
LEdlund
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Everything posted by LEdlund
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Well guys, how was it? I ended up staying in town this weekend but totally forgot about the wine dinner. I guess a bbq with family was just as fun.....
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So we had dinner there last night. Like tsquare says, it is unfortunate to be separated from the water so much. There is really no reason to sit by the window unless you want to watch the traffic on Alaskan Way. Of course maybe if it were sunny, it would have been better. The bar area is very "tech" looking: brushed aluminum bar with mint green tinted glass accents. My first thought was "antiseptic". Then I smelled bleach. Then the rest of my thoughts were all "antiseptic"! My friends and I had a drink there before moving to the dining room. My martini was good enough, but I wish they had a better gin selection. Most everything we ate was really quite good. For starters we had: grilled calamari steak. This was nice and tender and served on a bed of soft polenta. The shell on the soft shelled crab was not soft enough for me, but my friends liked it. The only disappointing starter was the bibb lettuce salad with crumbled blue cheese. Only that I was hoping for a lightly dressed salad with some blue cheese crumbles and what I got was a salad dressed with a heavy blue cheese dressing. The crumbles were part of the heavy dressing. I love heavy blue cheese dressing, it just wasn't what I wanted or expected last night. For entrees we had: boneless oven roasted duck. This had been weighted when cooked and was about an inch thick with a sweet, crispy skin. I had the lobster paella which I was warned was quite spicy (they had been receiving complaints) I took my chances since I love spicy food and was glad I did. The paella was full of shrimp, mussels, clams, white fish, chicken, chorizo and a nice big lobster claw. My favorite entree was the oven roasted whole red snapper which tsquare also had. I normally don't order whole fish in restaurants because I am too lazy to deal with the head/tail and bones. I would gladly deal with it for this fish. The skin appeared to have been rubbed with salt and olive oil and it had been roasted at a high temperature so the skin was crispy and salty and the fish was still moist and flavorful. Yum. We were too full for dessert....ok, let's be real, nothing piqued our interest enough to convince us to order it. The place was mostly empty with lots of size zero hostess parading around. The wait and bus staff were pleasant enough. I had a question about a wine on the list so the sommelier was sent over. I asked my question, she looked perplexed, then admitted this was her first day and she wasn't familiar with the wine I was asking about. She suggested I order a different wine. Will I go back? Probably. I won't meet people there for drinks, but I would go for a meal.
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Darn, I'll be in Vancouver that weekend! Luckily I'll be seeing Daniel Lanois in concert and eating at Vij's so I won't feel so bad about missing the class........
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Thanks for the review. I'm meeting friends there tonight. I'm disappointed to hear that there is so much space between the restaurant and the water. I have visions of sipping cocktails with a gorgeous view....... The flatbread sounds fantastic. Too bad about the sides with the copper river salmon. The ravioli sounds good.
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Depending on the date, my friend from the bbq tasting will come too. My hubby will probably want to come too.
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Do we have a date set for this? I have June 7th on my calendar, but don't know if that was ever confirmed. I read in the yesterdays Times that the Market hosts their own "cooking class" with local chefs. It will be interesting to see these groups of people roaming the market!
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Cafe Besalu for sure!
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City Kitchens for sure. I love their close out room towards the back! Their prices on Global knives were the best I found anywhere, including Vancouver and on line discounters. Since I am there so often, I also shop at The Mrs. Cooks at U Village. And, of course, Seattle Restaurant Supply on Aurora. I like Sur La Table, but the market location is soooooo small and cramped that it makes it difficult to shop. But when I was on a mission to find a salt pig, they were the only place in town to carry one............................
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I'm available all of those dates.
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Varmint, Good luck with your journey. It's going to be fun to follow your progress. Like Jeniac, I have been on Weight Watchers for the last year and have lost 66 pounds. I am proof that you can be a foodie and lose weight too. (I also just got over Strep Throat!) My advice would be to have fun with the process but I can see already that you are doing that! Lauren
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I haven't been mushrooming in years, but that is where we always went. My grandmother was born and raised in Leavenworth. One of the good (?!) things about the fires there were the mushrooms to come. My grandmother would never take people to her "hunting" grounds. Lucky for me I was family.........
