H igh up on the north coast of California is a pocket of food wealth hidden behind the redwood curtain. Two blocks from Old Town Eureka’s waterfront on Humboldt Bay sits Restaurant 511, a microcosm of all the bounty Humboldt has to offer. Josh Wiley, a veteran chef of 30 years and a southern California transplant, is a self-taught sensation often lauded as among the best chefs in Humboldt. His approach to food encapsulates the local spirit, flowing with the seasons like nowhere else in California – the microclimate in the north coast marches to the beat of its own drum, with late starting summers ripening the first tomatoes after the rest of the state’s crops slow down for the season.
Chef Wiley’s seasonal fare is upscale, adventurous, and experiential. It’s a balance of local ingredients with worldly inspiration, at times drawing from French and Italian classic preparations infused with accents of new flavors that tickle the chef’s fancy – like when he traveled to Mexico a few years back and returned to Humboldt with a love of achiote, a flavor seldom featured in local fine dining. Or, similarly, the comforting and coveted tonkatsu ramen which sometimes appears as a special. The local ingredients are hyper local, coming from the weekly farmers market behind the restaurant, from chef’s personal herb garden, and from Little River and Yager Creek Farms, both located within a half hour of the restaurant. Chef even has local mushroom foragers who make forest-to-plate dining possible with the wild-picked chanterelles that pepper the coast.
Restaurant 511 is a top choice for date nights and celebrations of all kinds; for loyal patrons looking for an excuse to return as often as possible, the menu of Crudo, small plates, entrees, and craft cocktails evolves so there is always something new to try. While the carpaccio, raw oyster creations, and burrata accompaniments may shift with the seasons, the comforting classics, elevated without unnecessary frills, are what keep many coming back again and again. The delectably brined fried chicken with duchess potatoes is quite simply the best fried chicken around, and the bolognese and fresh pasta keep the local food snobs yearning for more.
Upscale and no frills might seem definitively at odds, but it’s distinctly Humboldt and distinctly Josh Wiley. Chef Wiley is part of a modern culture of redefining what fine food is and what a top chef looks like; he can often be seen rocking a Raiders hat in the kitchen and running to The Pearl – the adjacent sister bar – to check the score between tickets. He’s not a white chef’s jacket kind of chef, but that’s the way Humboldt likes it.
Despite the county’s laid-back nature, its community has evolved, in part thanks to Chef Wiley at the helm of Restaurant 511, into a foodie community that’s captured chef’s heart. “It’s beautiful here and I love our weather, but I missed the solid food culture and community coming from a big city,” Chef Wiley says. But after connecting directly with the local online foodie community, and with the popularity of mainstream cooking shows, food expectations and trends have expanded even into Humboldt’s little corner of the nation. “The idea of cooking as a profession has changed; we’re building this industry into a respected profession, into artistry, where we collaborate with foodie fans to create experiences.” This collaboration and his personal evolution provided a foundation for other local chefs to branch out in part from his inspiration; touches of Chef Wiley are now seen throughout the county on menus created by his contemporaries and proteges. To taste his influence on menus across town is to know he’s been an integral part of building Humboldt into the burgeoning food bastion it’s become.
