Pictured at left is the menu from Poppy, the Seattle restaurant we visited. Read on for more about it.

Our last night of the trip, we opted to spend in Seattle. The plan was to enjoy walking around Pike Place Market some and to have a non-descript dinner somewhere nearby since we had enjoyed our sumptuous dinner at The Willows Inn on Lummi Island the night before. We thought we might never want to eat again after that meal, but actually we weren’t overly stuffed since all the courses were small and many of the offerings were called “snacks.”

Leaving Lummi Island, the last morning we took the passenger ferry back to the mainland after having had a delicious breakfast at the Beach Store Café (by the ferry dock) for the 2nd day in a row (there isn’t any other place to eat on the island except the Willows, and that’s dinner and by reservation). Our rental car was right where it should have been, and we tootled off in the direction of Seattle. We stayed at a very nice hotel close to the Pike Place Market, at The Inn at the Market.

Actually, I forgot to even mention that before we visited Lummi Island, we spent one night in North Van (short for Vancouver) at a lovely, LOVELY B&B that I’d highly recommend. ThistleDown House, on a pretty tree-lined street. We had a delicious dinner at a restaurant about 3/4 mile away in the small village of Edgemont, at Canyon, a newly designated Michelin 1-star restaurant. The restaurant doesn’t have a website (how can that be? but I couldn’t find one) so I’ve provided the link to Trip Advisor’s site for it. Food was good; service was slow, but I think it’s because the chef (old school kind of one, I believe) cooks to order. We were very pleased with our meal. Anyway, the next day we drove slightly east of Vancouver to cross the U.S. border at a less-busy location (called the Sumas crossing, near Abbotsford) and headed south to our 2-night stay at Lummi Island.

Now, let’s get back to the Seattle section again. We happened to end up there on a Saturday night. Had NO idea whatsoever what kind of zoo the Pike Place Market would be on a busy, sunny, Saturday afternoon. It was mayhem. We searched for one particular store (to buy their signature Cinnamon Orange Tea) and couldn’t get out of Pike Market fast enough. The guys were throwing fish at the landmark fish market there, as they do, and the crowds went wild.

Some ladies on Lummi Island had recommended we make a reservation for dinner at Poppy, a Seattle Capitol Hill restaurant, known because of the chef, Jerry Traunfeld. He made his name famous for the years he created the menus and food at The Herbfarm, a stunning place east of Seattle in Woodinville. That restaurant burned down a few years ago (and has since reopened). Meanwhile Jerry moved on, opening this restaurant with a very unusual menu and food style. They serve dinner on a round platter with lots of little plates on it. Here’s what their website says about it:

[The] inspiration comes from the “thali,” a platter served to each guest holding a variety of small dishes. Poppy’s menu borrows the idea of the thali to present Jerry’s own style of northwest cooking, highlighting seasonal ingredients, fresh herbs, and spices. it’s a modern northwest tasting menu served all at once.

A Thali (tal-ee) is a Hindi or Nepalese word. But the food at Poppy wasn’t all about that region – it was various cuisines. First, we ordered one of their signature appetizers – eggplant fries with sea salt and honey. OH my goodness was that ever fabulous.

When brought to our table, they were almost smoking hot. You can see a tiny bit of skin front-and-center on one of them (no big deal). The sea salt was clinging to the fries and the honey was very lightly drizzled. We let them sit for just a minute to cool down enough so we could pick them up.

This dish was an absolute revelation. If you go on the internet and search for “eggplant fries” you’ll find a few recipes for it – have no idea if any of them are the same as Poppy’s, but I’d sure like to know how to make them. They were THAT good!

I don’t know that I’ll ever really prepare them – I try not to cook anything fried like that, but oh, I might be tempted because these were so delicious. Soft inside and barely crispy on the outside. The salt was just the perfect amount and the very light drizzle of honey was so fun and it put these over the top in the flavor department.

