The Brief

If you have lunch at Follow Your Heart vegan cafe on Sherman Way in Canoga Park, you may see a friendly-looking guy hovering around. He’s there for a few hours every day, doing a little bit of everything.

“It’s kind of my job to eat different things on the menu to ensure consistency. One cook teaches another cook and recipes totally change.”

Take note — that man is not just the food taster. He’s Bob Goldberg, now a wise elder to the vegan food scene in Los Angeles. He began Follow Your Heart with friends in 1970, as a vegetarian hippie hangout in the valley.

Bob Goldberg and his partners

(

Courtesy Follow Your Heart

)

Today, more than 50 years later, it’s a vegan grocery store and diner, with a college town food co-op vibe, selling plant-based diner food: sandwiches, pot pies, chili cheese fries. And even more importantly, Goldberg has had a massive impact on plant-based eating, creating Vegenaise and starting the Follow Your Heart and Earth Island brands.

The Follow Your Heart cafe first started as a juice bar in the back of Johnny Weissmuller’s American Natural Foods on Owensmouth. Weissmuller was an Olympic gold medalist and star of the Tarzan movies.

In 1973, Goldberg, along with partners Paul Lewin, Spencer Windbiel and Michael Besançon, bought out the market, and got rid of all the meat and dairy products.

“When we first started, this strip was still Antique Row — we’d get thrifted plates from the Salvation Army,” he remembers.

The place soon attracted a loyal following, with people traveling long distances to the West Valley, because back then, as Goldberg says, "vegetarian places were few and far between."

By 1976, they outgrew the store and moved into a former butcher shop, which is the current Sherman Way location.

Questioning authority

"I grew up in a family of grocers,” says Goldberg. His grandfather Sam Kapitanoff opened Crystal Foods shortly after the turn of the century when he arrived in Beloit, Wisconsin from Eastern Europe — “very New Agey name,” he laughs. He’d visit the store as a kid with his parents from Chicago, an hour-and-a-half away.

The other side of Goldberg’s family was in the model airplane kits industry. In those days, Carl Goldberg Products was a hugely inspiring company for would-be aeronautical engineers. However, model planes later fell out of popularity in the 70's with the emergence of the space program. “I was a national champion as a child,” he says with a smile.

Chef Proof Fujiyama-Ahira and owner Bob Goldberg at Follow Your Heart Market & Cafe in Canoga Park.

(

Brian Feinzimer

/

LAist

)

In 1967, Goldberg got drafted into the army. Initially, he thought he’d have to travel overseas, but he received a last minute change of orders to join the Army Band. (Goldberg had played trumpet since he was 10 and studied music at Indiana University).

Goldberg says he wasn’t yet critical of the war in Vietnam. “It was a bad time — a turbulent time. But I was on board for everything. I didn't question authority ... that came later.”

In the barracks he was assigned to a room with one other guy who had the "opposite of my background.” He’d been in trouble with the law and a judge had given him the choice to go to jail or enlist. His barrack-mate showed him something rolled up in aluminum foil — he didn't know what it was. "I'd never seen marijuana,” he says. They went into a closet and got high.

A moment later Bob remembers sitting down on his bed and thinking “‘Everything I know was wrong’ — it just hit me. I remember an overwhelming feeling that I'd been lied to.”

In the Army Band he’d travel to midwestern states playing “a lot of parades,” Bob pauses, “but also Taps at a lot of funerals.” This experience made him see the impact of what war can do, which led to his embrace of meat-less eating.

“I became vegetarian for moral reasons. I was against unnecessary killing. And sometimes the practice of killing animals can lead to the killing of people.”

Out of the Army, in 1969, Goldberg drove across the country to Los Angeles. He spent the first few weeks on a buddy’s couch in Woodland Hills before finding a place up the street from Johnny Weissmuller’s.

Goldberg was glad to find somewhere he could get camaraderie and vegetarian food. “I was meeting my people and getting an education in living in a more peaceful way.”

A promotional image for Vegenaise that shows the product when it was first introduced in wide release in 1995.

