Trip Report: One Fine Day in Seattle

[MarketStEl]

(A clue to how my life runs: I started to post this yesterday, after reducing some more photos I wanted to include. I got only so far before I had to go out to defend my Trivia Queen title [go to Philly.com and navigate your way to the "Image" section of Sunday's Inquirer for more about this]. Then I tried to post this again this morning, but a friend came over with a job for me and I had to turn my attention to that. Now that I've got the week's groceries put away, I'm trying again. If I'm lucky, I'll get this up before 9 p.m. EDT tonight, when I head out to sing my brains out. As you can now see, I wasn't lucky.)

Now that I've finally gotten all the pix I wanted to post uploaded and have caught up on all the back-and-forth on the upcoming mayoral primary in Philadelphia, I can finally do that one marvelous day I spent in Seattle justice.

First off, let me say that while I found San Francisco absolutely enchanting--and, like most visitors, I didn't want to leave--I think that on the whole, I like Seattle better. My opinion may have been affected by the fact that I enjoyed very un-Seattle-like weather the three days I was there. For the entire stay, the scenery and climate lived up to the lyrics to the theme from the 1960s TV series "Here Come The Brides":

The bluest skies you've ever seen are in Seattle

And the hills the greenest green in Seattle

Like a beautiful child

Growing up, free and wild

Full of hopes and full of fears

Full of laughter, full of tears

Full of dreams to last the years

In Seattle

But my suspicion is that the city is pretty cool in the rain, too.

Actually, Thursday, April 5--the day I spent in the city--dawned somewhat overcast. I rode the commuter bus in from Bellevue--whose center I confused for downtown Seattle on the ride up from Sea-Tac to my brother's house in Woodinville--and exited at the corner of 8th Avenue and Pine Street, near the visitors information center, or so I was told.

I found the visitor info desk inside the Washington State Convention Center, got a tourist map, found out where the places I would have drinks and dinner later that night were, went up an escalator and walked right into Freeway Park.

This is a well-maintained, surprisingly quiet patch of grass and concrete perched right atop Interstate 5, but the foundation is thick enough that you can barely hear the traffic. It was also a surprisingly empty patch of grass and concrete. My guess is because it's rather difficult to just stroll into; I could only find one direct entrance from a bordering street into the park.

But someone else did eventually walk through, and she was nice enough to snap a photo of me in it.

As I was too busy gawking at the scenery to read on the bus, I decided I needed to find a place where I could survey the local newspaper (something I do wherever I go), relax a bit and maybe check my e-mail. I found that place just uphill from Freeway Park on Pike Street.

Here I got a cuppa -- a very good cuppa, too, fruity and smooth; this place does its part to uphold Seattle's reputation as Coffee Capital USA -- checked for any late messages from the area (none, thank God; your coffee purchase also buys you 20 minutes of time online) and sat down to read the day's news.

I understand that the Post-Intelligencer is the smaller of Seattle's two dailies. Sean tells me he only reads the P-I, though, and he led me to believe that it's more in touch with the pulse of Seattle than The Seattle Times. Besides, whenever I get sent a story about happenings in Seattle online, "it's in the P-I." I note that Thursday's edition had a story that was right up my alley: one about potential disaster striking a transportation facility.

The rack of FunMaps in the front window should have tipped me off to what part of Seattle I was in, but I thought nothing of it then.

From Uncle Elizabeth's, I walked down Pike into the shopping district and oohed and aahed at the stuff I couldn't possibly afford in Nordstrom. (I also made a mental note that as far as type of retail is concerned, Seattle's Fifth Avenue bears more than passing resemblance to New York's.)

I then made my way past several structures of varying interest to the building I definitely had to check out: the Seattle Public Library.

Rem Koolhaas' haphazard stack of boxes is the most jaw-droppingly stunning structure I have been in in quite some time, and I was impressed at the amount of thought the architect put into the building and how it should work. There are a lot of good, innovative ideas at work in the library, and it certainly seems to have fulfilled its intended purpose, which is to draw people into the heart of Seattle every day. But there are some areas where Koolhaas fell flat on his face. In particular, there's the little matter of how you get from the bottom of the parking ramp for the books to the gathering place on the floor below. There is no obvious stairway connecting the two. Instead, large signs direct you to a fire stair just before the end of the book garage.

I was told over cocktails later that day that many library staff say the building doesn't work as well as everyone thinks it does. Living as I do in a city with a similar architectural landmark that is a functional failure (Penn's Richards Medical Laboratories [1960], designed by Modernist giant Louis Kahn), I can sympathize with the librarians. Still, I'm glad I took the guided tour.

