For more on Seattle and Seattle Restaurants, see our Seattle web page.
Newer Entries  Older Entries

01/29/13 - Rover's Is Closing

One of our favorite restaurants in Seattle is closing. We've long been fans of Rover's, a restaurant serving in the classical French style, but with an emphasis on ingredients from the Northwest. We almost always had the grand tasting menu, usually paired with wine. This isn't a very popular style of dining anymore. It's too formal for some, but we have enjoyed and still enjoy it greatly. So, we are going to miss Rover's when it closes around the end of April. It had a 25 year run, and that is a good long run, but it still feels like the end of an era.





Keywords: restaurants, seattle

12/31/12 - Two Out Of Four

This was a last minute Christmas present suggested by most recent flight back from Seattle. The climb out of Boeing Field takes one over an industrial area south of Seattle. It doesn't look like much by day, but there are all sorts of fascinating lights by night. One set was hypnotizing, a set of four columns lighted two at a time, moving about an invisible shape. A quick trip to the Radio Shack provided an Arduino processor and some red LEDs. JoAnn's fabrics and hobby supplies next door provided four plastic columns for supporting elaborate wedding cakes. Add in a glue gun, a soldering iron and some black foam board, and there was something new under the tree. Be sure to click and watch the dark video. It can be hypnotic.

Click the image to see the movie

The works in a drawer

Click the image to see the movie

Keywords: christmas, seattle, science, art

12/19/12 - Seattle Sidewalks

With all its evergreens, Seattle doesn't have to work hard to be Christmassy. Still, a lot of folks make an effort as we discovered exploring the hills Capital and Queen Anne.

They've turned on their lights.

Another of the stately homes near Volunteer Park

More lights and a wreath

A very traditional display

A more modest home

Even the folks who maintain those communications towers have decorated for Christmas.

This year's trend - antlers for your car - We saw another set with lights, but they drove before we got our camera out.

Christmas brew

More Christmas lights - pooly photographed

How to dance the rhumba - sort of Christmassy in bronze

This was left over from the Day of the Dead - not Christmassy at all, but unusual

Keywords: christmas, seattle

12/18/12 - Christmas at the Volunteer Park Conservatory

One of our favorite places in Seattle is the Conservatory at Volunteer Park. It takes a bit of climbing up Capital HIll to get there, but the display there is always amazing. It's even more amazing around Christmas.

A winter scene in Seattle with the Space Needle in the distance

There are always orchids at the conservatory

But, around Christmas, they do the place up proud.

Christmas trees, poinsettas, and a model train set

More Christmas flora, decora, and wonderful, steamy greenhouse warmth

We dropped by to visit the cactus.

A nautical scene

Another view - so cozy

A plethora of Christmas trees - our kind of place

Winter foliage

There is always something even more amazing at the conservatory, like these flowers growing from the edges of this air plants leaves.

Keywords: christmas, flowers, seattle, winter

12/17/12 - The Gingerbread Display at the Seattle Sheraton

Whenever we get into Seattle around Christmas, we check out the gingerbread display in the lobby of the Sheraton. They always have some amazing constructions, and they always get us into the Christmas spirit.

This is actually the Macy's display which was on our way to the Sheraton.

That's Ariel on the left, Disney's Little Mermaid.

This one, with amazing spun sugar domes, is based on Aladdin.

Beauty and Beast, meeting on the bridge

This castle features tales from the Brothers Grimm.

This confection is based on Lewis Caroll's confection, Alice in Wonderland.

That's the Jabberwock up there.

That's Ursula, Ariel's nemesis, in her cave.

That's Aladdin with the genie.

Keywords: christmas, seattle

11/07/12 - Urban Rainbow

We were in Seattle again. This time the sky treated us to a bit of a show.

Sunset clouds and the space needle

An urban rainbow - They don't look like country rainbows.

