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reesek

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Everything posted by reesek

  1. zatz's on california in WS has bagel dogs. poppy or plain. never tried them, but i have been intrigued.
  2. ← it will be a great addition. i know the klocks very well, and can personally attest to their commitment to quality in everything they do. they're both great cooks...refined, but refreshingly unfussy. anson's charcuterie and fresh pastas are exceptional. jenny's wine knowledge is very solid, so you can expect a thoughtful, value-driven, and creative wine selection at picnic. they are dear friends, but beyond that, they're wonderful people. i have no doubt that their food, paired with jenny's warmth and effervescence will charm the neighborhood. now if it would only get warm enough to *have* a picnic...
  3. ocho in ballard. spanish tapas...and estrella dam in a bottle. i am very excited about this... i'm not sure of all the players, but one of them used to be a bartender at la carta de oaxaca, and is also the brother of a friend of mine. (full disclosure!) i haven't been, but it's getting buzz on CH and in the weekly today. the menu items sound pretty authentic, though i can't understand why anyone would rub a tomato on toast in january. (pan con tomate, or a variant is on the menu) that kind of behavior should be illegal. 24th and market - used to be a hotdog place?
  4. hi kiteless, mackerel is a very oily, fishy fish...it's kind of like anchovy or sardine - a very distinctive flavor. i love it, but it's very strong and definitely not for everyone. mmm...raw mackerel...
  5. Hope I'm not too late! Abeja is gorgeous - consider trying to spend one night there. The Beekeeper's blend is terrific and not available locally. The owners are lovely and gracious. K Vintners is right next door, and open whenever the mood strikes them - try to get in though, the owner is supposed to be quite the character, and they make a lot of fun wine. Walls wines I love: Pepperbridge (great tasting room - amazing view) Va Piano (right near Pepperbridge) Dusted Valley (very fun, completely lacking in pretense. the tasting room is in their garage) Buty (haven't been, want to go. love their wine) Rulo (ditto) Yellow Hawk have heard awesome things about Ash Hollow (in town tasting room) but haven't been Dunham Glen Fiona Syzygy are kind of next tier - if you're at the airport... Time permitting I'd add 3 Rivers (on the way into town!) but I'd skip Reninger (sp?) right next door. I had a different experience than Abra - ate at old 26 Brix & Whitehouse Crawford - far preferred WHC, but agree that old Brix was good for brunch. I would have gone back to either - but note that Brix is closed Sun/Mon and WHC is closed M/T The coleville patisserie is great (closed through this weekend, though IIRC) people also seem to love Creektown cafe - it's a restaurant outside of town. i thought it was ok, nothing special for lunch, but haven't eaten dinner there. Dinner at the Marc (at the Marcus Whitman) is fine, but nothing special. I can't believe I was just there and missed beef cheek tacos! Saffron is new and supposed to be interesting (across the street from the patisserie) Stop in Yakima on the way back - take the convention center exit - directly across the street from the convention center is the YakiMex market. great taco truck in the parking lot. sadly, we returned to town on the 4th and the truck was not there. i was sad. very sad to eat at taco bell instead. have fun!
  6. the vine must have been the place to go last week! i was there on friday with a bunch of ladies. we sat downstairs at one of the large tables - i love that space. our service was terrific, and food & wine were wonderful. i also have to say that for 8 people who ate and drank a heck of a lot, it was relatively reasonable. standouts were the boquerones (cured in house), the venison, the scallops, the cheese plate (i know, but it was a *great* cheese plate) and the pine nut tart. i know we had a lot of other stuff, but i just can't quite remember all of it. i think it's my new go-to for 6+ people.
  7. glad you liked lee's, tsquare, i'm so glad to have it in my 'hood. i think the owner or chef is a WG alum. we love the honey walnut prawns and lee's special fried rice which features tons of egg, and in the Spring, you're likely to find asparagus hiding in there. the HWP portion is absurd - i think there are 13 prawns/order - and the price is under $10. Lee's HWP are delightfully evil, right down to their bed of sweet, mayo-laden lettuce. someone at the stranger or weekly did a review a few years ago and recommended the nine flavor beef (or was it the seven flavor beef? i think they have both - but i have no idea what's "missing" from 7 that's present in 9. rocky? school me.) very fast service and a very efficent take-out operation (nice when you'd just as soon skip the aisle-meandering youth). i'll have to try the noodles.
