[PRIME] So you're coming to Seattle? A local's take on the best of the Emerald City
Quintious
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I swore I would be more social this PAX, meet more people, be more helpful, reach out more, etc. I think a good way to do it is to provide my insight as to the city I call home. I see lists here and there on the forum here, but they seem to be compiled largely from outsiders. That's fine, and a lot of what I see is good stuff, but it's missing that intimate knowledge of the area.
Who I am: Extreme foodie, thrill seeker, globetrotting 1st world hobo, all around generally nerdy type with just enough cool points to stay above the Creepy/Awesome scale. Longtime resident of PAX's fair homebase. Oh, and I really, really hate hipsters, hippies, hip checkers, hipless women, and rampaging hippos.
What I -hope- to provide: A comprehensive list of not only what to eat, but what to do while you're here when you aren't geeking it up. I'll try to tell you not only the best places to eat, but what made them so famous in the first place. I'll give you the typical touristy things to hit while here, but also try to take you off the beaten path a little bit to see some of the hidden gems that make this area so charming to those of us who live here. I'll not recommend anything I've not eaten nor send you someplace I've never been just because I've heard it was cool. I think I've lived here long enough to where I can say I have a pretty good finger on the pulse of the region.
Also keep in mind that not everything I'll recommend is walkable from a downtown hotel. I'll assume most of you will have transportation of some sort. Why? Because you can rent a car in this city for between 9 and 13 dollars a day, and the hotels in the outlying areas a whole 10-15 minutes from the convention center cost half as much as the hotels downtown. It just makes economic sense, not to mention you can actually drive from a hotel outside of downtown to the convention center faster than you can walk from many downtown hotels to the convention center - at least on a holiday weekend such as Labor Day.
First up in my Tour Guide Series: the Top 5 eats by genre. It's not a full list yet, just what I've had a few minutes to work on here and there while listening to the jet engine that is my datacenter in the background. I'll try to continually add to it, and if anyone has suggestions as to how they'd like to see it better formatted, I'm all ears.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AqMQiLE417ZHdG5rYlZWU3dMY1gzcVBEVU1MRk9LaFE
Who I am: Extreme foodie, thrill seeker, globetrotting 1st world hobo, all around generally nerdy type with just enough cool points to stay above the Creepy/Awesome scale. Longtime resident of PAX's fair homebase. Oh, and I really, really hate hipsters, hippies, hip checkers, hipless women, and rampaging hippos.
What I -hope- to provide: A comprehensive list of not only what to eat, but what to do while you're here when you aren't geeking it up. I'll try to tell you not only the best places to eat, but what made them so famous in the first place. I'll give you the typical touristy things to hit while here, but also try to take you off the beaten path a little bit to see some of the hidden gems that make this area so charming to those of us who live here. I'll not recommend anything I've not eaten nor send you someplace I've never been just because I've heard it was cool. I think I've lived here long enough to where I can say I have a pretty good finger on the pulse of the region.
Also keep in mind that not everything I'll recommend is walkable from a downtown hotel. I'll assume most of you will have transportation of some sort. Why? Because you can rent a car in this city for between 9 and 13 dollars a day, and the hotels in the outlying areas a whole 10-15 minutes from the convention center cost half as much as the hotels downtown. It just makes economic sense, not to mention you can actually drive from a hotel outside of downtown to the convention center faster than you can walk from many downtown hotels to the convention center - at least on a holiday weekend such as Labor Day.
First up in my Tour Guide Series: the Top 5 eats by genre. It's not a full list yet, just what I've had a few minutes to work on here and there while listening to the jet engine that is my datacenter in the background. I'll try to continually add to it, and if anyone has suggestions as to how they'd like to see it better formatted, I'm all ears.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AqMQiLE417ZHdG5rYlZWU3dMY1gzcVBEVU1MRk9LaFE
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P.S. I see Uneeda Burger is better than Red Mill and Skillet? Whoa. That idea just blows me away, I was really impressed with the burgers from those two joints.
As weird as this is going to sound, to anyone who likes drive-in, greasy, delicious cheeseburgers and milkshakes; you HAVE to go to Dick's. There's a few scattered around Seattle. I know there's one Broadway and Queen Anne. Here's all the locations: http://www.ddir.com/locations
Um. Yes you are correct. I enjoy stuffing my face full of Dick's after PAX. LOL!
I have. The food is quite good, if a bit limited (in the tradition of most French bistros). I'm happy to count Jim Drohman (their executive chef) as a decent friend. I'll be adding them to my "French" list, when I can think of 2 other French places to put on that list (Rover's, obviously, is no. 1, and RN74 no. 2). Of course, it also tends to require a diner step out of their comfort zone a little, given their love of things like liver, boudin, and black sausage at Le Pichet.