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I guess I best get this down before I completely forget everything from the dinner. Since this was my first wine dinner at BM I have nothing to compare it to, but I had a fabulous time. Arnie and his staff did a great job of serving the 40 or so of us that were there. Having done wine dinners at other restaurants, I was surprised to see that we were seating at different tables in the main restaurant. I had expected a big table in a separate room. The only thing I missed by having the tables separate, was that talking with the other diners was difficult. We were lucky to be seated right next to Arnie so we were able to chat with him regularly. First course was oysters on the half shell with St Hallet Poacher Blend wine. The oysters were plump and tasted just like the sea. They were especially good when eaten with the cucumber salad they were served with. I wasn't fond of the wine. A little too green for me. I should note that I am by no means a wine connoisseur. I like to drink it and that is all I know. Second course was shrimp skewers with tamarind and the wine was Howarths Pycnantha Riesling. This was not my favorite course. The shrimp had cooled too much by the time it got to us and the tamarind flavor wasn't as prominent as I would have liked. The wine was the strangest riesling that I have ever tasted. Very watery and almost sour. The third course was duck pot pie in green pea puree with a Sticks Pinot Noir. I loved this dish. The crust of the duck pie was rich and buttery and the duck confit was soooooo flavorful. The puree was split pea soup finished with fresh english peas. The brightness of the peas blended perfectly with the rich saltiness of the pot pie. It was mentioned that in Australia they would put tomato sauce on that dish (which they call a floater). Sounded like a crime to me. Oh, yeah the wine..... a pretty non-descript pinot. Very young and light. Arnie mentioned that they had tasted, and were expecting the 1999 vintage and ended up with the 2002. It needed the age. The main course was lamb served on foie gras filled gallette topped with a fried quail egg. I am the only one at my table who tasted the foie gras in the potatoes and I thought it was a fun touch. The lamb was perfectly medium rare and very tasty. The wine served with the lamb was my husbands favorite. It was a Jim Barry McCrae Wood Shiraz. It was peppery and big and went perfectly with the lamb. I wish I had known about this wine before Easter! By the time dessert came around I was stuffed, but I managed to eat it all anyway. It was pavlova with tropical fruit and on the side of the plate were three little cakes covered in coconut. The pavlova was a little too sweet for me, but the little cakes were a nice surprise. And the dessert wine was my favorite of the evening. It was a Campbells Rutherglen Muscat. Very dark in color. Tasted like hazelnuts and caramel to me. I loved it. The next dinner is featuring Southern Italy but unfortunately it is the Sunday night of Memorial Day weekend. I doubt we will be in town, but if we are, I'm sure we will be there.
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I have a vague recollection of an article I read years ago about a change in the liquor law to allow for taking unfinished wine home with you. I thought the reason for the change was because they found people were drinking more than they might otherwise, rather than having wine they paid for "go to waste". That, of course, the WSLCB does not want to encourage. I do remember the article saying it had to go in the trunk though. I just found this on the WSLCB web site: Can a partially consumed bottle of wine which was purchased with a meal in a restaurant, hotel or club be taken home? Yes. The remaining portion of any wine purchased for consumption with a meal may be taken home, provided it is recorked or recapped in its original container Lauren
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This is what we had for Easter, roasted in the oven. We took it out at 135 degrees and it was too done. We were using various cookbooks to figure out when to take it out and we should have stuck with Julia Child's recommendation. 125 - 130 would have been better.