(

Courtesy Follow Your Heart

)

The birth of Vegenaise

Their customers included many seeking a more spiritual parth, and would suggest books, which they’d sell in the corner of the shop. The Whole Earth Catalog, books on environmentalism or eastern philosophy, Hindu- buddhism, the Tibetan Book of the Dead.

Michael Besançon was a follower of a guru whose followers’ culinary practice excluded meat, fowl, and eggs (though dairy was okay). So the menu at Follow Your Heart applied that approach to their familiar diner fare.

But they wanted to serve that part of the community that didn’t eat eggs. And without mayonnaise, the cafe’s sandwiches were less than appealing. “They still needed a lube," laughs Goldberg.

So they set about finding a mayo alternative. They went through lots of options before stumbling upon a guy who’d created a product called “Lecinaise” which was supposedly an egg-free substance made from lecithin, which helped emulsify lipids.

They began using it in the restaurant. But a few months later they started hearing that there were actually eggs in this “Lecinaise.” Eventually, Goldberg says “the guy got busted by the California Department of Food and Agriculture — he was soaking jars of regular mayonnaise to get the labels off and then putting his own label on top!”

The fried chicken sandwich from Follow Your Heart Market & Cafe in Canoga Park.

(

Brian Feinzimer

/

LAist

)

The sprouts sandwich love plate, fried chicken, reuben and club sandwiches from Follow Your Heart Market & Cafe in Canoga Park.

(

Brian Feinzimer

/

LAist

)

They immediately had to look for other options. But when they approached food manufacturers, they were told an egg-free mayo alternative wasn’t possible.

So Goldberg started experimenting. What could be a good plant-based solution? He tried mixing various oils and fats trying to find the best way to make them cohere. “It took a lot of trials, my whole fridge [was] full of various stages,” he says.

He finally came up with the answer in a dream. “I bolted up, and then sat in bed, waiting two hours for light — then mixed tofu scraps in a blender and combined them with oil,” he says, which gave the consistency he was looking for. Eventually they replaced the tofu with isolated soy proteins — and began making it themselves, as Vegenaise.

“We didn’t want to be a manufacturer, but that became the only option,” he says.

It was so popular that in 1988, Follow Your Heart started a manufacturing division, Earth Island, which expanded from Vegenaise into other plant- based products like salad dressings, dips, and cheeses.

It was highly successful — but around that time the original Follow Your Heart partnership started to dissolve. Goldberg says “we all wanted to do different things. Like many bands we broke up. We lasted about as long as The Beatles.”

Goldberg and Lewin bought out their other partners. Goldberg says “Spencer went into early retirement, and Michael went on to become an executive at Whole Foods.”

Vegetarian to vegan

At that time Follow Your Heart and their Earth Island products were vegetarian, which meant they made some dairy products in their factories.

But when they started making white label products for Trader Joe’s, they were forced to wrestle with whether to go vegan. Trader Joe’s Caesar and Blue Cheese salad dressings had been made with a plant-based rennet. But when that became unavailable, they faced a choice.

"I wasn't comfortable with the company using a natural rennet — the enzyme used to coagulate cheese — from the intestine of a baby cow when the vegan one ran out,” he says.

They ultimately decided to give up that part of the business, and became completely plant-based. “I wasn't willing to be involved in the slaughter of animals.”

He says they walked away from millions. "We saw a short-term drop in sales, but eventually it paid off.”

Goldberg spent nearly 30 years building Earth Island. In that time, their products became available at grocery stores across the country and around the world. Their offerings helped spread the ubiquity of plant-based eating to a new generation that could now more easily access vegan food.

In 2020, Bob's long-time friend and business partner, Paul Lewin, unexpectedly passed away. "His passing was a big part of why I was ready to close that chapter of my life" says Goldberg "as it was something that we had done together for 50 years, and without him, it just wasn’t the same". So in 2021, he sold Earth Island for an undisclosed amount to French food-product corporation Danone, famous for their yogurt, who also had a dairy-free division, including the plant-based milk alternative, Silk.

