Rigatoni with Ragu Bolognese

I love food that is hearty and comforting, stews, slow braises, and meat sauce anything just to name a few.  When I go out to Italian restaurants, I have to force myself from ordering the ragu or bolognese.  I can't help but gravitate to it because I know it's probably gonna be solid with no surprises.  I figure if I'm going out to try a new restaurant, then I should order something different.  Anyways, I came across this recipe from Darin Dines and I wanted to see if I could recreate this yumminess.  If I could get my ragu fix at home, maybe I wouldn't gravitate toward it so much when I'm out.

So the recipe is very interesting because you use a food processor to munch up a ton of garlic and pancetta.

You then fry this up and try to resist the intoxicating aroma of fat, pork, and garlic making love in your pan.

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Top Pot Doughnuts

I have heard one too many things about this place.  It's always on the list for best donuts in the country.  Dumpling Man doesn't understand why a donut could be all that special.  To him, a donut is just a donut.  I would probably agree, seeing as that Yum Yum donuts back in LA pretty much does it for me.  On the other hand, if I lived in NYC near Doughnut Plant, I'd be singing a different tune.  I go cray cray for Doughnut Plant, but not so much Top Pot.

Old Fashioned Glazed
This is one of their signature donuts and one of their most popular.  Seriously, it just tasted like a donut!

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Crush

Dumpling Man can be the nicest sweetest dumpling man.  Instead of a present for my birthday this year, he treated me to multiple delicious meals.  I celebrated the beginning of a new decade by stuffing my face one morsel at a time.  Our Seattle trip goals were 2 fold, celebrate my birthday and eat delicious foods.  Paseo and Molly Moon's was a great start.  Now comes dinner at Crush.  After some random researching I made reservations here, but I had some doubts deep down inside because there were some legitimate sounding negative reviews.


It's always hard to go with just a la carte or the tasting menu, but we figure that we will get the best sampling of a restaurant's offerings with the latter.  It's unlikely we'll ever go back since we're not often repeat visitors of many high end establishments.  So for $93 we went for the 6 course (7 if you include the bread) tasting menu.

Gruyere Gougere, Rosemary Bread
I've had better gougere.  I was disappointed they weren't warm and cheese, but rather room temperature and only a little bit cheesy.  The rosemary bread was surprisingly fragrant despite looking plain like white bread.

Asparagus green garlic, truffle oil
A tasty vegetal offering that was pretty light.  The green garlic and truffle oil were hardly noticeable.

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Molly Moon's Ice Cream

I'm on a total "artisinal" ice cream binge.  Haagen Daaz? Baskin Robbins? Ben & Jerry's?  No gracias.  Hand scooped, hand made, local ingredients, small batches?  I'll have a double scoop please!

I've been quite pleased with the selection of artisinal ice cream in Portland, so I was on a mission to see what Seattle had to offer.  Their go-to spot seems to be Molly Moon's.  The line was seriously out the door and took probably 15 minutes.

Waffle Cones
Wonderful isn't it?  Well if you knew that the line was moving so damn slow because only ONE person was scooping ice cream, while the other person was making a basket of these, then maybe you wouldn't think this was so wonderful.  I'm not quite sure why the waffle person was moving so frantically since there was a whole other full basket being used to scoop ice cream.

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Paseo

Drop everything that you're doing RIGHT NOW and book a trip to Seattle.  You'll totally thank me when you get there, there being Paseo, a Cuban sandwich joint with 2 locations in Seattle.  Now, Paseo happens to be pretty famous.  I've seen it featured on multiple food and travel shows.  As well all know, these shows aren't always the most reliable.  Sometimes they draw attention to mediocre food that's just popular for historical reasons.  Going in, I had my doubts, but every crazy amazing delicious bite of the sandwiches here made me a true fan. 

