Last Fall, I spent a quick three-ish days in Seattle with my Aunt.  It was a fairly last minute trip – she had planned this months in advance to see a show by Taj Mahal with two of her girlfriends, but they’d had to back out, so I was called in.  Talk about my time to shine!  Anyway, with my ticket booked just a couple weeks in advance, there wasn’t a lot of time to plan, which sometimes is a good thing.  We didn’t do everything Seattle has to offer by any stretch, but we didn’t feel any pressure to, so it wasn’t a big deal to skip the “must do” kinds of attractions like the Space Needle or seeing them throw the big fish around (we did go to Pike’s Place, but somehow didn’t even see the seafood area!).  We just did the stuff that we really liked to do, and we didn’t try to go 100 miles an hour and cram it all in… so really, it was the opposite of sleepless, as so much sleep was had by all (Aunty and I are world class sleepers).  More like Lots of Food and Naps in Seattle.

day 0.5 – a little pregame for foodies

We arrived at our flat in the Capital Hill neighborhood on a Tuesday afternoon in early November.  According to my cousin, who went to college out thata way, this was the best / most central place to stay – and I must say, she wasn’t wrong!  There were so many wonderful places to eat in the neighborhood!  That first afternoon we stumbled upon this amazing little place, Manao Thai, where the pad thai was so good that we got it to go another night for a chill evening in the flat.  And then that evening, after a stroll around the neighborhood and settling in a bit, we had truly fantastic sushi at Momiji.  

day one – pike’s place market

The next day we did one of my favorite activities in any city I visit – a chef-guided market tour through Eat Seattle Tours.  I’ve been to Pike Place Market before, but this tour didn’t take us into the touristy raw seafood building at all, and so brought out a completely different, and heretofore unseen by me, aspect.  We learned the history of the market, marveled at (and tasted a few of) the regionally specific produce items, and then went to various artisanal vendors and tried so many wonderful things.  The best was easily the award winning Pike Place Chowder, but the al pastor taco from Los Agaves and the smoked salmon from Totem Smokehouse were also stand outs.  And as in every tour I go on, we got some great recommendations for other places to eat and shop in the city.  The absolute best was Truffle Queen, still in the market, where not only did we get to see a veritable mountain of freshly imported black truffles, we also got to taste so many products, and have a very nice chat about food in general!

After immersing ourselves in the flavors of the market, we went for a bit of a jaunt around the surrounding area. We strolled along the water front and popped into several super cute little shops and one enormous antique mall. It was a beautiful day, and I kind of wish we’d thrown a little Ferry ride to nowhere into the bargain, but our brains had been muddled by all the food and walking up and down hills and we were sleepy! So instead of forcing it, we jumped in an Uber and headed to nap town – aka the flat in Capitol Hill. When we awoke, it was cool and breezy and wet, and we just felt like being a bit lazy with the evening… so we did! It’s funny how I feel like I’m obligated to do things constantly when I’m traveling, when in reality I enjoy the things do do so much more when I also give myself permission to just chill the fuck out sometimes!

day two – volunteer park and lots of snacks

Day two was all about the aimless wander, with our only direction being the suggestion of Volunteer Park given to us by my cousin.  Aunty and I love plants and architecture, and we are just chalk full of silly goosiosity (a term we invented this day), and this turned into a great adventure for us.  Our walk to the park was filled with big old houses and big old trees for us to marvel at.  Once we got to there, we moseyed over to the Water Tower – despite how winded we were and old we felt by the time we reached the top, the views were absolutely worth it.  360* panoramas showed us everything – mountains and lakes and trees and downtown Seattle and the bay and even a great view of the Space Needle.  

A bit further on we came to the Seattle Asian Art Museum, and while we didn’t quite fancy actually going in, we did enjoy the statuary out front, and the gift shop in the lobby.  Plus more great views looking out over the reservoir.  Continuing Northward, we came to a beautiful glass building, the Volunteer Park Conservatory, where we had fun identifying weird plants with Aunty’s plant app, and took silly photos of ourselves, and saw a bird of paradise that we could easily identify as looking like a bird!  I feel like I usually have to squint a bit and use a lot of imagination, and even then I see a silly bird head and not the bird in flight.  As the cherry on top, on our way out we made besties-for-the-moment of a delightful Australian woman, who was in town visiting her dentist-daughter to get a new tooth, who in the course of our conversation gifted us with the phrase “don’t carry your mother on your shoulders.”  Like, truth bomb much? I really need to remember this one!

By this point we were starving.  We had walked and climbed and laughed our way through the morning, and thus we made a bee line for Taurus Ox for some Laotian cuisine.  The fried spring rolls were super tasty, and the N/A Mojito was not too sweet and made interesting by the Makrut lime leaf, but the Lao Sausage entrée was off the fucking charts.  Just packed full of flavors, a bit of spice but not over the top, perfectly textured, and served with cooling rice and chilled vegetables.  So so good.  For dessert, we continued southward on 19^thAve to pick up some unusually flavored cookies from Hello Robin.  My personal favorites were the orange habanero chocolate chip and the salted butterscotch, but there was no bad choice here!

