Sauced

C.S. Finnegan’s Irish House to Open in Belltown

In time for St. Patrick’s Day, no less.

Posted by: Christopher Werner on Mar 07, 2012 at 09:12AM 1 Comments

C.S. Finnegan’s: a new spot to get your Irish on in Belltown. Photo via Facebook.

A whole lot of Irish is descending on Belltown. Paddy Coyne’s is due soon on Pier 70, and coming to 2604 First Avenue is C.S. Finnegan’s. The pub is brought to you by one Gareth Hughes, owner of The Celtic Swell in West Seattle.

Nine brews will rotate on draft, including your usual Irish suspects (Guinness, Harp, Smithwick’s) as well local microbrews and European ales. The food menu will take cues from Celtic Swell.

Hughes, a native of Ireland, used to live in Belltown 17 years ago and says he is tickled to return to his former stomping grounds. C.S. Finnegan’s is opening next to Black Bottle in what is a former grocery store dating from the early 1900s. He’s been working on the space—now outfitted with bars on the first and second floors with room for 83 people—for about a year now.

Depending on how things shake out, Hughes may softly open early next week. If that doesn’t happen he’s organized a Herculean grand opening for St. Patrick’s Day, complete with six musical acts, food and drink specials, and a large heated tent with its own bar. An Irish dance troupe is scheduled to swing in for a jig. The bash gets underway at 11am and continues till bartime.

Hughes says he’ll likely continue hosting live music post-St. Pat’s. C.S. Finnegan’s will serve lunch and dinner daily.

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Tags: Belltown, Bar Openings, Seattle Irish Pubs

Upcoming Drinking Events: Ginger Bliss release party; Mezcaleria Oaxaca Opens

Plus: Boozing it up at Pike Place Market, oyster HH returns to Whole Foods.

Posted by: Jessica Voelker on Oct 03, 2011 at 09:23AM 0 Comments

This Saturday, celebrate the release of a new collection of cocktail recipes from Seattle author A.J. Rathbun.

Bargain oysters = happy times. On Tuesday, October 4, Whole Foods Westlake reintroduces oyster happy hour; from 6 to 8pm the slippery suckers are just 69 cents a piece. (Oh and lookie here, on Wednesdays it’s 50 cent wings.)

Thursday: Long-awaited Capitol Hill distillery and tasting room Oola throws itself an opening party, your chance to check out its vodka and gin and get a look at the Graham Baba-designed tasting room.

Pike Place Market hosts Arcade Nights on Friday the 7th. The $25 admission is purchasable at Brown Paper Tickets. For that you receive 10 tokens, each good for a beverage or snack. It’s 21 and over, drinks on offer include wine, beer, and hard cider.

A mezcal collection AND food from the Carta de Oaxaca folks? That’s more than a little exciting. Saturday, October 8 is opening night at Mezcaleria Oaxaca at 2123 Queen Anne Avenue N. You never know what Seattleites are going to show up for, but if the consistently clusterfucky crowd situation at Carta is any indication, you’ll want to arrive early.

Also on Saturday: Rob Roy celebrates the release of Ginger Bliss and the Violet Fizz, the new cocktail book from local writer A.J. Rathbun. Meet the author, buy a book, and sample some of the cocktail recipes between 2 and 4pm at the Belltown bar.

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Tags: Cocktails, Seattle Bars, Books & Authors, Whole Foods, Mezcal, Oysters, Drinking Events, Queen Anne, Cocktail Recipes, Belltown, Books About Drinking

Rob Roy’s Swig Well, a Drinking Academy, Begins Classes in October

The bi-weekly sessions will school Seattleites on cocktail culture via the teachings of bartenders and industry pros.

Posted by: Jessica Voelker on Sep 21, 2011 at 03:06PM 0 Comments

Photo: Swig Well via Facebook

UPDATE!: So, I just spoke with a Swig Well rep who says the first class on October 13 (which will be repeated again on the 15th) is limited to bloggers/media/and frequent tweeters as a sort of promotional event, but that the regular classes will start soon after that. Teachers will be local, in the beginning, and include the big-name tenders frequently behind the bar at Rob Roy. Down the road, Swig Well will bring drink luminaries from all over to teach classes.

The program also includes Swig Well schwag. There will be custom notebooks, and loyal students will have passports with a stamps for each of the teachers who has schooled them on the way of the drink. The classes will cost between $75-$200 depending on what’s involved; the length of the sessions will also vary. [END UPDATE]

Well! This is exciting.

