That’s our edible adventure… do you feel a bit full yourself now?

Our Seattle adventure concluded with a great visit Chez Sheckler. On Friday night, we went to a local pizza restaurant for dinner. The pizzas were superb, with the thin, crispy crust you find in Naples. I opted for a goat cheese variation on the evening’s special: white pizza with fresh Meyer lemon slices and caramelized onions. It was really good and something I want to try at home.

The next morning we walked to downtown Magnolia and had amazing cinnamon buns for breakfast (and finally, a coffee fix for me!). We spent a lot of time wandering from shop to shop finding, among other things, long fireplace matches ($1.49 at the hardware store versus $11 at the home/garden store – yeah for Tate!) and ‘Hoops & Yoyo’ talking/singing cards by Hallmark. If you haven’t seen these charming cards, I encourage you to visit your local card store. They are precious. And at $5 each, not cheap. But we were having so much fun listening to them, I just had to buy some. If you regularly receive birthday cards from us, don’t be surprised when you get one this year!

The boys immediately got to work on long-distance flaming arrow shooting. Brett, the quintessential do-it-yourself Dad, got into the spirit and made a 12″ bow from some odds and ends in the garage. It definitely made the arrows go farther. But he skyrocketed into ‘cool Dad’ territory when he brought out a blowtorch to light the arrows. At this point, I think, I missed Paul the most. This kind of thing is right up his alley… and to have a partner in crime, double-score!

The kids had a little contest to see whose arrows went the farthest. One of my boys won, I think, but I can’t remember which. Larisa and I watched from the upstairs window and hoped the neighbors would not call the cops. Luckily, no one noticed their shenanigans and the afternoon passed slowly and mellowly. We had a great picnic-style lunch with agrumi salami, olives, bread, pickles, cheese and strawberries. Larisa and I even slipped away for a little wine tasting excursion. It was the perfect end to a perfect trip.

Seattle, we’ll be back soon!

kathy

In between breakfast and lunch, I conducted a little errand for a friend of ours. Actually, it was a bit more of a trek across town with the clock ticking against our hotel checkout time and no taxis in sight; but, in the end, it was worth it. I wanted to get to Salumi (all things pork and run by Mario Batali’s father) when it opened at 11am so I could be back at the Ace Hotel by noon.

I just barely made it.

First of all, I assumed arriving at opening time would be a brilliant idea. I would beat the crowd. Well, the crowd beat me. The line was so long, I didn’t get inside to select my delicious, handmade, artisanal agrumi* salami until about 11:30. It took a mere 5 minutes to select a few cured meats, pay for them and be back on the street. At that point, I had about 25 minutes and maybe 12-15 city blocks to cover. Thankfully, the boys are old enough to stay by themselves a bit. If I’d had them with me, it would not have been pretty. I raced along First Avenue, frantically scanning for taxis. No such luck. Except, of course, after I had covered more than half the distance on foot. Thankfully, I was able to flag down a taxi around Pike’s Place Market and made it back by 12:01. Nice!

We didn’t have much time to store our luggage with Ed before we headed over to Lola to meet Larisa, Brett, Aiden and Katja. Larisa was waiting out front so we went inside immediately (in advance of Brett and the childrens’ arrival). Well, the third visit truly was the charm because we received VIP treatment from the moment we arrived to the moment we left. Larisa was incredulous. “You’ve been here three times and you practically own the place… I live here and have never actually been inside!”

Brian, our charming server, remembered us from the morning’s visit and came back immediately with a huge (complimentary!) tray of pita triangles and housemade spreads: tzatsiki, hummous, roasted red pepper puree, cauliflower/anchovy puree and the most heavenly item: a fig/olive tapenade. It is practically beyond description… so good! I especially loved the play of sweet versus savory; on top of that, the texture was incredible. I was curious as to whether they’d used fresh or dried figs (my usual habit of trying to reverse-engineer a recipe) so I asked Brian if he knew. He said he’d find out and headed back to the kitchen. Five minutes later, Brian returned bearing a scrap of paper. He had copied the entire recipe from the cookbook in the back. My hero! Look for this delightful appetizer on my 2010 sangria party menu (!).