That night was a personal highlight for me, as I got to reconnect with the chick who 12^th stepped me back in New Orleans.  It’s always amusing to me – this is a woman who I know well, and was incredibly close with for a long time, but as we hadn’t really been in touch for a few years I was nervous to see her!  Like, this bitch called me out on the worst of my worst alcoholism, and I think it’s going to be weird??  I’m an idiot sometimes!  And besides the easy and fun time we all had together, we ate very well to boot – ramen from Ramen Danbo, and then Molly Moon’s for ice cream that was to die for.

day three – food and glass and music galore

Day three dawned with more perfect weather (apparently, we brought the warming sunshine to Seattle), and after a solid lie-in we headed out on foot.  Our first stop was Taylor Shellfish Farm, a place I’d found on an Eater list that was also recommended by our chef-tour guide.  With the shellfish coming direct to them from their own farms, and the delightful layout that recalled the fish market I worked at briefly in my youth, this was my happy place.  We ate marinated Castelvetrano olives and raw oysters of several varieties, a Caesar salad with boquerones and Dungeness crab, geoduck sashimi and caramelized black cod, and balanced the salty sea air with fresh sweet and sour lemonade.  Like seriously, my personal heaven on fucking earth.  Everything was done so simply, in the most perfect way to highlight each of the flavors.  The geoduck sashimi was my top pick, with the two distinct texture and flavor combinations coming from the two parts of the mollusk, and high experience points from being a food that I’ve only come across once or twice before.

After walking off the worst of the food coma through all the interesting and dazzling architecture of downtown Seattle, and refueling with some ubiquitous Seattle coffee, we came to our next stop:  the Seattle Center.  This huge complex has a lot going on, but our first task was to sit below the Space Needle, finishing our coffee, people watching, and listening to this amazing violinist street performer.  I wish I could remember his name!  But the whole scene was perfect.  Then, after getting into this joyously whimsical headspace, we headed into the Chihuly Garden and Glass Museum.

If you’ve never come across Chihuly’s works, go google that shit right now.  Or I suppose just look at the pictures, but I know they don’t do justice to the magic of being in this building, where everything comes together to really immerse you in the otherworldly nonsense and silliness that is a Chihuly piece.  I mean, they’re just over the top, swirly colors and light making you feel like you’re in another place, a garden from Alice and Wonderland or a coral reef filled with churning water or inside a snowflake.  It just filled me with awe and wonder and fucking delight.  Between this and the seafood feast we’d started with, my joy had reached a level that necessitated going back to the flat for a nap.  Plus, naps are great, right?  Especially in preparation for a night out on the town, a thing us old ladies rarely get up to.

the last hurrah – fueling up for the flight home

The next morning we had to start packing up and get ready to head home.  But before we hopped on the train to the airport, we had time to make a couple more stops to fill our bellies and our souls.  First up was Dough Joy, a delightful little donut shop with perfect raised donuts – and the correct amount of frosting – plus an extra splash of pizzaz.  A wee appetizer, if you will, while we waited for Nue to open for lunch.  This is an absolute gem of a spot, with street food style dishes from all over the world.  We started with a Vietnamese coffee to warm up, and then moved on to the main event:  a World Butter plate, with little scoops from around the globe (who doesn’t want to do a butter flight, I ask ya!); Barbadian Pig Ears, sweet and sour and crunchy and so good; Brazilian Acaraje, a black eyed pea fritter stuffed with spicy shrimpy magic; and Filipino Tosilog, sweet-cured grilled pork with garlic fried rice and a perfect sunny egg.  Then, to pep ourselves up a bit before the slog to the airport, we stopped for a coffee and a tea at Espresso Vivace, which was delicious but very crowded.

I don’t think I realized it until right now, but Seattle is a foodie paradise!  My god, but we ate well over the few days we were there.  We also saw some cool art and lots of plants and super vibey music, but I keep coming back to the food we ate.  I think it felt especially neat because the foreign cultures that are well represented in Seattle are quite different from the majority of what you see on the East coast.  I mean, yes, every big city has its China Town and pockets of immigrants from every region of the world, but on the East coast you see so much more of a European influence, while Seattle’s has a more Asian flare, with more of the smaller countries of that continent represented.  It makes sense to me, given what’s on the other side of the ocean from the West coast as opposed to the East, but somehow it was still a surprise!  Just like this whole goofy, silliness filled trip.  And it’s surprises like these, like a city I didn’t think of as a food destination beyond the seafood and the coffee but turns out to be my personal paradise, that keep my wanderlust alive and well.