As a nation, we are beginning to understand the lesson behind that old maxim, "you are what you eat." As "locavore" becomes part of our everyday vocabulary and food critics continue to give West Coast cuisine accolades for its freshness and sustainability, West Coast Road Eats will show how why we eat - and where we eat it - matters more than ever. West Coast Road Eats will be the definitive guide to the cuisine of the West Coast. Part guidebook, part travelogue and part history lesson, this book will be a love letter to the seafood shacks, farm stands, taquerias, ice cream parlors, burger joints, wineries, and more that make up our unique edible ecosystem. West Coast Road Eats will offer a native's list of the dozens of extraordinary restaurants that dot our freeways and scenic byways, from the Canadian border to Los Angeles. The book will also include suggested itineraries, overviews of major cities with trips that depart from them, and sidebars covering everything from captivating food factory tours to instructions on how to pick the best produce at any farm stand. This won't be another book of disjointed restaurant reviews, however. At its heart is the unfolding highway - the enduring image of the American West. The restaurant reviews will celebrate the spirit of the open road and put each pit stop into geographical and culinary context for the reader. The ingredients are the cuisine, and West Coast cooking is not defined by the staid regional boundaries that confine our Eastern counterparts, but by our history of migration and conquest, our endless skyways and sprawling landscapes, and above all, by the pleasures and possibilities of the open road.