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Chef Howie plans a week long first birthday celebration, where he “gifts” back to the supportive Seattle community, with a give-away and specials (offered in Seattle only) based on the restaurant’s January 27, 2009 opening date. From January 21st through the 27th, the weekly and nightly “gifts”, each of which are spins on 1/27/09, will be: All week long: Beginning Jan. 21st, guests can drop their business cards in the fish bowl to win dinner for 8 people on their (the winner’s) birthday. The winning entry will be picked on January 27th. Thursday 1/21: $1.27 Sushi all night long, featuring Chef Howie’s Washington Roll (Smoked Salmon, Dungeness Crab and Granny Smith Apples), all Washington specialties, Shiro Maguro Ngiri, Ebi Ngiri, Vegetarian Futomaki roll, Kappa Maki, Washington Roll and Maguro roll. Friday 1/22: Every couple that comes in and orders two entrees at lunch or dinner will receive a $27.09 dinner gift certificate, to be used... 
Whenever I walk around South Lake Union, I see too many empty retail spaces, especially along Westlake, and I wonder how long it will take until they start til fill in. Well, in May there will be one less vacancy as Belltown's finest seafood restaurant Flying Fish is moving into Vulcan's building on Westlake and Thomas according to Nancy Lesson of Seattle Times "All You Can Eat" food blog. The 15 year old restaurant is owned and run by James Beard winner Chef Chris Keff. The 110 seat restaurant will have one floor, private dining rooms, a 30 seat patio, and even a retail space called On the Fly which will feature lunch, dinners to go, wine and groceries. The article by Lesson cites an influx of potential new customers moving into their area, such as Amazon's army that is building and certainly on the way and PATH in the new 2201 Westlake Ave building. Comments on the article mention the many other businesses that are already working in SLU: Group Health, Microsoft, UW Medical... Mistral Kitchen has opened in West 8th. The restaurant, designed by award-winning architect Tom Kundig, features four kitchens, a bar, and four distinct dining areas. Try it out for lunch, dinner, or brunch on the weekends. TechFlash has broken the story that well-known restaurateur Tom Douglas is in talks to open a restaurant in the Terry Ave Building on the Amazon.com campus. Nothing is final and the opening would be more than year out, but it's still pretty dang exciting. 
Little Red Studio's bistro is all ready to go. It's open 7 days a week from 7:00 am to midnight (or later) serving breakfast, lunch, dinner, and late dining with a full bar. Live jazz / folk on Tuesdays starting at 8:00 pm and cabaret on Saturdays, all with no cover. See website for more details. 
Vanilla bean, maple walnut, basalmic strawberry, cardamom, chocolate, vivace coffee, rosemary meyer lemon, ginger, strawberry, scout mint, honey lavender, mandarin chocolate sorbet, birthday cake, salted caramel, jasmine green tea, pomegranate curry sorbet. Need I say more? Okay, so it's not an actual Molly Moon's ice cream shop, but the same eclectic flavors can now be had at the Whole Foods on the corner of Westlake & Denny. You probably won't have to wait in line for an hour on a day like today, either! 
The South Lake Union Block Party is inching ever closer. Friday, August 7th is the big day. We've posted about the burger challenge, but what about food and drink for the masses? With its wealth of gastronomic options, this year's block party will give the Bite a run for its money. Several South Lake Union eateries will be on hand to provide tasty dishes to satisfy just about any appetite, including Skillet, Whole Foods Market and others. The Cascade Farmers Market will also feature local fruits, vegetables, and other mouth-watering offerings from local vendors to enjoy throughout the day.
Join them every Saturday for the remainder of July and into August from 6:00 to 10:00pm for 25% off your bill. I'll raise a pint to that! 
I was rather shocked last week when I looked across the street from my Apartment at Denny and Dexter to see a big rid sign that read "Liquor & Wine". I didn't ever remember seeing that sign before, which meant only one thing: new liquor store within walking/staggering distance to my apartment! It is located on 7th between Bell and Denny, which actually makes it more in the Denny Triangle neighborhood, but close enough. I checked it out last week, and not only is it nice and clean, but the staff were extremely friendly. I hadn't found my local liquor store since moving to SLU last year (apparently there is one in Queen Anne), so it is sure nice to have one nearby. I like to think of it as a fundraiser for the State of Washington. With such a huge gap in our state budget, I think that Olympia is desperate to increase revenuse any way possible. Of course, we could go the California route and consider legalizing and taxing marijuana. With the addition of this new Liquor Store, 7th...
The opening for Cajetan's replacement at Alley 24 is set for Monday, June 29th.
Bebas-n-Cinnamons World Cafe at 428 Westlake Ave N has closed "due to the economy," according to a note on the window. My personal guess is they've had a drop in business due to the 300 Rosetta layoffs around the corner. The good news? If you really liked the food you can still get it relatively nearby at Bebas Deli at 5th and Bell. Editor: Bebas Deli and Dos Amigos (both are housed in same space) is also replacing Cajetan Deli at Alley 24, opening any day now. I'm not sure at this point whether all these "Bebas" are under the same ownership. Now that fellow neighborlog Eastlake Ave is humming along, we have a go-to news source all things east of the lake. Here are some updates to the food and drink scene on Eastlake: Suffering from street food overload? Too bad. Here's one more: Tako Truk, who sets up shop right next to the Zoo.