Here are photos of the 2 thalis we ordered. I can’t even remember for sure what we both ordered (I had salmon, but that’s as much as I recall – I think it’s the one on the left). Naan bread is in the middle of both. There’s a pickle in one of the dishes, some veggies, a salad kind of thing and soup. We both loved our plates and the varied tastes each item provided. I’d definitely go there again if I lived in Seattle. The chef was there the night we dined – I asked the waitress to point him out to me. The very large kitchen was glassed in so you could see some of what was going on inside. Out behind the restaurant there is a very large herb garden (guests are invited to go visit if they want to – I did). I don’t recall that anything was labeled, but gosh, it was a riot of scents.

Our trip was really a good one – I am going to pat myself on the back that I planned a workable itinerary for us.  What I did differently this time was allow us to stay 2 nights most places. I’ve written up a synopsis itinerary below – it’s a pdf – of where we went, what we did and where we ate.

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No, this isn’t a commercial for All-Clad. I do have these adorable little single-serving ramekins, though, that my friend Cherrie gave me a year or so ago and I forget to use them. They were just perfect for this dish. You could also use just a regular pan for both servings.

While we were on our trip I got a nice email from the folks at Frieda’s Produce. It’s apple season again (hooray) and they wanted to send me some. We got them a few days after our return, and after eating one out of hand right away, I tucked them away in the refrigerator because I knew I wouldn’t use them immediately. But some nights later, once I got back into the routine of fixing dinner (gosh, it was so nice to be on vacation and eat out every meal – no prep, no planning, no cleanup), I was ready to start using some of those organic apples. They sent me baby Cortlands, Cox’s Orange Pippins and Ribston Pippins. If you’re interested, at least the Cortlands are available at some Sprouts markets. Maybe not all. Call and ask. They’re an unusual apple because when you cut them up, they don’t turn brown. All of these are heirloom types: Cortlands date to 1898, the Cox’s from the early 1800s and the Ribston from 1708.

It was so nice of Frieda’s to send the apples to me. I just love apples. Ordinarily I would make dessert with them, but I talked myself out of that since we’d had ample desserts on our trip. I wanted to give ourselves a little break. Not that we had dessert every day – we did not, but even every other day is more than we do at home. If I did my favorite apple dessert, I’d be making my Mom’s Crisp Apple Pudding. I just don’t ever seem to tire of that one. And maybe I will still make that one of these days.

One day before we went on our vacation I decided to clean out one shelf in the freezer. It just wasn’t packed very well, and items kept falling off the shelf and onto my tender sandal-clad toes. Ouch. I found a package of 2 small thick-cut pork chops in there that I’d forgotten I had, so I placed them strategically in the front so I’d see them when we got back. Once we returned, I reached into the freezer for something else, and gosh, wouldn’t you know, those pork chops fell OUT and landed on my toes again. So, that made my decision – I’d cook them.

Making these was not difficult or all that time consuming, really. Once I seared the chops, removed them, then cooked the onion, then the apples and re-inserted the pork in the 2 pans, I stuck them in the oven (covered with foil) and baked them for about 20-25 minutes, until the pork was not quite fork tender.

Pork chops have a habit of either being too chewy, or once they reach a point of tenderness, and you continue to cook them, well, they get dry and hard to eat.

Actually, I didn’t serve them in the little pans – my DH wanted me to, but the All-Clad ramekins are nonstick, and  using a knife might have gouged the nonstick surface. So I removed them to a plate. We had cabbage to go along with it (my recipe for sweet and sour cabbage) which was just very tasty with it. If I’d been better prepared I would have made some rice to put beside the pork because there was a lot of very tasty juices running all over the plate.

What’s GOOD: apples and pork are a perfect pair, like salt and pepper, meatloaf and potatoes; you know what I mean. This wasn’t an over-the-top kind of dish, but it was relatively healthy and had enough flavor for a satisfying dinner. If you have apples on hand, use almost any variety – just don’t use the types that fall apart when cooked (like Delicious). You want the apples to stay in their perfect slices. It was easy enough to make and while the pork cooks you can slap together the rest of your dinner.

