By now you’ll have got the message that this family doesn’t willingly go camping. Sabrina and our daughter like their luxuries and my various attempts to house them in what to me at least, seemed like perfectly comfortable ‘cabins’ in various beauty spots across the USA have produced sulks, with one notable exception, Big Sur’s sublimely eccentric Deetjen’s Inn.
Ironically it was Big Sur‘s wild, romantic reputation that first attracted the kind of people that wouldn’t have been seen dead with a tent peg or mallet in their hands or in a ‘cabin in the woods’. But as accounts spread, writers and artists like Jack Kerouac, Henry Miller and Hunter S. Thompson sought inspiration there and Orson Welles and his then wife Rita Hayworth actually bought a spectacularly situated shack on impulse on a trip down the coast in 1944. They never spent a single night in it but the site is now the famous cliff top restaurant ‘Nepenthe’, the location of many a memorable dinner for us and for the many friends we have enjoyed introducing to this place.
Fittingly for an area that’s still about as wild and remote as you can get in coastal California, Deetjen’s was started in the 1930s by Helmuth Deetjen, who was on the lam at the time from the authorities in his native Norway. What had begun life as a hideaway gradually became a haven for visitors, as the construction of the Pacific Highway opened up the area to tourists.
It took us several visits to finally discover Deetjen’s, but nowhere on this savagely beautiful stretch of California coastline more perfectly captures the vibe of this destination- a seductive combination of the rustic backwoods, 1960s hippie culture, and old money artfully disguised in plaid shirts driving around in ancient pickup trucks. The setting is stunning, as the cabins or ‘cottages’ as they call them at Deetjen’s, which were built by the founder himself with help from prison labor from the local highway project, are dotted around a canyon of ancient redwood trees. But best of all is the restaurant, situated in what used to be Ma and Pa Deetjen’s original house and which has some of the best food you’ll find anywhere in California. I like to begin my days there with an enormous plate of Eggs Benedict, secure in the knowledge that near vertical hikes in the foothills of the Saint Lucia Mountains and windswept beach wanderings will burn off all of that and more.
All the restaurant ingredients are locally sourced, as you’d expect and the meat in particular is exceptional. Here’s Sabrina’s re-creation of an unforgettable Rib Eye Steak she enjoyed there.
Barbecued Beef Rib Eye with Red Wine Shallots: Serves Three
3 rib-eye steaks on the bone
3 sprigs rosemary leaves only, finely chopped
4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 tbsp salt
1 tsp pepper
EV olive oil
9 small shallots, peeled
1 bottle of good red wine
1/3 cup sugar
Mix the garlic, rosemary, salt, pepper and olive oil together, spread the mixture over the steaks, place on a tray and cover with plastic wrap, refrigerate over night. For the red wine shallots; combine all the ingredients in a saucepan, bring to the boil, reduce the heat; cook until the shallots are soft. Transfer the shallots to a dish and reduce the wine until it is very thick and syrupy. Grill the steaks to your liking, rest for 10 minutes. Serve topped with the shallots and the syrupy wine.
It’s a testament to Big Sur that it can comfortably accommodate the kookiness of the famous Esalen Campus at one extreme: “The hot springs let us savor life on the edge, literally and figuratively. Clothing is optional; contemplation is guaranteed” and the outrageous luxury of The Post Ranch Inn, at the other.
Deetjen’s is completely off that spectrum in a world of its own. We love it for that.
Your vivid article brought back memories of exceptional Big Sur, Deetjen's a most magical of places, Nepenthe too. In 2017 we didn't stay at Deetjen, just breakfasted there - unforgettably. We stayed up the road at a pure 1960s construct, spirit of Buckminster Fuller hanging on in and those you mentioned...as child of those times the vibe could still be caught.
We visited Big Sur over 20 years ago and this excellent article brought so many memories flooding back. Splendid literary allusions, too.