At the time, Goldberg felt like he had spent enough time at the factory. “It was a good thing — but it was just so big,” he says. “I wasn’t having as much fun as the first ten years with the four partners behind the bar. I didn’t know everyone on the staff anymore. I didn’t know our customers, it was all big grocers. It wasn’t the same personal experience.”

Part of the sale required Bob to stay on at Earth Island/Danone for an extra year to help the transition, but now Bob is back where it all started at Follow Your Heart in Canoga Park.

He still has an eye to the future, seeing trends and wanting to be part of them.

"I have a sense, and a vision that Canoga Park is beginning a real renaissance of development, with the Rams building a training facility and Warner 2035. If you look around, this was an almost affordable area. Over the next twenty years it's gonna be very much in demand. We’re hanging in there — we want to be a part of the next phase.”

Diners eat in the cafe at Follow Your Heart Market & Cafe in Canoga Park.

(

Brian Feinzimer

/

LAist

)

They own the building across the parking lot, which still says “Mr Jack’s Wig Shop” (which was never actually a business, just the set design from the movie Licorice Pizza).

In that space they are going to build out a bakery and a coffee roaster. “We still have our wholesale bakery — but we want to get into the retail side,” says Goldberg.

When I visited Follow Your Heart to interview Goldberg recently, we had a lunch of plant-based Reubens. Afterwards, he gave me a copy of his 2020 book “The Vegenaise Cookbook, Great Food That’s Vegan, Too” and signed it “To Josh my great new friend. Integrity is the answer.”

For Goldberg, integrity means “making sure that one’s actions are congruent with one’s beliefs. That you are living in your truth. And when you aren’t, those relationships get fractured. Integrity is what makes things cohere.”

Kinda like Vegenaise.

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

Rabbi Amy Bernstein says the wind-whipped fire in January 2025 that scorched much of the Pacific Palisades, destroying her home and damaging her synagogue, “blew everything open” for the community’s faith leaders.

“If our hearts must break, let them break open,” said the rabbi, who leads Kehillat Israel where 300 families out of 900 lost their homes. “This tragedy has really pushed us closer to one another. We’re working to change the things we need changed.”

Faith leaders both in the Pacific Palisades and in Altadena and Pasadena — devastated by the pair of fires that tore across Southern California — have relied on interfaith and community partnerships to rally congregants who are picking up the pieces 16 months later.

They’ve had to learn on the fly about insurance coverage and local land use regulations while still trying to keep their scattered flock together and raising money for basic needs. Pastors in Altadena have had to fight to protect the rights of Black people who decades ago found pathways to home ownership in that community despite redlining — but now risk losing their land to outside developers who sense an investment opportunity.

And throughout this span, faith leaders have had to cater to the emotional and spiritual needs of their communities and think about how they want to rebuild their sanctuaries that were lost or damaged in the fire. More than a dozen houses of worship burned to the ground or were damaged.

Interfaith relationships have become stronger after the fires

This would have been difficult for faith leaders to handle but for the interfaith relationships that became closer and stronger after the fires, said the Rev. Grace Park, associate pastor at Pacific Palisades Presbyterian Church, which burned down.

Methodists, Presbyterians, Catholics, Jews and yogis have not just found common ground in human suffering and loss, but have learned how to lean on one another in a time of dire need, she said.

“It’s a sense of mutual affection and respect, learning from each other and leaning on one another,” Park said. “We’re sharing the joys and the deep valleys of what it means to lead through a time of tragedy.”

Brother Satyananda, a senior monk at the Self Realization Fellowship, lost his living quarters and belongings in the fire. Much of the campus, started by Paramahamsa Yogananda who brought ancient spiritual practices from India to the West, fortunately survived the fire.

Satyananda recalls one day when Bernstein picked up on his sadness and offered him “motherly compassion.”

“We share the same profession where we’re tuned to people in need,” he said. “Now, our relationship has changed because we’re tuning into each other. There’s a greater level of trust.”

Pastor BJ King, who leads LoveLand LifeCenter, worked with the late Rev. Cecil B. Murray to heal communities and build interfaith coalitions after the 1992 Los Angeles riots.

“Back then, there was a choice whether or not to get involved,” he said. “But with these fires, there is no choice. It has affected everybody.”

