Your guide to St. Patrick’s Day in Silicon Valley
This is the first year in many that I won’t be spending any time in Ireland. (I fell in love with Dublin after a summer internship in 2022 and have been visiting every year since.) With St. Patrick’s Day right around the corner, I’m missing it a bit more than usual.
Talking about why I love Ireland would be impossible without explaining its pub culture. In Silicon Valley, I feel like people generally stay at home, often spending free time sequestered playing board games, or possibly going on some remote hike. Many people also tend to eat at home, with busy schedules, high prices and traffic-fueled travel making eating out often reserved for special occasions.
But in Ireland, your house is just a place to sleep. The pub is where you live. Pubs shouldn’t be confused with bars, where alcohol is the focus. Pubs are filled with families, young and old alike. They open early in the morning, serving breakfast and mugs of steaming joe, and close late in the evening. Some pubs have live music or play sports on the TVs, but the most traditional of all are just filled with lively chatter – and proper Guinness, of course.
So if you, like me, aren’t able to go to Ireland to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day this year, I compiled a list of Peninsula celebrations sure to be good craic.
In other Peninsula food news, I spoke with Myshel Portz, also known as “Mountain Mama,” who’s building community through her mobile coffee cart, as well as Jordan Makableh, who finally reopened Mazra San Bruno after a two-year renovation.
Stay tasty,
Adrienne
‘She’s a legend’: A longtime Woodside bartender and community figure is now serving espressos from her own coffee trailer
Myshel Portz started Mountain Mama Java to fulfill her longtime dream of opening a coffee spot after a career in the service industry.
Highly anticipated Mazra San Bruno reopens, your guide to St. Patrick’s Day events and a new restaurant week
- After a two-year renovation, Mazra San Bruno has reopened. The Mediterranean restaurant has made Yelp’s Top 100 list twice and its owners were James Beard semifinalists last year.
- Plenty of Peninsula Irish pubs and restaurants are offering food and drink specials, live music and more this weekend and next week for St. Patrick’s Day.
- Downtown Mountain View’s Next Level Board Game Cafe is permanently closing March 26, posting to its Instagram, “While this is not the outcome we had hoped for, we are grateful to have been a part of the local community for as long as we were.”
- Palo Alto’s Town & Country Village is hosting its first ever Restaurant Week from March 14-22, with exclusive bites, prix-fixe menus and limited-time offers.
- Blue Moon Bar is opening April 1 in the former Eddie’s Sports Bar space in San Mateo.
- Diaspora Spice Co. is holding a cookbook signing at Verve Palo Alto Sunday from 1-5 p.m. with the launch of two exclusive collab drinks, Sunrise Tonic and Golden Hour Matcha.
- After 30 years in Pacifica, Vallemar Station Restaurant & Bar is preparing to permanently close, according to a recent Facebook post.
- House Family Vineyards is hosting its third annual wine pairing with Girl Scout cookies Saturday and Sunday from noon to 4 p.m.
- IB’s, a cheesesteak shop in Berkeley and Oakland, recently expanded to Santa Clara.
- Kenz Coffee Roasters in Los Gatos is hosting a Moonlight Market Saturday from 6:30-9 p.m. with various local food vendors.
- Industry Pizza, specializing in New York-style sourdough pizza, opened Tuesday in South San Francisco.
- Backyard Cafe at Treehouse Hotel Silicon Valley is hosting a matcha latte master class Saturday from 3-4 p.m.
- Small bakery Better For You Cakes is offering a limited cake flight with pickup at The Yard Coffee in Redwood City and The Coffee Shack in Campbell on March 21.
Seasonal drinks at Covour Coffee
I am a Covour Coffee addict. I wish I could stop, but they keep introducing new seasonal drinks that pull me back in.
Admittedly, when Covour Coffee first opened in 2024 I was skeptical – the owners are wedding photographers by trade with no previous experience in the coffee industry. It has since become one of my top five favorite Peninsula coffee shops.
Something to note: I would not recommend Covour Coffee for remote working, as the seats are usually filled and are quite small (Big Mug Coffee Roasters is the best for remote working in my opinion.) Parking is also usually difficult, but doable, as the parking lot is relatively small.
All this aside, the drinks are consistently phenomenal. Iced drinks are never watery, diluted or burnt-tasting, and I give them a massive plus for offering half-caffeine beverages (which my other coffee favs Big Mug and Dr.ink notably do not offer). In general, I think Covour Coffee’s seasonal drinks are actually better than its signature menu, which features lattes in flavors such as burnt honey, tiramisu and ube.
I recently tried the fresca horchata latte, part of their new spring drinks, and found it absolutely delicious ($8). It has a strong cinnamon flavor, balanced perfectly with espresso and a bright strawberry cream top.
Other previous seasonal favorites I wish they’d bring back are the Mint Julep with mint syrup and 0% bourbon (think a 50x better version of Philz’s iconic Mint Mojito) and the cafe de olla with Einspaner cream foam, which is hands down my favorite Covour Coffee drink. Here’s hoping Covour starts a rewards program soon.
Covour Coffee, 2706 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto; 650-412-7922, Instagram: @covourcoffee. Open daily from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Meet the McElhones, the Irish family behind popular Peninsula pubs
The family founded Fiddler’s Green, Behan’s and Molly O’s
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Joan Lane, trailblazing volunteer and Stanford’s go-to for ‘sticky problems,' dies at 97March 25, 2026 3:23 pm