Perpetually purple-wigged owner Alison Barakat started out as a pastry chef at the ultimate farm-to-table temple: Alice Waters’ Chez Panisse in neighboring Berkeley. Fooling around on her lunch breaks, she whipped up these extra-crispy buttermilk fried chicken patties for her co-workers, topping them with a savory slaw of sliced jalapenos, pickled red onions, and high-quality olive oil. Her McChickens-for-foodies grew so in demand that she soon opened her own lunch counter spot, which runs through 1,000 chicken sandwiches daily. Get there early — they almost always sell out.
On the Huffington Post.
The Lunch Encounter 