Hungrygrrl

Damn it’s been a long time. The boyfriend (Jacobe) is no longer a boyfriend–he’s a fiancee. We moved in together, I started cooking, and we stopped going out to eat.

Which is all really great, but sad for the blog. But every now and then we still make it out.

Last night I took the bus into town and met him at the Local Vine, a new wine bar slash small plates restaurant in Belltown. It was started by two female business grads from Harvard and they brought in Jason Wilson of Crush to do the food. How can you go wrong?

It wasn’t too crowded when I arrived at 6 pm on a friday. The seating was varied, several tables near gas fire places, a few cocktail-ish big leather covered blocks, very new york- esque. It’s a nice scene, relaxed. I opted for the bar.

The first thing that hit me was the wine list. They offer over 40 wines by the glass all arranged not just by red or white but by descriptives such as “spicy” or “statuesque.” At first this put me off in that wine-for-dummies way, but in the end I found it helpful. It’s a long list. Some wines of the same varietal were split between different categories–one shiraz/viognier was categorized under “bracing” while a different shiraz was “spicy.” And in a bit of an over-cutesy addition, there are little “keys” next to each wine, hearts for their favorites, pine trees for locals. They’re also happy to let you taste anything.

I chose a sangiovese which was quite good for a starting wine, “bracing” as it was described, light in body. Cobe walked in right about then, looking like he needed a drink (usual for a friday). He ordered a different sangiovese, we dug into the olives they’d set in front of us.

The bar staff was all drinking wine too, which was great as it meant they’d tasted most of the offerings. They all had their favorites and as our meal went on we bent to their recommendations. Cobe switched to an amazing shiraz (two hands gnarly dudes)– spicy with a buttered finish and tons of fruit in between. Much more fruit forward “in your face” kind of style. I chose a cab-merlot-syrah blend from Washington state, a bit more bite than the Sangiovese, the mushroomy syrah adding a nice depth.

And then the food. The menu is beautiful, simple fresh food, local tapas style. We started with a beet salad, purple beets and pink beets marinated in an orange dressing with golden raisins and watercress. The pink beets were amazing–the citrusy sweetness set off the beets perfectly, especially when mixed with the raisins. But the purple were overcooked. We still ate them all, the flavor was so great we couldn’t resist.

The arugula and braesola salad was also a hit. The dressing was a tad on the buttery side, we both like ours with a bit more bite, but the arugula was wonderfully light and young, rather than old and bitter. And mixed with thinly shaved braesola and reggiano… you really can’t go wrong.

Next we moved onto the meat. Pork tenderloin with polenta and roasted cherries. The pork was perfectly cooked, just the barest racy pink in the center and set off beautifully by the cherries. I only wish there were more of them. The pork almost begged for their sweetness. The polenta was a bit grainy, but had a great addition of fresh corn which gave it a spritely flavor rather than its usual heaviness.

And then we had the wagyu flank steak, again perfectly medium rare, set over blue cheese carmelized potatoes. The steak was well cooked but sadly not a flavorful meat, rare for a flank steak. The counterpoint of blue cheese worked well though, and the wines were well matched.

All in all, a wonderful meal, light and satisfying. And a great place to try out new wines. They have a wine storage system discreetly placed behind the bar to keep open bottles vacuum fresh.

As we were on our way out, the waitress tried to entrance us to come back for the two hands gnarly dudes wine maker dinner this tuesday, and we just might go. Hard to resist an excuse to go back. That wine was truly amazing.

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Local Vine

http://www.thelocalvine.com