July 2009

  • Bayou on Bay, Bellingham

    By macallister on 7/31/09 7:16pm
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    A southern-style SazeracA southern-style Sazerac

    Let me just preface this post by telling you I adore New Orleans. I love the food, the atmosphere, cold beer, icy Hurricanes in plastic cups, and the music. I love the tawdry, bead-bedecked, 24-hour street party that is the French Quarter. There's just no place quite like it, anywhere else.

    But I live in the northwest corner of the U.S.—almost as far from New Orleans as you can physically get, and still be in the continental United States. I haven't been back in a couple of years, now, so I often find myself longing for café au lait and beignets, gumbo, fried oyster po'boys. As hot as the Pacific Northwest has been, this week, I've found myself more and more thinking of super-heated, muggy afternoons in dim barrooms, nursing frosted mugs of Abita beer under a slow ceiling fan.

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  • Il Fornaio

    By lisala on 7/15/09 12:02pm
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    antipastoantipasto

    Il Fornaio is a restaurant chain featuring fresh bread baked on the premises, pizza, pasta, and Italian food. I've been to a number in Southern California, and last week, I tried the Il Fornaio on Pine Street in Seattle. I like Il Fornaio; the food is reliably good, and they tend to have very high quality desserts. I tend to have to be careful about the foccacio and olive oil they serve to nibble on while you peruse the menu; it's fresh and very very good, and it would be very easy to eat too much. I've gone with a small group of friends several times; it's fun to order several of Il Fornaio's fresh-made hand-tossed thin crust pizza, baked in a stone oven, and share.

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