Category Archives: Restaurant

Seattle: Day Two

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This trip was extra special in the food indulgence area because we opted to stay at a bed and breakfast instead of the usual chain hotel.  At the Villa Heidelberg, our hostess serves what she calls a “hearty breakfast,” which consists of coffee or tea and fruit, followed by a hot dish that changes every day.  As we ate this hot dish the first morning – a croissant stuffed with Canadian bacon, cheddar cheese and sliced, cinnamon dusted apples, then coated in egg and baked until the pastry was even toastier and flakier than before and the apples were just softening – she explained that she has almost run out of room in her kitchen for her cookbook collection.  Other bed and breakfast establishments have five or six standby breakfasts they alternate between or cycle through, but she said that early in her career as innkeeper she got tired of making the same things week in and week out.  She keeps adding and adding to her repertoire, and with a side of maple syrup to absolutely drench this croissant in fantastic sticky decadence, we were well set to begin our adventures.

Despite this incredibly filling start to the day, when thoughts of lunch started to percolate as we strolled through Pike Place, I knew almost immediately what I wanted.  The smells in the marketplace were so good that you’d think it would be hard to decide.  But I knew.

The fish stalls here were impressive, and when I say that the place smelled like fish, I mean this in a positive way.  Even raw, the fish was so fresh and so reminiscent of the salty spray of the Pacific that even N. admitted it smelled good.  It didn’t hurt that the aromas of smoked salmon and fried seafood lingered around us as well, and this became my lunch quest: fried shrimp.

For $7.99, the sardonic but chatty expediter at one stall sold me this beautiful portion of beer battered and fried prawns with French fries.  It was like heaven.  Since N. doesn’t like shellfish, we never eat it at home.  Not only were these fresh, plump, perfectly toothsome prawns, but they were coated in delicious rich batter and fried until they had soaked in just the right amount of grease.  Enough to coat the fingers and shine suggestively in the corners of my mouth.  Not quite enough to weigh me down.  Perfect.  Well, perfect if I’d had a beer on the side.  Maybe a nice wheat beer with a generous lemon wedge.  And bringing the expediter home, where he would become our local bartender.  Then I could call it perfect.

Dinner this night was to be our belated anniversary dinner.  Since I’d just celebrated my birthday, I decided it could do double duty.  We chose Purple, a bistro and wine bar right downtown, and entered the enormous, dimly lit room slowly.  Solid heavy doors and ceiling to floor windows protected a huge spiral staircase winding around a column of shelves packed with bottles.  While I was still gaping at this collection of wine, we were seated and handed a binder full of beverage choices.  Our poor server had to come back three times to get our order, as I, still a bit of a wine novice, was completely intimidated by the gratuitous supply and tremendous number of options.  I selected a nice citrusy Gewürztraminer while N., always the beer man, had an Old Rasputin Stout.  He gave me a sip and I was surprised by its dark smokiness.

With so many wine choices, I was almost dizzy with the rush of having to choose accompanying food.  I get nervous at restaurants when I have a plethora of choices.  Do I opt for something comforting, familiar, guaranteed to be good, or do I branch out and order something that sounds adventurous – a startling mix of flavors that might be outrageously good… or a slight disappointment?  Here, though, I needn’t even have opened the menu; the first special on the front page was too good to pass up: risotto with roasted tomatoes, spinach, and Greek feta.

The poor quality here is due to the dim lighting, but I could just as easily claim it was thanks to my hands quivering from delight.  It sounds so simple, and as I looked down at my plate I feared I had been too cautious, but I was wrong.  The blend of flavors was stellar.  The rice was tender and flavorful, the tomatoes had sharp tanginess that matched well with the feta, and the whole thing had that unbelievable magical creaminess risotto gains from twenty minutes of tireless stirring while the rice grains – little sponges that they are – slowly suck in more and more broth.

While my fork danced around my plate, N. enjoyed a more hands-on experience, ordering a gorgonzola and fig pizza, replete with walnuts and rosemary, and a shy sprinkling of Parmesan cheese.  The thick purple slices of fresh fig looked so alien on pizza, as did the hefty chunks of walnut, but the finished product was tasty and intriguing.  In my plans for recreation, I may try making a rosemary foccaccia dough as a base, and then replacing the fresh figs for dried.