What’s NOT: nothing really. Next time I might sprinkle just a bit of flour on the chops, which would help thicken the sauce a little bit – that would be nice, then you could drizzle the sauce on top.

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Only if you’re a foodie person would you likely make a trip to The Willows Inn for dinner. Some people who live in/around the Seattle area do – it’s a day trip, or rather an evening trip. The restaurant operates Wed-Sun nights, or off season from Thurs-Sun nights. We chose to stay on the island for 2 nights and had the feast one of the 2 nights.

If you go during most months of the year there is a car ferry, but as I explained in my post about Lummi Island a couple of days ago, we just happened to go there during the 3 weeks the car ferry was in dry dock for its annual maintenance. So we had to use the small passenger ferry that plies the half-mile distance between the mainland near Bellingham (about 15 miles west of the 5 fwy on the Lummi Nation Reservation) and the island itself. It was kind of special. Fun. Different. Certainly makes for good story telling, and my DH has been making the most of it (he’s good at that).

The meal is expensive. I mean ferociously expensive. $150 per person. We’d not usually pay that much for any dinner, but this was vacation, and it just got lumped into our trip expenses, I suppose. Dave and I talked about it before we went – were we willing to spend that much? We decided for an island destination, maybe it was, and hoped we’d be happy about it.

And, indeed, we were. It was a spectacular dinner (dining room is through the right hand side of the windows above – lobby was on the left side). Took 3+ hours with so many courses I could hardly keep track. I took photos of them all and you can see them below. The servers were kept hopping all night long, setting up for each course and then bringing some treasure that was lying on a rock, or hot rocks, or a plank, or rustic plates. Take a look at the photos, and then down below them I’ll tell you what my favorites were.

Most unusual: raw goat tartare (not my favorite, but I think it was just because it was raw – the meat came from goats on Lopez Island nearby); the baked kale chip with black truffle and buttered rye bread crumbs; the halibut skin – crispy and good – stuffed with some halibut mousse, I think; and definitely the woodruff ice cream. I wasn’t even sure what woodruff was – if you look closely at the plate bottom left you can barely see some greenery – that’s woodruff. It’s a low growing ground cover in that neck of the woods. The ice cream had a very refreshing flavor to it, and I was kind of enchanted with the malted barley crumbles alongside. Certainly never had those before! Probably the plum skins (which had some plum flesh on them) were delicious, but very  unusual! They’re at right on the bottom. I tried to get that photo to rotate, but every time I did the one on the left turned sideways. Gave up. Oh, and then the hearth bread was so good, but what made it unusual was the little bowl of hot chicken drippings. We were to butter our bread, then dip a bit of it into the drippings. Who would ever have thought we’d be eating chicken drippings.

Most tasty: the raw albacore tuna was sensational. It was scraped with a scallop shell into large, but thin pieces, then sitting in a delicious vinaigrette of some kind. The seaweeds were really wonderful – I think my favorite of the evening. Underneath the seaweed were chunks of the local and ever-so tasty Dungeness crab with a brown butter drizzled over it. Wow is about all I can say. And the charred Romano beans. Oh my. I could have eaten a plate full of them. They’d been cooked (steamed?) then grilled outdoors wrapped up in little bundles over oregano stems, then it was served with an oregano vinaigrette drizzled on top. It was fantastic.

My least favorites: the goat, as I mentioned, but most people just loved it – it actually didn’t have much flavor. I also didn’t like the smoked sockeye salmon. Normally I love smoked salmon, but for me it was too smoky. My DH ate his and 99% of mine. The duck was good, but not exceptional. I tried everything – even the goat, and the salmon and I ate all of the duck.

