This is our old Weber grill. My husband, Frank, and I have been using this grill for over 20 years. This is a gas grill. I feel obligated to mention that my employer, Tom Douglas, pooh poohs gas grills; he only likes the charcoal ones because he prefers the flavor a charcoal grill imparts to the food. I agree that charcoal grilled food tastes best, but I love the convenience of a gas grill. Frank and I own both a Weber gas grill and a Weber charcoal grill.
During the 20 years we owned this old Weber grill, we did replace the flavorizer bars at least twice and the grates at least once, ordering the new stuff off the Weber website. The ignition doesn’t work anymore, but you can light this old grill with a match and it still works. It works fine actually. Over the course of the 20 years, we used this grill about 3 times a week, on average. That’s a whole lot of use. All of which is my way of saying, Weber makes an amazing product.
Which means, when you want a new Weber grill, you just have to get rid of the old one because it’s never going to stop working! I finally convinced Frank of this truth and we just bought ourselves this beautiful new grill. I am so happy! The first thing I cooked on the brand new grill was a platter of vegetables from the Farmer’s Market (including a Prosser Farm eggplant). I think a gas grill is especially useful for grilling veggies and fish because the heat is so easy to control.
But we still love our Weber charcoal grill. Here’s a photo (bottom, right) of Frank making burgers on our charcoal grill. (Frank believes that we need a Big Green Egg, too. But for now I’m holding the line at 2 grills for our smallish house and yard.)
August 24th, 2010 | 13 Comments »
August 23rd, 2010 | 1 Comment »
Red, Coconut White, and Blue!! In this Wall Street Journal blog, the menu that Tom Douglas and our catering team prepared last week for a fund raiser that President Obama attended got more print than Obama’s speech! The WSJ blogster was fascinated by the Cougar Gold cheese we put in the green bean salad and didn’t spend as much time discussing our Triple Coconut Cream Pie, but we did get a boxed up pie to the President via his personal bodyguard, Reggie Love!! Hope you enjoyed our Coconut Cream Pie, Mr. President!
August 23rd, 2010 | 3 Comments »
Sunday morning was perfect for hanging out at Seatown Snackbar with a couple pots of Starbucks specially fresh roasted “pour over” coffee. We ordered the Sumatra and enjoyed some of the best, smoothest, most flavorful coffee I’ve ever tasted. My husband, Frank, tried the spicy Bloody Mary, mainly in order to taste the bacon pickles- cuke slices pickled in bacon brine- quite amazing. I ordered from the “English Muffin Love” section of the menu, choosing the breakfast sandwich with a fried egg, sablefish, cream cheese and cress. Served on our own Dahlia Bakery English Muffin with our own smoked fish and even our own house made cream cheese- it was delicious. Frank ordered the “cured and smoked” plate: king lox plus hot smoked silver salmon, buttered rye, more of that divine cream cheese, capers and tomatoes. Fishy bliss. We had just enough room for a piece of peach blackberry buckle, served warm with blackberry syrup, and another pot of great coffee. Nice way to start the day. Next time we have to try the buckwheat pancakes and the biscuits and gravy! Seatown Snackbar opens at 8am.
August 23rd, 2010 | 3 Comments »
Dungeness crab, avocado, tobiko, and a bit of creamy sauce: cool, creamy, briny, and spicy. We call it “wild thing.” You can get it at Seatown Snackbar. On the corner, next to Etta’s.
August 19th, 2010 | 2 Comments »
I am guilty a thousand times over when it comes to waiting too long in the day to finally eat something. More often than not, I wait so long, I throw myself into a hungry person’s no man’s land- one where I need/want to eat, and yet have waited so long that I have zero energy to even decide on what to cook, let alone actually cook the food itself. In these scenarios, I don’t feel as though I have the gumption to make a full, well-rounded, delicious meal for myself. On the other hand, I don’t like to eat like crap- a a box of mac n’ cheese while quick (and occasionally delicious) just aint gonna cut it.
The other day, after running around like a wild dog doing various errands and whatnots, I was in such a quandry and found myself ready for my first meal at <insert gasp> 4:45 pm. A scan of the fridge revealed a few leaves of rainbow chard and a pork chop. SOLD!