Everyone enjoyed perusing the Greek-inspired menu. Larisa chose the day’s special (something really terrific) and I chose the lamb skewer/greek salad plate. My boys shared a chicken skewer/greek salad and Aiden tried the lamb one (I think). My memory of what Brett and Katja ordered is sadly, lost. We did triple down on the donuts for dessert in case any of you were wondering. They were, of course, pronounced perfect by all!

After lunch, we headed over to the hotel to say our final goodbyes to Ed. What a lovely guy and a lovely place to stay. We hope to come back soon.

In the late afternoon, we trekked to the beach near Larisa and Brett’s house. They live in Magnolia, which is one of my favorite parts of Seattle. I’m still in awe they can walk to the beach from their home; that is seriously cool. The photos are from the kids looking for geoduck clams, crabs and sea glass. We probably spent about two hours exploring the area and it was fantastic (especially the light that time of day).

More to come, but this is the last Tom Douglas chapter (from THIS trip, of course!).

kathy

*I don’t know what is in the agrumi salami from Salumi but it is wonderfully lemony-citrusy with a bit of coriander and other good stuff – yum!

Another day, another fabulous breakfast at Lola. When it’s that good, you don’t want to go anywhere else! But, to be perfectly frank, we wanted the chance to gorge on donuts. Hey, when in Seattle…

The boys ordered the Lola breakfast again, sans potatoes since I felt the carb quotient would be high enough with the extra bag of donuts. Still reeling from the previous evening’s dinner, I opted for a simple bowl of fruit (plus a few donuts, of course!).

We were welcomed back by staff members who remembered our visit the morning before. They loved that we loved their donuts so much! And that pretty much sealed the deal for the day’s lunch option. We opted to come back later with our friends, the Shecklers, hoping the daily donut supply would not run out by then.

Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion of our Tom Douglas adventure!

P.S. This photo is from the first breakfast (amazingly, the donuts look THE SAME each time!).

[Photo by Kathryn Besser]

During our dinner at Palace Kitchen (the next Tom Douglas restaurant on our list), I acutely felt the lack of my husband’s presence when Tate’s Palace Burger Royale was set on the table. Paul stayed in California to work and (hopefully) enjoy a few days alone in the house, something he’d never experienced in the 12+ years we’ve owned our home. I thought I was being careful ordering only an appetizer for myself and something small for Dane. The photo below does not do justice to the size of the french fry pile on the plate nor the size of the burger! FYI, this was a wood grilled oregon county beef burger with ‘nearly traditional accompaniments’.

Poor Tate did his best, but he was seriously distracted by the (again) delicious fries. Dane was not up for beef, having selected the crispy chicken wings appetizer. And I was somewhat beefed out myself after my appetizer choice: grilled bavette steak with oregon blue cheese, endive and quince. But I tried to pull off a husbandly plate clean-up because the burger was amazing. Needless to say, there was no ordering dessert and we staggered out into the street.

http://tomdouglas.com/index.php/restaurants/palace-kitchen

On the way home, we began talking about the variety of matchbooks Tate had collected and he wondered if he’d be allowed to take them on the plane in his carry-on bag. Since we weren’t sure about the airline’s policy, we decided to use them up. How, you ask? By using the wooden matchsticks as flaming arrows in the hotel’s parking lot! Tate had made a little bow out of a rubber band and paper clip and the boys raced up to the hotel room to retrieve it. We had the best time trying to light the matches and send flaming arrows toward a small puddle in the parking lot. Not the most safety-concious behavior, I’ll admit, but I like to be a fun mom whenever I can. We determined that the matches were too short to be either safe or impressive so we called it a night after about 15 or so. The boys were not happy to retrieve the spent matches from the disgusting water in the puddle but that’s how our fun usually ends (with the inevitable clean up). There is a part two to the flaming match adventure… stay tuned!