Maybe I'll put Rovers's sister restaurant Luc in there and just call it a 4way, since French cuisine isn't something that's real prominent in this city. Or maybe I'll finally use this as an excuse to visit Cafe Pressé and find out their signature dish
Suggestions for you to try:
For Dessert, try Simply Desserts in Fremont. They've been there for about 20 years and make fantastic cakes, which can be bought by the slice. They've survived the onslaught of the cupcake trend, so that says something. Also try Cake Envy over at Greenlake. It's the only Seattle cupcake place that's owned and operated by bakers instead of business marketing professionals, and their cake can stand up to anything I've had in Austria. Not so much a fan of Molly Moon's - they have fun flavors, but it's tongue-numblingly sweet, like what would happen if Wal Mart made gourmet cones. It's no good if you can't taste it after the 4th bite.
For Sushi, check out Shun over by University Village. It's a small, very traditional menu, executed flawlessly. No spam musubi there.
forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/159700/prime-the-great-foodening-pax-food-destinations-2012
But, I like your idea. Maybe you'd like to incoporate it into our PAX Wiki. Where it will survive from PAX it PAX. Hmm?
Café Presse is awesome. Had many a breakfast/lunch there with the French husband and his friends. The OEufs plats is very good as are the steak-frites and croque monsieur/madame.
There's a yelp list of French places - http://www.yelp.com/search?find_desc=french+food&find_loc=Seattle,+WA.
Shipping cookies for Prime 2013
I know about the other thread....but it's just an omnibus of places with no real regard as to whether the places are any good or not. I do like how they incorporate URL's and addresses, though. This is going to be a more comprehensive list of all-things-Seattle, not just food, and from firsthand experience. Didn't know about the Wiki. That might be an option.
Yeah, I just haven't been to most of them because most of them haven't really garnered much of a name for themselves in the foodie community - and I try to avoid using/trusting Yelp too much because I find that it's pretty much overrun with 20-something hipsters (or hipster-wannabes) that don't really share the same values as I do, both from a culinary perspective as well as an anti-groupthink perspective. I've been to so many places that rate highly on Yelp (usually in Cap Hill) that are just either uninspiringly mediocre or downright atrocious.
There's basically a thread for each indiviual topic and although the Google Doc in the food thread (which just got merged to this EDIT: Strike that I just can't keep tabs on what tab I'm in. i.e. I'm stupid) is just an omnibus, the discussion takes place in the thread itself.
I'd imagine the same is true for other threads (such as the "Non Gaming things to do" thread down below.)
"Good or not" is a highly subjective thing anyway, so it requires a fairly good discription of what's what.
http://www.king5.com/news/cities/seattle/Work-begins-on-Pier-57-Ferris-wheel-145914345.html
I've heard of Bumbershoot and the Rainier park. For those getting to Seattle before PAX what would you recommend? Is it cool to take a break from Prime to go to Bumbershoot on Saturday without pre-purchased tickets, for example?
http://depts.washington.edu/uwbg/gardens/wpa.shtml
Compared to the other 5 on the list, Jak's doesn't even come close. Heck, for that matter, I could come up with another 5 off the top of my head that make a better steak (El Gaucho, Pallisades, Stumbling Goat, Buenos Aires Grill, Sullivans). Jak's makes a better burger than steak, and I had a real hard time leaving them off my list of 5 best burgers.
Yeah, so long as you can ignore the 75 blatant-to-every-customer health code violations, it's fantastic eats.
This will be on my "things to do" spreadsheet update. Great place.
seattle.gov/parks/magnuson/art.htm#noaa
http://www.seattle.gov/parks/magnuson/docs/NOAA_art_walk_brochure.pdf
Please know that I'm saying this with the least amount of snark and sarcasm possible. By saying that you haven't been to a place because it hasn't garnered much of a name for themselves in the foodie community, aren't you just giving in to the groupthink perspective that you seem to rebuke?
Shipping cookies for Prime 2013
Slight difference. When I say "the foodie community", I don't mean random blogger X and his merry band of misfits, or some Meetup group or the like. I mean local chefs that I've come to know and become friends with whos tastes I trust, and who actively wander this city seeking out great eats (mainly so they can steal the ideas, I'm sure). A lot of these friends will ping me anytime they discover something great, and I'll put it on my to-do list, and of course, I try to reciprocate the favor.
Anyways, I've added sections for the Indian region, Italian, Miscellaneous Ethnic, and a little section I like to call "Quin, help! I'm an awkward 5 dating a hot cosplayed 9, and 'Master Chief's' gotta get some tonight! (aka romantic)"
Find me on Steam.
As for comic book shoppes, there's a place in Bellevue called the Dragon's Lair that people seem to like, though I can't personally vouch for it. Bellevue is also a good 20 minutes outside of Seattle in traffic.