Mashikos

Recent out of town company inspired an indulgent dinner at Mashiko's Sushi Bar in West Seattle. Mashiko's had me charmed right off the bat with three things done delightfully: pretty water glasses garnished with cucumber slices, table set with a bowl of rice cracker snack mix, and a claim to be Seattle's first fully sustainable sushi restaurant.

The menu is large and has a variety of vegetarian items mixed in (marked with a radish icon) with the fish, in addition to a dedicated vegetarian sushi list. There is even a vegetarian "Chefs Choice" sushi assortment that includes a couple vegetarian rolls and a selection of vegetarian nigiri.

I started my meal with a "Deep Forest" roll, which included tempura asparagus, avocado, tomato and Cajun spices. I really enjoyed the flavor and spice of this roll, but found the overall texture of the innards to be a bit on the homogeneously soft side.
Next, I ate Agedashi Tofu, special ordered vegetarian (menu indicates that it can be made veggie upon request). The order included a hefty quantity of fresh tofu in a surprisingly thick, deep-fried crust bathed in some delicious savory broth.
As the meal continued and more details emerged, the restaurant revealed itself to be even more awesome. I found our waitress to be especially wonderful. For starters, she acted neither bitchy nor judgemental about having a vegetarian to wait on (not always the case at sushi restaurants). Second, she seemed to really know her sushi and used an impressive array of descriptors (including swimming speed) when describing what a certain fish might be like.

I was also really impressed with the bathroom, which was complete with high tech Japanese toilet seat that was not only exquisitely electrically prewarmed, but had multiple bidet/shower options that came with a multitude of adjustment to suit any mood.

Really everything about this place was fantastic: food, ambiance, spirit, staff. Not exactly cheap, but there was no reason it should have been.

Bent Burgers

I am happy to report a change for the ol' Seward Park (Columbia City, Lakewood, Genesse, etc) neighborhood: The oft changing restaurant on the corner of Dawson and Wilson might have finally found a long term resident, Bent Burgers.

This poor corner has long had the taint of unsuccessful bistros and breakfasts joints, and somehow the idea of a reasonably-priced burger place just feels right. It's about time!

The decor is well coordinated with lots of handmade urban art and a super hero theme.
The staff was friendly, the owner was hanging out in the shop, and Garden (as well as beef, chicken, turkey) Burgers are featured on the menu. I enjoyed the list of additional toppings and added jalapenos to my burger for $0.50.

They also have hot, fresh fries, both potato and sweet potato. The fries came with fun house-concocted sauce: Mae Ploy Ranch (ranch with sweet chili sauce and spices).


I've got my fingers crossed for this place!

Wrap O Roll

On the way out of town recently some friends and I stopped at Wrap O Roll hoping to grab a quick dinner. The restaurant looks like a chain, but I don't believe it is. There were various vegetarian options on the menu, and I ordered a spicy lemon grass vermicelli bowl.

We were the only ones in the restaurant, yet our order took a really surprisingly long time to arrive. Considering we were hoping to make this a quick stop, it was sort of a nuisance.

The food that I got was so-so. The tofu (special ordered fresh) was tasty, and the veggies and noodles were nice, but the sauce was so disgustingly mega-sweet I couldn't eat it. A dining companion who ordered the same thing but did eat his sauce later complained of a stomach ache that felt like he'd eaten a massive amount of sugar. Not surprising.

The "rolls" are supposed to be the specialty here, so perhaps those are more inspiring than the overall meal that I got.

Anthony's Pier 66

Dear readers I apologize for a second post in a row without pictures. I'll try to keep this short. I was recently forced (a rather pampered use of the word) to eat lunch at Anthony's Fish Bar down on the waterfront. The choices for a vegetarian at this establishment are limited to sides: french fries, coleslaw, chocolate chip cookie, or fish taco sans fish (tortilla with coleslaw in it). Essentially: NO GO unless you eat fish.

The exceptionally nice cashier suggested that I check around the corner at Anthony's Pier 66 proper (white table cloth), and it was there that I found a few vegetarian options: grilled cheese, grilled bowl of veggies, spaghetti with marinara. Still not exactly the garden of Eden but I asked to combine the bowl of grilled veggies with the spaghetti and had a somewhat decent vegetarian lunch.

This actually wasn't the first time I'd found myself hungry at Anthony's fish bar with a table full of fish-eaters. In the past I'd just abstained and pilfered unfinished fries from my dining companions as they made their way to the trash. It was a good discovery today that I could go around the corner and buy an entree to-go from the main Anthony's and bring it over and partake a little more wholesomely with my greasy-lipped dining companions at the fish bar.