By now, it was noon, and time to head downhill to the Pike Place Market.

This sprawling complex occupies nine buildings along a four-block stretch of Pike Place. The main building also descends four floors from Pike Place to about one floor above the level of Alaskan Way. That's a lot of space to sell a lot of food. I'd guesstimate that there's about three times the space in the Pike Place Market that there is in Philly's venerable Reading Terminal Market and about four times the space found in the nation's oldest farmers' market, St. Louis' Soulard Farmers Market.

Like the RTM, the Pike Place Market strives to balance its primary mission of bringing the food producer and the food consumer together with its secondary function as tourist magnet -- in fact, before I left for Seattle, RTM General Manager Paul Steinke e-mailed his list of RTM loyalists a Seattle Post-Intelligencer story about how some in Seattle are worried that as the Pike Place Market gets ready for some needed renovations, it will lose its character as a source for quality fresh foods first and foremost. (So far, the RTM has successfully kept fresh food in the forefront.)

I've got news for them: The market has already gone way too far down that slippery slope for my comfort. While most of the auxiliary buildings are occupied by vendors of either fresh foods to prepare at home or prepared foods to eat there, the Main and North Arcade buildings (I didn't get a chance to explore the Economy Market adequately) struck me as more crafts fair than cornucopia.

But even there, there's plenty of good food to be had.

I had said beforehand that, having experienced the workplace motivational juggernaut called FISH! already, I was not particularly interested in seeing the guys who send fish flying through the air. As it turns out, it's impossible to avoid them, for their fish market lies right inside the main entrance to the Main Arcade, under the famous neon sign and clock. Just listen for the shouts and look for the clump of tourists -- you can't miss it.

I quickly made my way down a ramp and into the North Arcade, where nary a scrap of food was to be found in the building's nether regions. I guess the food keeps better on the street level.

And the flowers, too -- loads of them.

And as with so many other places in this very hilly city, there were marvelous views from many vantage points on the main level.

But I was getting hungry, so I strolled up Pike Place itself, looking in the other market buildings for a place to eat.

There were plenty of them, offering fare from around the world, but ultimately I settled on a deli in the Stewart House building called Bavarian Meats.

Unlike most of its East Coast analogues, this deli really doesn't do food to eat on the spot. The woman behind the counter told me that while the shop does make sandwiches, they were definitely an afterthought: for instance, I couldn't get cheese on the cured beef sandwich I requested -- if I wanted that, I'd have to get at least a quarter pound of it. Ordinarily, that wouldn't faze me, but I really didn't feel like eating that much cheese right then.

So I had it without. It was simple, and very good.

And yet I still had room for more. I guess traipsing up and down all those hills had left me ravenous. That morning, when I told Sean I wanted to buy both my partner's birthday present and something good to take home at Pike Place, he responded that I really had to go to Uli's: "You may have seen it on the Food Network." I didn't tell him that I don't watch the Food Network all that much. But I recalled his advice and headed there next. On the way there, I passed by the original Starbucks, which has two things you can't find at any of their thousands of other outlets: The original logo featuring a bare-breasted mermaid --

and a special coffee, Pike Place Blend, sold only at that store. As I'm not a big fan of Starbucks, I passed on buying some.

Uli's is all that. They make their sausage right there on the premises--

--and their varieties span the globe: German bratwurst, Mexican chorizo, Portuguese linguica, Cajun andouille...the list goes on and on. The proprietor is a certified German master butcher, and his certificate hangs proudly in the front window of the sausage-making room.

I decided I'd send some smoked salmon -- from Pure Food Fish Market next door -- home and ordered a South African boerwors on a roll to eat right there.

I'm not quite sure how to describe its taste -- a little winey, a little sagey -- but it sure was good.

Finally, I bought a T-shirt -- salmon-colored, of course -- and the best beef jerky I've ever eaten from Stewart's Market.

I had some time to kill after that. So I went down the seven or so flights of steps that connect Pike Place Market to the waterfront and took a stroll along Alaskan Way.

An earthquake a couple of years ago left the 50+-year-old Alaskan Way Viaduct, left, structurally compromised. A heated argument has raged ever since over what to do with the elevated expressway. I refer readers to the Ferry Building pictures in my San Francisco trip report on the California board for the obvious answer. I also see that the (now out of service ) Waterfront Streetcar Line is named for George Benson. He is one of my favorite musicians; I didn't know he was a Seattleite!

I then climbed up the University Street steps and stopped in Tully's not for coffee, but for an energy drink they're promoting made from some sort of South American tropical rainforest plant. Sean tells me he prefers Tully's to Starbucks, so on my next visit, I will have to try their coffee.

