I don’t know why we don’t eat in Chinatown more often. Believe it or not, it’s been well over a year since we’ve eaten at any Chinatown restaurant which seems so utterly crazy since dumplings and dim sum are probably Mia’s favorite food (Claudine, not so much). We do eat plenty of dumplings and have even made our own quite a few times, but dim sum only seems to be a once a year thing for us. Why is that?
 
But sometimes when you have a craving there is no stopping it, which is what happened last weekend with soup dumplings. We decided to go to Shanghai Cafe again on Mott Street above Canal because we almost always get a booth and they have noodles in soup which Claudine loves (there is very little else on a Chinese menu that she likes). Like other restaurants in Chinatown, Shanghai Cafe has a reputation for some pretty bad service and if you read any online review you’ll see what I mean. It almost makes you not want to go. I guess I always temper my expectations and know to just eat my meal, pay and not linger, but maybe that’s because I just know that’s what you do. The waitresses are not your friends. They do their job and you do yours, which is to eat your food.
 
Can I tell you a little story? Back when I was working in an office and did such things as go out to dinner meetings with my coworkers, I would always secretly cringe when anyone suggested Korean barbeque. Not because I was doubtful that my coworkers would like Korean food, but because these dinners would inevitably end up being long, leisurely affairs. That’s fine in other restaurants, but not in ones in Chinatown or Koreatown. If my coworkers unanimously agreed on Korean, I would try to steer them towards the few restaurants downtown which were definitely more hip and had a more Americanized vibe where you could linger for awhile, but they always wanted to go somewhere in Koreatown because it was more authentic. Keep in mind that this was 10-15 years ago so Korean food as a cuisine, even in NY, wasn’t quite mainstream.
 
Being “The Korean” in the group, I always ended up having to recommend a restaurant which basically consisted of me searching online for reviews or reading Zagats like anybody else because I didn’t really eat all that much in Koreatown. I also always ended up ordering for the table because, well frankly, the waitress would always look at me when she came by for our order. This was fine and all, but I’m not fluent in Korean and so I would stumble through the order as best I could and then she would realize that I was a non-fluent Korean speaking Korean-American and I could just sense the air of disapproval even if she didn’t say a thing. She didn’t have to. This little exchange and slight shift in the power balance between me, the non fluent speaking Korean, and the waitress, a very fluent Korean, was always unnoticed by my dinner companions, but I will tell you that it most certainly transpired.
 
The meal itself was always enjoyable and I’d even forget for an hour that I was wearing the badge of shame as the non-fluent Korean in the restaurant. That is, until the end of the meal. See, this is where the dinner starts getting really stressful again, but this stress is only apparent to me. Usually when I’m out eating at a Korean restaurant with my parents, we pay and leave as the waitress is clearing the table after our meal. Dinner can be done in under an hour. But my friends and coworkers all want to stay and talk and linger and drink and talk some more. There’s nothing wrong with this, of course, but not at most busy restaurants on a Friday night in Koreatown. Let me tell you…I have been in some stressful situations in my life and trying to subtly nudge my coworkers to move our party elsewhere for an hour while the waitress keeps walking back and forth after putting down our check has got to be up there in the 10 top most stressful moments.
 
“Well, why didn’t you just say something?”, you might be wondering. And yes, you’re right, but how can I explain that at that moment, blurting out that the Koreans don’t want you to linger in their restaurant isn’t the easiest thing to do, especially when it’s loud and your coworkers are all in a heated conversation about a client or you know, Ally McBeal. It isn’t easy I tell ya. And maybe, just maybe for making me feel the Shame, I was subversively trying to get even with the waitress who you could tell was getting increasingly agitated by the table of Americans and the one non-fluent Korean-American who wouldn’t leave the table even though they finished their dinner an hour and a half ago. Because really, it was me she was glaring at, not them and I knew what she was thinking. “You know the drill! You eat, you leave! No lingering! Why you not tell your American friends that?”
 
There are always these differences that exist between cultures. Maybe a simple awareness of them, which is not always apparent I know, would go a long way. It goes both ways too, of course. Take my dad, for example. He never understands why dinners take so long to serve at non-Asian restaurants. He’ll inevitably mumble about how he’d already be done with his meal if he were at a Korean restaurant while waiting for his entree. He also doesn’t understand the bread thing. “Why they bring so much bread all the time? I finish bread, but they bring more. Why so much?”
 
Incidentally, the service at Shanghai cafe when we were there last weekend was quite good. I don’t know if the owners started reading those reviews or we just caught them on a good day, but our waitress was super nice, smiled at the girls and was overall really pleasant. They even thanked us for coming as we headed towards the door. Thanks Shanghai Cafe. We’ll be back, sooner rather than later.

