When the archaeologists of the future pick through the layer we know as the present, in this waterscape we know as Seattle, they will undoubtedly conclude that the urban tribes of this era subsisted on small portions of fish and copious amounts of spirits, preferably together, ideally around outdoor fire pits. Manolin is the latest such site—the Stone Way endeavor of the Whale Wins and the Walrus and the Carpenter expats—and on its menu of small plates it trolls similar waters: the denatured, smoked, poached, and grilled seafoods one finds at these sorts of watering holes all over town. Bracing cocktails are big on tequilas and piscos and cachaças, and the food can evoke the same lower latitudes, like plantain chips (which longed for a dipping sauce) or rockfish ceviche lushly partnered with cubes of avocado and sweet potato and then lit bright as a Baja sunset with chilies and plenty of lime.
Seafoods, not surprisingly, shine brightest here; grilled romaine salad was better in flavor than texture, and the chicken thigh dish was plain boring. Plus the place is screaming for oysters. But the winning friendliness of these servers and the utter enchantment of the setting neutralize any disappointment. When those future excavators unearth this neighborhood haunt, clad in sea-blue subway tile and anchored with a rounded bar counter aiming out paned French doors to the outdoor fire pit—will they know it was Seattle’s hangout of choice circa spring 2015?
At her white-tiled, chandelier-lit bakeshop in Greenwood, Rachael Coyle mixes French patisserie tradition with Americana and a dash of England’s baking culture. But mostly she offers confections she terms “either difficult or nonsensical to make at home”—more puff pastry and Paris–Brest than peanut butter cookies. The morning queue is mostly for her croissants, later seasonal tarts, galettes, cocoa-imbued sables, and supermodel layer cakes fill the pastry case. It’s undoubtedly a neighborhood spot, yet worth a drive across the city.
Tucked into an indigo banquette beneath Lark’s starlit ceiling, wrapped in the homelike elegance of one of this city’s seriously lovely rooms, I’m staring at a long menu, dumbstruck by how appealing it all looks. What’s a diner supposed to rule out off this menu? Not the housemade charcuterie nor the classics made famous in Lark’s original location. And how is a diner supposed to choose among all these mains?
Perhaps when a place is actually three places, plenty is simply the prevailing concept. In the loft above is Bitter/Raw, the crudo and amaro bar serving cocktails and platters of Kumamoto oysters. Behind, peeking out from between the staircase slats, is Slab Sandwiches and Pie, the daytime takeout shop sharing Lark’s kitchen. Owner John Sundstrom may be the most accommodating chef in Seattle—this is the chef, remember, who at the original Lark on 12th Ave effectively invented have-it-your-way small-plate dining.
But in Seattle the three-in-one restaurant is hardly unique. Compound restaurants have officially become a Thing—just ask Tom Douglas (TanakaSan/Assembly Hall Juice and Coffee/Home Remedy), or Renee Erickson, currently launching the dining room Bateau, adjoining oyster bar Bar Melusine and doughnut shop General Porpoise. Sundstrom launched his when he found his dream space for the new Lark, an airy warehouse at the south tip of Pike/Pine, whose 5,000 feet enabled a couple of his other entrepreneurial dreams.
Avocado toast at Lark
Benefits for the restaurateur are clear: economies of scale, shared storage, ease of management, lower overhead. (Sundstrom wasn’t eager to repeat Licorous, his bar one door down from the original Lark—widely beloved but killed by separate overheads.) Clustered restaurants can also squeeze lemonade from lemons; at Erickson’s compound a narrow alcove, awkward for the restaurant, was just right for a doughnut shop.
The benefit for the diner is a festival-like vitality, as one feels in upscale food courts like Melrose Market or the new Chophouse Row. Sundstrom claims he’ll sometimes see a party begin an evening at Bitter/Raw, end it at Lark—even come back to Slab for lunch the next day. Do they love Sundstrom’s food that much? Feel that good about the fact that their Lark rib eye and their Slab brisket came off the whole cow this shared enterprise allowed Sundstrom to buy?
Perhaps they’re simply lured by a place that, in three places, is its own bustling neighborhood, within four beautiful walls.
Ask Ethan Stowell protege Brian Clevenger if there are downsides to opening a high-end restaurant in a neighborhood like Madrona, and he’ll reel them off: No foot traffic. The person who travels to you is passing a dozen great restaurants. You need your neighbors. “In neighborhood restaurants, 80 percent of your business comes from 20 percent of your guests,” Clevenger says. No problem there: Many nights in Vendemmia’s six-month life, you couldn’t snag one of its 32 seats before 9pm, so packed has it been with east-of-34th Ave gentry. Not to mention neighbors from the commercial district. “Paul the barber from across the street probably comes in four times a week,” Clevenger laughs.
The reason for the fond embrace? Vendemmia was born a classic; a little black dress of a place with a clean menu of simple pastas and mains, exactingly executed. Straight lines and right angles and palette of grays and open ductwork ceiling provide just the right minimalist backdrop of DIY elegance, and there in the open kitchen you can see the chefs huddled carefully over their art: pastas, from the spaghetti brightly topped with a light basily tomato sauce to the dense bucatini, wicked rich in lamb ragu; mains like a preparation of roasted vegetables with buttery black cod, or thick pink slices of fork-tender Wagyu beef over Walla Walla onion puree with chanterelles.
It feels like a destination, especially when the waiter intones that “the mixed green salad is very anchovy forward.” That’s a sentence that’s possibly never before been uttered in a residential neighborhood. And when it arrives—green and purple ruffles with strips of pecorino and a dressing that’s, yes, very anchovy forward—it tastes like something a neighbor could become a regular for.
Welcome to the neighborhood.
Halibut with crispy skin and sweet corn pudding at Salare.
Chef and owner Edouardo Jordan has skills, no question, hailing from big-deal restaurants like French Laundry and, closer to home, Bar Sajor. But frankly, the food at his new dinner house may not even be as big a draw as his location, smack in the heart of Ravenna’s commercial district—a neighborhood that’s never had a restaurant of this reach. The airy space is feminine and farmhousey, with an informal floor plan of two-tops and stools around the open kitchen and a long table for chatting neighbors. (You’ll even see kids, owing to a special kids’ menu—a feature not often spied in the same room as tripe with Castelvetrano olives and Calabrian chilies.)
But Jordan’s style favors nanoseasonality and freshly imagined combinations—grilled octopus with watermelon gazpacho, salted plums, and preserved lemon—in painterly presentations. Some, like a minuet of rich yogurt with colorful heirloom tomato and embellishments of spring onion and pine nuts and chrysanthemum, live up to the promise; others register as interesting experiments. It’s all what Jordan intended. “When I decided on this neighborhood, I knew in my gut this was a place I could have fun with my food,” he says. As for the neighbors, “I knew they were traveling all the way to Pioneer Square and Capitol Hill for dinner. I knew they had a palate—but no locations to challenge it.” Now they do.
