To Try

Harvest Vine, 2701 E. Madison, Seattle (MB said this was the best restaurant she’s been to in Seattle…MUST TRY!)

Lark

I’ve been wanting to try Lark since I first heard about it (basically when it opened), and I finally got to try it last week. I heard great reviews about it both from people I knew and from different magazines I have read.

It’s a place where you get small plates and share them, so you can taste and enjoy various different things. We went in a group of 5, which I think may have been too big of a group for such a place. It’s more of a date type place, where you can enjoy the food a bit more. Maybe 4 would have been ok, but 5 certainly was a bit too much. It’s recommended that each person get 2-3 plates and share it between everyone. We ended up getting 10 dishes with 2 desserts, and a bottle of wine. We all walked away quite full, but we didn’t get to enjoy all of the dishes as much as we would have liked, I think. But I do like that I got a taste of a lot of things.

We ordered a bottle of the 2005 Castello di Ama Rosato. We wanted a light red, since we had some fish/meat dishes. It was a drier red, but it still had a bit of sweetness in it. I think it was a happy compromise for those who like sweeter wines and those who prefer drier wines. We started the meal with the pear and mizuna salad with warm brick pastry wrapped chevre. YUMMY! Everything about it was just perfect. We also had the Wiliamson Ranch beef tartare with crispy fingerlings and dijon mustard. That was pretty interesting, the flavors were good.

Second course was we had the rosti potatoes with clabber cream, which was like hash browns and sour cream…but better. Pretty good, but nothing spectacular compared to some of the other dishes. There was also the carpaccio of yellowtail with preserved lemons and green olives. That was interesting, it was very lemony and reminded me of the time I ate the oysters at Palace Kitchen and put too much lemon on the oysters. The group also ordered the steller bay oysters on the half shell with red wine migonette and Penn Cove mussels with spicy peppers and shery. Duwardo gave both these dishes a thumbs up and said that the rosato paired nicely with both of the dishes was well, especially the mussels.

The next course we had the crispy liberty farm duck leg with apple and caramelized salsify, YUMMY. I quite enjoyed that dish, although the duck overwhelmed the rosato a bit. We also had the Williamson Ranch beef bollito misto with salsa verde. It came out and we all felt that it was a bit like a pot roast in ways. However, when you ate the beef and the salsa verde together and then had some of the rosato…oh my, it was GREAT!  It made an ordinary dish, extraordinary. We also had the wild boar.  It came with some pasta that was delicious.  Last dish in the batch was the bluebird grain farms farro with mascarpone and kabocha squash.  This was an interesting dish, but it was a bit heavy on the cream for me.  It would have been better also if there were more squash pieces.

We ended the evening with a pear gingerbread upside down cake with whipped cream and chocolate madaleines with dark chocolate sauce. I really liked the pear gignerbread cake and thought it had a great taste, and also put me in the holiday spirit. The chocolate madaleines were a bit hyped up to me (I was told that it was the best bang for your buck) and while they were good, I didn’t think it met to that hype and would have actually preferred trying another dessert.

Overall recommendation is not to go in a group larger than 4.  It’s defintely a place I would recommend for a date though.  The 2005 Castello di Ama Rosato is also recommended.  We each paid about $35, which I think is reasonable for everything that we got to try and taste, and included the bottle of wine.

Thanh Vi

My second favorite Vietnamese restaurant in Seattle. We live by the U-District Thanh Vi, and I cannot attest for the one located on Jackson, but I will certainly vouch for the one on University Way!

While the pho isn’t exactly the best I’ve ever had, it certainly is the best I’ve had in Seattle (ok, so I haven’t been to all of the places in the International District, and I suspect there are places down there that serve better pho, but again…I live by this restaurant.) They also have great, and cheap, sandwiches. We’ve tried the pork, chicken and tofu, all of which are YUMMY…and all at the price of about $2!

The bun bo hue (spicy beef noodle soup) isn’t the greatest, but certainly not horrible either. Go to Moonlight Cafe if you want that dish. Their bun thit nuong (rice vermicelli noodles with grilled pork) is also pretty darn good and cheap.

The waitstaff here is great, and the girl that works the counter is super sweet and cute. She’s always got a smile on her face.

Oh, and the best part…they make my favorite drink…salty lemonade. YUM!

They also are a quick take out order if you feel like eating at home. You just can’t go wrong.

Thanh Vi, 4226 University Way NE, Seattle, WA