Because it was a special occasion, and because our server told us the desserts were “tapas sized,” we decided we had to splurge.  With options like these, there was simply no leaving before we had a sample or two.  We decided to share two desserts: the red velvet cake with lavender cream cheese frosting, and the blackberry cheesecake with blackberry coulis and candied lime zest.  Despite being barely bigger than golf balls, both were triumphant.  The cake was moist and rich, and the lavender sprinkled atop the frosting was an unexpectedly good touch.  It had a sophisticated flavor somehow and a light perfume, making this more than just good cake.

The cheesecake was rich and exceedingly smooth, and I found the perfect balance was a generous dip of blackberry coulis and a sliver of candied zest.  I like a bite of sour citrus with my cheesecake, and without that tart, slightly bitter chew, this perfect little cylinder might have been bland.  As it was, if I were slightly less polite I would have licked my plate.  Hell, I would have licked both plates.

Thanks, Seattle, you were that good. 

Seattle: Day One

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As the end of my first year of marriage to N. approached, we decided that instead of gifts, our anniversary treats to ourselves (and each other) would be brief trips to see or do something fantastic.  Our first wedding anniversary, we saw Eddie Izzard live in Portland.  It was fantastic.  Then we went to the zoo.  Our second year, we saw Macbeth in Ashland, then went to Crater Lake.  Again, fantastic.  This year, we outdid ourselves a bit and spent a few days in Seattle (again, ending the trip with the zoo… I have a weak spot for zoos…).

I write this here because we took this opportunity not only to see the sights, but to taste them.  Seattle has a bit of a reputation for being a foodie haunt, and we decided if we were treating ourselves to the voyage, we might as well… well… eat well… during it.  I sent out a call for suggestions and my friend S. responded with an impressive list of possibilities, so what I’ll present to you here are our highlights of Seattle in food.

After lunch on the road (smoked mozzarella sandwich at the McMenamin’s in Centralia, which unexpectedly came free because our server forgot to put in our order and consequently comped our whole lunch), we set foot in Seattle in mid-afternoon with plenty of time to sightsee a bit before dinner.  We planned our evening at the top of the Space Needle, and ended up deciding on Oddfellows Café and Bar.  The space was great: open and airy with lots of exposed wood ceiling beams, and one old, mellow brick wall.   It’s close to the campus of Seattle Central Community College, and we could feel the youthful vibe of the place in the décor and the demeanor of our fellow diners.  Our server had probably finished up classes an hour or two before serving us dinner.

And what a dinner!  We started off with drinks, since it had been a long drive.  N. had a local porter, and I had pear cider.

The menu was simple and clean, and though at first I was a bit disappointed by the small number of entrée choices, it only took me the first two lines on the menu to decide what I was having and to guess (accurately) what N. would order.

I had the rotolo, a beautiful rolled pasta, like conchiglioni mated with lasagna, lovingly topped with a blanket of this beautiful tangy, sweet, slightly acidic tomato sauce.  The pasta itself was stuffed, rolled, sliced and flipped on its side to expose its creamy filling to the eye.  It was filled with a mixture of spinach and ricotta cheese, with a light herbiness I haven’t figured out yet.  Oregano, maybe, and perhaps chives.  Though we had agreed upon ordering, I was almost unwilling to hand my plate across the table to share. 

But it’s good to share.  Really, really good.  N. ordered the roasted chicken with summer vegetables, and when it came, almost half a chicken, I knew how good this would be.  With N. a white meat man and me a dark meat fan, he would take a nibble of the thigh, consume the breast, and gladly pass along the rich leg to me.  The chicken was very simply roasted, hot and juicy with crisp brown skin and perfect saltiness.  Really a sexy lady all around.  The meat was tender and rich, and as our knives took turns plunging into the flesh, little rivulets of fat trickled across the plate into the vegetables on the other side, which became the unexpected superstars of the dinner experience.

“Summer vegetables,” in this case, meant a mélange of green beans and thick medallions of green and yellow zucchini.  They were crisp tender and lovingly coated in lemony buttery perfection.  Crunchy, citrusy, peppery, and with the addition of the chicken fat mixing in, perfectly indulgent too.

We passed on dessert this evening, but only because we didn’t want to overdo it on the first night…

Gourmet

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On a warm, July day, when a person (and her husband) is unjustly required to spend the shining hours of the afternoon working, teaching, holding office hours, what better treat could there be than to come home and indulge in a little gourmet dinner?

As I’ve divulged previously, I like cannibalizing from restaurant menus.  Usually it’s not the dish I order, but another that was second or third on the list… or just barely missed the final, nervous, rushed decision as the server hovers above me… and I jot down the description on a slip of paper somewhere and try not to lose it in the subsequent weeks.