Pastors have had to acquire new skills

King’s congregation has switched to online services after their leased church building in Altadena suffered smoke damage. Twelve families lost their homes. In addition to helping meet people’s basic needs, King has created a program organizing gatherings to connect therapists with those in need of mental health.

“Many people didn’t even know they needed that,” he said.

One of the most powerful roles faith leaders have played after the fire is to “continue to talk with power, people in charge,” said Pastor Jonathan DeCuir, who leads Victory Bible Church in Pasadena. He and others in the region have continued to meet with local officials and even conferred with Gov. Gavin Newsom to keep things moving for their communities.

DeCuir chairs the board of a nonprofit called Legacy Land Project, which provides financial aid, legal support and guidance on building contractors, as well as medical care to those affected by the fires.

The disaster has brought a level of camaraderie that DeCuir says he has never seen among the region’s clergy.

“Denominational lines have been crossed,” he said. “Even if we have different theological stances or approaches to ministry, we are all now looking at how to care for our people and community. If we don’t come together, Altadena will never ever be the same. The people won’t be there anymore. That, to me, is terrifying.”

While a church is more than a building, physical churches do appear as “beacons of hope” in traumatized communities, said Pastor Mayra Macedo-Nolan, executive director of Clergy Community Coalition in Pasadena. Her group has lobbied for houses of worship to be prioritized on the same footing as businesses in the rebuilding plan.

“When people start seeing churches rebuilding in Altadena, they’re going to feel like it’s going to be OK because the churches are coming back,” she said.

Reimagining a purposeful future

Pastor Jonathan Lewis, fourth from right, holds a groundbreaking service at the site of the burned Fountain of Life Nazarene Church to mark the beginning of its rebuilding in Altadena, Calif., April 26, 2026.

(

Damian Dovarganes

/

AP Photo

)

Members of the congregation join in prayer during the groundbreaking ceremony at the site of the burned Fountain of Life Nazarene Church, marking the beginning of its rebuilding, April 26, 2026, in Altadena, Calif.

(

Damian Dovarganes

/

AP Photo

)

Pastor Jonathan Lewis poses for a photo with his congregation during a groundbreaking service at the site of the burned Fountain of Life Nazarene Church, marking the beginning of its rebuilding, April 26, 2026, in Altadena, Calif.

(

Damian Dovarganes

/

AP Photo

)

On April 26, the Altadena Fountain of Life Church broke ground to build a new sanctuary after their house of worship, which had stood for over three decades, was destroyed in the fire. Pastor Jonathan Lewis, who ministers to about 75, hopes the church will be ready in time for Easter next year.

“It’ll be a Resurrection Sunday for our church, too,” he said.

Alexis Duncan, who grew up in Altadena attending that church, came to the groundbreaking with her 6-year-old daughter. She lost both her home and her church building.

“It means everything to me that they’re rebuilding because I want the church to be there for my daughter as she grows up,” she said. “This new beginning gives me and my family hope and the encouragement to come back.”

Some churches like Altadena Community Church, a United Church of Christ congregation, are pausing to rethink their future purpose. The Rev. Michael Lewis, who took over in February after the previous pastor retired, said the congregation is looking into several possibilities for the one-acre lot, including affordable housing.

“We know that a church is not intended to be a landlord and the pastor is no property manager,” he said. “But, we’re also thinking about who is able to return to Altadena? How will this rich, economically diverse community that was scattered by the fire come back?”

The church has been around since the 1940s. A haven for actors, poets and musicians, the former sanctuary also served as a vibrant performance space. Lewis said they hope to incorporate a performance stage into the new facility.

“It’ll look different from what we had before,” he said. “Once we figure out how to build community, we can decide what physical structures will help us support that community.”

As for Kehillat Israel, on May 15, members will carry their Torah scrolls back to their sanctuary, marking one of the first returns by a house of worship to the Palisades since the disaster.

Judaism has had “a long history of starting over,” Bernstein said.

“It’s encoded in our cultural approach to the world, that there are things that can always be taken away from you,” she said. “But what you become can never get taken away.”

Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Friday that he has requested a yearlong extension of FEMA funding for L.A. fire survivors. Without the extension, the money will run out July 9.

Now the decision on FEMA support lies with the federal government.

The funds have allowed many survivors to afford temporary housing and other daily needs. Most have yet to return home — 2 in 3 survivors who were living in Altadena or Pacific Palisades at the time of the fires are still displaced, according to the latest survey of more than 2,100 survivors by the nonprofit Department of Angels. Nearly 40% of respondents reported they will either soon run out of temporary housing insurance coverage or have already.

The situation is particularly dire for low-income households: Nearly 80% of respondents making $50,000 or less said they didn’t think they could afford housing for three months once coverage ended.

“The data is clear: This recovery is not over,” said Angela Giacchetti of the Department of Angels at a news conference organized by the Eaton Fire Collaborative in Altadena on Thursday. “If you are a survivor, you know this in your bones. For many families, it has barely begun. People have just begun to stabilize. We need federal support that reflects the scale of this disaster and systems that survivors can actually navigate and access over time.”

FEMA assistance isn’t reaching most survivors

The FEMA Individuals and Households Program can provide funding for survivors of disasters to pay for temporary housing, repair their homes, and respond to other challenges that insurance may not cover. It can also help cover costs if a survivor has no insurance.

Gil Barel has been relying on FEMA funds to pay rent on a small back house for herself and her son for the last year. She said they still haven’t been able to return to their rent-controlled Pasadena apartment because of smoke damage, though she still has to pay the rent for it.

Gil Barel is paying rent on a smoke-damaged apartment in Pasadena while FEMA funds have helped her cut the cost of temporary housing.

(

Erin Stone

/

LAist

)

Barel doesn’t know what they’ll do if the FEMA funding runs out.

“ I'm really stressed out,” she said. “I think I'm just kind of trying to put that thought aside and hope for the best.”

But in the 15 months since the fires, most survivors have not accessed FEMA funding. About 60% have received no FEMA assistance beyond the initial $770 payments dispersed in the immediate aftermath of the fires, according to the Department of Angels survey.

Many have faced denials, according to disaster case manager workers with Catholic Charities of L.A. and lawyers with Legal Aid Foundation of L.A.

That’s the situation for Gayle Nicholls-Ali and her husband, Rasheed, who lost their Altadena home of 15 years in the Eaton Fire. They’ve relied on their insurance to pay for a rental in Montrose, but that’s rapidly running out. And because they have that insurance, FEMA has denied further support.

Gayle Nicholls-Ali and her husband, Rasheed, lost their home in the Eaton Fire. They plan to rebuild, but the cost is a major hurdle.

(

Erin Stone

/

LAist

)

“A lot of our ALE [Additional Living Expenses insurance] is going to run out before we even are able to get into a house,” Nicholls-Ali said.

Without FEMA or insurance support, they’ll have to find a way to pay rent on top of a mortgage. They also face a big gap in the cost of their rebuild versus how much their insurance covers. Nicholls-Ali said without the help of FEMA and other sources of funding, recovering feels further out of reach.

Funds for long-term recovery still in limbo

FEMA funding extensions have been routine in past disasters, including the 2023 wildfires in Hawaii and after devastating flooding in North Carolina in 2024.

But the agency has faced significant cuts during the second Trump administration, and there are indications that disaster aid is becoming increasingly political. For example, President Donald Trump has approved aid for just 23% of requests from states with a Democratic governor and two Democratic senators, compared to 89% for states that with Republican governors and senators, according to an analysis by Politico.

The state has also not received more than $33 billion for long-term recovery, which can help pay for infrastructure upgrades and repairs, as well as help rebuild schools, parks and homes. That money was requested by state and local leaders shortly after the January 2025 fires and hasn’t been appropriated by Congress.

An international team of disease detectives is now racing to connect with the more than two dozen passengers who disembarked the MV Honius cruise ship on the Atlantic island of St. Helena before the hantavirus outbreak was identified.

These individuals have flown across the world, including to the United States.

The risk of further spread of this virus is low since it requires close and prolonged contact with an infected individual — and those infected seem to transmit the virus for only a brief period of time. But public health officials want to make sure the outbreak is contained.