Sunset light

Keywords: seattle

10/07/12 - Manga Seattle

We recently downloaded an application for our phone that turns ordinary photographs into manga-like drawings, complete with untranslated Japanese text for enhanced versimulitude. Where better to mangafy the imagery than the trendy Capital Hill neighborhood of Seattle?

That's J. Crew and Barnes & Noble downtown. We went up Pine and down Pike.

The Paramount - looking good

A record shop

A boring looking building looking less boring - This reveals some of the power of mangafication.

Is that Spinassa?

An appliance repair shop on Pike


This must be a head shop

This could be Tokyo, or Des Moines.

A costume shop

The convention center

Keywords: art, seattle

09/27/12 - Seattle Update

On our latest lightning trip to Seattle we went to one of our favorite places in the city, the Ballard Locks. We just love the early 20th century Army Corps of Engineers style, the botanical garden and the amazing fish ladder viewing area. There were plenty of salmon, and though there weren't a lot of boats, we still got to see the locks cycle. We definitely got our civil engineering fix this trip.

We also tried out the cupcakes and ice cream at Cupcake Royale and were pretty impressed. We aren't big ice cream people, but we did enjoy the mix of caramel cupcake chunks with partially crystallized caramel smooshed into sea salt ice cream. The whiskey bacon crack ice cream was pretty impressive too with a good clean whiskey flavor and good use of the salty bacon. If ice cream is just too sweet for you, this might just be close enough to savory to please. The chocolate cream cheese cupcake we tried, however, was the real treat. They are serious about their cake and crumb, and their icing expertise is excellent.

Ballard seems to have a number of pretty good bakeries. The Great Harvest Bread Company down the street smelled pretty good, and they had seriously sticky looking cinnamon rolls, but we were also booked for dinner, so it will have to wait until next time.

In fact, we went to two restaurants for dinner. First, we went back to The Walrus and The Carpenter for some oysters. They only had four types, including some lovely little Olympias, but we still had a nice tasting. Then, we went down the hall of the bicycle shop and checked in to Staple and Fancy Mercantile where we had a great charcuterie plate with some of the best speck we've ever had with some coppa to match. (The octopus salad was good, but not great.) For our main courses we had their wonderfully tender pork shank with an eggplant puree, grilled padron peppers, and oil cured dried tomatoes. As usual, some of the padron peppers were mild, while others were quite spicy. We also had some wonderful penna full of rich melted cheese. Staple and Fancy is definitely a restaurant we have to get back to.

Cupcakes royale

Sprinkles at Cupcakes Royale

A ship coming through the Ballard Locks

Serious civil engineering style

Botanical garden

A fishy friend at the fish ladder

A passion flower

We'll check out the cinnamon rolls on our next trip, if we're feeling thin.

Staple and Fancy Mercantile

Keywords: oysters, restaurants, salmon, seattle

06/09/12 - Restaurant Update

We've been eating out a bit, so we have some updates on some old favorites we've been neglecting, and at least one new place.

Cafe Campagne

 We hadn't been to Cafe Campagne in a while. Our last visit, some years back, was a disappointment. We tend to go for lunch, and the lunch menu had be sorely reduced with many of our favorite dishes gone. This time, things were much better. We really liked the asparagus mimosa with asparagus, eggs and a mustard dressing. It was a lighter version of the old, incredibly buttery, asparagus flamande. We also enjoyed the country pate and our hanger steak frites. That's one of our favorites, and it was good to see it back for lunch. We'll definitely be coming back to Cafe Campagne again.

They had really good lighting for this picture of their bar.

Palace Kitchen

 Palace Kitchen was another neglected favorite. Here too, the problem was the menu. It had settled into a rather pasta heavy pattern and seemed all too predictable. Time, and a few more iterations of the menu, seems to have changed things, so we enjoyed old standards like the glazed chicken wings and coconut cream pie, but also some new dishes like a meltingly tender spring lamb ragout with green chick peas, ramp (wild onion) oil and little cavatelli stuffed with ricotta. We also had the pork debauch (our term) with crispy ears, pork loin lomo, pork belly, and bacon bits served with arugula. To compensate for all the porky goodness, we also had a spring time dish of flowering broccoli with nettle pesto and white beans.