Sometimes it takes a visit from out of town guests to inspire you to take a walking tour of your own city. And sometimes when you play tour guide you see the streets that you’ve walked down a hundred times with new eyes. Or maybe it’s actually because you haven’t been to this part of the city in quite awhile and by this I mean walking for the sake of wandering around and not just getting to a particular destination. Never mind that it’s raining. It’s warm enough that it’s not unpleasant and it actually adds to the charm, especially as you duck into a cheese shop and a French cafe and watch the rain come down, sometimes heavy in wet sheets, as you cup your warm latte bowls in your hands.

When the rain lets up just enough, you weave in and out of the narrow streets between Bleecker and Hudson and even have to whip out the map on your phone because the streets downtown can get so confusing. This reminds you that this city is big and sometimes you forget that because it’s so easy to stay in the bubble of a few neighborhoods that you know. You make a promise to yourself that the next time you’re feeling in a rut you’ll pick a neighborhood and just go with your camera because this day reminds you why you love NYC so damn much.

We ate out a lot on our NW trip this year which is not always the case; we usually do a lot more cooking. Don’t know why it was different this time around, but since I’ve received emails from readers in the past asking about places to go in Seattle, I thought I would put together a list of places we ate. I’m not listing all the places we grabbed food at Pike Place Market or any of the other food trucks and farmer’s markets because I just can’t remember them all, but the joy in that is really just walking around and discovering what grabs you anyway.

Oh, and coffee. Yes, lots and lots of coffee. Not surprisingly being from the NW, Mark is really particular about his coffee and we horde bags of coffee beans to bring back home with us in our suitcases. We don’t ever really buy coffee when we’re out back home, but we were constantly running in to get coffee everywhere we were. Hey, it’s vacation.
 
Seattle
 

Mashiko – 4725 California Ave SW., West Seattle
I’ve mentioned this sushi restaurant in a prior post. Worth dealing with the traffic to West Seattle. Seriously.
 
Lighthouse Coffee Roasters – 400 North 43rd St., Phinney Ridge
We’d walk over here in the mornings from Mark’s sister’s apartment and get a cup. Without the kids. How civilized (excellent coffee btw. But man, they need a new website. Call me!)
 
Top Pot Doughnuts – various locations around Seattle
I’ll admit it, I’m not much of a doughnut fan, but Mark is, so of course he had to try the doughnuts at Top Pot. It was good, but really, the only doughnuts I ever got excited about was Dynamo in San Francisco. Sure, it’s owned by a friend of ours, but it really is the best in my humble doughnut opinion.
 
Local 360 – 1st Ave and Bell St., Belltown
Food was really great, but my dinner company was better. Just don’t buy into the hype of these PB&J Bon Bons. If you don’t believe me, just ask Uncle Beefy.
 
Thai Tom – 4543 University Way NE., U District
If there are 2 cuisines that are just better in the NW than in NY, it just might be Thai and Vietnamese (although SriPraPhai in Queens and Long Island is truly outstanding and might very well be the best Thai I’ve ever had). Thai Tom is a tiny, hole in the wall restaurant in the U District. We got there super early before they opened so we can get a seat. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Mia enjoy Thai food so much (Miss C, on the other hand as you can see, was not interested in the food one bit and read her book all through lunch).
 
Oddfellows Cafe – 1525 10th Ave., Capitol Hill
Oddfellows was already mentioned in a post about Capitol Hill – I just love the interior of this place so much.
 

Jules Mae Tavern – 5919 Airport Way S., Georgetown
Georgetown is one of those neighborhoods that seemed to just suddenly appear one day, but has really been around forever. It’s kind of out of the way and still really industrial looking, being surrounded by Boeing and Rainier Brewing Company. I guess back in the turn of the century it was a saloon town and Jules Mae is kind of like stepping back in time to that era. Perfect place to hang out with old high school friends and catch up. Also, I have never been to Georgetown except late at night so I imagine that it’s always this dark, gritty, industrial night time place.

 
Caffe Vita – various locations in Seattle, Portland, Olympia and even one on the Lower East Side, Manhattan.
Some of the best coffee in Seattle, I think. But I’m not a picky coffee drinker like Mark so what do I know.
 
Theo Chocolate – 3400 Phinney Ave., N Seattle.
Theo Chocolate is right by the Fremont Sunday Market, where we grabbed lunch one Sunday from booths and food trucks. Even if we don’t intend to buy any chocolate (you can now find Theo at many retail locations around the country) we always go in because um, free “almost all you can eat” chocolate samples! So uh, yeah.
 