The place is really small, only a handful of tables inside and small counter for ordering.  The place is cash only, so don't be like the foolish couple in front of me that was scrambling to find an ATM when they got to the top of the line!  We got there at 2pm and there was a pretty decent line outside, but it was moving and we had our hands on our sandwiches after 20-25min.

Midnight Cuban Press roasted pork, sweet banana peppers, smoked ham, swiss cheese, caramelized onions
It really doesn't look like a big deal, but no joke, this sh*t is the REAL deal.  The pork is moist, succulent, and slow roasted.  The ham, cheese, and caramelized onions, in Emeril's words really kick it up a notch.  The banana peppers add a spicy sweet sourness.  Drool.

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Navarre

It pains me to write this post for two reasons.  The food was not good and the pictures are pretty crappy.  Somehow, I wasn't as motivated to take good pictures because the food was so uninspiring.  I like the idea of tapas (good for sharing, more variety), but I've not been impressed with real Spanish tapas.  Spanish food in general is not high up there for me, maybe because of my dislike for olives.  Toro Bravo is probably an exception. 

Ordering at Navarre is very complicated.  They have their standard menu and another list of specials, which turns out to be a whole lot longer than the standard menu.  You can order things in small or large portions.  You can organize your orders to be served as courses or rounds.  You can also do a chef's tasting and save yourself a whole lot of trouble.  I guess I wanted trouble and Zhu Zhu Hamster, Little Pet, and Dumpling Man were just little lemmings.


Ken's Artisan Bread grassy olive oil
People make a big deal bout the bread from Ken's Artisan Bakery.  I will have to admit the bread was pretty good.  It was so soft, but dense and hearty.  The crust was a little too hard for my liking but overall pretty good.  We were stupid and ordered a large portion of this which was just WAY TOO MUCH bread.

Spicy Italian Sausage pickled beets
I'm big on the texture of sausage.  I like it to be springy and fatty, but this was really crumbly and dry.  The pickled beets were not anything to write home about.  Zhu Zhu Hamster really didn't seem to mind the offensive texture.

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Bruxie

People are getting pretty creative with waffles these days.  Gone are the days of waffles with a drizzle of Aunt Jemima.   Bruxie in OC is one of these places reimagining this classic breakfast food into something the savory or sweet to be had at any time of the day.  The Germaphobe suggested Bruxie for lunch during our weekend-long celebration of April birthdays for The Mom and me.  It would be hard to follow up the previous night's dinner at Gjelina (no post because the lighting was terrible but the food was amazing!).   We were worried the line would be around the block for this not-quite-a-restaurant-or-food-truck/cart outpost.  It's an order-and-call-your-name place with a smattering of outdoor seating.  It was perfect for a casual lunch on a hot and sunny Sunday.

Roasted Mushroom & Goat Cheese fresh basil, arugula, balsamic reduction
HemaSh, being a vegetarian, is quite limited when she dines out.  Fortunately, Bruxie had some meat- free offerings.  The Germaphobe went 50/50 with her, as she commonly does.  They seemed to like their 2 waffle sandwiches.


Club avocado, tomato, gruyere, pesto aioli
I actually think this was supposed to be a "turkey club" that had bacon, but HemaSh and The Germaphobe must have gotten it sans.

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Cocotte

Portland is replete with food just like what I'm about to show you: farm to table, seasonal, made to order, small batches, comforting, simple.  Cocotte takes that and just puts a French spin on it all.  Zhu Zhu Hamster and Little Pet, who are becoming quite our favorite duo to hang out with, joined us to try out some delicious French delights.

Roasted Beets pistou, blue cheese, pea shoots, honey mustard vinaigrette

More beets!  This was better than the version at Drago Centro.  Maybe the French do it better than the Italians??  It just tasted fresher, crisper, sweeter?

Chicken Liver Mouse house pickles, whole grain mustard, port plumped cherries, baguette
I love me a big hunk of animal liver.  Classical accoutrements with the mustard, baguette, pickled veggies, and some fruity bits with the cherries.  I could have used some more baguette slices.

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