ask and ye shall receive

after starting this blog, many people have asked "where is that photo taken from at the top of your blog?"! and the answer is las columnas bar in seville, spain. i loved this place...loved it so much that i went about three times. inexpensive and tasty tapas reign supreme here and what i loved about it was the size...so big people leaked out since there were so few tables. check out the above shot and you can see what i mean. here i have my picture of delicious pork lomo in a soft roll with tomato and olive oil - man oh man is that good. what separated this place among the million other tapas places in seville was the modus operandi of the place - - first, they had this huge, almost horseshoe like bar with a grantite top...so when someone would order their drinks and tapas, one of the many bartenders would keep tally of what you had by writing on the granite top with chalk! and this place was bananas every single day - so busy that i would watch these guys remember who ordered what and my jaw would hit the ground on the entire debacle. pretty damn good tapas too for i had not only the aforementioned lomo but ham (duh), weird salads consisting of tuna, olive oil, olives, potatoes and boiled egg...like a spanish nicoise but not really. so, when in seville, check out this place or get across the river for some great food.

Junbi dekita...Oishii !!

check out this picture with the specials of the week/day/month - i don't know! recognize it? yup - it is from maneki. two of my favorite people in the whole wide world run the place, jean and oka-san! and i like them because every single time i go there, they always want to chat and we always chew the fat for an extended period of time. btw, do you have a favorite resturant? sure you do but do you have one where the owner snacks with you sometime or, does he/she let you in after they close and still serve you? and does this same owner make fun of you and your idiosyncrasies in the nicest possible way? did i spell that right? anywho, jean is the bestest ever and i am here to write it out and make it public.

i went to maneki with k.fey after she suggested sushi so last friday night we went and had an exceptional dinner...the black cod was stellar...sweet and sticky black cod collar in miso, then broiled can be one of the greatest things to eat on earth. we ordered up some takoyaki and it was sooooo good! tako can be tough and it can be unyeilding but damn it, when it is done right whether in sushi form or takoyaki, it is one thing - delicous! the special tuna was blue fin and we ordered up some sashimi to get the optimal taste and it was delicate, tender and a slight firmness that lent well to the pureness of the fish. phenomenal. some spicy tuna roll, miso and kinpira and we were pretty happy. i am not sure where else i can get kinpira (gobo), crazy inexpensive black cod ($6.95!!) and many other traditional japanese items but maneki comes through every time.

and on a totally different tangent, maneki and jean remind me of so much i love about los angeles. which is maybe why i like it so much. maneki can be anywhere and it would remain the sweetest, nicest and most sought after place to dine in my eyes. i love it when people say that maneki is unorganized, bad service and uneven food but damn it, i love this place! i consider this place one of "my" places even though maneki is no secret to many seattlites yet i feel welcome there like no other place.

i got a crush on you

my birthday was in october yet i am going to write about my birthday dinner now. why now? because i was going back and forth with different resturant people, some food freaks and others last friday night about where to eat in seattle. i recalled my birthday dinner with ms. jen/o. she took me or shall i say she suggested crush, i was like - uh, no problemo. i really like owner/chef justin an awful lot, he and his wife nicole are neighbors of mine, they go to another fave or mine, sweet and savory and he is just an exceptionally kind guy. so, off we went. and j.o. had never been there so when she suggested sharing the tasing menu along with two other starters, i was game! over the top and maybe a bit too much but check out this octopus salad with chickpea fritters along with some chorizo...

this was one of those dishes that upon first bite, perfection. above the pic of this salad is the largest of grilled scallops along with some foie gras placed on top...which was a birthday gift from chef jason. lovely man like i said...this too left us speechless. i wrote notes down on sauces, complexities and what not but they are lost. that is what i get for posting this 60 days after the fact but i guess i did come to one conclusion, crush is my place for a solid, unflinching meal in seattle...any thoughts?

clandestine is a big word

there is so much talk around our fair city about 'underground' places to dine at. yes, gypsy, cache, one pot and others have flourished and i have hit one pot and cache and both are distintly different from one another. i am going to leave you wiht these nice (borrowed) pics above from a one pot deal in georgetown a couple months back (see anybody familiar in this group shot?) and when i report back next, snacktruck will bring you a guest star blog entry on the nice folks at cache and the first of two christmas dinners they are throwing together!!

hit the streets...eat raw meat

i bitch about a lot of things and one of my biggest rants is street food or the lack thereof. check out this photo of my pal jesse holding a falafel he purchased OFF OF A TRUCK, a falafel truck in capital hill here in seattle. hard to miss too, it is next to caffe vita on pike. what the hell? now i want to tell you how it tasted because i got one too - but no. i have not got one of these spendy - at $6.00 - deep fried friends of both vegetarians and meat eaters alike. so, i will tell you one day how this adds up but what a great start beyond the hot dog carts we have here in seattle...which by the way, suck. i do not like cream cheese on my hot dog and dante inferno dogs will not let you dress the damn thing on your own...they do it for you. that is infuriating and just plain wrong. being a big fish in a small pond, dantes are widely praised yet it begs for more damn street food!!! portland has tons of street food, don't get me started about nyc or for that matter, anywhere else...we seattlites are lacking. i wanna see more and i am wondering - what is stopping this from happening?

dumped

today a good friend made me lunch (green goddess salad dressing anyone?!) and during our lunch, she said "you repeat yourself all the time". i do not! ok, i do. and i believe food is the same...if you go and get the same thing at a place that rarely veers from one day to the next and the menu is spartan, then i say repeat thyself and do it often. that is my habit or whatever you wanna call it at szechuan noodle bowl as i order the same thing over and over, never wrong - always great.
here is your simple chinese dumpling soup with housemade noodles, baby bok choy...white pepper, you get the idea. this amazing bowl of greatness is good on a hot day, a cold day or my personal favorite time to eat it is right after swimming in lake washington...in fact, once i ate there wearing my still wet swim trunks and a t-shirt. get this or the beef noodle soup along with some bamboo shoots and one of the best green onion pancakes ever. this place for three is about 25 dollars. money well spent friends.

das gut!

damn! i get a certain taste and flavor in my mouth and i want more. once again i digress for here is the taste i want to write about - zergut eggplant appetizer. i love the name of this stuff. funny only in that i use it for so many things other than putting it on a cracker. this stuff is so inexpensive too @ $3.20 for a 19oz jar at pfi here in the emerald city! it wasn't too long ago i had this folded into scrambled eggs - fantastic! and i use it in pasta all the time along with spinach and feta...phenomenal! the entire line of zergut products have been great...also at pfi you can get pickles, roasted red peppers and a ton of other stuff too. as much as i should be roasting my own peppers and eggplants, this stuff is the deal for real.

contraband

been to vancouver lately? i have and i love it there for multiple reasons...one of those reasons is les amis du fromage located in kitsilano. here you can purchase all kinds of canadian cheeses including some, god forbid, not pasturized! along with cheese, the kind folks here will also guide you around some of the wonderful pate they sell there which is also made in british columbia. and since they are food nerds, they also have a good resturant suggestion between handing you tastes of what they sell. when in kits next, visit these guys and do a picnic or just bring some over the border like ms. ms and i did. mwah ha ha!

ballard market

that is where i am going right now...back with a report later.