Now that Seattle’s new waterfront Wheel is up and running, there are a couple of new spots nearby worth checking out.
Among them, the new Seafood Cafe at Elliott’s Oyster House.
There’s a new food truck, Chopstix, making the rounds between Pioneer Square and the neighborhoods with Asian fare.
In Georgetown, a new 24-hour diner, Square Knot.
In Belltown, Far Eats on the corner of Fifth Avenue and Bell Street.
Downtown, Cupcake Royale replaces The Chocolate Box.
At Century Link field, look for a new Trophy Cupcake outlet, and in Green Lake, a new burger spot called Charlie’s Buns.
Wine for a cause
Wine, nectar of the gods, is what the elites drink — an expensive indulgence for snobs. Martin Barrett has heard it all. He’s a wine guy, former owner of Cana’s Feast in Oregon, now living in Seattle and running inner-city, social-welfare programs.
Over a glass of wine one evening with his longtime friend Monte Regier, a human-resources manager who’d just returned from a stint on a hospital ship in Liberia, the talk turned to the contrast between Africa’s grinding poverty and America’s pockets of poverty in a land of abundance.
Barrett realized that, for a dollar a day, he could feed a hungry kid. Not in some distant land, but here at home, where he knew well that there are too many hungry kids.
“This glass of wine,” he said, “could feed a kid.”
And so was born the concept of Sozo (a Greek word that suggests rescue), a unique project that shares the revenue from wine sales with local food banks.
Barrett understood that Sozo had to start with excellent wines, “but the last thing the industry needs at this point is another new winery.”
Yet, there’s a lot of good juice out there, languishing, begging for a good home. Tasting tank samples around Woodinville that seemed to have some potential, Barrett and Regier discovered the talents of Cheryl Barber Jones, the former winemaker for Chateau Ste. Michelle, now a freelance consultant. She began working her magic, blending stray lots so that the sum was greater than its parts.
In its first year, Sozo released six or seven wines, whites like Riesling and Pinot Gris; reds like Pinot Noir, Tempranillo, a Rhone blend, a Bordeaux blend, in addition to special bottlings for the Rotary Club — so far, so good.
In fact, the Rhone blend was named Best of Class at the Los Angeles International Wine & Spirits Competition last year, and the Bordeaux blend won a gold medal; priced at $120, it sold out.
“Cheryl’s crafted some amazing wines,” Barrett said. So the “cause” is a bonus.
There’s a number in the lower, right-hand corner of the wine label that represents the number of food bank meals that the sale of the bottle will generate. Not a guilt-inducing “instead of” admonition that you could have made a donation instead of buying the bottle, but a satisfying “in addition to.” Five meals for the Riesling; 25 for the Bordeaux.
The biggest supporters have been local restaurants — more than 70 at last count — from swanky spots like Canlis to neighborhood eateries like Magnolia’s Mondello.
There’s no mention on the list that there’s anything special about the wines, but each restaurant names its own charity (Canlis picked the None Will Perish foundation; Mondello named the Ballard Food Bank). Sozo writes the check, and the restaurant mails it to the beneficiary.
So far, the Sozo project has generated 70,000 meals for hungry kids.
“People who work in the private sector think we’re crazy to be giving away our profits. Yet, the idealists in the nonprofit world probably didn’t have the discipline and analytical skills to make this happen,” Barrett said. “With Sozo, we seem to have created the best of both worlds.”
Rebranding an old image
There’s a 50-foot-high sign at Shilshole that says “RAY’S” to let boaters know they’ve reached the entrance to the ship canal. It’s been there since 1952, when Ray Lichtenberger operated a boathouse and coffee shop on the dock.
Almost 39 years ago, Russ Wohlers, Duke Moscrip and Earl Lasher bought the property and set its new course as a destination seafood restaurant.
Today, the downstairs dining room offers two main courses that are local icons: Grilled Alaska King Salmon and the Sake Kasu Sablefish — the latter created here by Ray’s first chef, Wayne Ludvigsen.