My DH ordered the wine pairing (an additional $70 per person). They were all Washington wines, from various places. Five wines were poured: 2012 Ross Andrew Meadow Rose (Walla Walla); 2012 Long Shadows Poet’s Leap Riesling (Columbia Valley); 2009 a Maurice Chardonnay (Walla Walla); 2011 Waitsburg Cellars Three Merlot, Malbec, Mouvedre (Columbia Valley); and 2012 Brian Carter Cellars Opulento Dessert Wine (Yakima Valley). They offered (for a fee, I’m sure) a juice pairing with the dinner too which included a sparkling blueberry, a cucumber, tomato, sorrel and elderflower. At the beginning of the meal they served to everyone as part of the dinner, a glass of hard cider (also Washington origin) which was delicious. I nursed that glass through several of the courses and had sparkling water as well.

The next morning we went to the actual Inn (where we’d been to the dinner the night before) and checked out. We had some fresh coffee and a fabulous pound cake they had beside the coffee carafes – I had to try it. Oh my, it was SO good. I want that recipe! I snapped a photo of the kitchen – they were already working and it was just about 9:00 AM.

I found the article which got me intrigued about this hotel and restaurant. It was in April’s Bon Appetit, and it was titled the Best Food Lover’s Hotels in America. I think Sooke Harbour House was one of the nominees, but not one of the top 10.

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After leaving the west coast of Vancouver Island, we crossed on the ferry from Nanaimo to Vancouver, spent the night, then drove south across the border and wended our way to a ferry dock north of Bellingham . . .

Some months back I’d read an article about a bunch of top food destinations in the U.S. (of course, I can’t now find the article) and amongst the top contenders was The Willows Inn, on Lummi Island, Washington. Having never even heard of Lummi before (pronounced lumm-ee), I investigated online. Lummi is named for the Native American Indian Nation – most of them live on the mainland side, I believe. Reservations were made and the trip plans fell into place. Lummi is a small island, only accessible by ferry, and 3 weeks a year they haul out the car ferry for annual dry dock maintenance and during that time everyone who lives or visits Lummi must commute via a small passenger ferry. Only after I made the reservations did I find out that I chose a time during that 3-week period. Oh well.

If you go online to read about The Willows Inn, you’ll find that the Inn itself is quite small, with just a few rooms. But the resort (well, can one even call it a resort . . . not sure about that as it’s very small) has made its name because of their Executive Chef, 27-year old Blaine Wetzel. He’s an up and coming chef – no, I take that back, he’s arrived, since he was honored this year as a James Beard Foundation rising star nominee.

In a couple of days I’ll give you a write-up about the dinner we had there. For today, though, I’ll tell you about the Island.

It’s just 8 miles long, and maybe 1 to 1 1/2 miles wide, with relatively few roads. If you have a car, you’ll be able to tootle around the island on your own, exploring every nook and cranny. For us, though, since the car had to be left on the mainland at the ferry dock, we relied on the staff at the Inn to take us one place or another. The Inn rents houses in various places on the island (because there are way more people wanting to visit and have dinner there, than they have rooms) and we stayed in one of those. Pictures below. Other than the Inn itself, there IS no town. There’s a ferry dock and a tiny little café about 200 yards up the road from the ferry. And there’s the Inn. That’s it. We had dinner at the café the first night, and at the Inn the 2nd night. Both mornings breakfast was provided at the café by the ferry dock also. The Island is fairly remote, quiet for sure, beautiful, but there isn’t a whole lot to do there. If I’d understood all of that we might have stayed just one night. But we stayed two, and that was fine. The in between day we took walks, watched the mist and fog, watched the reefnetters hauling in salmon right outside the front window of the house we stayed in, and read books on our Kindles. Here’s a collage of photos:

Clockwise from top left: a fishing hut right on the beach in front of where we stayed, in Legoe Bay; the Bay bathed in morning fog; the individual room where we stayed; some shells other guests had collected; a late afternoon view from the Inn; a lovely chrysanthemum arrangement on the dining room table at the house where we stayed; and a view from the rear deck overlooking the man-made pond.

