Restaurant Dispatch from Seattle

As the regular followers of the blog know, I have been to a number of Mario Batali's restaurants and have been known to use recipes from a couple of his cookbooks on a semi-regular basis. When I first moved to Seattle, I had heard that Mario's father, Armandino, had a small restaurant/shop here called Salumi.

A friend that I recently reconnected with after many years (and surprisingly, it wasn't through Facebook or LinkedIn) told me that her husband visited Seattle and is a huge Batali fan. Of course, he went to Salumi while he was here. That was enough of a kick in the pants to get over to Pioneer Square and have some cured meat. The thing that makes Salumi a challenge to visit is that it is only open for lunch and the lines are of legend, or at least so I was told.

Given that I am in a transition week and we had some incredible lamb prosciutto (never heard of it but I know I will be getting some of this again) sourced from Salumi at another restaurant last week – more on that later, I told Marc that we should meet for lunch there before I start my new role. As expected, we waited in line for about 20 minutes and then were able to score a couple of seats – bonus, since Salumi has seating for maybe 20 people. They gave out samples of a salumi that had fennel and black pepper, which I enjoyed.

Marc had the lomo and provolone which was pretty tasty. I had porcetta with some sweet onions to try something I hadn't had before. Aside from the sandwich being huge, it was also really good. The porcetta was braised in Madeira, a type of fortified dessert wine, which probably made it go well with the sweet onions. A quick but enjoyable lunch. Hope to go back, or have Marc get some meat to go – particularly the lamb prosciutto. J

Other places that we have checked out recently:

• Bricco: Again, another overdue visit to this Italian eatery in Upper Queen Anne. Have heard about this place since it opened, and once I moved out of Queen Anne, it never seemed to work out to get over there for one reason or another. It was worth the wait – the lamb prosciutto was excellent, as was the duck. They had an outstanding cheese selection. Also great quality on the per glass selections for wine and beer. Our friends over at Suzuki + Chou Communimedia told us we needed to get over there because of –
  
• Chocolopolis: Yep, you know what they specialize in here. Not only did they have some very tasty truffles, but it was the first time I saw chocolate displays arranged by geography so we were able to learn a bit about the different regions that produce chocolate. They just opened a couple of weeks ago, so if you are a chocolate fan or know someone who is, check it out.
• Ocho: This was recommended to us by our neighbors, so it only made sense to check it out with them. Cuisine is Spanish Tapas and the restaurant is located in Ballard. The food and service were very good; the wine list was reasonable and the boys seemed to like their cocktails. The only issue is that the tables were so small that we had to keep our wine glasses off of the table on the bench we were sitting on. If you go, you might want to bring glasses if you are near-sighted. No printed menus; just a very long list of enticing food options on a blackboard.
• Wild Ginger: We've been plenty of times before but decided to go back while Marc's folks were in town. We had a stellar '05 Jayson Pinot Noir to go with dinner. As usual, the food did not disappoint. My favorite dish was the halibut with papaya, but the squash and sweet potato soup was particularly yummy. Nice pick, Dee! But the normal favorites lived up to the hype – this includes the 'seven flavor beef' and the 'wild ginger fragrant duck'.

More soon on some of the recent experiments in the kitchen.