[All photos by Kathryn Besser]

In between breakfast and lunch, we made a few stops. First, to the Army/Navy surplus store where Dane and Tate spent 45 fascinated minutes looking at everything from old grenades to camping gear. I decided to buy them wool hats because, in typical California-boy fashion, they’d neglected to bring heavy coats and the previous evening’s walk home had been a bit cold, even for them. Dane eventually settled on an East German mini folding stove (about the size of a large, flat matchbox). He figured it would be great on Boy Scout backpacking trips not to mention being a seriously-cool boy toy. Tate, ever the window shopper, decided against the empty grenades and bullet casings, figuring they would be difficult to get home in our carry-on luggage.

From there, we went to Pike’s Place Market to pick up some special pickles, officially Tate’s new favorites. We had made a brief stop the day before (in advance of dinner at Serious Pie) and Tate charmed the counter girls into giving him a huge pile of samples. Now, we just had to make good on our promise to eventually buy some! We then stopped at Sur La Table (the original!) where both boys found many, many kitchen gadgets that they really, really wanted. Luckily, they were persuaded to purchase just one thing each (note that this was with their own money). Practical Dane chose a pair of folding scissors for his pocket first aid kit (which he happened to be carrying). Tate, possibly frustrated by not being able to score some ammo at the Army/Navy store, chose a strawberry huller that can only be described as a ‘potential’ pain inflictor (not that he would use it against anything other than a defenseless strawberry, but I’m just sayin’). See the photos below to understand what I’m referring to.

By this time, it was getting late and we hurried over to Etta’s for lunch. Tate found his slice of heaven in a pulled-pork sandwich with the crispiest, tastiest fries this side of the Mississippi. Notice that there is no food photo of this incredible find. I can only say that he was so hungry by the time the plate arrived, I didn’t have the heart to make him wait while I whipped out the camera. Suffice to say, it was excellent and Tate deemed it his number two sandwich OF ALL TIME. (First, of course, is the Office Burger at Father’s Office in Los Angeles, but that is another story). Dane split the sandwich and fries and said it was very good but did not qualify as one of his favorites of all time. I had some lovely mini tacos: pulled pork and crispy fish, with housemade guacamole and salsa. Yum-O!

http://tomdouglas.com/index.php/restaurants/ettas

After lunch, we walked up the street to Dahlia Bakery (yet another Tom Douglas establishment). We only had one more dinner out in downtown Seattle (that evening) and made the choice to go to Palace Kitchen over Dahlia Lounge, primarily because we heard the Burger Royale was fantastic and partly because we found out we could try Dahlia’s famous coconut cream pie at the bakery. The best part was not having to shell out eight or nine bucks for a dessert I just wanted a bite or two of. At the bakery, you can purchase an entire pie for $35 or a decent-size bite for two bucks. I opted for the bite and it was amazing. Dane had what can only be described as a ‘gourmet’ twinkie (filled with vanilla-bean cream) – the first of his life. I can almost guarantee he’ll never taste one that good from whoever it is that really makes Twinkies. Tate had a peanut-butter filled truffle, still so full from his amazing lunch.

http://tomdouglas.com/index.php/restaurants/dahlia-bakery

In one of the photos below, you will note the ‘grunge’ look the boys sported the entire trip. I was so tempted to buy the cool Swiss wool army blankets to bring a little slice of the Ace Hotel home with me but held off since we only had the tiniest of carry-on bags… oh well.

[All photos by Kathryn Besser]

As previously stated, the made-to-order donuts at Lola were the reason we decided to visit Seattle for our culinary mini-tour. The boys were ready to go upon awakening (!) and we quickly walked the 7 blocks to the restaurant. On a Thursday morning, Lola was perhaps half full, the wait staff were quietly bustling from table to table. We settled into our window seats with the boys barely scanning the menu, so anxious were they to place our order. They decided to split the Lola Breakfast (two eggs, bacon or maple-sausage, garlic smashed potatoes and toast) and an order of donuts. I ordered scrambled eggs with feta (delicious!).