Oh, yeah: I also took a monorail up to this thing that looks like a pie plate perched atop an egg beater. It's called the "Space Needle" by the locals.

I'm told that this structure is the signature of Seattle to the outside world. It was built for this world's fair that took place here in 1962. I must admit that the structure is quite distinctive and very striking, and (yet again) it offers breathtaking views from the observation deck on the top of the pie plate.

I think that snow-capped peak barely visible in the far distance is Mount Rainier.

But I must confess that the Space Needle was ultimately a letdown, because unless I had mad coin to drop in the fancy-schmancy revolving restaurant one level down, this was all it offered in the way of food:

Not that I really needed to eat, for it wouldn't be long until I would meet my Seattle hosts for dinner.

From there, I went back downtown, up Pike Street past Uncle Elizabeth's, crossed this street:

and, one block later, found myself on Broadway.

The main drag of Capitol Hill is a really neat thoroughfare--busy and unpretentious, full of funky shops representing a (ahem) rainbow of cultures. I think I could easily make myself at home in this neighborhood.

I had a couple of Cape Codders as preliminaries at a place called Julia's on Broadway -- nothing special, just your usual gay-bar happy-hour special, with a little chitchat with a local on the side--and hopped a Route 49 trolleybus back downtown.

After deciding that I'd get there faster walking once we got stuck in traffic in the Pine Street construction zone, I strolled into Vessel at about 5:15, 15 minutes after our arranged meeting time. There waiting for me were Lauren Edlund (ledlund):

Rocky Yeh and Jan Lang (SeaGal):

and Wendy Miller (littlemsfoodie, not pictured) and her husband, who didn't join us for dinner later. Neither did Henry Lo (hhlodesign) and Lorna Yee (Ling), but they did drop in for cocktails with us.

And what cocktails they were! Should Katie Loeb, Philly's chief spiritual advisor, ever get a chance to get away from the bar at M, she must come here to try Vessel's creations.

I ordered their signature drink, the Vessel 75.

I generally don't do bourbon, but this concoction of bourbon, Peychaud's bitters, simple syrup, orange zest and maple syrup foam might make me reconsider.

Another outstanding specialty cocktail on the menu was the Chartreuse Swizzle -- green chartreuse liqueur, falernum, lime and pineapple juices.

I note that here, too, olives are offered as the standard bar snack at happy hour. Apparently, this is all the rage at better bars these days.

Rocky also ordered this cocktail:

The wasabi remoulade was a delicious change of pace.

My hosts informed me here that I had fortunately stumbled across the right fish market from which to ship smoked salmon when I bought my fish at Pure Food. (Most of it is still in our fridge, awaiting consumption. I suspect I will have to serve it before anyone else eats it.)

From Vessel, we proceeded uphill, then downhill, a few blocks to Union, a fabulous restaurant recommended by my hosts when we coordinated this outing.

This being Seattle, I had to order seafood, but I'm getting ahead of myself just a little bit. But only a little, for fruits of the sea were also represented among the appetizers we ordered. Like this geoduck with Tokyo onion, cucumber, and lime.

I had never had geoduck before; the enormous clam is found only in the waters off the Pacific Northwest coast, so I can say that I ate something you can only get in Seattle on this trip.

We also ordered the Totten Virginica oysters, served with lemon ice and Casa Brina olive oil.

These lasted about two minutes.

Rounding out the first course was beef tartare with capers, cornichons and rye crackers:

and something that would get the chef fined in Chicago, a miner's lettuce salad with roasted beets, pistachio, and shaved foie gras.

We are grateful to the Seattle Department of Health for warning us about the risks associated with eating raw or undercooked food, but as you can see, we were all quite willing to take those risks in exchange for delicious starters that all played sweet, tart and savory elements off against one another. I guess things could be worse: instead of a warning on the menu, we could have had an attorney making us sign affidavits before dining instead.

For the second and subsequent courses, the health risks were a non-issue. The second course included grilled spotted sardines with celery, pine nut and golden raisin salad:

something not on the menu that I vaguely recall as a lamb chop -- does anyone else remember?:

and roasted squab with parsley root and young garlic, served over squab jus.

All delicious, and all well executed. Then it was on to the entrees -- grilled lamb T-bone and braised lamb shank with asparagus salad dressed with grenache vinegar and fennel pollen:

a rare veal tenderloin with roasted spring onions, Bloomsdale spinach, and veal jus:

and the dish I ordered, roasted halibut with carrot and fennel juice and braised ramps.

