Joule

1913 North 45th Street
Seattle, WA 98103
(206) 632-1913

Reviewed: 12 March 2012

We were big fans of Coupage, Rachel Yang's restaurant in Madison Park. She left Coupage some time ago and opened her own restaurant on restaurant row (45th Street) in Wallingford. We took our time getting there, but we're big fans of hers again. The cooking is based on Korean cuisine, and Koreans love their beef, garlic and other meats, but Joule puts an imaginative spin on things, and the cooking and spicing are impeccable. One of our favorite dishes is the beef tongue, wonderfully tender, sometimes served with a Chinese celery pesto, sometimes with pickled fennel. They have great barbeque beef ribs and their beef short ribs with pork sausage, collards and kim chi was a classic.

It isn't just about the beef. They have wonderful lamb shanks (with tamarind and butter lettuce) and vegetables. They do a wonderful job with charred local vegetables like charred kale, an obvious favorite at the Kaleberg site, with pickled chanterelle or oyster mushrooms or charred brussels sprouts with apple, fennel and lardon. Joule is afraid of no vegetable, and some of their preparations are inspiring, like their broccoli rabe with slightly sweet Chinese sausage. With vegetables, Joule follows the seasons, but always with their own imainative twist.

It might be worth trying Joule just for the smoked tofu with enoki mushrooms. We even tried smoking tofu at home with limited success. The Joule version of the dish gives the tofu a meaty richness. They also serve Korean mochi, rice flour dumplings frequently found in desserts, in a variety of savory dishes, for example with green beans and red miso. The cooking may be based on Korean classics, but Joule covers a lot of ground using a broad range of ingredients and a variety of techniques.

We could go on and on. In fact, we have gone on and on, but that's just our enthusiasm. We haven't even mentioned the cocktails, some with Korean rice wine, flat or sparkling, and one cleverly seasoned with an earl grey tea reduction. We haven't mentioned the baguette with bacon butter. We just can't say enough good things about Joule which is about as a high a recommendation we can give.