More great lighting

California Taco

 We made a short side trip to chow down at this taco truck in a Lacey strip mall, and we were well rewarded. We took over a table in front of the next door pawnshop and devoured our tacos, with beef tongue and with chorizo. They had great fresh corn tortillas and wonderfully spicing fillings. Nothing was bland or greasy. Even the rice and beans were great. We also had a sandwich on a soft roll called a cubano with chunks of meat, green peppers and onions. Everything was absolutely delicious. This truck has the best Mexican food we've eaten in the Seattle area.

It's one of four trucks. This one was in a strip mall in Lacey.

Blue Flame

 Blue Flame is close to home, and we drive by all the time. There's the distinctive blue flame design and often the distinctive smokey smell, but we usually just pass by. This time, we were hungry, so we ordered up a rack of pork back ribs and a pile of beef brisket, slathered on the barbeque sauce and chowed down. The meats were great. The romaine salad with blue cheese dressing was delicious and refreshing. Even the smoked potatoes were wonderful. It's going to be much harder to drive by in the future.

It's hard to miss on route 101 east of town.

Joule

 We were in the cab, on our way to Joule, when we thought to call ahead and make reservations. It took a while for the phone to answer, and an apologetic voice explained that the restaurant was closed. They were moving to a new location. We are really excited about this. The word is that there will be few changes in the direction of the restaurant, so we can hardly wait until they reopen.

They are reopening in Fremont this summer.

Keywords: reviews, seattle, restaurants

05/08/12 - Revel in Fremont

We have been big fans of Joule and its fusion Korean cooking for a while now, so we decided to check out Joule's sister restaurant Revel. We went for lunch, but the dinner menu is the same or at least similar. It offers much simpler food than its sophisticated sister, but in the same vein, Korean fusion comfort food. This means wonderful noodles with oxtail ragout and even more wonderful dumplings stuffed with beef short ribs or, for vegetarians, cauliflower, chick peas and yogurt. The latter are curried and reminded us of wonderful samosas.

There are also the amazing savory pancakes. Think excellent egg foo yung, not iHop. We tried two, one with pork belly and kim chi, and an even more spectacular one with asparagus, feta cheese, almonds and kalamatas olives. The pork belly was just wonderful, but in the Korean fusion tradition. The later pancake was Korean-Mediteranean and would not have been out of place in a Greek fusion restaurant. The cheese and olives came through nicely and set off the seasonal asparagus.

403 N 36th St., Seattle, WA 98103 206.547.2040
We only tried one of the salads. We had to balance all the other dishes a bit with some greenery, so we ordered the salad of argula with thin slices of corned lamb. The arugula was great, and the corned lamb was wonderfully spicy. It was a great combination.

To be honest, we liked every dish we tried at Revel. Interestingly, our two favorites were the Greek - we'll call it that - pancake and the samosa, which combined ingredients and spicings from two widely varied cuisines with Korean techniques, and married them perfectly. We'll have to keep our eyes open and see what the folks at Revel come up with next. Until then, we'll be coming back for neo-traditional comfort food.

We should note that the restaurant is a bit noisy with a lot of hard reflective services, and it fills up for lunch and probably for dinner. We were able to converse once they turned down the music a bit, but this could be a problem for some. Despite this, we plan on coming back for our next fix.

Revel, poorly photographed

Keywords: seattle, restaurants

05/02/12 - Like a Snout

When we put a roof over the front steps of Lake Crescent Cottage, one of the items in the statement of work explicitly stated that the result "should not look like a snout". Then, there are those times you do want something to look like a snout. For example, this Maximus Minimus pulled pork food truck on Pine Street. We didn't try any of their pulled pork, but we can imagine the statement of work given to the body shop.

It does look like a snout.