Everyone’s favorite Seattle cocktail personage Anu Apte is the lady behind Swig Well, a new series of classes held bi-weekly at Rob Roy, her Belltown cocktail lounge. The website’s teacher roster is currently limited to Apte and Ted Munat, author of Left Coast Libations, but I feel certain there will be a longer list soon.

The first class takes place on October 13 but I’m not clear yet on whether that is open to the public. I have a call in at Rob Roy, will update with details. Meantime, check out the Facebook page for more information.

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Tags: Belltown, Tastings and Classes

Five Questions for the Bartender: Bryn Lumsden

“We are going through more eggs than Denny’s,” says Rob Roy’s bar manager.

Posted by: Jessica Voelker on Apr 11, 2011 at 03:27PM 2 Comments

Photo: Lucas Anderson

This is Bryn, who is about to make a very pretty drink for us.

View Slideshow » Photo: Lucas Anderson

This is Bryn, who is about to make a very pretty drink for us.

View Slideshow » Photo: Lucas Anderson

Clean egg cracking, an essential skill of the serious bartender.

View Slideshow » Photo: Lucas Anderson

Stick with us, the drink at the end is really, really pretty.

View Slideshow » Photo: Lucas Anderson

Almost ready…

View Slideshow » Photo: Lucas Anderson

And there it is! A Ramos gin fizz with a Japanese cherry blossom garnish.

Find Lumsden behind the bar Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday. “Tuesdays are really fun,” he says. “We let folks bring in their own vinyl and play whatever they want. If you bring in something rare or otherwise interesting, I’ll buy you a round.”

Rob Roy bar manager Bryn Lumsden was born in Everett, but moved to Ballard in 2001 where he fell for the music scene on Ballard Ave.

My mom even helped me make a fake ID so I could see Ryan Adams at the Tractor, says Lumsden. I still love Ballard, but have since given up on Ryan Adams.

A musician in his own right, Lumsden was one of the original Fleet Foxes. His first bartending gig, however, was at O Lounge in Queen Anne. My job was to bring in a younger crowd that would stay later into the night. Service and ambiance were all I could really offer—proper cocktails weren’t on my radar yet—but I learned that was enough to keep a room full and people happy, which made me happy.

Here we have five questions for Bryn Lumsden.

What is the most underrated spirit?

In the craft cocktail community, nothing is underrated at this point.

What’s your favorite Seattle bar (other than Rob Roy)?

Vito’s. Real bartenders, proper selection, cool room, no bunk. I was there a couple months ago while one of their piano players was having a birthday party. The room was packed with folks in their seventies wearing long fur coats and gobs of diamonds and makeup, taking turns singing Sinatra tunes. Time warp.

What drink do you order at that bar?

Justin [Gerardy]’s Judas Kiss is as good as a brown and bitter cocktail can be.

What’s the worst thing you’ve ever seen someone do in a bar?

I’ve seen people drink right out of my water pitcher, bite into a garnishing orange like it was an apple, and yark into potted plants. To these folks I say: “thank you for coming, enjoy the rest of your evening.”

But worse than any of that is when guests who are much more lucid treat your bar like their living room. I’m talking about people who walk behind the bar, put their feet up on a table, and play videos on their smart phones with the volume cranked. To these folks I want to say: “Don’t you have a mother?”

Name three reasons you live in Seattle.

My family lives here so we are lucky enough to be able to get together pretty often.
Managing Rob Roy is a great opportunity for me and by far the most rewarding job I have had.
In my mind, Seattle is just a couple moves away from being a “big city.” It’s an exciting time to be here!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!SAUCED BONUS QUESTION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What are your customers drinking a lot of these days?

Fizzes are really popular at Rob Roy. We are going through more eggs than Denny’s.

CLICK ON THE SLIDESHOW TO SEE BRYN MAKE A VERY PRETTY RAMOS GIN FIZZ.

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Tags: Belltown, Five Questions for the Bartender, Seattle Bartenders

This Week in Happy Hour News: Local 360 and Golden Beetle Roll Out the Discount Menus

Two new restaurants with even newer HHs.

Posted by: Jessica Voelker on Mar 16, 2011 at 03:27PM 0 Comments

Golden Beetle has gotten around to happy hour.