Dessert consisted of a cheese plate:

I don't seem to have notes on the cheeses, so maybe someone can recall what the five varieties were?

a medley of sweet vegetables (I believe that the triangle at the lower left is a beet):

and fruit-and-nut bread, barely visible at the left above. Speaking of bread, the bread that was served at the start of our meal was excellent -- crusty and toothsome.

I didn't get to meet chef-owner Ethan Stowell, but I was introduced to dining room manager Hans Horchler, who runs the house with skill and aplomb.

Service was attentive, efficient and unobtrusive -- exactly what it should be at a restaurant of this caliber. One of my dining companions will have to recall the wine we had with dinner, which flowed almost as freely as the conversation -- I can see why you all like to get together to dine often!

Over dinner, Lauren and I agreed to exchange outstanding local foodstuffs from our respective home regions. She will send me a Late Harvest Syrah from Washington that she praised highly, and she will get from me a block of Pennsylvania Noble, an outstanding cave-aged Cheddar-style cheese from Lancaster County.

On the way out, we encountered this fella:

who was being readied for inclusion on the next day's menu.

For this level of dining, BTW, Union is an excellent value, with nothing on the menu over $30 and plenty of choices in the small plates under $20.

I should also note that a meal like this demonstrates that there is such a thing as too much food. I'm no stranger to fine dining, but occasionally I wonder how anyone could be sated with the dainty portions I often see on the plates at restaurants renowned for their creativity, a category into which Union falls. Let me state right here that not only was everything absolutely delicious, it was quite filling too (although getting stuffed is not what you come to a place like Union to do).

And yet the evening's dining wasn't over. From here, Rocky took me up to Belltown, that way cool neighborhood on downtown's northern edge where Henry and Lorna live, for real dessert at Ethan Stowell's new place, Tavolata. (Sorry, no photos.) This was one of those places where the decor is bare-bones, the ceilings high and unfinished, the atmosphere laid back but with a slight buzz, and the food fresh and interesting. Rocky took me here for the (mumble) -- I forget what they're called in Italian, but they resemble donut holes or beignets. These were fresh out of the fryer and dusted with powdered sugar that had melted to form a glaze. I'm sure it wouldn't surprise you to hear that we ate these like candy.

Then we drove to the other end of downtown, past the train station and Pioneer Square, to the International District, Seattle's Chinatown. This part of downtown Seattle struck me as a little more desolate than the parts to its north, and there certainly wasn't the color, light and energy one finds in the Chinatowns of San Francisco, New York or Philadelphia.

But looks are deceiving. Like those other Chinatowns, the ID is the place to go for good cheap eats late at night. Rocky took me to a Chinese restaurant like none I've ever been to:

What made the Purple Dot unique was not the kind of Chinese fare it served -- though Rocky pointed out to me that the spicier Chinese cuisines (Szechuan, Hunan) found in Eastern Chinatowns are by and large missing from Seattle and that Cantonese dominates everything -- but by the menu's mix of Cantonese and American diner fare.

Up at the top of this picture is what Rocky ordered: a ham and cheese sandwich with fries. In the foreground is my dish, "Beef Internal Delicacies" -- "offal" to you. Together we made pretty quick work of a congee with thousand-year egg, not pictured.

The offal was far from awful; in fact, it was wonderful -- chewy and beefy; it looks to me like it had been simmered in beef stock for quite a while. Accompanying our post-dinner adventure was running commentary on Seattle and its restaurant scene.

By now, it was the other side of midnight, too late for me to catch the last Sound Transit commuter buses back to the Eastside, so Rocky headed for the Mercer Island floating bridge -- Sean's wife hates tunnels, so they rarely cross it -- and ultimately Woodinville, where we promptly got lost in the network of twisty lanes and cul-de-sacs, all similarly named ("This is NE 179th Street...no, wait, it's now 191st Avenue NE...now we're on NE 181st Street...wait, it's NE 182nd now..."). Sean had to come outside to guide us to his place on 199th Place NE.

If you've managed to make it all the way to this point, you have as much stamina as it took me to traverse all those hills. My thanks and compliments go to my Seattle hosts; you all sure know how to make a visitor feel right at home! We will definitely have to do this again the next time I visit -- and as Estella Rose Smith is only six months old, there will be plenty of visits in the years ahead.

Restaurants and establishments mentioned in this essay:

Uncle Elizabeth's Internet Cafe

1123 Pike Street

206-381-1600

Nearest transit service: King County Metro routes 10, 11, 14, 43 and 49 all run east on Pike and west on Pine, one block north.