2100 Bar and Bistro (Marriot Hotel)

I was recently at the Marriot Hotel on the waterfront for a business lunch of sorts. I was initially excited to have a fancy lunch on somebody else's dime, but was totally disappointed when I got a look at the menu.

There were four vegetarian choices:

1. Grilled cheese sandwich
2. Oven fired cheese "flatbread"
3. Butter lettuce salad with goat cheese croutons
4. Tomato soup

These options might sound like fun little meat-free interludes to an omnivore looking to vary it up, but for a vegetarian, the cheese+bread option can be tiring and incomplete.

I ordered half a grilled cheese with the house salad. What came was an expensive joke in proportion... a tiny sandwich and a pile of full-size butter lettuce leaves with sliced red onion. Sandwich was delicious, but with enough butter and good cheese and fresh bread it's not hard to make a tasty grilled cheese. Salad was nice too, it's hard to go wrong with butter lettuce, but I would have appreciated it if somebody in the back could have cut it into manageable size before it hit the table. I felt like a tool cutting my salad with a knife and fork like it was a piece of flimsy watery steak.

But the main problem was the tiny quantity. One of my dining companions ordered a Cesar salad, and when she too was done screeching her knife across her meager plate of full-size Romain leaves we nearly crashed knuckles reaching desperately for the last bread in the bread basket.

This place isn't worth the money for a vegetarian.

Dante's Inferno Dogs

Dante's Inferno Dogs has a cart in Ballard that is open late to feed the drunken masses. I recently went on a dark and rainy night and was quite pleased to see that they have two veggie dog choices: Spicy Chipotle and Apple Sage. I chose the Spicy Chipotle, and from a nice list of toppings selected cream cheese, grilled onions and peppers, banana pepper and jalapeno slices as my toppings. My 3 other dining companions got the same dog with their individual topping choices.
I inhaled mine, enamoured by the toppings and not paying much attention to the dog itself. My dining companions, all of whom were of the "conscientious omnivore", sometimes vegetarian persuasion, were not exactly enjoying theirs. One went back and got himself a meat dog. The other two ate their Chipotle dogs, but felt pretty immediately gross and had lingering upset stomachs that lasted into the next day. These friends all love spicy food, yet there was talk that the Chipotle dog was just too danged spicy to be enjoyable.

I seem to be winning this hotdog race

It is kind of a mystery that I didn't experience this myself, especially considering mine was covered in hot peppers... I'm thinking that maybe I was so relieved and thankful to have a vegetarian option to shove in my piehole I didn't pay enough attention to whether it was actually good or not.

Gustav's

A lovely weekend in Leavenworth to loosely celebrate a friend's birthday recently landed us at Gustav's, one of two burger joints in town, for dinner. We chose Gustav's over the no-frills Heidleburger because it has an awesome rooftop deck that is just perfect for hanging out in the evening sun.

It had been many years since I'd eaten at Gustav's and there were some changes, most notably that fries now come with the burgers.

I ordered a pepper jack veggie burger, which was composed of pepper jack cheese, roasted red pepper and chipotle mayonnaise.

The burger was tasty, but in a serious "grass is greener" moment I found myself a little disappointed about the french fry situation. The past annoyance of having to buy a separate order of expensive fries to accompany a somewhat expensive burger at least ensured a giant, piping hot basket of french fries. The new "fries included" scheme instead provides just a meager few luke-warm french fries along side the burger.
Now I know I probably sound sort of gross being so concerned about the french fries, but dinner in town in Leavenworth usually comes after a physical day and the french fries are a highly anticipated event. That and on this particular evening, the birthday boy was really looking forward to the feeling of over-eating with an emphasis on fried potato variations, so I felt especially sensitive.

As much as I love kicking back with a beer on a rooftop deck, and I think my Leavenworth burger preference is definitely Heidleburger, where the veggie burgers are just as good (and way cheaper), they have both tatertots and fries, and you can eat outside on picnic tables, on the grass, or wherever you want with whatever libation you have. AND, as we discovered on the way out of town the next day (still on the bday boy's quest for the fried potato overload), Heidleburger now has a "Chipotle" option for it's burgers that was spicy and delicious.

Sorry Gustav's! I want to love you but your little nemesis Heidleburger keeps getting in the way!