Seattle

Macrina Bakery: Usually we wedge in to Macrina for a girly brunch complete with smoked salmon bialys and decadent strawberry nutella pastries but this time it was only for regular ol’ breakfast and only me. Still delicious, even by myself. You have to walk by the big windows looking down into the heart of the busy bakery to go into the dining room, and the heavenly-looking cake making nearly drove me to pastry for breakfast, but I somehow (barely) managed to resist and have a big bowl of yogurt and fruit and house-made granola instead. Regular old yogurt n’ fruit made Macrina-amazing with a big handful of date-laden cinnamon-heavy granola. Fortified me for my walk to…

Pikes Place: My guilty pleasure. I cannot resist it’s photogenic glow. I tried to be all hip and walk on past the lame ol’ tourist trap, but no. Colorful rows of peaches, grimy fish cases… yes please. And of course, I also got sucked into buying things, as always. Once they offer that glistening little slice of peach, I’m so done. Such a sucker. Got some just-perfect peaches and nectarines, really pretty but really bitter arugula, and a hunk of smoked salmon. And a bunch of pictures. And a lot of joy. Managed to stay away from the wonderfully pink mounds of peonies, though I certainly daydreamed about walking down Pine St with a big bunch of flowers under my arm.

Homegrown: New favorite sandwich experience, quite possibly. Super extra hip and sustainable and local and all that, but not in an obnoxious way. In a really really tasty way. Got a strange sandwich of snap pea pesto, green beans, and summer squash, inside a hot whole grain roll. Yikes. Good. Everything perfect, everything good. Also got bagel chips, which only gave Stuart and I the taste for salty blood, and we soon caved and ordered french fries, which arrived coated in dill with a sage mayo to dip into and did not disappoint in any way. Here’s a nice picture of the door, too distracted by sandwich bliss to take any good photos.

Molly Moons: We were a little underwhelmed by the hyped ice cream. Line out the door hinted at bliss, mouthwatering list of flavors (lavender honey, goat fro-yo…) seemed to confirm, but the real deal fell a teeny bit short. Went for salted caramel and balsamic strawberry. Salted caramel (something I thought I’d love to the moon and back, salt in my sweet!? Yes.) was a little too salty and balsamic strawberry was… really creamy strawberry with little eensy wafts of balsamic tang. I mean, still good. But not wait in line good. (Although the waffle cones… that’s a different story. Made as they go in the three well-worn irons, the waffle cones were indeed line-worthy. Didn’t finish the ice cream, did finish the waffle cones.)