At the end of the same post is a reminder that local favorite Louisa's Bakery is now open for dinner Wednesday through Saturday. Down the street, the folks who own Serafina are looking to open a Venetian-inspired cicchetti bar with an ETA of September. Last but not least, new greek restaurant Kristos received a rave review from the Seattle Times:
You can enjoy those superb happy-hour deals twice daily, 4:00pm - 6:30pm and 10:00pm - close. It's only fitting that the Street Food Fair will call South Lake Union home. We've got Skillet at the Cascade People's Center on Wednesdays, a rogue "tacos and more" truck cruising the construction sites, and a kitchen-equipped truck we've yet to mention here on The Southlake—the Kaosamai Thai Cook Truck. You may know Kaosamai by its restaurant in Fremont or popular truck location by Seattle Pacific University, but this year they've rolled out a whole new truck located at the Center for Wooden Boats at 1010 Valley Street. They're only open for lunch from 11:00am - 2:30pm Monday - Friday, but it's well worth the trip down to the park—Kaosami's original catering truck was rated the #1 street food vendor in Seattle Restaurant Magazine for 2008. You can expect to find all the standard Thai dishes–phad thai, curry, etc.–all in the $6-8 range as well as refreshing thai iced tea and coffee. 
A new restaurant is coming to the hood with an opening slated for the fall, Seattle Magazine has the scoop:
Read on for more about Mistral Kitchen. It sounds like owner/chef Belickis has big things planned for the space. 
Remember to Dine Out on Thursday, April 30 to help support Lifelong AIDS Alliance and the fight against AIDS. Here's a list of participating restaurants right here in the neighborhood: Feirabend If you care to venture out of South Lake Union, there are over 160 participating restaurants in the Seattle/Bellevue area to choose from. 
The tiny retail space on the ground floor of the Tommy Bahama building that has been vacant since the beginning of time is now the future home of a Quiznos franchise. Exciting, huh? Not really, but makes sense with a bunch of hungry Amazons moving in next year. If you prefer to not have your sandwiches made by The Man™, try Slices or Cafe Mae. 
"Zag-a-monia". Really? You're going to go with that? Okay. If you can get past the fact that the name sounds like a food-borne illness, BluWater Bistro is going all out for Gonzaga's game tomorrow against the mighty University of North Carolina. We're opening an hour early for all the Pre-Game hype, serving it up at Happy Hour prices. Then when the game is on, $3.00 "Gonzaga Bulldog" drinks throughout the entire game! Then we started thinking... YOU WEAR your Gonzaga gear (Hats, Ts, Tubes, etc.) and a FREE order of Jaeger Wings are yours! I'm thinking there might be a link between Zag-a-Monia and Jeager Wings. Still working on that theory. Click here to go BluWater's website. There are two principal St. Paddy's Day hangouts in South Lake Union, and – by the luck of the Irish – they happen to be only one block away from each other!
The 2009 Mardi Gras SLUT Crawl, which conveniently occurs two weeks after Mardi Gras, is coming up this weekend. Saturday, March 7th at 6:00pm to be exact. A couple developments since we last mentioned the crawl:
Remember, this is a drink contest between the bars, so there should be some pretty interesting concoctions. $25 pre-pay or $30 at the door for 6 drinks at 6 bars. RSVP and pre-pay can be done through the Evite. 
Olive 8 received praise here for its green cred, but let's get down to what really matters: is their coffee bar any good? Zee Grega at Seattle Metblogs seems to think so! Here's an excerpt from a review that will make you want to drop everything and head for the blue beacon: Each cup of drip is individually brewed from your choice of beans, each exquisite espresso drink carefully crafted. The bar offers your choice of handmade syrups, including a ginger syrup that makes me want to weep for the pleasure of drinking it. 
Jonesing for some sushi, I decided to give the newcomer from Bellevue a try last Friday for happy hour. Seastar's happy hour starts a bit early at 3:30pm (not a bad thing!), and it was the restaurants opening week, so the bar area was pretty full when we arrived around 4:30pm. We inched up towards the bar looking for a seat and were promptly greeted by a host who found us a table–kudos to you, guy. After ordering drinks ($3 draft beer & house wine, $4 well drinks, $5 martinis during HH), we looked over the newly remodeled bar. Marazul's rounded "rhum bar" has been replaced with a more traditional one, and a sushi bar has been added across the room. There are a lot of of other seating options–perhaps too much–with cocktail tables in between the two bars, smaller tables-for-two sprinkled about, and some booths along the partition which separates the bar from the restaurant. The space's decor now espouses an ocean motif with hand-blown glass art and seaweed-print carpet. For food we tried... 
Wendy at Seattle Condo Review has the scoop on a new restaurant in the Equinox condo complex on Eastlake due to come online this spring. The restaurant, called ‘Mosaic’, is a new concept from the owners of popular Seattle sushi restaurants Wasabi Bistro and Red Fin. The closest competition would be I Love Sushi on Lake Union, but it doesn’t have the same panache as a Wasabi Bistro or Red Fin. It appears Equinox is having better luck finding retail tenants than it is selling condos though, as only 61 out of the 204 units have sold. 
Just received word from Brian aka "Squirrel Pusher" (there must be a good story behind that) of Tougo Coffee Co. that their second location on Westlake Ave is now open. T2 actually had its soft opening on Friday (though they eluded me on Saturday) and will be keeping hours of 6:00am – 5:00pm this week while they get a feel for the neighborhood's needs. Personally, I like the option of grabbing a cuppajoe after work and relaxing a bit. How about you—would you like to see evening hours? A grand opening celebration is in the works with details to follow, so stay tuned. |
