be there will his bicycle powered drinks.

Firestone Walker, Altamont Beer Works, El Jefe Tequila and Fog City Farms and CENTR will both sponsor the event and serve concertgoers too.

Redwood passholders get access to still more goodies, including Miss Lippe’s Dumplings, NotPie Bakery marshmallows, and Cali Roots-branded brownies and cupcakes from Sweet Reba’s.  

And there’s a lot of non-musical or non-edible intrigue where that came from.

Two dozen creators will present wares. Interactive art outposts will feature glassblowing, live mural painting and workshops diving into painting (with Progress Not Perfection), stained glass (with Ryann’s Signature) and jewelry (with Sea Maid).

Meanwhile, Cali Roots is pioneering conscious event planning as the first certified green festival in the state. Vendors are prohibited from using single-use plastics. All packaging is compostable. Blue Strike collaborates on waste diversion and REVERB and Nalgene provide #RockNRefill water stations. 

Surfrider benefits from Nalgene reusable bottle sales, and representatives of the Esselen tribe host a booth and opening ceremonies Thursday afternoon on the Bowl Stage.

“We are not just a music festival,” Sheehan says, “For us it’s important to do something with substance. We live here, we’re raising our kid here, it’s important to give back and support our community. If we can use our platform to showcase what our area has to offer, that’s awesome.” 

She adds that evolving the festival is a required ritual. 

“We’d get bored if we did the same exact event every year,” she says. “We like to one up ourselves. We want to make it as fabulous as possible. In our niche of music, we have set the bar in a lot of ways.” 

Cali Roots tickets don’t come cheap. The good news there is three-fold. 

One, a ticket does unlock a flood of fun, so while $176.44 a day, a pass still represents a formidable value.

Two,  it’s possible to soak up a miniature—and free—version of the festival every month with Night Market 831 in Sand City’s Art Park. The same Good Vibez team behind Cali Roots spools out a kaleidoscope of food trucks, craft beer, live music and interactive art activities on the first Friday of every month. 

The next installment, on June 3, will feature Carmel Valley reggae rockers 60 East Band, Ollie’s Cheesesteak, Ono Ono Hawaiian, Seoul Food Korean barbecue, Unique Batch baked goods, Wings Uncommon, Central Coastan pizzas and more. 

Three, while Reba’s Cali Roots goodies will be reserved for performers and attendees, her small-batch bakery and all its memorable treats at modest price points is open 10am-5pm Tuesday-Saturday. 

It all makes for a tasty situation, for all the senses, which is music to my ears and my tummy.

More at californiarootsfestival.com and sweetrebas.com.