belltown dining

RONALD HOLDEN meets a local hero
The good, the not-so-good

A dedicated catch-and-release fisherman who ties his own flies, Kevin Davis promises you'll never find steelhead on the menu at his terrific new restaurant, Steelhead Diner (95 Pine St.; 625-0129). You'll find plenty of succulent seafood, though: A transcendent crab cake, a moist and flaky kazusake black cod, spice-rubbed Alaskan king salmon, beer-battered cod and chips, the sorts of dishes you'd expect from a guy who spent the last five years running the kitchen at Oceanaire.

Then again, Davis also spent two years behind the stove at Sazerac, and five years before that as executive chef at Arnaud's in Nawlins, so he's into things like a complex gumbo, juicy po'-boy sandwiches (he calls his a "Rich Boy"), meltingly tender short ribs, pecan pie. In fact, less than half the menu is seafood, lest he compete with his former employer.

So far, so good. Quite a few chefs with impressive resumŽs out there. But here's the surprise: along the way, perhaps streamside in the Cascades, Kevin Davis must have been touched by whatever great spirit brings karma to the dinner table.

With quiet conviction, he has put together a menu that is, above all, local. (It does help that the Diner's pantry is the Pike Place Market; it's in the spot abandoned almost two years ago by Vivanda.) Flash-fried cheese curds from Beecher's, down on the corner. Sausage from Uli across the way, and Armandino Battali's Salumi, in Pioneer Square. "Frank's Veggie Meatloaf," named for Pike Place produce vendor Frank Genzale. Theo chocolate, Olsen Farms potatoes, Full Circle Farm lettuce.

And it goes on: Bread from Jurgen Bettag's underappreciated Golden Crown Bakery in Everett. (Jurgen recently bought out La Panzanella; just wait till he gets his act together!) Soft drinks from Seattle's ultra-sophisticated Dry Soda. A wine list composed entirely of 60-some Washington and Oregon wines, selected by an impossibly young Aaron Angelo, who avoids easy choices, opting for adventurous bottles like Windfall Asian Pear, a bright, citrusy accompaniment to seafood.

Brief aside: Windfall, founded by a former biotech CEO, donates its profits to the San Juan Community Home Trust. And Davis, having already launched one non-profit, Sea Into the Future, is now helping to underwrite a steelhead restoration initiative managed by Long Live The Kings.

Working alongside Davis as the restaurant's GM is his wife, Terresa, an Australian from Adelaide who starts law school later this year. (Steelhead's poutine-the only one west of Quebec, I'll venture-is based on her childhood snack of "chips and gravy.") And backing him up in the kitchen is Seattle's best young sous-chef, Mary Lokar, a culinary Wunderkind in her own right. Davis himself is not a fussy innovator. "There's a reason for culinary classics, dishes that stand the test of time," he says. "When it's done right, a crab cake can be as good as anything you'll ever eat. There's an emotional response."

From the kitchen, he has a clear view of the Olympics, but he watches the front door and virtually every one of the restaurant's 95 seats. If you snag one of the seats at the counter, it's like going to a sushi bar. (Davis says Shiro Kashiba-Shiro's, at Second and Battery-told him the most important part of being a sushi chef wasn't slicing fish but knowing how to interact with guests.) My sense is that Davis could be Seattle's next celebrity chef, with a TV show and everything. In the future, maybe. For now, he says, "I just want to be cooking in my kitchen."

Except on Mondays. Mondays he goes fishing.

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There's no sign outside, no street number, just a Vespa on the sidewalk below a fluttering Italian flag. Welcome to Tavolata (2323 2nd Ave.; 838-8008), the long-awaited Belltown outpost of Union's Ethan Stowell and business partner Patric Gabre-Kidan. Neither has clogs-at-the-forno experience in Italy, but that didn't stop them from creating an upscale, "modern Italian" restaurant in Belltown.

Now, before you start reading accolades from folks who can't get a seat at 8 o'clock, consider this: At midnight, bracketed by the brightly lit kitchen (open till 1 a.m.) and the dimly-lit bar, Tavolata's dark and dismal dining room is a galaxy of gloom; it feels like an opera set without the scenery. The stark, empty room must have the worst accoustics in Seattle, rendering conversation impossible when the joint is full, swamping conversation with ill-chosen music in the wee, small hours. Sound pulsates off the exposed concrete walls and polished wood floors; the tables wobble and the uncomfortable wooden benches vibrate.

In fact, Tavolata gets its name for a massive table (with seating for 24 to 32) running down the center of its shoebox space. Mini booths run along the south wall (perfect for feeding one's date); but what morsels to pass across the table? Surely not the bitter clams, or the minestrone filled with severly undercooked beans. Veal carpaccio, perhaps? Excellent meat it is, transluscent but tasteless, drawing its flavor from white anchovy strips and Parmigiano-Reggiano shavings. A bit of grilled octopus, then, with a tangy dressing. Chew well.