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We visited The Wickininnish Inn (most folks just call it The Wick Inn) because two different friends of ours recommended it. It’s a long drive to get there, and there isn’t a whole lot of activities to keep you occupied unless you do active water sports or extensive hiking. But oh, is it ever beautiful in that part of the world.

Most people wouldn’t take the time to go further upland from Victoria, except maybe to the ferry at Nanaimo, or to visit Butchart Gardens. But because friends had recommended it, we fit it into our trip plans. From Sooke Harbour, it took us about 3 1/2 hours to drive (back toward Victoria, north to Nanaimo, then west for a long way, clear to the western coast of Vancouver Island). It’s a beautiful drive, although I’ll call it fatiguing because it’s on mostly 2-lane curvy roads nearly the entire distance. There are a few passing lanes (to get past all those campers and trucks) and a couple of places where the road is straight enough to pass, but otherwise, it’s a slow slog. Beautiful, though.

And then you’re there. The Wickaninnish Inn. It’s noted for its cuisine (Dave enjoyed it more than I did – the food combinations just didn’t appeal to me for whatever reason). We stayed in a building just to the left of the one in the photo at top. We had a spectacular view out over the ocean, facing west. The Wick is a posh place to stay, and definitely the priciest of our trip, but we enjoyed every single moment of our view and the nice amenities.

We had a delicious clam chowder at a funky outdoor dive down the road one of the days (people in that neck of the woods like to add other vegetables to their chowder, like corn, carrots and peas). We had a fabulous hamburger at a town 15 miles or so away. That was in Ucluelet (that’s pronounced you-clue-let), although the locals call the town Ukee for short. Anyway, we had a great lunch at The Blue Room Bistro. Nothing fancy for decor (trust me on that) but the food was really worth stopping for. The other day we were there we popped down the road just a bit from our hotel and had lunch at the Wildside Grill. When you’re in this part of the world, know that restaurants feature fish, fish and more fish. And it’s good, for certain. After days of fish, though, we wanted a change and ordered clam chowder there also, and we shared a barbecued chicken sandwich. Both were delicious.

Our second evening, after dinner, we took a walk on the beach in front of the hotel, and other than being happy the sand was a hard, compacted type which made for easy walking, we were astounded to find several groups of starfish clinging to the rocks. The tide was out. Here is a collage of pictures from The Wick.

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Butchart Gardens is located 20 miles or so north of Victoria. It’s kind of out in the sticks. Its origin is interesting – Mrs. Butchart wanted to DO something with the land her husband had used as a quarry, so she decided to make it into a garden. She collected plants, shrubs, flowers and trees from all over the world and spent years creating the gardens. The deepest part of the quarry is the “Sunken Garden” in the park. Mrs. Butchart’s husband thought she was nuts! I would assume he changed his mind by the time she finished. It lives on, still owned and managed by the family.

It’s a beautiful place. Takes about 2 hours to do it all. There are several restaurants, from order-at-the-counter, to more formal sit-down types. There are lots of places to just sit and admire the beauty. There is a gorgeous fountain, a Japanese garden with streams, an ornate Italian garden with ponds, a rose garden that usually has something in bloom too. There’s a life-sized chess board (see it below) and flowers from every color in the rainbow. Here’s a collage of what we saw.

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Of the 3 recipes I prepared for a recent event, this one was far and away the most popular. The plate of these were gobbled up in no time, with nothing but crumbs remaining. Perfect with a cup of coffee or tea.

The recipe comes from a cookbook I don’t own, Nuts in the Kitchen: More Than 100 Recipes for Every Taste and Occasion by Susan Herrmann Loomis. Susan is a Francophile, although she is/was an American first, finally settling in northern France and some years ago she opened a cooking school in her home. A decade or so ago I attended a cooking class with her (about her cookbook On Rue Tatin: Living and Cooking in a French Town). She’s actually written many books, the one at top the most recent one.

