Barolo

Today's the last day of March's Dine Around Seattle, I wasn't quite ready to let go of March without one more lunch adventure. Luckily, it paid off this time.

I arrived at Barolo solo. I have to say my first impression wasn't exactly positive. The hostess was very attractive, but I'm not sure her sense of style is exactly fitting for a classy restaurant. She had an extreme low cut mini dress on with tights and cowboy boots. Maybe I'm too old fashioned, let's just say it was too much of a statement that I didn't know where to look.

The service started a little slow, but picked up quickly. I people watched as I sat enjoying the nice bread with toasty crust, served with olive oil and olive tapenade. There were many lunch groups having a good time, enjoying the wine by the glass, served in mini carafes. Pretty generous pours and a fun presentation, I must say!

For the appetizer, I debated between the lobster bisque and the buffalo carpaccio. The waiter readily pointed me towards Carpaccio di Bufalo con Finocchio - the Montana buffalo carpaccio topped with shaved fennel and microgreens tossed in vinaigrette. I found the fennel a little plain at first. But the sweetness of the fennel came to full bloom when eaten together with the salty carpaccio and red onions. It was lovely. My only complain was that I suspect it was plated a little early, as the edges of the meat were a little dry.

I'm normally a very indecisive person. It's true that I often take forever to decide when eating out, but I rarely ask for the waiter's recommendation. But today, I broke the record by not only asking him to decide my appetizer for me, but also my entree since I couldn't decide between the seafood risotto and the pheasant. He was right the Faggiano e Polenta con Fichi - the braised pheasant with polenta, onion and black figs - was a wonderful dish. The pheasant was perfectly tender, not gamy at all. The polenta was creamy. The tender roasted pearl onion was SO sweet, it could be eaten as a dessert. I'm not an onion person, so I couldn't believe that I finished it before everything else. The black figs were a lovely combination of sweet and sour in the balsamic vinegar reduction. As for the rest of the vegetables, the beet was nice and sweet, but the asparagus and carrot, while they were also fine, they were a little forgetable. When the dish came to the table, I thought the portion was too small. But it turned out to be perfect, I had just enough room to enjoy the dessert.

The dessert, Chocolate Tortino, was a molten chocolate cake, with a very moist almost oozy center. It sat on top of vanilla cream, drizzled with chocolate raspberry sauce, dusted with powdered sugar and decorated with a single raspberry. Mmm, yum! I was a little puzzled when the next table got a tortino served with the big end up like a cupcake. Was mine upside down? Oh, who cares! It was still scrumptious!

I walked out of the restaurant perfectly content. This must had been the best out of my 2010 March Dine Around Seattle experiences.

Barolo Ristorante
1940 Westlake Ave Metropolitan Tower (between 6th Ave & Virginia St), Seattle, WA 98101
(206)770-9000

Artisanal Brasserie (closed)

Hubby and I had a lunch date at Artisanal Brasserie. We've been to Artisanal couple of times in the past. They always have $18.50 2-course, and $21.50 3-course lunch specials. The Dine Around Seattle is an even better deal than that. I love good deals, and I'm normally not that particular about service. However, today the service really left much to be desired. We had to wait forever for each course, even the desserts were like a 20 minute wait. Were they making the mousse or cheesecake from scratch? How long would they need to plate two simple things?

For appetizer, we got gnocchi Parisienne “Alfredo” with grilled red bell pepper in pine nuts tomato sauce (according to the menu) and organic Mesclun with herb vinaigrette. The gnocchi was very nice and creamy, but I couldn't taste the pine nuts in the sauce at all. The salad was so boring I don't know what else to say.

I then had Penn Cove mussels, à la Provençal with French fries. The sauce was nice, but the dish was just OK, not too special. I found the piece of bread at the bottom very tough around edge. Hubby had lamb ragout served on pappardelle with green olives in tomato sauce. As unhappy with this lunch as I was, I have to admit this was a very well done dish. The lamb was nice and tender.

As I mentioned earlier, for dessert, I had ricotta mousse with winter fruit compote. This wasn't a typical mousse. I enjoyed the first few bites, but it was a little too much cheese, a bit too heavy after the initial taste. Hubby loves cheesecake, so of course he went with the Artisanal cheesecake with pecan praline and caramel sauce. The flavor was just fine, but hubby found the portion a little on the small side.

PS: Artisanal Brasserie closed on Jun 14, 2010.
Edited by Viv on Jun 14, 2010 at 10:25 AM

ART Restaurant and Lounge

Couple weeks ago, I met J at a Taiwanese hot pot place. We hit it off right away, and found that we both loved eating more than anything else, and had very similar taste in food. Of course, we couldn't pass on any opportunity to try another restaurant. On this particular day, we went to ART Restaurant and Lounge at the Four Seasons. J and I, along with her 9 month old son, C (who is THE most easy-going baby in the world!), requested a table with a view, and had high hopes of what a Four Seasons restaurant could deliver. However, right in front of us was an old red brick building.