Keywords: seattle, art

03/10/12 - Joule in Wallingford - Our Kaleberg Review

We have been trying new restaurants, but we haven't been updating our reviews online. Joule is one of our great new finds. The chef, Rachel Yang, was originally at Coupage, but she's opened her own place in Wallingford, and it is wonderful. The cooking is based on solid Korean cuisine, but with an eclectic touch, following the seasons and borrowing freely. This means beef shortribs and tamarind lamb shanks, savory mochis and chickpea agnolotti, and a broad range of local vegetables including our Kaleberg favorites like kale, broccoli rabe and fennel. For more, read our glowing review.

The restaurant towards dusk

Keywords: restaurants, reviews, seattle, kale

02/18/12 - The Ballard Locks in Winter

We recently took a lightning trip into Seattle, and made our way to the Ballard Locks in hopes of seeing our favorite winter garden. We were a bit early for the richly scented winter daphne, but there were some magnificent witch hazel trees and a fair bit of industrial action. It was like something out of a children's book with the locks cycling, the diggers on the dredging barge hauling up rocks and the railroad bridge opening between mile long trains.

Nature may have been a bit disappointing. The daphnes weren't in bloom. The fish ladder was fishless, and the garden winter bare, but sheer industry made up for it nicely.

The dredger removing this year's crop of fresh rocks

A witch hazel tree in bloom

A lone barge and tug passing through the locks

The dredger and the railroad bridge in action

A kingfisher cooperatively sitting on a cable

Keywords: seattle, winter

11/19/11 - Seattle Light

We were in Seattle the other day and could not help noticing the amazing light. It was one of those typical sunny-cloudy Seattle days with dark gray clouds and bright blue sky. There was also that science fiction-y looking building to catch the light.



Keywords: seattle

09/13/11 - Wood Fired Pizza

For a while they were going to build some luxury condos on this lot. They even dug a deep hole for the foundation, but now it's back to a parking lot and wood fired pizza. We didn't actually try their pizza, but they've got the wood and flames all right. If nothing else, it shows imagination in the face of economic collapse.

You can see the flames

Keywords: seattle, food

07/19/11 - Some Arty Pictures of Capital Hill

On our last trip to Seattle, we wandered up Capital Hill and took some arty photographs. It's an arty looking neighborhood, so it's perfect for taking arty photos.











Keywords: seattle

07/18/11 - The Goats of Seattle

We were wandering around near Pike's Place Market when we saw these goats on the steep hillside. They're definitely urban goats and quite hungry. Apparently, they can't get a mower for that steep slope, so the goats are their answer. According to the press release, they're from Rent a Ruminant.

Keywords: seattle

07/17/11 - Seattle Collage

We were in Seattle a while back and visited the Ballard Locks which are always wonderful. The channel was full of water, and the fish ladder was full of fish. We got to see the railroad truss bridge go up and down. The locks didn't cycle this time, but they're a wonderful working piece of architecture as well as a museum piece.

We also tried out a new Ballard restaurant, The Walrus and The Carpenter. We came early, at 4PM, and loaded up on oysters which were half price. We also had some wonderful grilled sardines with walnuts and coriander, fried oysters with coriander aioli and some wonderful bread pudding with caramel sauce.

Like the Ballard Locks and the fish ladder, The Walrus and The Carpenter was a very Seattle experience. One enters through a coffee shop which fronts a bike shop which leads to the restaurant. Sorry, but we couldn't get a really good photo of the place, but we'll try again when we get back.

The Ballard Locks

There's a lot of water,

some wonderful early 20th century civil engineering architecture,

railroad bridges,

and, of course, fish in the fish ladder.

This is not The Walrus and The Carpenter, but we passed it en route.

The entrance to The Walrus and The Carpenter, a coffee shop,

which leads to the bike shop,

and finally to the restaurant where they had these wonderful oysters.

Keywords: oysters, seattle

Newer Entries  Older Entries