Two new restaurants have introduced happy hours. Let’s have a look.

First, Local 360 in Belltown now offers HH from 3 to 5pm on weekdays, and the same menu is also available starting at 10 every night of the week. Four-dollar food items include: fried manila clams with aioli, deviled duck eggs, mini mac and cheese, corn dogs, and a rabbit liver mousse. There is also a $10 hamburger on the menu (with beef ground by the house butcher) and $1 oysters.

Draught beers are $4, select wines are $5, and well cocktails featuring local spirits are $5 too.

Also, the new Ballard restaurant from Maria Hines, Golden Beetle, has rolled out its much anticipated happy hour menu, featuring smaller portions of menu items for $4. This happens from 5 to 6pm Tuesday through Sunday. (A snacky late-night menu menu, more expansive than the HH one, is served every night the restaurant is open beginning at 10pm).

On the early HH menu: Za’atar-spiced French fries deep-fried in beef fat, grilled chicken wings, pita and hummus, a turkey doner kebab, and spiced donuts.

Snack away, Seattle.

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Tags: Happy Hour, Belltown, Ballard, Seattle Happy Hours

Jamie Boudreau Back Behind the Bar

Miss him? Well now you can get your Boudreau drinks once more. Here’s where and when.

Posted by: Jessica Voelker on Mar 09, 2011 at 02:11PM 2 Comments

Jamie Boudreau, now torching cocktails at Rob Roy on Sundays and Mondays.

A couple weeks back, Jamie Boudreau reappeared behind the bar at Rob Roy after a lengthy hiatus.

The last time you saw him mixing drinks in Seattle may have been at Knee High Stocking Club. Since leaving that bar he has been focusing on his job with St-Germain, traveling for the elderflower liqueur company as a brand rep. Also, he says, he’s been meeting with potential investors about the Seattle bar he hopes to open down the road.

“It great being behind the stick again,” said Boudreau, adding that he’s already started to lose weight gained since he stopped shaking and stirring for a living. “I forgot how much work it is! My first few shifts were a little rocky as I became acclimated to the bar and had to rack my brain to remember recipes, but I’m getting a bit more comfortable now.”

He also offered the Rob Roy some love. “Rob Roy is one of only a handful of bars in the city where I’d be able to do the quality of cocktail that I would be proud of. I also love the fact that they are doing a quality program while still keeping a neighborhood feel, something that I’d strive to do at my own bar.”

In other news, Zane Harris no longer works at Rob Roy.

Go see Boudreau at the Double R (that’s what none of the cool kids call it) on Sunday and Monday evenings starting March 20—he’s off next week for Tales of the Cocktail Vancouver. Hey, speaking of Tales Vancouver, I’ll be there too, posting and Tweeting at least semi-coherently. I hope.

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Tags: Belltown, Seattle Bartenders

The Best of the Drinky Halloween Happenings

Two adult events where you can get spooked on spirits (and a little Halloween math).

Posted by: Jessica Voelker on Oct 25, 2010 at 11:51AM 0 Comments

This is Kim Kardashian dressed up as Wonder Woman. She doesn’t drink.

Let’s face facts. If you’re old enough to be in a bar, you’re old enough to know that Halloween is a holiday that can be hard to pull off.

For the great majority of us, the Halloween math works like this.

Human older than 23 + lots and lots of drinks + costume=massive cringefest.

There are exceptions. Some people are just awesome, and do the whole drunken, dressed-as-a-nun deal with roguishly charming aplomb. It’s true. It’s also true that some people subsist on Lucky Strikes and pork-and-Klonopin sandwiches but live until they are 85. Statistically speaking, you and I are unlikely to be among those people. So we are left with a choice. We can either dress up and watch our drinking (admittedly, the healthier and safer choice anyway), or we can have a few cocktails in our street clothes and just avoid the Halloween pitfalls altogether. If you’re awesome and you can pull off all three, more power to you. Just please don’t drive.

Okay, PSA over. Here are two Halloween happenings that seem pretty fun.

Belltown’s Spur is planning an iconic Halloween party—you come dressed as your favorite icon to compete for prizes. All-night happy hour includes drink specials from spirit sponsors to sweeten the deal. This party starts at 7pm on Sunday, October 31 and ends at 1:30am. The prizes haven’t been announced yet.