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I signed up on the LA Times site and printed the recipe. I'm adding the changes posted by capers as well as the recipe notes from Mamster. The recipe in the LA Times doesn't call for salt along with the ground almonds. How much salt should be added? After I finish this, is in appropriate for me to email it to anyone who wants it? Lauren
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Thanks! I just placed my order. They asked me who I was referred by and I started to say Fat Guy! I had to quickly look at your sig line so I could give your real name Lauren
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I live a block or so from there so I have been a couple of times, hoping to make it "home". Unfortunatley my husband hasn't been as enamored with the place as I have been. First we went there for lunch with my parents a week ago Saturday. They serve brunch until 3PM on the weekends along with a limited "brunch" menu. My father ordered eggs benedict with apple sausage and said it was really good, although we were sure the hollendaise was Knorrs. Hubby ordered the turkey sandwich (also with a salad) and said it was awful! The turkey was the pressed kind he doesn't like, and he also didn't like the bread. I'm not an apricot fan so I didn't try it. My mom and I both had the BLT, also with salads. We both loved them, although she had to ask for extra mayonaisse. And I agree about the salad, it was wonderful and perfectly dressed. I had their ESB to drink and, though I am not a huge beer fan, I thought it was the best I have ever had. Hubby had the stout which, as you can imagine, he didn't like. My mom had something light but I can't recall what. I had some of it and wasn't impressed. The next visit was for breakfast last Sunday. I had a huevos rancheros kind of thing with corn tortillas, tomatillos, beans and eggs. I thought it was fabulous, but I am really into that type of thing. Hubby had a standard sausage and egg breakfast, again with the apple sausage. He didn't like either the sausage or the hash browns and, at 7.95, thought it was a little pricy. It looks like we will continue to go to the Varsity Inn for our breakfasts. Lauren
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I'd love to try some new olive oils, what do you recommend I order? Lauren
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My cousin does that too! She commented once that my mini quiches turned out better than hers. Hers were dark on the outside and not heated through. Later, when we made them at her house, I found out why!
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I have so many picky eater friends that I don't know where to start....... There's the one that won't eat celery. I had made tuna salad sandwiches in pita pockets for a picnic party and she took all the tuna salad out of the pita pockets and proceeded to pick every piece of celery out of it before returning the salad to the pita. Leaving a pile of celery bits on her plate. There's the one that can't order anything as it is listed on the menu. Every dish had to be special ordered...."can I have the veal but with the polenta that comes with the pork and the asparagus that comes with the chicken?" It only got worse when she went on the Atkins diet. And she used to work in a kitchen! A co-worker of my husbands was complaining that she hated going to dinner with her inlaws because her mother-in-law wouldn't order until she knew what every one else was having. She couldn't understand it. When I mentioned that we do the same thing, so that we are sure to get tastes of lots of different menu selections she was mortified! "I would never taste something anyone else ordered" she says. Then we went to a restaurant with she and her spouse and I found out why. Her spouse had "food allergies" and ordered everything plain, without sauce. She had food dislikes and ordered everything without onions, garlic, "weird" ingredients etc. Another friend won't eat vegatables except canned green beans. In fact, she really won't eat much except Hamburger Helper kinds of things. For some reason she wants to join my book group which is made up of foodies that work in restaurants. At our meetings we cook food that is represented in the books we read. It should be interesting to see how she deals with those meals. My grandmother was very old school when it comes to restaurants, low tips, treats people poorly, that sort of thing. She took my cousin and I to a nice seafood restaurant whose chef was the son of a friend of hers. She kept dropping the chefs name and being just generally rude and ornery. They had mussels in a thai curry sauce as an appetizer and my grandmother wanted to order it. I was afraid it would be too spicy for her so I asked the waiter how spicy it was. He replied not spicy at all. Of course it came and it was inedible. You just know he told the kitchen to "kick it up a notch"! Another friend treats wait people like dirt. We were at a wedding where a friend of mine was working the reception. Wait staff were walking around with trays of satays and after a few minutes my group of friends had accumulated a few used skewers. She motioned for my friend to come over then handed all the used skewers to her. I was so embarrased! Lauren
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But isn't that because readers reported they caught on fire, not because it didn't kill bacteria?
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I just made reservations. I agree, it doesn't sound as interesting as those previously posted, but I'm sure I will learn a thing or two.... Lauren
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I can assure you it is not a guy thing. I am the same way, right down to the hatred of mixing colors. My latest bout of anal retentiveness comes from trying to rid my life of plastic. If it was good enough for my grandmother to store her goods in glass jars, then it is good enough for me. And Mamster, I too love my Dymo label maker. I would label my cat if she'd let me!