Consensus favors brains over brawn, veal brains to be exact; they stuff the delicate agnolotti, swimming in sage and brown-butter. Rigatoni are underdone, though, with sausage too spicy for the fresh tomato sauce. A whole branzino (European sea bass) gives up only a fraction of its moist and tender flesh. Why? Apparently, somebody in the kitchen scraped off the scales before putting the fish on the grill, so most of the flesh sticks to the skin. The double pork chop is perfectly done but its bed of cheese-flavored polenta tastes like it came out of a Cream of Wheat boxˆê-surprising, since chef de cuisine Randy Whiteford even grinds his own wheat for the house-made pasta.

Best for last, at last: the zeppole, tiny, lemon-flavored donut holes. That's one of the signature desserts at Dahlia Lounge, where Patric used to be the pastry chef. We gobble them down, and allow the red glow from the gritty-but-authentic Rendezvous across Second Avenue to guide us back out to the Belltown sidewalk like an honest beacon. That Italian flag? Nah, not really.

The wine list is solidly Italian, with a particularly lovely bottle from the south coast of Sicily, Cerasuolo di Vittoria based on frappato and nerello grapes. It's always a good sign when restaurants expand beyond "safe" varieties like sangiovese and merlot.

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Somewhere between "too many notes" and "there's a pony in there somewhere," chef Bruce Dillon, most recently in Florida, offers an almost overwhelming panoply of Indian, Chinese, Thai, Indonesian, Cuban, and Carribbean flavors at the just-opened Marazul (2200 WestlakeAve.; 654-8170). Perched atop Whole Foods, adjacent to the Pan Pacific Hotel, the restaurant's 170 indoor seats focus inward on a wood-and-copper dŽcor that suggests palm trees and a whiff of the exotic.

Just how exotic remains to be fine-tuned. Marazul opened for dinner in late February and in early March for breakfast and lunch. Before then, they were doing "mock service," using invited guests as guinea pigs (oops, sorry) for the servers and cooks.

Starters include ceviches, sushi rolls and an all-purpose "tapas" category. The salmon ceviche, nicely textured with salmon roe and hearts-of-palm and served with crisp plantain strips, is cured with tropical yuzu juice. A plate of skewered Thai ginger beef strips is accompanied by a lassi dipping sauce, assertively flavored with chilies. A mild Szechuan salad of shredded chicken was enlivened by pepper cress. But what did the three perfectly seared scallops do to deserve their fate? They were sent to the table beside a lump of starch (well, actually, mashed cassava and boniato, a Cuban sweet potato) and a tasty but inappropriate oxtail gravy.

Good rum isn't that hard to find in Seattle, but Marazul is staking claim to the biggest stash in town, what with 40 varieties. (And, puhleeze, do spell it rhum, as the French do, since they're the ones who developed the Carribean distilleries.) Maruzal also has its own machine to juice sugar cane. This makes for a lot of frou-frou "umbrella" cocktails, sweet rather than distinctive. Why use Mount Gay as the base for something called a Buena Vista cocktail if you're going to muddle it with apricot brandy, guava, pineapple and coconut?

Still and all, Marazul will find a willing audience in Seattle: Folks looking for something upscale, unusual, and relatively inexpensive. Two people could easily share two appetizers and two main courses for under $40, assuming you don't succumb to the lure of the sugar-cane juicer. At that price, you can't even walk up and down The Ave for a night of international take-out. Let alone the valet parking.

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More Comings, Goings: That empty corner at Second and Vine where the furniture showroom used to be? A couple of months ago we reported that something called Epilogue was going to take it over. The financing on that deal fell through, though. So now it's Sarah Munson's and Alison Nelson's turn. The business partners (both have MBAs from Harvard, no less) plan a wine bar called The Local Vine. Factoring in permit delays and time for build-outs, they expect a June-ish opening.

Kerry Sear at Cascadia enjoyed the company of Giada DeLaurentiis back when the weather was still warm, but it took until mid-January for her Three-Day Weekend episode to appear on the Food Network. The result was a spike in happy-hour visits to Cascadia's bar (explaining the six-case orders of Absolut Citron for Alpine martinis). The kitchen's still turning out 25 dozen miniburgers a night, even without the bar's outdoor seating. Leslie Marckie of Macrina Bakery is hooking up with Pagliacci (pizza) and DeLaurenti (the Italian deli). No, she won't start making pasta dough, but she does get some full-time management expertise.

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Restaurant reviewer Ronald Holden welcomes news and comments from foodies and feeders alike. His Belltown-based Tasting Notes & Culinary Dispatches, www.cornichon.org,was named one of the Internet's "Top Ten Food Blogs" last year by About.com.

More tasting notes and culinary dispatches are at www.cornichon.org, Recently named one of the Internet's "Top Ten Food Blogs" by About.com..

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