FOOD MATTERS | Opening up in Madison Park

By Ronald Holden-mptimes@nwlink.com

Wednesday, October 29, 2014

On these crisp, fall days, Madison Park is one of the loveliest places in Seattle — in particular, the great swath of green at the very end of Madison Street, where you can sit on a bench and look out over the water. Leaves from the giant, variegated maples are beginning to glow across the still-lush, green grass, but the air is just breezy and cold enough to discourage swimmers. Clouds have wiped away all traces of Mount Rainier, but the tranquility itself is sufficient reward for idlers bundled up against the chill.

Then you get yourself up off the bench and walk over to BeachHouse Bar + Grill (1927 43rd Ave. E.), which formerly housed the Madison Park Conservatory, and check out the newcomers.

They’re planning to retain the brick oven in the corner of the kitchen (Margherita, sausage and chicken flatbreads), but that’s just the start. The wild, spicy prawns (wild-caught, with a Cajun cream sauce) that they love in Kirkland — they’re on the menu here, too. So is a seafood chowder bowl and cod fish tacos.

At lunch, you can get a grilled steak salad; at dinner, they’ll serve up a plate of buttermilk fried chicken or fire a 12-ounce New York center cut in the wood oven.

Several popular Kirkland items are on both the lunch and dinner menus: the BeachHouse burger (with an herb cheese and a secret sauce), fish and chips, and a BeachHouse paella that includes andouille sausage alongside clams, Alaskan salmon, chicken and shrimp.

Owner Ricky Eng is a savvy, young guy in a business that attracts ambitious and energetic people. He’s done a great job so far at BeachHouse Kirkland, and his new place on the Seattle side of the lake is in good hands. Judy Dean is the general manager, with the no-nonsense Pepa Brower as director of operations.

BeachHouse Madison Park opened its doors a week before Halloween.

Still new

I’m hopeful, though not enthusiastic, about October’s other opening in Madison Park: Bella Viet Cafe, the 10-table spot in the old Mad Pizza space at (4021 E. Madison St.). Owners Tani Phan and Elena Vo haven’t run a restaurant before, and the kitchen hasn’t yet found its footing.

Three types of pho are offered: beef, tofu and shrimp. But the key to any pho is the quality of the broth, which needs to have a depth of flavor you can’t duplicate at home.

The dish originated in the early 20th century in the market towns of northern Vietnam, where it was eaten as a breakfast food; by the end of century, with Vietnamese refugees established across the United States, pho had jumped the cultural frontiers. The traditional recipes call for beef and an assortment of spices, to be simmered long and slow. Yes, it needs to be made fresh every morning, but somehow the longer you’ve been making it, the more flavorful it gets.

The best dish at Bella Viet at this point is the vermicelli bowl, or bun thit, with sautéed lemongrass chicken and a lime vinaigrette. Cucumbers, pickles, sprouts, and peanuts add some welcome crunch.

Phan has been an operations manager for Papaya Corp., the company behind Basil Box Catering at the Columbia Center downtown.

Bella Viet’s kitchen was only three weeks old when a guest and I stopped in to sample the menu, and we decided we should give it time to get better.

Getting out

Did you take advantage of any the Restaurant Week specials? Cafe Flora (2901 E. Madison St.), Luc (2800 E. Madison St.), Voila! Bistrot (2805 E. Madison St.), The Harvest Vine (2701 E. Madison St.) and Crush (2319 E. Madison St.) were this year’s local participating restaurants.

Now that you’re kicking yourself for missing the boat, let me make a suggestion: Go out when it’s not a promotion. Restaurants kick back to The Seattle Times to get listed, then barely break-even on the food they serve, so it’s no wonder that many perfectly lovely places simply don’t sign up at all.

A better promotion is Dine Around Seattle (www.dinearoundseattle.org), put together by local nonprofit Seattle Good Business Network. The deal, throughout November, is a three-course meal for $33 (slightly more than the Restaurant Week special), and there are fewer restaurants to choose from (57 instead of 170). The good news is that the promotion runs through the entire month of November and includes three local spots: Nishino (3130 E. Madison St.), Bar Cantinetta (2811 E. Madison St.) and newcomer BeachHouse Bar + Grill.

And better still: Go out more often and support local businesses. Leave a nice review on Yelp and Urbanspoon, and don’t forget to tip your minimum-wage servers; anything less than a 20-percent gratuity these days is actually pretty stingy.

You could do a lot worse than the pork tenderloin at St. Cloud’s (1131 34th Ave.) in Madrona, by the way. Gage Tschyekovsky runs the bar until late at night and mixes a fine Negroni.

RONALD HOLDEN is a restaurant writer and consultant who blogs at Cornichon.org and Crosscut.com. His new book “HOME GROWN SEATTLE: 101 True Tales of Local Food & Drink,” released in October.To comment on this column, write to MPTimes@nwlink.com.