This time it was that Americanized, fancified Italian food-of-the-common-man: pizza.

Several weeks ago N. and I celebrated Friday by meeting some friends to drinks and dinner.  We’d already eaten, so we swore to each other we would only drink one pint (for him), and one glass of wine (for me).  Then we went to Agate Alley with our friends and ordered a huge, gluttonously greasy, spicy, salty, decadent basket of onion rings.  I ate so many…

While we patted our fingertips on napkins to try and assuage our greasy shame, our friend S. ordered a personal size pizza topped with prosciutto, gorgonzola cheese, brandied figs, and a bright salad of fresh raw arugula, piled high right in the middle.  I had never thought of putting figs on a pizza before, but it seemed so inspired.  Though S. ate hers without the porky delights of prosciutto (one of those vegetarian types, you know), the idea of wafer-thin slices of cured pork-belly lingered in my mind when I recalled the recipe.

So I, so often operating as Dr. Frankenstein in the kitchen, decided a recreation was required.  This pizza would be a hybrid – a loving, daring combination of Agate Alley’s delectable pie and the prosciutto and caramelized onion darling Ree of The Pioneer Woman has developed.  With a hunk of gorgonzola languishing in my cheese drawer, it was just the right thing to do.

Ingredients (mostly approximated):

1 lump pizza dough (I shamelessly bought mine, pre-made, from Trader Joe’s fridge section)

1 medium to large sweet onion

2 TB brown sugar

4-6 oz. prosciutto

5-8 dried figs, sliced

1-2 oz. gorgonzola cheese, crumbled

1 cup (at least!) shredded mozzarella cheese

Big handful of arugula or basil

While my pizza stone heated in the oven, I caramelized my onions per the Pioneer Woman’s directions.  Then, while I prepped all my other ingredients (grating cheese, slicing figs, playing with the dough), I forgot about the onions for a little bit too long and the brown sugar started to burn.  But I decided to just call that “extra-caramelized” and be happy with it.

With the dough stretched, plunked onto the hot, cornmeal sprinkled stone and already starting to shrink back in on itself (it never wants to stay in a 12-inch circle; why not?), I quickly piled on the toppings: a drizzle of olive oil, evenly spread mounds of mozzarella, trailing slices of salty hammy goodness, cheese crumbles, figs, and dark, dark mahogany clumps of onion.

Into the oven at 450F it went, and about 12 minutes later, gasping, I edged it out and clunked it down on my stovetop.  Lacking arugula, I sprinkled baby leaves of basil atop the whole thing.

It looked glorious.  The crust was crunchy on the bottom, the cheese was golden and bubbling, the prosciutto had crinkled and crisped, and the figs were these dark, seeded pockets of mystery.

We ate.  We ate more.  The combination of salty and sweet has been hyped for years now, but that’s because it works.  The sweet onions and tangy, sugary figs balanced the rich creamy funk of the gorgonzola and the perfect saltiness of the prosciutto.  I would have preferred arugula to basil, because the licorice overtones of basil weren’t the perfect match, but the fresh greenness was definitely welcome.

I would never have thought of figs on pizza, but I would urge you to try them in this combination (or just figs and prosciutto, I won’t tell).  Sliced thin, they warmed in the oven and just started to create their own glassy brulée atop their honeyed interiors.  With chewy dough, creamy bubbling cheese, crisp-chewy ham, soft sweet onions, the crunch of the little seeds inside each slice of fig, popping between the teeth and tickling the taste buds, was the perfect final flavor of each bite.

This would be perfect enjoyed with a crisp, semi-dry white wine, though the beer we drank with it was just fine.  It is supposed to be simple fare, after all.

Post-partum parcels of joy

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After passing my exam a couple weeks ago, I went and spoke with my adviser to find out what I should be doing to keep on track.  She told me to rest.  Rest!  Actual, warranted permission to lie around, to catch up on terrible reality television series, to take naps and sleep in, uninterrupted by guilt about conferences, articles or (gulp) the dissertation!
Of course this didn’t last long.  Like any kid after the first few weeks of summer vacation, I got bored.  So I turned to the kitchen, as usual, to vent my new creative focus.  I spent my weekend on a few special projects.  As I’ve mentioned before, it has become something of a hobby of mine to “collect” menu descriptions from restaurants and try to recreate them.  On this occasion, I didn’t even have to do that much guesswork.
Pasta Piatti in Ashland is a favorite of mine, and I’ve mentioned it before.  When N. and I had dinner there in celebration of our second wedding anniversary this past summer, I had their butternut squash ravioli in a brown butter sauce with sage, crumbled biscotti cookies, and “Oregonzola” cheese from Rogue Creamery.  It looked like this:

Gloriously, the restaurant posts recipes for some of their dishes on their website, and the filling for their extravagantly delicious squash ravioli is one of them.  Make this at home?  Yes, please.

