I stuffed myself at Kingfish Cafe...

From N.

It was a fried chicken, ribs and mac and cheese kind of weekend. That's what happens when you eat at Kingfish Cafe. There's no way around having the biggest, heaviest meal imaginable and loving every bite.

Kingfish is legendary, at least among people I know. It's one of Seattle's few Southern spots, and wins the award for biggest portions in Seattle, including massive slices of cake. But I have never indulged in dessert because by the time I've gotten through a plate of food, I can barely waddle out, let alone consider red velvet.

A couple of friends recently moved from New York to Seattle into an adorable Jolly Rancher house a few blocks from the 19th Avenue business district on Capitol Hill. Kingfish is their neighborhood spot. I hope they are prepared to join a gym.

Kingfish always has a wait, so we started off at the bar. After spending some time in the South, I am a fan of sweet tea and I also have an out-of-character weakness for sugary coffee drinks, but I am strict when it comes to my cocktails. I like them balanced and tart and I like to taste the alcohol. Southern or no, unbearably sweet cocktails are just wrong. And my mint julep ($9) was all kinds of wrong. I could barely detect the Maker's Mark whiskey or the mint buried beneath half a glass of simple syrup. I couldn't even come close to finishing it and O. abandoned hers for an IPA.


Moving on to more pleasant topics, like the food. Sho'Nuff fried green tomatoes and crab and catfish cakes appetizers tempt me every time, but O. and C. had seen the tremendous platters of food float past and I knew better, so we all showed huge restraint. Then decided we were splitting ribs, fried chicken and mac and cheese.



The My Way or the Highway buttermilk fried chicken had a lovely, crisp coating and moist, tender meat, while the brick of Down Home mac and cheese broke apart easily and revealed layered flavors that comes from, surprisingly, just two kinds of cheese. Onion, green pepper and mushrooms are probably the reason. Or maybe it was just a lot of cheese.

The ribs also were fork tender and had a tart, sweet sauce, which merely confirmed that I am not out of the woods yet on my bbq-sauce burnout. The wild green salad that came with the mac and cheese was a bit overdressed, but the potato salad was a nice, creamy counterpoint to the rich barbecue, along with some collard greens.

The menu also includes ribeye steak, pork chops and catfish, but you try saying no to mac and cheese. I'd love to see dishes like shrimp and grits (maybe they do on other nights), and they need to overhaul their cocktail recipes STAT, but Kingfish otherwise is a hugely fun and tasty slice of the South.

Kingfish Cafe
602 19th Ave. E.
Seattle
206-320-8757
Open for dinner seven days a week, lunch on weekdays and brunch on Saturday and Sunday.

I heard great music at the Capitol Hill Block Party...

From N.

I spent my weekend navigating Capitol Hill Block Party, when the intersection of 11th and Pike gets shut down, stages put up and thousands of people show up. Many are tattooed. It's a thrill to wander familiar streets without worrying about taxicab drivers mowing you down in the crosswalk, to check out new bands, get crushed by Sonic Youth fans and be sad that you didn't snag kimchi fried rice at Marination Mobile when it was there on Friday night.

There were a lot of people there.

Friday was about new music and the small Vera stage, where I saw two of my favorite performances of the weekend: Starfucker and Micachu and the Shapes. Starfucker, a group of guys from Portland, showed up in dresses and had the entire audience pulsating along with its danceable music and cool hooks. Their energy was contagious and their music knocked me out. Micachu is a UK band with a sweet singing voice and a banjo that allows for cuteness yet quashes any categories by mixing in intensely raw, edgy sounds. It was creative and awesome.

I think I would have really loved Deerhunter if I could have seen them. Friends L., M. and I didn't venture to the front of the pack at the main stage on Friday night and so couldn't see a thing. Deerhunter sounded great, but I realized it really is about actually seeing the band. My mind was already overstimulated and it wandered when I couldn't focus on the stage. (Although I don't think seeing Black Lips would have convinced me to get into their music.) They Live! also killed Friday at Neumos. They've really brought their stage performance to a new level since I first saw them not that many months ago, this time performing with two Massive Monkees (who are such a fun part of the show), lights and a thundering stage presence.

Saturday was about determination. I wanted to see Gossip up close and personal on the main stage. We pushed our way into The Thermals crowd, then surged forward when they finished so we could get thisclose to Beth Ditto. I thought we did pretty well.

Beth Ditto is a force on so many levels. She was adorable in her black and white striped dress and is so fun, sassy and charming, I could see how the fashion world has gone gaga. And then there's her voice - thrilling and huge. We had to cope with a few surges of frantic, dancing fans pushing past us, but mostly just loved hearing Beth Ditto's outrageous voice, be wooed by her ("Cheers, bitches!") and get swept up in her music and aura.

We decided not to wait the next hour for Sonic Youth so attempted to leave the front of the main stage. Attempted. We nearly got trampled as Sonic Youth fans swarmed the front and Gossip fans tried to get out. Some order or organized way of getting people in and out of the claustrophobic narrow chute that opened to a large space in front of the stage (a fence divided the street for 21+ and all ages) would have been nice. It was enough crowds to last us quite a while.

It was too hard to focus during Sonic Youth since we couldn't see, so we ended the night at at the Sport'nLife showcase in Neumos, which felt like a real show. Got to see D. Black, Spaceman, Fatal Lucciauno and even Grynch do their thing. It was a familiar and soothing end to a great festival.