Reading about this recipe (on David Lebovitz’s blog, as he and Susan are friends, since they live not too far away from one another and both have careers in the food biz) I knew I’d have to try it. The only decision being when and which nut. The when was soon and the which nut was almonds (recipe calls for pecans first, almonds second). The fresh rosemary – such a lovely addition to a sweet bar – is in the base crust. All of it is easy enough to make, although it does require stages. The base must be chilled for at least 30 minutes before baking and the apricot filling must be cooked, pureed, then allowed to cool before proceeding with the recipe. And the base needs to cool to room temp before the bars are put together and finally baked together. So although none of it is difficult, it took several hours to make these and have them ready for cutting and serving – just so you know . . .

One of the requirements for this bar is the use of California apricots. There is a difference between those and the Turkish apricots you more often see. The California ones have a more tart, and bright taste. Turkish apricots for whatever reason, are sweeter. So if you substitute Turkish, reduce the sugar in the filling (probably 1/2 cup down to 1/3 cup). One of the best parts of these is the somewhat piquant taste. At first I thought they were too sweet, but I was baking on/off all day and tasted several cookies, so my palate was jaded when I got to these bars. Two days later they tasted just marvelous with a cup of tea or coffee, and definitely not too sweet.

What’s GOOD: gosh, just loved these. The subtle rosemary is part of what “makes” them, although the apricot puree is thick and tart – good. Would be great for Christmas cookies. I’m sure they’d freeze well, too.
What’s NOT: nothing at all.

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There isn’t much else that could make that view any more beautiful. I stepped out onto our deck, used my new 12 megapixel point and shoot camera and bingo. The far mountain range is Washington State, the Olympic mountains, the very mountains we’d visited the day before.

Some years ago (probably about 10), before I started writing a blog, we flew to British Columbia (one of many similar driving or flying trips we’ve done over the years with BC in the plans) and stayed at Sooke Harbour House. An absolutely stunning inn, along the southern coast of Vancouver Island (not Vancouver the city, but the island that is the home to Victoria and Nanaimo). We were enchanted with the place. So, some months ago when Dave said to me, “I’d like to go back to Sooke Harbour House again” I was on it, and had begun planning a trip. The stay here was the anchor of our trip plans, and all the other places we visited were just part of the grand circle we did, starting and ending in Seattle.

We came across the ferry from Port Angeles (just below the dip in the far mountain range) and drove about 30 miles or so north and then west of Victoria. We’ve stayed in Victoria before, and didn’t think we needed to stay there again, so we headed directly to the inn. The roads are a bit windy and narrow, so it takes awhile to get there – an hour at the most. Sooke is the town itself, Sooke Harbour is, of course, the marina, and the Inn is situated on a promontory overlooking the Straits of Juan de Fuca, and also one of the major shipping lanes in and out of Seattle. Sometimes you’ll see ships, sometimes not. We didn’t this time. But small fishing vessels were going in/out of Sooke morning, noon and night.

There’s another view from our deck, at early morning.

Secondly, a photo of our spacious room with a living room on the left, a soaking tub on the right and the bedroom part where I stood to take the picture. A double-sided fireplace separated the two. We didn’t use it as it was such pleasant weather both days.

We had dinner at the Inn both nights. They do a set menu, excellent food, lots of fish and shellfish on the menu. They only serve wines from British Columbia. I didn’t have any – Dave ordered the wine pairing to go with the meal. He’s not particularly fond of BC wines – they’re too soft for his liking, but it was all they had.

The Inn provides a nice breakfast tray (bottom picture) to each room – pastries, hard or soft boiled eggs, yogurt, fruit, coffee or tea. The croissants were fabulous. Loved it all. We sat outside on our deck both mornings to enjoy the meal.