It’s a process, but I think it’s worth it.  See the recipe for detailed directions, but note that there are a few inconsistencies (i.e. do you food process the onion along with the squash and garlic, or just fold it in?).  It took about an hour for the squash to cook and the garlic to soften and fill the house with its sweet buttery aroma.  I processed together the squash, garlic, sauteed onion (though I used shallot), and egg yolks, but folded in the cheeses so they wouldn’t melt or gum up the blades of my food processor.
When the filling is cooled, you can address containment.  Though you could certainly make your own fresh pasta, or maybe even stuff large shells or manicotti, I addressed a package of square wonton wrappers.

Made from wheat flour and fairly flexible, wonton wrappers are a good, easy substitute for fresh pasta.  I loaded up each square with about ½ a tablespoon of filling, wet the edges, and folded them into semi-clean, somewhat isosceles triangles.  How that word survived in the memory banks astounds me.  Geometry was a long time ago.  After spreading the little packages on a well floured cookie sheet, I stowed them in the refrigerator for an hour or so to let the seal set while I got everything else ready.  With water heating on the back burner to boil my squash-stuffed parcels, I readied the rest of the arsenal:

½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
2 TB fresh sage, minced or in chiffonade
½ – 1 cup graham cracker crust crumble (recipe follows)
2 oz. Oregonzola cheese, crumbled (or any gorgonzola or mild blue cheese)
salt and pepper to taste

1.  During a downtime in the cooking process (either while the butternut squash and garlic are roasting or as the ravioli are cooling down in the refrigerator), mix together about a cup of graham cracker crust with 2 TB brown sugar and 2 TB melted butter.  Spread the mixture on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet and bake at 325 or 350 until deep golden brown and crumbly.  Crumble up and cool.  Pasta Piatti uses crumbled almond biscotti.  I just used what I had in my pantry and it worked out very well.
2.  While you wait for the water to boil for the raviolis, melt the butter in a large pan over medium heat.  When foam subsides, the butter will begin to turn a deep gold and then brown.  As it moves from gold to brown, toss in the sage and allow it to fry until almost crisp; crunchy little shards of herbage.  You may at this point have to turn down the heat so the butter will not burn while the ravioli cook.
3.  The ravioli will only need 3-4 minutes to cook in rapidly simmering, salted water.  I let the water cool from a rolling boil before dropping them in a few at a time because I wasn’t sure how well sealed they were, and I wanted to forestall explosions or leaking.  I was mostly successful.  When they float to the top of the pot, scoop them out with a strainer or a slotted spoon and deposit them carefully into the butter sauce, draining off as much water as possible before adding them to the skillet.
4.  When all raviolis have joined the dark golden buttery bath, fold them gently into the sauce and add the cookie and cheese crumbles.  Mix again gently and serve with bread and salad.

We had a ciabatta loaf from Trader Joe’s and a salad of romaine, arugula, thinly sliced Granny Smith apple, pomegranate seeds, and walnut halves as a side.  I made a quick dressing from finely diced shallot and sage, with honey, white wine vinegar, and mayonnaise.  Thanks to an impromptu Trader Joe’s trip for the gorgonzola cheese, the pomegranate seeds and the ciabatta, I was able to pair dinner with a TJ’s special: Green Fin white table wine.  This is made from organic grapes, which supposedly eliminate some of the problems caused by tannins (headache, bad hangover), but also tastes delicious.  It’s a bit on the sweet side, which seems good for this meal; the sweetness of the butternut squash and the cookie crumbs in the sauce offers the peril of bitterness to an ordinarily lovely white wine.

