Seattle Birthday Trip Part 1

I cannot tell you how perfect this trip was. It only drizzled once! And everything was as wonderful as promised by friends and celebrities alike.

We took an early - oh God so early - flight at 6am. The descent into the city is so beautiful. In the distance you can see the snow covered mountains, which in the morning sun were all pinks and creams and blues and just breathtakingly beautiful. I told Ed the flight in over the water and islands and keeping the mountains in eye line the whole time made that descent the most beautiful I've ever seen. Even more than Hawaii and the Grenadines! We got into the city a little bit too early for the hotel to be ready for us. The nice guy at the front desk, Alexander, said he was going to try to upgrade us a bit to a room with a view, and in the meantime we should explore the city. Works for us! We had our breakfast options before us. I was dying to try the fried egg sandwich with crab that Bourdain had on his episode of The Layover last week so we walked on over to Seatown Seabar . It was pretty empty at 9am on a Thursday so we got lots of friendly attention from the ladies working there. I feel like a jerk, I should have remembered their names. They were generous with recommendations from food to things to do in the city.

Because what is a vacation breakfast without cool drinks? Mine had little fizzy pieces of ginger in it.

DELICIOUS Biscuits and gravy. I may or may not have accidentally eaten all of it without checking to see if Ed wanted any extra... :)

Fried egg sandwich with crab and avocado. The fruit salad was pretty delicious - pomegranate seeds always sucker me in. Also that egg is for the biscuits and gravy recommended by the waitress. She was spot on with that.

And to top it all off? The sweet women bought me a birthday dessert, lit candle and all! Amazing start to the weekend.

We made our way back to the hotel and got set-up. The room... was fantastic. It was one of those awesome suites with a dining room area and a living room. They had a pretty great 'hub' feature in the lobby and in the rooms that had all of your information easily accessible when you turned on the T.V. The fitness room was pretty awesome too and while I was aiming for going multiple times, I'll give myself a high-five for even making it once. Apparently, my knees are aging right along with me and walking multiple miles does not enable much extra running.

The picture below doesn't do the view justice or the room. The windows were ENORMOUS. To Ed's dismay I love leaving windows open and having cold, fresh outside air (and light and noise) rushing indoors. In general, I get really claustrophobic in closed off rooms and homes. Hell, I get claustrophobic when I pull the sheets over my face. Or my shoulder crowds my throat when I'm sleeping on my side. I may or may not be a highly strung person. Annnnnnyways!

We made our way down to Pike Place Market just to explore even though we knew it would be pretty quite on a weekday. I enjoy seeing places when they aren't insane with crowds and I can get a feel for an area. After that I don't mind it being chaotic, I feel like I've already got my sea-legs about me.

This was the wall across the way from the gum wall in Post Alley. I thought it was too bad there weren't more people taking pictures of this side!

And of course the gum wall. No we did not add anything to it. I'll just blame that one on my temporary crown.

After exploring the area a bit, checking out the waterfront and all, we made our way to the Underground Tour recommended to us by Jeanne. It was great fun. The tour guide, (Betsy I think?), was very funny and a great lead. My only complaint was how freaking fast it was going. It was nearly impossible to take many pictures because of the pace moving in and out of rooms and areas. We passed a bunch of things I wanted to hear more about but we just had to keep walking along. I still recommend it though. A great deal of the things we learned about on the tour we ended up talking about for the rest of the trip! I had no idea Seattle had such grimy and hodgepodge beginnings. And I mean that in the best way. I would much rather live in a city with hauntings and sketchy back stories than some whitewashed humdrum area.

At this point we're in what appears to be a basement.... but at one point this was the ground floor and these windows would have looked out onto the street... the street which later was lifted up some 30 feet in the air and could only be reached by ladders. You can't make this stuff up.

As the day wound down, we made our way to dinner, based on the recommendation of Man vs. Food's Adam Richman, The Crab Pot. A giant pile of seafood? Yes. Please.

We ordered the Westport: dungeness crab, snow crab, mussels  clams, shrimps in the shell (heads and all!), corn, red potatoes, and andouille sausage.

Snow crab? You're giving blue crabs a run for their money, I can't lie. You're dividing my Maryland heart!!!!

The next day we started out by trying to get in on Salumi. This. was. ridiculous. It opens at 11. We got there about five minutes before. Big mistakes. The reviews say get there early, but that is not clear enough. You need to get there REALLY early, like, 30 minutes before open. They were offering the oxtail sandwich, one of their best apparently, and it sold out to the customer 3 people in front of us. Ed was debating attacking them. Thankfully we weren't like the people directly in front of us who were here for a second time that week trying to get the oxtail. While we didn't get out first choice, we did get the muffo, the porchetta and the beef tongue. It saddens me to say that waiting in line for over an hour outside in the cold was worth it but... it was worth it. I was in love with the porchetta. In LOVE. I could eat that every single day. The beef tongue was just alright, not in the same winning league as the muffo and porchetta for me, it was a bit on the sweet side. It had a similar nutmeg-y flavor to some of the salami we picked up to try.

I've never felt more like a silly foodie in my whole life. 

The Muffo with vegetables, olives, pimento, provolone, cotto salami, and hot sopressata salami

Beef tongue with peppers and onions and some fantastic mozarella added on

Pork butterflied and stuffed with meatballs, spices topped with peppers and onions

Afterwards I desperately needed some coffee to help me out of my food coma so we made our way to one down the street named Trabant. I fell for a non-coffee drink however and ordered the Freddy Quimby: a spicy chai and cider drink that is possibly my new favorite warm drink. Ed tried the Pfefferneusse at my request which was ginger molasses syrup, espresso, rimmed with Mexican chocolate, nutmeg and pepper.

Oh delicious spicy chai and cider, someday you will be mine again!

We made our way over to Discovery Point to walk around a bit and see more of the water. As you can see it was pretty overcast, but I have to admit, I was falling deeply in love with Seattle. The food, the people, the weather, and the sights.

More tomorrow!