  8. they should pay me...how about tavolata? they come no louder nor more hip...and agnolotti aside - pretty approachable. the upstairs space is totally cute, there was an 8 top up there last week, but they could easily reconfigure for 12 or so. la spiga also has some cool semi-private spaces.
  9. your menu looks great, best of luck! i'm a little hazy on the seating/service...is everything going to be packaged to go or is there seating in the trailer? what kind of packaging are you using...sustainable/biodegradable...? will you be posting your locations online? how will your prospective clients know where to find you on a given day?
  10. Your last sentence is intriguing - can you expand on it? Both are local schools - so what is the difference between best cooks and most knowledgeable - who's food you'd want to eat and who you would ask a question of regarding food preparation, history, business? ← That's pretty much what I mean. If I wanted an explanation on practices of a foie gras farmer I'd ask an SCCC grad. If I wanted to sample a decent bearnaise I'd ask a Art Institute grad. In my experience it seems that SCCC grads know more about food, where Institute grad know more about how to cook. Does that make sense? ← interesting...
  11. What is an "air check signal"? ← A wave of the hand to indicate to the waiter that you want your check, and I can't see a single thing wrong with it! ← really!? how fabulous! different strokes! i've always thought of it as being really rude...rather than waiting patiently until the server has a chance to get over to your table, it's basically an announcement to the restaurant that you are not being attended to properly. it depends on the ambiance of the restaurant, but in a nicer (quieter) place, a flailing hand motion will draw more attention than just from the server, and i can't help but think that that is part of the point. certainly though, in a busy, bustling kind of place - a discreet wave can sometimes be required.
  12. my dad favors the "air check signal" at times...which, while very effective, makes me want to slide under the table. dining companions i'd just as soon avoid - the host who discusses the wine prices with the staff (as in, "in the *real* washington, this wine is $x cheaper.") he was joking. i know, i didn't get it either. or the know-it-all who likes to quiz the server to see if he can prove he knows more than they do. you go, big man! and the most repulsive actually goes to my otherwise awesome sister. if she's got her kids with her, she will bring food from home and place it *directly* on the table. the kids are definitely old enough for a b&b plate - some might even argue they could probably handle cutlery, but it is a serious appetite killer to watch her rip up a piece of deli ham and lay it on the table. not having kids i would just never say anything to her. but it's wrong. so very wrong.
  13. i always feel like an outsider - i hate broccoli. it seems to be the one veg *everyone* loves - even if they just love it covered in cheezy goo. i was never indoctrinated into the love of cheezy goo, and (thus?) i'm still deeply suspicious of broccoli. i think the green giant is evil bigfoot - caught red-handed in the act of deforestation. all those tiny trees...where is the joy in eating the amazon? (i know!!! but i can't help it)
  14. AndrewB's list is good. You may find some need for a bird's beak (tourne knife) but I think you'll find they're less essential than the rest - and you can do it with a paring knife if you need to. I'd also add a good boning knife - if you're looking to splurge, get both a flexible (fish) knife and a rigid (better for poultry and especially meat). Finally, I'd add a bread knife - they're hard to sharpen, and tend to be the dullest "house" knife in the block. i love my dansko's - they're pretty a standard issue brand of cook's clogs, but i'd caution you to buy them in person rather than online - they are reported to be handmade, and each pair is a little different. good luck!
  15. we were going to bed. i swear. i flipped to FTV just to see, and it was her, the bane, in antigua. we honeymooned there last year and felt compelled to watch...the train wreck. my takeaway from the show was this; la ray (and certainly her producers) are in no way making a travel show. they juxtaposed several locations - some 30 minutes away from one another (leading my husband and i initially to question our sanity and run to google for a little fact checking) without any VO noting "take a short cab to historic nelson's dockyard..." any well-meaning person watching this show and thinking - hey - antigua, let's go there - and expecting what RR presented would be totally baffled. i can just picture joe and mary average re-looking at their expedia itinerary, and then at downtown st. john in incredulity. lots of tight shots and clean streets...many ridiculous shots and a 5 minute description of what looked like a very average (thai!!) green curry cooked for english tourists. and i can't even think about the whole gelato incident. no breadfruit, no codfish & ackee...instead we got, "a little bit of italy." excuse me, i need to cut myself. we loved our visit, and frankly, i think FTV is insulting not only antiguans but also the average's with their portrayal. i mean, seriously - it's an island of black people - is that so distasteful for FTV to show?