We enjoyed reading as we watched the view from our deck. Even the evenings were warm and comfortable. During the in between day, we drove over to Butchart Gardens. We’d been there before too, but it’s always beautiful. I’ll give a synopsis of that in a couple of days.

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Going on a cooking or baking frenzy is fun, sometimes challenging and tiring. I love trying new recipes (and if you didn’t feel the same, you probably would not be reading my blog), so when I needed to bring goodies for a women’s meeting, I went through the hundreds of to-try recipes I have in my “internet” cookbook arsenal. This is one, and coming up in the next week will be 2 others.

What I wanted were some varied baked things – not just cookies, or bars. Three other women were on my committee and they brought fruit, cold drinks and peanut butter & jelly treats (on bagels). Sometimes the hostess serves coffeecake, since the meeting is in the morning, but I’ve noticed that rarely do people take any of it. I thought finger food would be the best. First up is this easy zucchini bread, a sweet bread that used about 2 zucchini.

The recipe is simple enough, one devised by Peabody, over at Culinary Concoctions by Peabody. Way back in 2008. But who’s counting any of the recipes we set aside to make . . . some day?

You may recall that a few years ago I went through my ancient files – recipes dating from about 1962 to 1995. Within each of those folders were ones I’d made and ones to try (mixing them in the same folder was a bad idea), just divided into categories like salad, beef, veggies, etc. Once I retired in 1995 I started entering all of my favorite recipes into MasterCook and then throwing away the clippings. That took nearly a year, pulling some from those clippings, and many others from cookbooks with flags on the pages. But there were still hundreds – gee, maybe a thousand or more – clippings in the pocket folders. A few years ago I started systematically going through those folders again, tossing some and re-sorting them into sub-categories and returning them to the Pentaflex hangars. As time has gone on, I rarely even refer to those recipes anymore – maybe only every 3 months or so. That tells me I should get rid of them, Period. But gosh, is that ever hard! Don’t know if I can do it. To do so, I’ll have to go through them yet again. Sigh . . . so many recipes, never enough time. I seem to veer toward new recipes, either ones I find on the internet or in the hundreds of cookbooks I own. I could cook for 10 years with nothing but 4-5 of my newer cookbooks. Well, I will think about all that another day . . .

Back to this chocolate zucchini bread. Divine. Oh, I think that’s a no-no word in foodie culture. Bloggers use way too many superlative adverbs – yummy, luscious, delicious, fantastic, greatest, and we’re supposed to nearly forget about using an exclamation point. Oh dear. I’m guilty. Garrett McCord (from Vanilla Garlic) wrote up a post recently about not using the following words: nice, good, bad, great, unctuous (which he says has a totally different meaning than food writers [me included] may use it for) and better than sex. I don’t think I’ve ever used that last phrase, but undoubtedly I’ve used all of the others. But McCord cautions bloggers to clarify – if it’s nice, explain exactly what makes it nice. Or if it’s good, exactly how or why it’s good. I think I do that ever since I added the little blurbs at the bottom of my posts – the what’s good and what’s not. I’ve had a few of my friends tell me that they bypass all the paragraphs I write and simply go to the what’s good and what’s not to decide if they’re going read the recipe and/or print/save it. Or not.

What’s different about this bread is the addition of mascarpone cheese in the mixture. It also is a buttermilk based batter – I always like using buttermilk since it makes cakes and breads so very tender. This one included. My only difficulty was getting the very center cooked through. I used a different sized pan, so I expected the timing to be different than the stated recipe, but after researching all over the ‘net I’ve concluded that moist short (non-yeast) breads like banana bread and I’ll include this bread in the same category since it’s moist from the zucchini, should be baked to an internal temp of about 200°. Some recipes say 190° or even as high as 210° – and I baked mine to 190°, but only after the bread cooled and I cut into the very center, did I discovered that it wasn’t quite cooked, right down the center, inside that crack in the ridge and down about 1/2 inch or so.

