Reader Primetime sent me a tip that the last South Coast Fosters Freeze restaurant at 5205 Carpinteria Avenue in Carpinteria closes August 23rd. “Katherine & Jason Lesh, who own the Farm Cart on Carpinteria Avenue, have rented from me and will be taking over and they are going to be a farm to table restaurant,” says long time property owner and Fosters Freeze manager Laura Pettit about the new eatery named The Good Plow. Katherine Lesh’s family has been farming organically in Santa Barbara County since 1973, as Shepherd Farms. “I was raised in my father’s fields, at his Farmer’s Market stands, and at the Farm Cart, which my parents passed on to me in 2012,” says Lesh.
Photo by The Restaurant Guy
That Foster’s Freeze had a slow painful death. It was always fun to walk to from the beach.
Good luck to the new owner.
I wonder if the farm cart family have any restaurant experience?? My best friends family owns and operates several restaurants down south.
We both studied business in college and from what I learned in school and almost 10 years of friendship/consulting friends parents it is one of the most difficult business to open and in the middle of a pandemic..( I have no words )
I wish them the best,
Concerned local
We’ve been coming to the Carpinteria Foster Freeze 100’s of times over the last 5 decades. It seems when the current owner took over/mgmt. change, they had problems from the start. Running out of ice cream, ice cream machine couldn’t keep up, long waits, young help (Always seemed like family & friends working there), vagrants sleeping in the store, deferred maintenance, unorganized ordering.
We kept coming back for nostalgic reasons. Lots of good times there. Great memories, Sad to see it’s demise.