Here's how authorities are using the practice of contact tracing to contain the outbreak and keep the hantavirus from spreading.

Contact tracing 101

The concept of modern contact tracing dates to the 1930s and was part of an effort to stop the spread of syphilis. It involves locating the close contacts of anyone who may have been infected. "By identifying people who are at risk of infection," says Preeti Malani, an infectious disease physician at the University of Michigan, "you try to get ahead when people don't have symptoms yet with the goal of preventing the infection from continuing to propagate."

This is a well-tested approach for containing an infectious disease. "It's the oldest tool in the epidemiologic toolbox," explains Malani. "We thought about this a lot early in the pandemic with COVID. But we also do contact tracing for sexually transmitted infections, for things like meningitis and even measles."

Malani likens contact tracing to monitoring ripples in a pond, "trying to prevent those outer rings from propagating by isolating individuals and by identifying individuals who might be at risk of infection."

The idea that "there's a time period where people don't have symptoms but could be harboring the virus, that's what contact tracing helps identify," says Malani.

It starts by pinpointing someone with an infection or suspected infection of the disease in question — in this case, hantavirus. Epidemiologists then look to see with whom they've recently had close contact since these individuals are more likely to have been infected.

This hunt for those with the greatest probability of infection is important. "Otherwise, it becomes an impossible web to contain because everyone is connected to everyone," says Boghuma Titanji, an infectious diseases doctor at Emory University. "So you have to stratify by high, intermediate and low-risk contacts."

The next step involves public health agencies ordering precautions for those who are infected or who may be infected but aren't showing symptoms yet. Such measures may include quarantine, so that an individual doesn't come into contact with even more people — who may then become infected.

One challenge that hantavirus presents is that its incubation period can last up to several weeks. In other words, "people take a long time to become symptomatic after they've been exposed," says Titanji. "Some of these primary contacts would have to be monitoring themselves for symptoms for up to 45 days to be at the tail end of that very long incubation period."

Aboard and ashore

The work isn't high-tech but it is painstaking, requiring officials to reconstruct the many interactions someone may have had over days or weeks.

Onboard the cruise ship, "you might have an individual who is a source of an infection," says Titanji, laying out a hypothetical example. "And then they were sitting at a dinner table with one individual who then goes back to their cabin and shares a bed with their partner who has a conversation with someone else on the deck."

Once someone disembarks the ship, the number of potential interactions can grow quite quickly. This is why officials were concerned when a KLM flight attendant fell ill after being aboard a flight with one of the infected cruise ship passengers. Fortunately, the flight attendant ultimately tested negative for hantavirus.

Titanji is heartened by what she's seen playing out so far. "It seems like the international collaborative effort has been really robust and the mechanisms for containment are in place and underway," she says.

Public health officials argue that contact tracing is a powerful approach that will reduce further spread. "We can break this chain of transmission," said Abdi Mahmoud, the director of the World Health Organization's health emergency alert and response efforts, at a press conference on Thursday.

He has good reason to be confident. Contact tracing was vital during the fight against COVID-19 and helped end the Ebola crisis in Liberia, containing the epidemic there more than a decade ago. Some of the contact tracing even involved hours-long hikes through the jungle to a remote village.

Authorities are hoping for similar success with this hantavirus outbreak.
Copyright 2026 NPR

The sky above Los Angeles State Historic Park in Chinatown will be dotted with color Saturday with the annual Kite Festival.

The festival had its beginnings as a joyful protest in 2021, back when a proposal for a Dodger Stadium gondola included cutting through the airspace above the park. Organizers say last year’s Kite Festival drew a crowd of about 7,000.

“The Kite Festival, [for] some people, it’s their favorite day in Los Angeles,” said Sue Bell Yank, executive director of Clockshop, the nonprofit arts org that runs the festival. “It’s the time when they really feel connected to their city. More so than any other time.”

This year’s programming includes a kite-making station where you can build your own flying art for a donation of $5, along with art workshops and the unveiling of a large floating, inflatable sculpture by Guatemalan kite artist Francisco Ramos.