Redemption at the Cafe

Lunch at Elliott Bay Cafe one day in late January was a disaster.
When you try to order the chili verde and the counterperson says, “I
don’t think we have it… there was an accident,” things have clearly
gone awry. When he then backs away slowly, takes a look into the
kitchen, and returns to confirm the unavailability, you can’t help but
picture the chili verde—which sounded so good (“chunks of pork
simmered with tomatillos, green chilies, and cilantro, served with corn
tortillas,” for $8.50)—in the form of a great chili-verde lake on
the kitchen floor.

After that, two out of three things ordered came out wrong: macaroni
and cheese without requested-and-extra-charged-for chorizo, and a meat
loaf sandwich gone missing, replaced by (coincidence?) a chorizo
burger. The third dish was tepid, and it was the thing that should be
least tepid in the universe: a bowl of regular red-bean chili. Friends
who joined late had their order lost entirely; another man was
overheard back at the counter (many trips were made) complaining that
his food had failed to materialize, while his companion was close to
finished eating. The kitchen and the counter looked amply staffed
(overheard in a semidesperate tone: “LET’S GET IT TOGETHER, GUYS!”),
and the place was less than half full. The food, when it all got sorted
out, was fair to middling. Considering that Tamara
Murphy—chef/owner of longtime Belltown favorite Brasa, founder of
gourmet barbecue festival extraordinaire Burning Beast, and general
local culinary heroine—had remodeled, reorganized, remenued, and
reopened the place two months before, fair-to-middling was a big
disappointment.

When I finally had the chili verde, almost two months after “there
was an accident,” the idea of that big pot of sheer goodness cascading
to the floor took on an extra dimension of sorrow. The chili verde has
garlic and cumin and green-chili heat that’s not shy, but not
overpowering; the tender, flavorful meat is from pigs that Murphy
herself helps raise (as chronicled in her 2006 Life of a Pig
blog—now seen as the
beginning of a movement, still reviled
by animal-
rights activists). It’s a limey, warming posole, its

hominy with some hulls still attached, a strange but pleasant
textural addition. There’s the little luxury of a dollop of chipotle
sour cream. It’s served in a heavy, thick-sided rustic bowl, like the
mortar got away from the pestle, and the tortillas are warmed, rolled,
and sprinkled with paprika on their own white rectangle plate with an
extra wedge of lime.

Murphy was not there the day of the accident (nor, as it happens, on
either of my two entirely successful and accident-free visits since,
though she spends time at the cafe pretty much every day), but on the
phone she was entirely philosophical about it. Restaurants, she said,
like you or me, have bad days: “It gets really hectic, and even when
it’s not busy, it’s like dominoes—one thing happens, then
another… There are always days that, for some reason, there just
isn’t a flow.” (She later found out from her kitchen manager, Zephyr
Paquette—who used to cook at Ballard’s dear departed
Dandelion—that on that day, the entire steam table collapsed: the
accident. Murphy said, laughing, that Paquette said, “Oh my god, she
was here THAT DAY?!”)

Murphy doesn’t sound like she’s making excuses when she talks about
getting the place up and running. The monthlong renovation included a
painstaking removal of a dark blue permeating the concrete floor; it’s
now butter colored, as are the walls. With new blond-wood banquettes,
it’s like night turned to warm, sunny day in the subterranean space,
and the old brick and vaulted ceilings look better than ever. (The
bathrooms, formerly gross, are spick-and-span, with a new
mint-chocolate-chip color scheme.) Then in adding the people
component—staff and customers—”There were a lot of problems
and a lot of kinks.” She readily admits she made her menu too big, too
fast; she says finding the kitchen’s pace took a long time. “You have
to be on it and be consistent, keep at it,” she says.

The crew is still the same as when the cafe reopened, just a
thousand times more comfortable, chatting at the counter and making
wine recommendations. (Another hurdle: the loss in January, for more
than a month, of the long-standing beer and wine license due to some
fresh Byzantineness on the part of the liquor board. Never fear, drinks
are back.) They now take your last initial if you’re named, say, Dave,
and they call your name over the speaker system, calm and godlike,
instead of screaming it from the counter.

The food is now likewise assured, presented simply but beautifully,
and very good to eat. Last time I went, I had an irresistibly
messed-up-looking chocolate-chip cookie ($1.25) as an hors d’oeuvre; it
was Frankenstein-squared-off, caramelized at the edges, distinctly made
by an actual human (they’d just hired a baker, come to find), of the
crispy instead of chewy kind, and excellent. If there’s any pork on the
specials menu, you’ll want to get it: A sparerib-sloppy-joe special
($9.25 with chips or salad) was an exceptionally fine, tangy,
pulled-pork-type specimen, with superfresh cabbage/carrot/cilantro/lime
slaw. “The Italian” sandwich ($9.25): also great, overstuffed with a
variety of Zoe’s meats, muffuletta-like with oil and pepperoncinis. The
macaroni ($7.50 with green salad) could use more cheese—it’s more
cream-saucy, under a bank of butter-glistening bread crumbs.
Black-eyed-pea soup ($3.50/$5.20) only needed a little salt and
pepper.

Also impressive: a crisp-crusted pizzetta ($9.25) with coppa,
splinters of asparagus, Manchego, and (yes!) a poached egg; a
chimichurri steak salad ($9.75) with grapefruit, avocado, Cotija
cheese, and a wealth of skinny fried tortilla strips; a messy,
superlative St. Jude’s albacore tuna sandwich ($8.50) with julienned
celery root and a couple white anchovies. Breakfast dishes are served
all day, and the Greek eggs, baked in a little cast-iron skillet,
looked so good, I wanted to commandeer someone else’s order at the
counter.

Over the last half a dozen years, the food under the creaking wood
floors of the city’s dearest bookstore was widely known to have gone
far downhill and stayed there. Tamara Murphy is just what Elliott Bay
Cafe (and Pioneer Square, and your stomach and wallet) needed.