  16. near the alaska junction on california ave sw - right across from elliot bay brewery, in the old remo borawhoha space. immediate proximity to mashiko & husky deli.
  17. as i've always understood it, people who are pro-steam vs. boil are arguing that steaming is *healthier* than boiling because minerals can't leach into the water when you're steaming as they do when you boil. but more to the point, blanching and boiling are really separate methods, despite both using boiling water. when you're blanching (especially in a large pot with a lot of salted water, which i'm sure you are) you're keeping the temperature of the water high enough to help keep the chloryphyll from leaching into the water (salt helps with this too, as does shocking since it rapidly stops cooking). since you're blanching (rather than boiling for a long time) you too are preventing (some) mineral loss. i'm a blancher myself.
  18. i keep all nuts and flours with high fat contents (nut, bran, some wheat) in the freezer. otherwise i'm with you - except fruit - i rarely ever refrigerate fresh fruit at all. i prefer the flavors at room temp, and i'm also better about consuming fruits in a timely fashion if they don't go into the black hole that is my fridge.
  19. breakfast. i cooked him a birthday dinner not long after we started dating and think he too had a brussels sprout revelation. (his mom does not hate me, but she's english - her brussels are not changing.)
  20. hey! why not? good one. do tell on the buttercream - do you add it to whole butter, or brown, chill and then beat?
  21. so maybe she meant to say "blue crabs are my favorite"? that would be the eastern shore of maryland show, though... if she meant (florida) stone crabs - why didn't they make her a plate of stone crab claws? if she wanted blue - why didn't she rip that puppy in half and eat the good stuff? sounds to me like she wanted a regional speciality, but also needed the restaurant to do more than toss some already cooked food onto a plate, so they blended. deliberately. the truly strange thing is her eating the claw of the blue as though it were a stone - that's not an editing issue, it's a recognition issue.
  22. 6ppc, how do you smoke your peppers? (i assume there's also a drying process?) please do tell. ok abra, i'll keep the aleppo. i do like heat though, so i doubt it will replace my flakes. i'll try it this week on something i usually use flakes on - pizza or greens or something. can you tell me a little about about your chicken adobo? filipino style? worcestershire is a good one...it reminded me of something slightly fussy i do sometimes that i think is worth the trouble - grating my garlic on a microplane. instant garlic paste (for meatballs, burgers, mayo, etc.) the microplane is nearly always getting dirty anyway. lotta zest in my kitchen.
  23. a friend introduced me to green & black organic 70%. i love it's rich, fruitiness. it's dark (enough for me) and has no sourness. i want to pair it with good olive oil and salt. speaking of - what was the milk chocolate and salt bar all about...? i love salt + almost-bitter. edited to add: i bought a bar of michel cluizel from plantation "Maralumi." this is good. very very very good chocolate, but it was in a case in a small chocolate shop in pike place market and i didn't see the price until the woman rang me up. as a girl on a serious budget, i should have walked away from the $14 chocolate bar. as an intrepid explorer, i had to know what a $14 chocolate bar tasted like. (research!) was it worth it? while i liked it very much, for me the answer is no. to my taste, it's not 3x as good as green and black's but is nearly 5x the cost.
  24. i love the coffee tip, thanks CT! chocolate is a good one for dryish vegetable stews or compotes...and i love smoked paprika. when i was not eating meat, it was indispensible as a bacony note in greens and soups. doesn't hurt a devilled egg, either. as chufi's butter braised beef simmers away on the stove and the smell of bay fills the house, i'm reminded of how much depth it adds to underlying flavors. i'm not crazy about it as a front flavor (like in a bay ice cream or anglaise) but it really does add a round, savory quality to a braise. a couple of random things in my pantry - mushroom flavored soy sauce (what should i be making with this? i bought it for a braised pork belly and used a spash - i'm left with a lot...) aleppo pepper. i confess, i bought it because it was in every food mag (it's not even that fresh, to be perfectly frank - should i toss it?) what are the unique uses for it? to my taste, it was not unlike a zatar/pepper combo. i have both of those - is the aleppo a faddish distraction?
  25. what exactly is maggi seasoning? Abra thanks for the photo...i rediscovered your blog(s) and from that chufi's dutch cooking blog. i think butter braised beef will be on the menu for dinner!
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