Decadent Chocolate Dipped Strawberries

Free Starbucks VIA Ready Brew

Dalliance at Dahlia’s is Always a Pleasure
Consistency is perhaps one of the hardest things to achieve in a restaurant. Tom Douglas, owner of six restaurants in the Seattle, puts out some consistently excellent restaurants. This is why the Dahlia Lounge is one of my favorite places to have dinner. This is not just because they are attached to the Dahlia Bakery and thus have some amazing deserts in their arsenal. It is because Dahlia’s has brought fine consistency to an art form. Located in Belltown, the Dahlia Lounge is essentially the brilliant center

Michael Mina’s SeaBlue Las Vegas
I’m back in Las Vegas this week for yet -another- conference and I thought I’d take some of my quiet down time (that I never seem to get at home) to let you know about one of the great dining spots we visited last month. When we were in Las Vegas in October for Blog World Expo, we met up with some lovely twitter foodie people at the conference (Hi Chef Mark Tafoya & Jennifer Iannolo!) that in turn invited us out for a Chef’s Tasting at Michael Mina’s Seablue at the MGM Grand where the chef is Chef Stephen Hopcraft. We started the mea

Andina Good Only in Small Bites
When a place has a menu that is 2/3 tapas and 1/3 entrees and you order an entree you should consider yourself pre-warned. Perhaps the owners are strongly trying to suggest a smaller bite. In the case of Andina, a Peruvian styled restaurant located in Portland’s Pearl District, I apparently wasn’t paying attention to the telltale signs. The place was packed, loud, brightly lit and bustling. Not the kind of place to have a romantic dinner but perfect to bring friends or business if you are in the mood to share. The tapas menu ranges from cheese stuffed yucca, to avocado stuffed with crab and prawns, or beef heart kabobs. There were also five house cebiches. All o

Death of a Coffee Pot
As with most other thirty-ish people we know, our day starts with the sweet nectar of morning coffee. It’s what makes us ready to face the pile of email that shows up at 8am. It’s what keeps us awake for that mid morning meeting that is so incredibly booooooring. It’s what makes us a little jittery around 3pm. We’ve gotta have it. And this morning, we didn’t. I’ll be the first to admit, our current coffee pot is just short of garbage to start with…a friend gave it to us when he ended up with an extra freebie from an online coffee purveyor. Yeah, you know the one. Since our old coffee pot had just died an inglorious dea

For a Hole-in-the-Wall, Akiko’s Knows its Sushi
In my lexicon the term “favorite dive” usually doesn’t extend to sushi restaurants. Often I forgo nondescript places for flashier well-lit places. San Francisco is chock-full of high flash sushi joints that a place like Akiko’s Sushi Bar is easily overlooked. Located on Bush Street, half-way between Grant and Kearny, Akiko’s looks less like a sushi mecca and more like a place you might pick up a bento box for lunch. Don’t be deceived. Now despite the wor