Pub at Third Place

I was recently at the Pub at Third Place for a big ol' gathering of friends. The menu had a Greek/Middle East style bend to it and had all sorts of delicious looking options, and I made a classic mistake that is typical of me: I ordered lamely.

Instead of ordering a big fresh falafal sandwich with piping hot pub fries, I ordered a plate of roasted garbanzo beans and a plate of beets. The garbanzo beans were billed as Spicy Chickpeas with aleppo, cayenne, ancho & ghost chilis. Sounded awesome. The reality was more a drinkin' snack than a meal... they were very salty, very greasy, and very much not at all spicy. Between the aleppo, the cayenne, the ancho and the (for god sake!) ghost chili, I would have anticipated a little tongue warming and was disappointed when it wasn't there.

The second thing I ordered was a beet salad. I love beets, and this dish was advertised as roasted beets with parsley and cumin in walnut oil. Sounded Delicious. Unfortunately, the reality was mealy beets absolutely overwhelmed with a cumin paste so strong I couldn't eat the dish. Dang!

I should have ordered any of the number of other delicious sounding things on the menu... salads, braised greens, butternut squash soup, the afore mentioned falaful and fries, hummus, green olive tapenade, the list goes on. I am pretty sure the problem was, overall, my ordering choices. So it goes!

Daphne's Greek Cafe

Was recently down in the brand spankin' new mini-metropolis that has sprung up in North Renton, hungry, and not sure which of the many mid-price, not exactly "fast food" chain restaurants to visit. Eventually it was a giant advertisement on the side of Daphne's Greek Cafe offering a sandwich slathered in "fire feta" that drew me in.

Daphne's has a few good looking vegetarian options, including a falafel sandwich. The sandwich I was chasing had a garden burger patty between warm pita rounds and lettuce and tomato and a spicy feta mix (fire feta, duh), with choice of fries or rice pilaf and salad, for $5.99. Not bad.

Got it to go, and by time I got home things were cold and not quite all that inspiring. It wasn't gross by any stretch, but probably quite a bit better when it was warm and soft.

My dining companions ordered their sandwiches with fries, and per usual Greek restaurant tradition, they were pretty danged good, even cold and soggy at home. I sort of regretted ordering the rice/salad option. The salad was a standard simple Greek salad, while the rice pilaf was more or less just plain rice.

There was ample ketchup and yogurt sauce, even to go, which I appreciated.

It wasn't a negative dining experience, especially for the price, and all felt relatively healthy. However, the "to-go" experience probably wasn't worth repeating. In addition to the dimenishmet of deliciousness due to cooling, the meal generated a rather huge amount of garbage in the form of rigid plastic trays and lids.