Etta's

2020 Western Avenue

(206) 443-6000

Etta's is another quintessential Seattle restaurant, with fresh ingredients, unobtrusive cooking and an emphasis on seafood. We go because they serve an early Sunday lunch. We abhor Sunday brunch, except for the old all you can eat Olympia oyster brunch they used to have at the Four Seasons. So, now we go to Etta's.

We usually start with the fried squid rings and romesco sauce and something else. The squid rings are flavorsome and crisp and the romesco sauce rich and smokey. Something else is often the seared tuna with scallion pancakes, pea shoots and pickled ginger. It's the sort of thing you might find at a chinese restaurant, but usually don't. Etta's also has excellent crab cakes and a generous Dungeness crab salad.

Salmon is always a great choice for a main dish. We'll go for the king salmon with corn bread and garlic mushrooms or the Copper River salad with egg noodle pudding. Another winner is the fish and chips and there is also the ling cod with buttery cabbage and potatoes.

One nice thing about Etta's is that you can convince yourself to eat vegetables very easily. They have a great selection of side dishes including the local swiss chard, which has much more flavor than swiss chard elsewhere, possibly including Switzerland.

Etta's is distinctly northwestern, with the usual Pacific Rim Asian touch, but they also have a southerner on the staff, because the desserts always include some kind of cobbler or berry pudding. Maybe we are onto something? Did we mention the corn bread and corn puddings? We'll stick with our original description, quintessentiall Seattle.

Etta's is down by Pike's Place Market and open for lunch and for dinner, so they are a great place to get your taste buds oriented.