The donuts arrived in a white paper bag (see photo 3 below) and our server, Kim, made a cute ceremony of shaking the bag to disperse the cinnamon-sugar, cutting it, then shaking the donuts onto the plate. Dane and Tate dove in almost immediately, happily sampling the donuts and their accompaniments: a crock of vanilla mascarpone and one of homemade pear sauce (which had a similar consistency to apple butter). In the melee, I was able to score one of the 6 donuts (thanks, boys!); it was absolute perfection. Light, fluffy and flavorful. The sauces were delightful, too.

The Lola Breakfast (photo 4) was abundant, particularly with the generous split between two plates. The boys ate everything and especially enjoyed putting Tabasco on their eggs and bacon. Tate thinks he invented something new: spicy bacon (bacon and Tabasco plus freshly ground salt and pepper). Look for it on our weekend brunch menu sometime soon!

http://tomdouglas.com/index.php/restaurants/lola

Over breakfast, we staked out the location of our next meal: Etta’s, another Tom Douglas restaurant (located near Pike’s Place Market). Kim was kind enough to call over and inquire if they served a pulled pork sandwich (Tate’s request from the night before) and, to our amazement, they did… voila!

P.S. If you’re wondering why I’ve included two photos of the donuts, it was because I couldn’t decide which photo made them look more luscious… what do you think?

[All photos by Kathryn Besser]

Since the boys have an annual winter school break, we decided to take a short culinary tour to one of our favorite cities: Seattle. The idea originated with Tate, who has been obsessed (to say the least) with the made-to-order donuts at Lola (recommended by Giada de Laurentis on the ‘Totally Fried’ edition of ‘The Best Thing I Ever Ate’). Seattle was at the top of his list of places to visit; the decision was made even easier by the fact that airfares are relatively cheap this time of year (rainy season?). Well, the joke was on Alaska Airlines because we had 3.5 days of absolutely sunny weather! A bit chilly in the AM and PM, but otherwise nice the entire time.

After discovering that one of the hotels on my ‘must visit’ list (Ace Hotel – Portland) has a sister hotel in Seattle, AND that Lola is owned by Tom Douglas, who has 5 OTHER restaurants to visit, the donut lure became the tip of the proverbial iceberg. What follows is a meal-by-meal account, in chapters, of our amazing trip.

But first, a word about the Ace Hotel (http://www.acehotel.com/seattle) and the not-to-be-missed Ed, who runs the show. We checked in by late afternoon and Ed gave us the most incredible VIP treatment. Our room could not have been nicer (a very generous upgrade) and Ed was a warm, solicitous host. We received excellent directions to our first stop, Serious Pie, a mere 6-7 blocks away, and a gorgeous laser-cut Tom Douglas restaurant binder to peruse. Did you know that Tom Douglas beat Masaharu Morimoto in ‘Battle Salmon’ on ‘Iron Chef America’ in 2005? We didn’t and it only whetted our appetite for his world-class cuisine. So we decided to get an early start in order to beat the crowd (and were glad we did).

Dinner Number One: Serious Pie (seriously, good!)

Pizzas at Serious Pie are unlike any I’ve ever had (and coming from someone who has lived in Italy and made a pilgrimage to Naples, this is saying a lot). The crust consistency is thin but not overly so, and crispy like bread (Italian ciabatta is the closest I can think of); this is reinforced by the air wafting through the restaurant which smells primarily of yeast. We decided to order two pizzas, the first on the recommendation of Tyler Florence, one of Tate’s favorite television chefs along with Giada. Note: this pizza was Tate’s secondary reason for choosing Seattle. The pizza in question is very simple and very delicious: yukon gold potatoes, rosemary, pecorino cheese. Heavenly…. really. We decided to try a meat-based pizza, too, this one with house salumi, caramelized onions and sardegna (also a sheep’s milk cheese). Another bullseye – wow! (http://tomdouglas.com/index.php?page=serious-pie)

We staggered home and laid on the hotel beds (the white down comforters and Swiss military wool blankets making it extra cozy). We watched a few ‘Throwdown with Bobby Flay’ episodes, one of which prompted Tate to ask if we could seek out a pulled-pork sandwich for lunch the next day.

To be continued…

[All photos by Kathryn Besser]