Boka created two Halloween cocktail specials. You can order them, along with food, during the free scary movie series at the adjoining Hotel 1000. There is a spiced pumpkin martini, some people like those. But the one that sounds potentially tasty to me is the Ghostly Cocktail. Its Pernod, St. Germain, white rum, white cranberry juice, and lemon sour.

On October 29 the movie is The Shining, or Saturday, October 30 it’s Psycho, and on Sunday, October 31 it’s Halloween. Showtimes are 7pm and 9 pm.

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Tags: Downtown, Belltown, Movies, Halloween

Happy Hour Spotlight: Palace Kitchen

Palace shows off its quieter side in the early evening, and an ever-changing flight-of-bites menu makes for tasty snacking.

Posted by: Jessica Voelker on May 27, 2010 at 09:38AM 0 Comments

• HOURS: Mon-Fri 4:30-6pm; Sun-Thurs 11pm-1am
• PRICES: Small plates $3-$4; cocktails $4-$5; beer and sangria $3.

At peak hours, Palace Kitchen heaves with energy, diners who can get past the hostess sardine themselves into the bar area and pile up in booths. Once in, they shout happily at one another, making sure their own good times are included in the cacophonous chorus of another epic evening out.

And late night here tends to be blurry, nonsensical, wicked fun—I imagine a lot of iphones and credit cards are abandoned alongside forgotten bits of burger Royale and froth-crusted pint glasses.

But in the afternoon and evening, you’ll sometimes find a different Palace. The dimming sun casts a lazy bit of buttery light on all the stainless steel and the staff are purposeful but calm, chopping lemons and rinsing clams in resolved preparation for the coming onslaught. Seats at the bar are easy to come by and rewarded with friendly (but never hovering) attention from the bartender, who pours $4 cocktails (the Aviation gin, Luxardo, and lemon drink is rather tasty) and $3 pints of beer and glasses of housemade sangria. The HH food menu is small but way more welcoming than your typical happy hour fare—Penn cove mussels, an open-faced pork sandwich, lamb sausage with a white-bean bread salad. All of these are $4, and Palace also offers Dungeness crab legs for $3 a pop during HH.

But my favorite bit is the themed menu, a flight of bites that changes every few weeks. The Palace staff famously served three different preparations of Berkshire-pork “Spam” earlier this year, and one time I encountered three different lamb dishes. Currently Palace’s happy hour menu features a trio of crudos, $7 for all three. Steak tartare fans will not be disappointed. And if you haven’t tried properly prepared raw scallop, I suggest you do so as soon as possible.

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Tags: Happy Hour, Cocktails, Belltown, Tom Douglas

All-Night Happy Hour at Wann

Two nights a week, the Belltown sushi bar keeps it cheap into the wee hours.

Posted by: Jessica Voelker on Apr 05, 2010 at 02:00PM 0 Comments

Soft-lit booths line the back wall at Wann.

Every Monday and Tuesday night Wann on Second Avenue has happy hour all night long. Judging it by its drab exterior and neither-here-nor-there location, I never would have found this place on my own. So I’ll tell you who first turned me on to Wann. It was famed blogger/photographer Seattle Bon Vivant.

Listen to this lady when she tells you something. Wann is handsome inside—you should insist on sitting in one of the booths in the back that are so cozy and private and gently lit that they class up the experience considerably. During HH, small plates start at $1 (miso soup) and end at $6 (tempura udon). The rolls are all $4 and are pretty much the usual suspects (spicy Tuna, Spider roll, etc). Five pieces of sashimi (yellowtail, eel, albacore, salmon) are $8, and then there are three sushi combos for $5, $6, and $10.

Here is where I should tell you that, due to sustainability-related freakouts surrounding fish, my experience at Wann is largely relegated to the small plates menu. Eating sushi is complicated: Yellowtail is no good, eel is worse, you’re only supposed to eat albacore if it comes from BC, Hawaii, or the US Pacific coast. By the time I start wondering whether the salmon is farmed or not I have generally bored myself and my dining companions out of the mood for raw fish.

But I have had good experiences with other menu items, beginning with the all-important edamame—referred to, at Wann, as chamame and served much less steamed-to-a-shrivel than at so many other sushi bars. The seaweed salad was gently dressed and refreshing, and the fried-with-finesse atsuage tofu was a triumph of consistency. The tempura udon was kind of a mess—crazy wormlike udon noodles swimming in a salty broth of soggy deep-fried zucchini and prawns—but otherwise the dishes were surprisingly fresh and well-seasoned, adding up to a light dinner that paired perfectly with a cold Sapporo.

