Seattle, part three

Even when we weren't taking trips through the mountains, Jen and I covered a lot of ground.  Luckily, though, sometimes we didn't need to go too far afield, because there was plenty to do almost in Jen's back yard.

Jen lives in Fremont, an eclectic neighborhood that I'm quite confident is way too cool for me.  It's filled with cute shops and eateries and a sign the casually marks the center of the universe.  In addition to being home to a street market every Sunday that boasts a bizarre yet intriguing collection of antiquities, collectibles, junk, and food, there's plenty of permanent public art, like a rocket perched precariously on the corner of an old warehouse, a thirteen-foot tall bronze statue of Lenin, and, perhaps Fremont's most famous resident, an eighteen-foot tall troll that lives under a bridge.

Fremont is also home to Theo Chocolate, a bean-to-bar chocolate factory.  Theo offers tours of their factory, which includes tastings of several of their chocolates and a brief explanation of some of the machinery and processes used to make chocolate.  On my last morning in Seattle, Jen and I signed ourselves up for a tasting.

I had attended a chocolate class at work the week before I headed to Seattle, which was helpful to me at the beginning of the tour, when our guide handed out samples to taste.  When tasting chocolate, you want to consider the ingredients included, the percentage of cacao (the percent listed on a bar is the percentage of cacao; the remainder is sugar), whether the chocolate snaps cleanly when broken (a good one will), the aroma (which is stronger just after breaking the chocolate), the flavor (which is best experienced by chewing the chocolate a little, letting it spread throughout your entire mouth, and then bringing air into your mouth, like in wine tasting), the mouthfeel, and the finish.  There's a lot to consider, and I was glad to have had a course in the basics before launching in to tasting on my own!

Chocolate is one of those products for which I really have to wonder how anyone discovered its existence.  It begins as the seed of the cacao pod, the flesh of which is white and slimy and tastes, I am told, something like SweetTarts.  In its raw state, the cacao bean is bitter and unpalatable, like apple seeds.  After the cacao pods are harvested by hand (a necessary step, because cacao pods never fall from the tree, and on one tree you may see pods that range from the flower, to barely formed, to entirely ripe), the beans and pulp are extracted from the pod, and then they need to be fermented for five to seven days, which kills the bean and eliminates some of its bitterness.  Next, the beans are sun dried, and then they are packed and sent from the cacao farm to the chocolate producer. 

Once at the producer, the work to make the chocolate has only just begun! The beans need to be roasted (as in the first photo to the left, with the yellow bins of raw, dried beans and the round black roaster in the back, which, incidentally, was a coffee roaster in a previous life).  After a good, long roast, the beans (now much darker, as in the second picture) are cracked and winnowed, which separates the inedible husk from the edible interior, called the nib.  The nibs are then ground, after which they are conched, a process that heats the chocolate and helps to create the desired mouthfeel in the finished product.  Next, the chocolate is refined, which gets all the particles of chocolate and any additives (like sugar) to a consistent size.  From there, the chocolate is tempered, which is a precise cooling process that, when done properly, gives chocolate its smooth sheen and its crisp snap when broken.  And then, of course, it's packaged and sold and, most importantly, eaten!

Theo produces a couple dozen different bars, many of which have added ingredients that range from the standard, like almond, to the unusual, like chai tea or buttered toast.  The flavored bars are intriguing, but ultimately I felt that the additional ingredients clouded the flavor of the chocolate itself.  I ended up purchasing one of the plain bars, an 84% dark chocolate made with beans from the Dominican Republic.  It has a dark flavor that reminds me of tobacco.

(By the way, if you're interested in learning more about the specifics of chocolate production, or you'd like to try your hand at making your own chocolates, Chocolate Alchemy has some great DIY instructions for the enthusiastic budding chocolatier.)

But of course, we had to eat more than just chocolate.  Sometimes, we had to eat ice cream, too, like the stunning cone of honey lavender ice cream I got at Molly Moon's.  I don't know how anyone who lives by Molly Moon's doesn't immediately gain fifteen pounds - the sweet, toasty aroma of freshly-made waffle cones (as we waited in line, we watched the cones come off the griddle and get shaped - that's how freshly made they are!) wafts out the front door of the shop and permeates the surrounding street within at least a ten-yard radius.  When I order ice cream I usually opt for a cup, but how could I turn down a cone I had watch them make?  The honey lavender was floral without being overwhelming, utterly delicious.  And that last beautiful bite, that was mostly cone with the last nibbles and drips of ice cream - perfection.

Once in a while, we even took a break from dessert and ate real food.  When I was planning my trip out to Seattle, about the very first thing that Jen suggested we do was to eat at Ivar's.  Ivar's has a few outlets in Seattle (including, I discovered on my way home, one at the airport), and they are known for their seafood.  The specialties vary from place to place: there's a clam house, and a sports bar, and a few quick fish fries.  We ate at the Salmon House, which offers stunning table-side views over Lake Union.

The menu seemed to be about 90% salmon: coho, sockeye, red, king, Sitka sound white king, all grilled over smoky alder wood and served on Caesar salads or with panzanella or just as is.  I ordered the King salmon, alder grilled and served with roasted fingerling potatoes and fresh green beans, along with a glass of pinot noir:

After our attempt at preparing salmon for dinner a few nights prior, I was reminded why I so often eat fish when I eat out - these chefs really know what they're doing.  The fish was perfectly prepared, slightly flaky, moist, with a rich, smoky flavor. The potatoes were crisp and lovely, and green beans are about my favorite thing ever, so they made a perfect accompaniment.  Yum.

But let's not forget ourselves; there was dessert at the end of lunch, of course.  Jen and I decided to split the strawberry shortcake.

The biscuits were so crisp, they almost seemed more like sugar cookies.  But when they got moistened with the sweet strawberry juice and the silky, freshly whipped cream, it made a very satisfying dessert.

When we weren't raising our blood sugar to dangerously high levels, Jen continued to show me around Seattle.  One of my favorite visits was to Gasworks park, a wonderful example of post-industrial repurposed land.

She also led me around the University of Washington's campus on a stunningly comprehensive tour ("That's a building.  That's another building.").  At the end of the day, Mount Rainer even poked its head out of the clouds to say hello. 

See that oblong triangular shape in the middle of the clouds?  That one that looks like a cloud itself?  That's Mount Rainier, reminding us that, even as freak earthquakes and hurricanes roll through the east, there are still active volcanoes ready to terrorize the west on a whim.

Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, and eventually I had to say goodbye to Jen and return home.  Not to worry, though: during my visit, we must have come up with a dozen things to do "next time," so sooner or later I'm sure I'll be returning so we can start plowing through that list.

Thanks to Elizabeth for playing the part of chauffeur, and especially to Jen, for playing the host and tour guide, and for showing me the path Ben Franklin took to work each morning.  After all, we all know that was the real reason I came to Seattle.