But let’s get on to the important bit: the ravioli.  The filling is soft and luscious, since it has been blended, and the wonton wrappers are so delicate after their boiling bath that they almost dissolve on your tongue.  With a whole head of roasted garlic in the mix, you might expect a stronger garlic flavor, but because it is roasted it just melts into the background as a sweet, mellow support for the squash.  Sage and squash are a natural pairing, and the herb adds a little freshness to the nutty, almost caramel notes of the brown butter.  These flavors all blend so well, but the real glory of the dish in my mind is in the contrasting crumbles.  The cookies and the cheese are such opposites in flavor and in texture; the cookies are crisp and sweet-crunchy, even after a dunk in butter, while the cheese maintains its structural integrity for a while as the dish cools on your plate (ahem, it would, if the dish had long enough to cool on your plate before you devoured every last bit) and provides a creamy, slightly chewy counterpoint.  Since gorgonzola is not terribly sweet and, in fact, has its own definitive funk to it in flavor and in aroma, it coats your palate a bit, protecting it from the potentially overwhelming sweetness of the squash, the butter, the cookies.
This is a beautiful dinner.  It would also make a rich, out-of-the-ordinary dessert, and an unconventional but satisfying breakfast.  But we didn’t leave enough for all that…

Christmas 2009: Gluttony

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Medieval theology and philosophy usually cites Gluttony as the least series of the seven deadly sins.  In the division of types, it is one of the sins of the flesh (along with lust), and it is easily conquered through abstinence.  You know, the kind so many people embark on after the New Year.  Call it a resolution.

Medieval theologians and philosophers never saw these:

These individual bittersweet chocolate soufflés provided the dessert course to our hors d’oeuvre dinner.  Our dear family friend L. brought them, and baked them in our oven just prior to serving so we would have as fluffy and elevated a puff as possible.  She was wise to do so.  Just look at that gorgeous height!  The cracked tops provided a lot of textual diversity, which was lovely because the insides were so luscious and creamy and rich.

We served these miniature masterpieces with a generous dollop of whipped cream and a sprig of spearmint, which I happened to have in the kitchen leftover from spring roll production.

They were a really nice, sophisticated blend of flavors.  Because the chocolate was bitter- to semi-sweet, the richness of the soufflé wasn’t overwhelming.  In fact, the whipped cream leant a very pleasant sweetness to the dish itself.  L. added orange zest to the batter for that classic combination, which emerged only as a subtle undertone, very complementary to the relative bitterness of the chocolate.  It was like a grown-up throwback to those chocolate oranges that you smack on a table and then unwrap to reveal perfectly molded segments.  There were nine of us.  There were nine soufflés.  We only managed to eat about six of them because they were so decadent, so rich while curiously so airy, and so sinful feeling only moments after that last loving lick of the spoon.

I fell asleep dreaming about the leftovers.  The next morning after a triumphant gift-exchanging ceremony, the Husband and I jetted off to spend the big day with his family, while my sister and her boyfriend did the same.

N.’s family does a very traditional style Christmas dinner after the fashion of a traditional Thanksgiving dinner: an enormous turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, the works.  It kept our dog’s nose, and desires, busy all day.

The next day, feeling repentant, we set off to share lunch with my sister and her boyfriend, whose parents live only a few miles from N.’s old homestead.  After a few days of richness, what could be more penitent and healthy than rice and fish?  Perhaps many things, if that rice and fish looks like this:

This jewel-encrusted carbuncle of sushi beauty is courtesy of Mikuni Japanese Restaurant and Sushi Bar , my favorite sushi establishment, and perhaps even my favorite restaurant in California.  The rice is chewy and nutty and sticky, the fish is extremely fresh and expertly handled, and as you can see, the combinations and toppings are imaginative and beautiful.  N. and I shared three rolls which, as you can see, I forgot to document until it was almost too late.  Such are the consequences of gluttony.

Trick or treat!

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Since Halloween was on a Saturday this year, we donned devil horns, walked downtown, and found a window seat at Davis’ Restaurant and Bar.  Right across the street from John Henry’s, Jameson’s, and The Horsehead, it offered a tantalizing view of the night’s revelers.  We whetted our appetites for the festivities with the Mezze plate, which consisted of babaganoush, hummus, and tzatziki with warm pita triangles.  I thought the cumin flavor in the hummus was a little bit too strong, but the babaganoush was really excellent.  Then our server brought around the dessert tray.  Among other delicious looking choices (two flavors of cheesecakes in tiny round presentation, a huge and luscious parfait, and a butternut squash pie) there was a creme brulee.  A chocolate and cayenne creme brulee.  I had to have it.

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Sweet, spicy, hard crackling sugar shell with a soft and creamy chocolate mousse underneath, dark and delicious.  A perfect Halloween treat.  And trick.