Happy hour begins at 4pm at Wann. Wednesday through Sunday it lasts until 7pm in the dining room, 8pm at the bar. Also at the bar on Friday and Saturday: a late-night HH from 11pm-2am.

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Tags: Happy Hour, Belltown

Free Port Party Tonight on the Hill, Virtual Merlot Tasting in Cyberspace.

Ports and Pairings at Barca. Poco and Local Vine get in on a twitter-based merlot event.

Posted by: Jessica Voelker on Mar 25, 2010 at 09:54AM 0 Comments

Barca

Capitol Hill’s Barca hosts a free port tasting from 6:30 to 9:30pm tonight, March 25. Elemental Importers will pour you free wine plus sips of a new line of artisanal ports from Quinta Santa Eufemia, a 100-year-old winemaker based in the Alto Douro in Portugal.

There will be free chocolate and cheese pairings, live music, and featured port cocktails. The cocktails intrigue me, thinking about Portugal makes me weepy, and the party sounds fun.

Also: tonight: two of my favorite wine bars, Poco Wine Room and The Local Vine, are participating in a massive virtual merlot tasting. The idea is that people all over the country drink Washington merlots and tweet about them.

So if you’re on the hill, you can get a glass of merlot at Poco, tweet about it, then head to Barca for free port. Meanwhile in Belltown, winemakers from Dusted Valley, creators of Boomtown merlot, will be at Local Vine (the tasting fee is $5). The wine bar also invited two of the best local wine bloggers to be onhand for the purposes of Twitter tutelage. Tweeters register here, the hash mark is #WAMerlot. If all this Twitter talk gives you hives, just ignore it and drink your wine.

The virtual tasting “happens” tonight, March 25, from 5 to 7pm.

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Tags: Belltown, Wine, Capitol Hill, Wine Tastings, Twitter

Legendary Swirl: Tuesday, March 9 at El Gaucho

A suprisingly social wine event in the basement of El Gaucho Belltown.

Posted by: Jessica Voelker on Mar 08, 2010 at 10:24AM 0 Comments

Legendary Swirl takes place March 9 from 5 to 7pm.

Legendary Swirl, the annual tasting party where a bunch of great Washington wineries set up shop in El Gaucho’s cavernous black basement, is a surprisingly social event. I remember last year I had only just bit into a wee slice of aged Angus—it had been draped, like some beefy beret, onto a tiny square toasty—when the first stranger approached.

She had no idea who I was or what I was doing there, she just came over to say hello.

If you’re the sort of wine drinker who likes to get to know the people behind your favorite bottles: this one’s for you. It’s almost like going to a cocktail party where half the guests make wine for a living.

This year’s Legendary Swirl takes place Tuesday, March 9 from 5 to 7pm. Tickets are $95 per person, call El Gaucho for details. Some of my favorite wineries attending this year: Andrew Will, Col Solare, Delille, Efeste, Gramercy Cellars, L’Ecole, Long Shadows, Pepper Bridge, and Woodward Canyon. Admission buys you a taste of any and all wines—you receive a ginormous sipping vessel upon your arrival—as well as access to an impressive buffet of succulent snackies like those aforementioned beef bites.

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Tags: Belltown, Wine, Wine Tastings, Drinking Events

Whisky Pairing Dinner at Ventana on Thursday, February 25

Spaces still left for five-course, $50 meal.

Posted by: Jessica Voelker on Feb 24, 2010 at 04:51PM 0 Comments

If you haven’t had the chance to witness the kilt-wearing antics of Seattle’s master of whiskey Ari Shapiro, you can remedy this at Ventana’s in whiskey pairing dinner. Shapiro will be onhand to offer bits of history and folklore and most likely some of his signature bawdy toasts—scotches to be imbibed include: Dalwhinnie, Singleton, Oban, Talisker, and Lagavulin.

The five-course meal is $50 per person and starts at 7pm. The scotches will be paired with: butternut squash gnocchi with braised endive, house-smoked Sockeye salmon, duck breast with black bean puree, smoked pork belly with miso butterscotch, and Oban (a single malt) ice cream with burnt orange and star anise caramel, and pecan. Call 206-441-4789 for reservations.

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Tags: Belltown, Special Dinners, Scotch