I ate at Poppy...

From N.

I've been interested in Poppy since it opened, but heard it was spendy and wasn't ready for another lecture from Mint.com. But when I read about the crazy cheap $5 happy hour, I had no more excuses to stay away.

I wasn't expecting an Ikea-ed out orange and blond wood interior. It's really cute in that Scandinavian way, but sort of a funny choice for a high-end restaurant. Perhaps it's intended to make it feel more casual, and I loved the pops of bright orange, but I prefer the natural, elegant style of Spur or Anchovies & Olives.

I can't say much about the restaurant as a whole since I was there for happy hour, but HH appeared to reflect a regular meal. Food is typically served as a thali, a platter that has several small dishes. For happy hour, you get four dishes plus naan for $5. I can't think of a better deal, except free, and cocktails also clocked in at $5.

My six twenty-two drink with rye whiskey and rhubarb and agnostura bitters and another liqueur was pleasant, but not memorable. A Pimm's Cup and Turkish Delight also were on the cocktail menu.

The thali is a beautiful way to present food, and this Thursday creation included a sumptuous tiny slice of onion, pancetta, oregon blue and walnut tart that had a lovely balance of rich and sweet. An oregano aioli livened up mussels, while a cauliflower mashed with sesame was a moist accompaniment to the naan. There also was a puffy rice, dried fruit and macadamia mixture referred to as spice crispies. The dish was probably the closest thing I've encountered to a snack vividly described in a Jhumpa Lahiri short story about a character who mixes Rice Crispies with peanuts and spices to mimic an Indian treat. A roasted beet salad with albacore tuna, green olives and lemon basil was nicely done, but didn't make much of an impression.

There's a definite Indian tang to the dishes, particularly the spice crispies, and I was less than in love. I adore Indian food but somehow adding Indian spices and accents to new American dishes didn't quite work for me. Others disagree. I could be lured back for happy hour, but for a full meal, especially with a regular thali priced at $32, it's more likely I'll be ensconced at the bar at Spur.

I ate at Anchovies & Olives...

From N.

I have been taking it somewhat easy with restaurants lately, trying to keep things within my Mint budget, which loves to remind me just how much I spent this month. I need and loathe Mint.com. When on budget, I tend to eat a lot in the ID for cheap, delicious Chinese or Vietnamese.

But I joined up with some friends to revive a moribund Dinner Club and finally made it to Anchovies & Olives on Capitol Hill. The latest restaurant from local superstar Ethan Stowell is more casual than his swanky Union. It's more akin to Tavolata, but also has big open windows great for hanging out to wave to friends walking by and offering a decent view of downtown, even on a rainy evening.

Here, the menu boasted several cold plates with beautiful raw fish, some small appetizers, pastas and a few additional cooked fish dishes. The escolar ($14) from the cold menu was my absolute favorite of the night. Meltingly soft, raw sliced escolar, or butter fish, was combined with slivers of white peaches, crunchy pine nuts, coppa and olive oil for a mesmerizing dish. The layers of crunchy, sweet, tart and buttery fish was amazing, and I could eat it over and over and over again. I also adored my uni pasta (pictured, $14), or tagliari. Uni was cooked with butter and then mixed with fresh pasta and bread crumbs for a whiff of salty, buttery sea air that wouldn't turn off even uni-haters. I do think the pasta should have been slightly more al dente, but it was a generous serving and I was not about to complain.

A cauliflower salad with ingredients I can't remember beyond pine nuts also had a nice mix of textures and a salty anchovy dressing. We also had some raw oysters, served with diced apples, and a spoonful of uni that arrived with sweet cantaloupe and crisp cucumber.

I love the style of food served here; Mediterranean with its focus on fish and pastas, and a really great cold menu. But the prices are high. I would rather pay a lot less for some of the food. The server sold the place as small plates for sharing, but I don't think small plates should cost $14 or $16 a pop. In my world, that's the price for an entree, and most of the plates were legitimately small.

But if someone else is buying, I'm definitely there.

I *was* the bachelorette, LOL! ;)

From K

And I think that might help explain why I've not written since the weekend :)

Truth be told, I wanted to go to Miami to celebrate my upcoming nuptials. But between the economy, friends having babies and a variety of other factors, staying close to home seemed the better plan, and it ended up being so much fun! We started the party relaxing in the 35th-floor pool at the Seattle Sheraton (nothing quite like being a tourist at home), where you're at eye-level with most of the downtown skyline. My friend R kept commenting that she felt like she was in Denver. I felt calm and relaxed for the first time in weeks since this whole wedding-planning adventure began!

We got all dolled up and scooted up the hill to Oddfellows, one of my favorite spots to dine as a big group. The pulled pork sandwich was yum as usual, though I think the one at Skillet remains the sandwich to beat. It was a delight connecting with so many girlfriends! We drifted to Molly Moon's for ice cream, upstairs to the Century Ballroom for salsa and then to Havana to get our groove on. After a brief, yet lovely, sleep, we walked to brunch at Lola, where I capped off one of the happiest weekends to date with this amazing concoction:



By all means, next time you're at Lola, get the eggs benedict. Light, lemony, dilly, dainty even. Those perfectly poached eggs you tap with your fork to release the luscious yolk. That perfectly chewy English muffin that doesn't fight your knife. A sauce that does not overpower the bite-sized, thin layers of ham. Perfection!