Julia's on Broadway

300 Broadway East (at Thomas Street)

206-860-1818

Nearest transit service: Metro routes 9, 49 and 60 stop at Broadway and John Street, one block away.

Pure Food Fish Market (206-622-5765)

Uli's Famous Sausage (206-839-1000)

Stewart's Market Beef Jerky (rotating space, no phone)

North Arcade Building, Pike Place Market

Bavarian Meats (206-441-0942)

Starbucks Coffee (206-448-8762)

Stewart House, Pike Place Market

Vessel

1312 5th Avenue (between University and Union streets)

206-652-5222

Union

1400 First Avenue (at Union Street)

206-838-8000

Nearest transit service to all of the above: Anything headed toward dowtown Seattle. While the downtown transit tunnel is closed for reconstruction, most of the principal routes operate on 3rd Avenue, one block west of the tunnel. When the tunnel reopens--with light rail a few years hence--all of the above places are a short walk from University Street station. Union is three blocks downhill; Vessel, one uphill; Pike Place Market, four blocks, downhill first, then uphill slightly.

Edited April 23, 2007 by MarketStEl (log)

[little ms foodie]

Sandy it was a pleasure to meet you and to dine with you!

We ate the dungenous crab salad before a picture could be taken and then little wedge on the cheese plate is quince or membrillo (sp). The red we had with dinner was Wa's own Cadence Winery but I'm forgetting which one!

gorgeous photos!!

[judiu]

And yet the evening's dining wasn't over. From here, Rocky took me up to Belltown, that way cool neighborhood on downtown's northern edge where Henry and Lorna live, for real dessert at Ethan Stowell's new place, Tavolata. (Sorry, no photos.) This was one of those places where the decor is bare-bones, the ceilings high and unfinished, the atmosphere laid back but with a slight buzz, and the food fresh and interesting. Rocky took me here for the (mumble) -- I forget what they're called in Italian, but they resemble donut holes or beignets. These were fresh out of the fryer and dusted with powdered sugar that had melted to form a glaze. I'm sure it wouldn't surprise you to hear that we ate these like candy.

If they're the same thing that are sold at New York street fairs, they're called zeppole and are absolutely freaking addictive!

[SeaGal]

Zeppole is correct and they are truly delicious at Tavolata.

Sandy, thanks for the great report and pictures. It was a real pleasure meeting you and sharing some of our NW food and drink with you.

(We also drank a Sancerre with the first courses, no recollection of year or appelation.)

[moosnsqrl]

Very entertaining and envy-evoking report, Sandy. You seem to have stumbled upon many of the same places we did on our visit a few years back - must be some innate midwestern-ness guiding us.

Looks like the Seattle group could almost hold their own against the Heartland gang when it comes to finding and devouring good food. Maybe they should send their A Team to Cleveland in July for a little non-literary smackdown.

[kiliki]

That was great, thanks. It's always fun to see my hometown through a visitor's eyes.

[Domestic Goddess]

Sandy - what a fascinating trip/food report! Thanks for sharing and letting us experience your day in Seattle.

[rockdoggydog]

Thanks for the great report Sandy! You forgot the fried quail we had Purple Dot in addition to the other things. I'm glad you enjoyed yourself and anytime you come back we'll be more than glad to take you more places.

Moosnsqrl (btw - how appropriate ) I for one would love to come to Cleveland and try to hold my own.

Rocky

[MarketStEl]

Moosnsqrl and I share hometowns, though not home states, Rocky. We also met, over lunch at the kind of nuevo-Mexicano restaurant that simply did not exist in the Kansas City of my childhood, last summer, when I went back for the first time in 20 years to attend my 30th high school reunion.

Yes, I completely forgot about the quail. If we ate the zeppole like candy, we consumed the quail like popcorn.

I enjoyed gallivanting around Seattle with you, too, and look forward to doing more of the same on my next trip.

BTW, no photos, but Sean's wife Christine is a pretty good cook too. She welcomed me to town with delicious homemade burgers topped with sauteed mushrooms and onions.

[prasantrin]

Great report. I really want to visit Seattle again, and go to all the places I missed when I was there (6 years ago!).

BTW, have you lost weight, Sandy? You're looking a bit leaner in that photo!

[Ling]

That's some good eatin'! Glad you had a wonderful time here, and it was so cool meeting you in person!

[MarketStEl]

BTW, have you lost weight, Sandy?  You're looking a bit leaner in that photo!

←

Thanks, but no, I haven't.

My weight continues to fluctuate in a range between 203 and 207.

I probably need to give my Lizard Brain a good talking to.