The age-old test of whether a cake/bread is done, using the toothpick test, still seems to be a good one, though, if you don’t have an instant read thermometer.

What’s GOOD: loved this stuff. It has the heft of a bread, but it’s very tender (thin slices are not possible with this). It’s not a cake, though – maybe it’s something in between. The chocolate flavor is just right. And if you shred the zucchini finely (mine were a bit on the more-medium sized) you’ll not even see it. It freezes well. A real winner of a recipe, thanks to Peabody.
What’s NOT: nothing, whatsoever. Very worth making.

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A few photos from the Dungeness Barn B&B near Sequim, Washington.

Whenever we plan a trip, I frequent Trip Advisor. It’s my favorite trip planning site, no matter where I’m going. I scour their site for ideas about places to go, things to do, and mostly for places to stay. Then once the plan is in place I research restaurants. After Dave and I more-or-less decided our destinations (British Columbia and specifically Vancouver Island – near Victoria) I started plotting the trip on a physical map, finally deciding we’d go to the Olympic Peninsula area first, since Dave had never been to the Park there. We thought about driving the whole way from So. California to British Columbia (I do 99% of the driving), but with us still in full summer temps, it would have been several days of fairly uncomfortable heat. So, we flew into Seattle, rented a car and drove about 3 hours or so out onto the Olympic Peninsula. My parents actually lived in Port Townsend, WA for a few years before they returned to Southern California their last 10 years (mid-80s to mid-90s).

We stayed at a B&B in Sequim (pronounced skwim), a little town in between Port Townsend and Port Angeles. An adorable place called the Dungeness Barn Bed & Breakfast, a few miles outside of the Sequim village, right on the ocean. We loved our room (on the ground floor), loved the inn itself (used to be a dairy barn back in the day, now converted to a B&B), loved the owner(s), and thought the breakfasts were off the charts.

We spent 2 days and nights there, and on the in between day we drove up to the top of Hurricane Ridge in Olympic National Park. It was a clear day – the sun shone brightly most of the day – and it was well worth the drive. Pictures below are ones I took in the park. The deer (protected, obviously), were quite tame, although once you got within about 10 feet of them, they’d skitter away. Prior to our trip, I visited the webcams up on the mountaintop several times, to get an idea about the weather. In case you’re interested, here’s a website that provides lots of info about the Park – called 10Adventures.

A very small aside piece of trivia – the green plant you see just above – the leaves are shaped the way they are because often the summers are dry, so the leaves provide a trough for any dew or raindrops to nourish the bush so it can stay alive during the short, but hot summer.

We had dinner one night at the Alder Wood Bistro. A great choice. We went early, as it’s one of the most popular restaurants in the region. Had a super dinner including some fried calamari that was as good as any I’ve ever eaten.

After we spent part of the day at the top of Hurricane Ridge, we drove back down to nearly sea level and drove 20-30 miles further west to Lake Crescent. It’s also part of the park, and has one of those old, clapboard wood lodges and cabins that are such nice summertime retreats for families. We didn’t stay there (it’s somewhat pricey, but all the rooms are for a small group, starting at about $200+ per night), but we sat out on the lake edge, in comfy (but hard) Adirondack chairs looking out on the shimmering lake and watching people dive into the lake from the small pier. We had our Kindles with us, so we just sat and enjoyed the tranquility for an hour or so. The place is the Lake Crescent Lodge, if you’re interested. Our dinner in the Lodge was not memorable. In fact I returned my pork loin dinner because it had been brined and it was too salty for me to eat. Ordered salmon instead. It was okay; not great. But the scenery was beautiful.

The next morning we drove to Port Angeles and lined up at the ferry dock to board the car ferry to Victoria. After an uneventful and pleasant ferry ride, we disembarked in downtown Victoria and headed out. I’ll tell you about the next segment of the trip in a couple of days.

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