Three years ago, the Sacramento Convention and Visitors Bureau established a program to promote the city as “America’s Farm to Fork Capital.” [...] the marketing staff can make a strong case for its importance as an agricultural powerhouse for such distinctions as growing 80 percent of the world’s almonds and domestic caviar, and for its production of high-quality rice that fills the steamers in some of Japan’s best sushi restaurants. “I feel that Sacramento has a cool soul about it,” says Michael Thiemann, who moved back to his hometown in 2013 to open Empress Tavern after cooking around the world and spending four years as Tyler Florence’s corporate chef working at Wayfare Tavern and other projects. Never having spent time in Sacramento before my recent foray, I can’t prove or disprove that statement, but I did find a fresh energy in the dining scene, and while some places showed signs of ambition without the needed focused execution, I found some things to love. For many years, Caggiano — along with the Kitchen, which serves a $135 fixed-price menu — were about the only places that garnered a national reputation. For 25 years, Randall Selland has featured his own brand of dinner and a show with a dining counter surrounding the demonstration kitchen. Selland and his wife, Nancy Zimmer, have been a force in the dining scene, opening Ella and Selland’s Market Cafe and in June debuting Obo Italian Table & Bar. Thiemann credits McCown with shaking up the dining scene by creating a chefs’ collective. McCown is one of the participants in September’s Farm-to-Fork Celebration, a month of farm tours, wine tastings, street festivals and restaurant events. A Farm-to-Fork Festival on Sept.