* A few places worth noting from prior visits, but not this year are Delancey for really good pizza in Ballard and Cafe Besalu for really good pastries, also in Ballard. And ok, if you’re from Seattle you’ll probably laugh, but I can’t help but love 13 Coins. Other than the fact that there aren’t that many 24 hour restaurants in Seattle let alone any restaurant kitchen open past 10pm (this is true of most anywhere outside of NY I guess), I love the cocktail lounge cheesiness, the dark interior, all the leather and brass, and the super high leather back booths that make you feel like you’re in your own private room. The food is meh but there’s dancing! People actually dancing.

 
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Portland
 

Luc Lac Vietnamese Kitchen – 835 SW 2nd Ave.
When my friend Jen started tweeting about the food at Luc Lac, I knew that this was at the top of our list of places to go in Portland. The pho is huge. I think we spent less than $30 total for our family of 4 and we still had leftovers.
 

Smallwares – 4605 NE Fremont St.
Smallwares is a new place up in NE Fremont which I think still has yet to catch its groove. They serve small plates of “inauthentic Asian” (their words, haha) that are meant to be shared. For the most part, our dinner was really good (I think my favorite of everything was the fried kale), but it can quickly get pricey (ok, it didn’t help that we kept adding dishes as the meal went on). The kids’ dinner, however, only ended up being a few dollars which is just crazy cheap these days. The thing that I’ll remember about this place other than the fact that we had a nice meal with our old roommate, is that the Pee Wee Herman movie was playing on a wall (we sat in the back bar room area) and we didn’t hear a peep out of the kids for 2 hours. Eventually they wandered over to the couch in front of the movie after they finished eating, where they plopped themselves for the rest of the evening.
 
Screen Door – 2337 East Burnside St.
Another place where we had to line up half an hour early just to make sure we got seated for dinner. It’s Southern cuisine in Portland. HUGE portions! Good old comfort food in the way of Mac and Cheese, fried chicken, excellent salads and hushpuppies (which I still don’t really know what they are).
 
Woodsman Tavern – 4537 SE Division St.
We didn’t eat dinner here, but I did go out for a ladies night at this place. I don’t usually drink, but the cocktails sounded too good to pass up and my friends and I shared a dessert. The restaurant has a big bar/ tavern scene, though loud, and the interior is dark walls, tea lights, rustic hipster blah blah with many of the waitstaff in long, full beards a la Mast Brothers Chocolate. Oh, Brooklyn Portland.
 
Random Order Coffeehouse & Bakery – 1800 NE Alberta St.
What is up with the lines out the door for ice cream on the West Coast? Well, after a late night ice cream run where we decided to skip the ridiculous line down the block at 10pm, we opted for pies instead at Random Order. I got the Oregon Cherry. This was good pie.
 
Stumptown at Ace Hotel – 1022 SW Stark Ave.
Mark’s not a huge Stumptown fan (I told you, the guy is picky!). Stumptown is all over NYC now, but we made our way over to the Ace Hotel while we were briefly in downtown Portland only because we had never been.
 
Petite Provence – 1824 NE Alberta St.
We hit Petite Provence on the way out to our drive back up to Washington on our last day in Portland. As soon as we walked in, the girls went nuts. The pastries were so pretty and baked in flower and pinwheel shapes I had never seen before.
 
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Olympia
 
The Bread Peddler – 222 N. Capitol Way.
Ok, so most of you will probably never find yourselves in Olympia, Wa., but if you do (for example, as a pit stop on your drive between Portland and Seattle), make sure you stop by the Bread Peddler for breakfast and fantastic pastries. Also, do the Farmer’s Market. And for being a small town, Olympia always had it’s decent share of good restaurants, even way back when I first moved there in ’91.
 
Olympia Coffee Roasters – 108 Cherry St.
So what coffee does a discerning coffee drinker like Mark drink? Our favorite roasters are these guys. We bring back bags when we leave the NW and we have family bring bags too when they come visit. They’re small and we like to support them any chance we can.
 
Ramirez Mexican Store & Tortilla Factory – 5105 Capitol Boulevard Southeast.
Ok, so this is technically in nearby Tumwater and not Olympia, and this combination grocery store/restaurant really does make you feel like you’re eating in a grocery store so it’s seriously no frills, but geez, the food is really good. I got the “wet burrito” and it’s the single most biggest (or as Claudine likes to call things that are big “hughnormous”) burrito I have ever laid eyes on in my life, like seriously twice the normal size burrito you’d get at any other place and I ATE THE WHOLE FREAKING THING.

The girls didn’t know much about LA before we went, but they did know that Hollywood was there, mostly because their friends would gasp and say they were jealous that they were going to Hollywood. So of course their only request was to see the Hollywood sign and the stars. Personally, I don’t need to walk down Hollywood Boulevard again. It’s like the worst of Times Square x 10 and I wished we had stayed in Silverlake a bit longer where we had brunch with my friends Bonnie and Joy earlier that morning instead, but you know…we have the photos to prove that the girls were there, as well as the star that Claudine claimed as her own.