What made the meal particularly good had little to do with any prowess I had in the kitchen and everything to do with the Rub with Love Pork Rub. Our company spice rubs are now a part of my weekly cooking repertoire. I know that sounds sales pitch-y, but the truth is I had never used any Rub with Love prior to working for TDCo. I used to be that person who scoffed (because I’ve been know to be an unreasonable food snoot) at the idea of using pre-made spice rubs. This was a belief I once held, but no longer do. Why? Because the simple fact is this: the spice rub made my pork chop taste better. It was smoky and sweet and put a crusty edge on my chop that my usual salt and pepper treatment wouldn’t have accomplished. And when I am ready to finally eat my first meal of the day at some obscene hour, anything that can make my food taste really good on the quick step is A-OK in my book.
Long Live Pork Rub!
August 19th, 2010 | 6 Comments »
Farmer in Chief, Jackie Cross, has been bringing loads of glorious Prosser Farm vegetables to all the Tom Douglas Restaurants. Palace Chef, Brian Walczyk, turned some of the Prosser cukes into these bread and butter pickles. (Behind the jars of pickles you can see some beautiful yellow wax beans, also from Prosser Farm.) Right now, Brian is serving the pickles on the Palace menu with applewood smoked ham and Besse’s biscuit.
August 18th, 2010 | No Comments »
Here’s what we ordered last night at Seatown Snackbar: the Seatown smoked seafood sampler- 6 different smoked fish and seafoods on buckwheat blini- each one bright and flavorful. The black cod with nectarine miso might be my favorite- no wait, maybe the Neah Bay Caviar with housemade cream cheese! The sampler was perfect for a warm summer evening with a glass of bubbly Rosé. I enjoyed the bubbles while my husband, Frank, explored the beer list and ordered the “Bitburger in the can”- from Germany, which was mighty tasty.
A plateful of Jackie’s peak of summer Prosser tomatoes with avocado skordalia (Eric Tanaka’s invention) was another delight- beautifully seasoned, featuring the tomatoes but with the surprise of the skordalia.
We also enjoed the lavender duck leg with tamarind eggplant and coriander yogurt. The duck was moist and super tender and the eggplant-….meltingly soft and superbly spiced- I could eat a giant bowl of the eggplant alone.
We also had the porchetta sandwich- rich delicious pork, but not overwhelmingly so- which meant we still had room to share a piece of warm apple pie with Beecher’s cheese crust and vanilla ice cream. We were very happy indeed!
The patio at Seatown Snackbar is open, the weather is perfect, and it’s almost cocktail time…..
August 18th, 2010 | No Comments »
A jam and jelly tasting first thing in the morning is not the worst way to start your day. These are jams and jellies Garrett is developing in the test kitchen for the upcoming Dahlia Bakery Cookbook. Every recipe we develop presents its own set of issues because we’re going from the professional kitchen to the home kitchen. One of the big issues for jams and jellies is that Dahlia Bakery bakers use apple pectin which is difficult to find, even in the industry, and would be almost impossible for the home cook to find. So, Garrett developed recipes using the kind of pectin you use in the supermarket, which sets things up with a much clunkier textue and with less finesse. The blueberry jam (at the top in the photo) was pretty much perfect. The cranberry hibiscus jelly ( to the right in the photo) has gorgeous color and great flavor, but needs more pectin. The whole preserved strawberries (at the bottom in the photo) taste good but the jelly part is too clumpy. So a bit more work is needed. Garrett made whole wheat flax biscuits because in his opinion, you can’t taste jams and jellies on a spoon. As a professional eater, of course I would have tasted them on a spoon, but I wasn’t going to argue with the warm, delicious biscuits!
August 18th, 2010 | 4 Comments »
We did it!! We’re open!! Seatown Snackbar is a restaurant with a large bar that serves sophisticated snacks such as smoked sturgeon and pickled chanterelles on buckwheat blini. There’s also a section on the menu called “Crab, Crab, Crab,” with items such as “wild thing” Dungeness crab with avocado and tobiko and spicy cast iron fried whole Dungeness crab. Check out the whole crabs on ice sitting right behind the bar in the photo top left. You can see Seatown chef, Jack Spiess, in the photo top middle (he’s the guy with the beard.) Seatown’s menu also features sandwiches, platters, and seasonal Pike Place Market finds such as a red butter poached duck egg with fried onion toast. Yum! Our pastry chef, Stacy, has created a short but sweet dessert menu that includes one of the loveliest berry cobblers ever. Right next to Seatown Snackbar is Seatown Snackbar To Go (the To Go Chalkboard is in the photo top right) serving our own rotisserie meats and poultry as platters, sandwiches, and whole roti chickens to go. These spaces are sweet! Come check us out!!
Seatown Snackbar is located on the corner right next to Etta’s. The restaurant side is open daily 8am to 11pm and the to go side is open daily 8am to 8pm.
August 17th, 2010 | 4 Comments »
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