We understood that a restaurant didn't have any choices about the surrounding buildings, so even though was a bit of a letdown to not have an unobstructed view, we were still in high spirits anticipating a fabulous lunch. However, it was like a train wreck, things kept on getting worse, never picked up. First came the focaccia, while the flavor was OK, it was cut and plated too early as the edges all dried out. Instead of separate choices for appetizer, entree and dessert, they had 3 Dine Around Seattle prix-fixe menus. We were intrigued by the "TV tray" names until the plates showed up. The portion was SO small (only couple bites of each), everything was served on ONE plate (therefore a "TV tray").

We had the "Pacific Ocean TV Tray" and the "From the Farm TV Tray". The seafood platter had cured steelhead with pickled rhubarb, crisp penn cover oysters, macadamia nut crusted Opah with bonito-miso wilted pea vines, and tropical "Tres Leches" cake. While the rhubarb was very nice, both the steelhead and oysters were very plain. The opah was very tender, but the pea vines was too salty. Even the tropical "Tres Leches" cake was just average. The meat plate had a grilled asparagus salad with warm goat cheese, a soft boiled egg with crispy prosciutto aioli, a spring lamb "BLT", and double cream cheesecake. The asparagus salad was probably the best part of our lunch with the supple asparagus, nice goat cheese, and fried onion that reminded one of onion rings. The egg was perfectly cooked, but the cooking stopped at the boiling. It was very plain, then paired with some overcooked, overly salty and dry prosciutto. As for the lamb "BLT", other than the dry bacon, hard and dried croissant, all I could say was that "where is the lamb?". The cheesecake tasted fine, but it was more like a mousse than a cheesecake. I know I must sound like a broken record when I say that half the meal was just PLAIN PLAIN PLAIN, while the other half was just salty and dry. What a disappointment! Of a Four Seasons restaurant! We left the place unsatisfied and unsatiated!

The concept of Dine Around Seattle was to bring more people to restaurants they haven't been before, so they could become potential future clients. If the restaurants felt that their profit margin was too low, they could choose not to participate or not to use expensive ingredients. I believe firmly that you could create delicious meals with fresh everyday ingredients. What really bugged me was that it felt like ART was so insincere about the whole experience, I couldn't understand why they even bothered to be part of this event. Not only they didn't gain me as a future patron, they lost me and my friends forever.

ART Restaurant and Bar
99 Union Street (Four Seasons Hotel), Seattle, WA 98101
(206)749-7070

Steelhead Diner

Every March and October are Dine Around Seattle months. There are often many places I'd like to try, but I haven't been really taking advantage of the opportunities since it's not very convenient to take kids to these places, and I'm often very self-conscious about eating out alone. Maybe it was the sun, I decided to lunch at the Steelhead Diner last minute.

Steelhead is located near Pike Place Market. Soon after I sat down, the waiter brought two types of bread, a yummy cheddar rosemary focaccia that was fragrant with a faintly spicy aftertaste, and a hearty and toasty mini loaf loaded with oats, black sesame seeds and black sunflower seeds that you could literally taste the essence of health. The bread was served with butter and basil-infused olive oil.

For appetizer, I got the hot smoked wild salmon rillette. The rillette itself was just OK, but it went well with the salty caper, creamy avocado, and pickled red onions. The herb emulsion tasted nice on the cheddar rosemary focaccia crouton chips, but didn't do much for the rillette.

The preserved lemon crusted stream raised Idaho catfish came with a Tellicherry peppercorn butter sauce served on top of creamy hominy polenta. The fish was very tender and fluffy. The crust was very lemony, but a little too thick for my liking - it was more than 1/4 inch, and had some little bitter burned spots. The creamy polenta and the lovely sauce (dispite the fact that I couldn't taste the peppercorn) completed the dish.

I couldn't quite decide on the dessert. Fearing the pecan pie being overly sweet, I picked the chocolate mousse based on the waiter's suggestion. It wasn't bad, but the flavor seemed very monotonous, lacked depth. I kind of regret not getting the Theo’s chocolate pecan pie, or the banana foster crème brulee.

However, it was still a very satisfying lunch. I shouldn't complain when all of these fared at only $15 plus tax and tip. Not to mention my little find at Nordstrom Rack completed a very gratifying afternoon.

Steelhead Diner
95 Pine St, Ste 17, Seattle, WA 98101
(206)625-0129