Later that night, we had a last dinner feast with my cousins at our friend’s restaurant, Sotto. Mark and Steve started their chef careers back in the day together here in NY and since then, Steve has found success cooking pizza and regional Italian dishes in LA to critical acclaim. We were sent so much good food (to his credit, I hear that it’s getting difficult to secure a reservation at this place) and Mia declared her squid ink pasta as one the best tastes she’s ever had in her mouth. The girls, by the way, totally fell asleep at the table around 7pm. They were the only kids at the restaurant (it’s pretty swank) and maybe it was bad form to have these 2 kids totally asleep on my lap, but whatevs. It allowed us adults to savor our wine and our meal. Also, more cannoli for us!

And that crazy sunset…seen through the windshield driving up the Pacific Coast Highway from Santa Monica to Malibu the night before. We stopped by a side of the road seafood shack for fried oysters and clams. I’d say we picked a perfect night to do that.

I really like diners. More so if it’s still housed in a vintage railroad car. I really like how the food, no matter which diner you go to in any part of the US, is pretty much the same everywhere. You know the coffee is going to be weak, but endless refills get you caffeinated anyway and breakfast is always usually solid. I like the history of how the diner began, how it evolved, and how American it is. Often times it’s a bit like stepping back in time if you find a good one – and we did go to a good one right in Venice. A place that has regulars like all good diners should, and is oddly enough run by Europeans (maybe it’s because my cousin’s husband is a German expat, but he seems to know and frequent all the European-owned establishments in the neighborhood).

In related news, the girls have been getting keen on ordering their own food when we go out to eat. While cute, it sometimes ends up confusing because Mia has bigger eyes than her stomach and she’ll try to order all this food that I know she won’t finish, so I’ll try and intercept which just ends up as one mess of an order. Claudine, on the other hand, raises her hand like she’s in class and orders stuff that she likes and eats even if it’s not on the menu. She doesn’t quite get that the food isn’t going to come right after you order, so she’ll ask any waitress that happens to be walking by where her food is. Oy vey.

Friends, I know it sounds crazy, but it’s true. This is only the 3rd time in the history of this blog (that is nearly 4 years!) that we’ve gone out to dinner without the girls. The last time was on my 40th birthday nearly 2 years ago. Let’s not get into the why, but rather revel in the fact that we did it (and to think that I got totally chewed out by a blog reader last year who said that I treated the girls like burdens to our lifestyle when we handed the kids off to Mark’s mom as soon as we got to Seattle so that we could walk around Pike Place by ourselves, bwahahaha).

We’re so out of the whole restaurant scene at this point that it was hard for us to choose where to go, but after some deliberation, Mark chose The Modern for his 40th birthday meal, the fancy formal restaurant inside The Museum of Modern Art. Somewhere along the way over the past few years, fine dining with 3 or 4 course tasting menus has turned into dining experiences with many little extra dishes in between the courses that you do choose (we are not talking about the 8 course tasting menus which, sad to say, I’m unsure I can do anymore. Can’t eat like I used to in my old age). So even before your first appetizer comes out, you may have already been given a few amuse bouche dishes and a few extra sweets at the end of your meal. In our case, we had some kind of foamy carrot soup in a test tube-like glass vessel, a bit of raw fish and some kind of goat cheese tart served on spoons, and our personal favorite, a ceviche like dish with skate in a sauce that I could have licked straight from the bowl, with a single squid ink marshmallow cube. And after our dessert course? Your waiter comes around with this insane sweets cart filled with rows and piles of macarons, petite cookies, brittle, marshmallows, chocolates and truffles and you get to choose whatever you want. And while you are stuffing your face with all this sugar (after already having dessert), some other waiter comes and hands you mini cones filled with perfect domes of ice cream, and then as you are handed the check, you are presented with this fancy, shiny box of petite cakes filled with caramel to take home.

I gave it to the girls. Okay, there were 3 mini cakes inside. I ate one.

 
We don’t have any more big birthdays coming up in quite a while (oh thank god, because I didn’t have a problem with 40, but the next one is almost too much to bear), and that has been the only time that we’ve indulged in such fanciness because let’s face it, the bill at the end of the meal can be shocking, but we decided that we should go out to fancy dinners once a year, perhaps on our anniversary. We also decided that when Mia turns 10, we’d like to take her out to a lunch at one of these fancy restaurants. If there is any kid who has a sophisticated adventurous palette, it’s this kid. While looking over the menu trying to decide what to order, we couldn’t resist saying how much Mia would have enjoyed this meal.
 
PS. thank you all so much for the birthday wishes to Mark. So sweet.