Over the years, Ray’s has rebuilt after a fire and greatly expanded as well, adding a popular upstairs cafe and a catering company. Now the Cafe, a reliable destination for fish ‘n’ chips and craft beer, is about to get a makeover.
Australian-born marketing consultant Ken Grant (who has a string of clients in the local hospitality industry) has been handed the assignment of rebranding the Cafe. There’s going to be some remodeling this fall (after the summer tourist season), but the primary emphasis will be on a lighter, more playful menu.
“Rather than blow the whole thing up, we’re going to tweak it,” said executive chef Wayne Johnson, who came aboard in February after more than a decade at Andaluca, in the Mayflower Hotel.
He’s grateful that the focus at Ray’s is food and beverage, not rooms.
“We’re adding some global flavors, but we’re going to stay seasonal and local,” Johnson said. “The new emphasis at the Cafe will be on smaller portions and lower prices.”
A preview tasting for a handful of food writers featured plates of seared halibut with leek-mashed potatoes and grilled salmon with curry-mashed potatoes (both $13.95); assorted grilled vegetables ($5.50 for asparagus and bok choy, $6.50 for artichoke hearts); and a full order of blackened-rockfish tacos with a yummy avocado cream ($13.95).
Not tasted, but coming to the Cafe menu: a half-portion of the iconic sablefish, for $15.95.
Ray’s has 140 seats downstairs, another 140 in the upstairs Cafe and bar and, when the weather cooperates, there’s seating for 140 more on the deck, making for one of Seattle’s biggest stand-alone restaurants.
Mo Shaw, Ray’s longtime general manager, reminds us that there are something like 5,000 restaurants in Seattle: “We want to be on the leading edge again.”
It’s a question that has faced any number of older Seattle restaurants: How do you modernize without scaring away your regulars? How do you update your decor and your menu and appeal to a younger clientele? At Ray’s, it looks like they’re going to try rocking the boat a little bit.
Quite the collection
Dale Chihuly is something of a packrat, and now that he’s rich and famous, he can indulge his inclination. The new Chihuly Garden and Glass at Seattle Center, a $20 million project funded by the Space Needle, is a sort of corporate vanity project.
They’re careful not to call it a museum; it’s more like an indoor/outdoor library of Chihuly’s greatest hits (the chandeliers, ceilings, sunbursts and flowers; the forests, sea creatures, globes and reeds) on the former Funhouse site that’s sure to become a treasured tourist destination.
Tucked onto the north end is a moderately priced restaurant called the Collections Cafe, which houses some 28 displays of Chihuly’s personal stash of ephemera: ceramic dogs, bottle openers, Mexican ashtrays, pocket knives, inkwells, alarm clocks, vintage plastic radios, kitchen string holders (like Tom Douglas has at Cuoco), cast-iron dogs, fish lures, tin toys, carnival prizes, dollhouse furniture, shaving brushes, Christmas ornaments and, hanging from the ceiling, a cacophony of accordions, squeezeboxes, concertinas and stomach Steinways.
Let’s move on to the food and wine: custom bottles of Dunham Cellars chardonnay and Syrah labeled Billy O “Mazie” and “Mighty,” respectively, named for Chihuly’s right-hand man, Billy O’Neill.
Craft beers from local brewers. Regional fare designed by Seattle’s preeminent menu consultant, Jason Wilson, and executed by former Hunt Club executive chef Ivan Szilac, under the watchful eye of the Space Needle’s executive chef, Jeff Maxfield.
For a 50-seat restaurant, the kitchen is way overbuilt; that’s because it will also handle catering for the Glasshouse, a spectacular, new, 40-foot-tall conservatory appended to the building. There, under a 100-foot vine of red-yellow-orange-amber glass blossoms, Seattle swells will find their new favorite gathering spot for prestigious parties.
RONALD HOLDEN is a restaurant writer who blogs at Cornichon.org.