I wanted a steak. Steak, medium. If you can’t find that in Bakersfield, you’re not getting it in the vegan-leaning, gluten-free, low-sodium enclaves encircling us in California like tall, green prison wire. That’s why we ended up at the Italian Heritage Dante Association recently, on a forgotten stretch of Wilson Road (former home of the old Stone School).

A place with a clubhouse and two acres of park-like grounds that you may not have been to or heard of. Founded in 1922 as the Societa Italiana Mutuo Soccorso Dante Alighieri, the Dante Hall has been on Wilson since 1950. Think Italian Rotary. Think gathering place for the Italians who came from Lucca, Italy, in the 1890s to work for the Miller & Lux Co. in Buttonwillow and Old River.