1889 August | September 2018

TRIP PLANNER: 

LEAVENWORTH 

PG. 80 

The Best Crêpes 

Two Modern 

Houseboats 

A Yakima Valley 

Wine Retreat 

the 

bounty 

issue 

THE LADY GAGA OF PASTA 

WILD YEAST BEERS 

GIRL MEETS DIRT JAMS 

SUSTAINABLE SALMON RECIPES 

THE DIRTY GOURMET 

CAMPING COOKBOOK 

1889mag.com 

$5.95 display until September 30, 2018 

LIVE THINK EXPLORE WASHINGTON 

August | September volume 10

360.671.3990 

bellingham.org 

SEAFEAST FESTIVAL | SHOPPING | CRAFT BREWERIES 

ADVENTURES BY LAND AND SEA | WATERFRONT HOTELS

Garden Path Fermentation co-founder Ron 

Extract checks on the fermentation process. 

2 1889 WASHINGTON’S MAGAZINE AUGUST | SEPTEMBER 2018

Into the Wild 

photography by James Harnois 

Beer starts simple—malt, water, hops, yeast. That 

yeast is one of the places where things can get 

very interesting. Take, for example, Garden Path 

Fermentation and its friends in Washington, who are 

capturing wild yeasts from their backyards, locally 

grown fruits and tree bark and using the cultures 

to brew up funky, wild ales. This is not your father’s 

beer. This isn’t even your older brother’s beer. This 

is at the cutting edge of delicious. (pg. 58) 

AUGUST | SEPTEMBER 2018 1889 WASHINGTON’S MAGAZINE 3

FEATURES 

AUGUST | SEPTEMBER 2018 • volume 10 

64 

Flower Power 

Welcome to Triple Wren 

Farms, where fresh-cut 

flowers are king. 

photography by 

Katheryn Moran 

52 

Local Love 

Savor the state’s most remarkable 

flavors, from cheese to shellfish 

to blueberries. 

written by Corinne Whiting 

58 

Katheryn Moran 

Fermenting Wilderness 

Breweries in Washington are 

at the forefront of wild beer, 

made from the yeast living in 

the microscopic wilderness that 

surrounds all of us. 

written by Mike Allen 

Triple Wren Farms, near Bellingham, grows 

a variety of flowers, including sweet peas.

28 

DEPARTMENTS 

AUGUST | SEPTEMBER 2018 • volume 10 

LIVE 

14 SAY WA? 

Summer’s not over yet. Hit the Washington State Fair, watch the vintage 

tugboat races and take your campout food to the next level. 

20 FOOD + DRINK 

Get your French fix with the best crêpes around the state, then switch 

to noodles and dumplings at Yakima’s E.Z Tiger. Not done yet? Try Orcas 

Island-made shrubs and jams from Girl Meets Dirt. 

22 80 

COVER 

photo by Jim Henkens 

(see Oh, the Pastabilities!, pg. 36) 

10 

11 

86 

88 

Editor’s Letter 

1889 Online 

Map of Washington 

Until Next Time 

Benjamin Benschneider 

Icicle TV 

24 FARM TO TABLE 

Salmon is arguably Washington’s most-celebrated snack, sustaining 

communities for centuries. Learn more about how it gets to your plate, 

and how you can re-create the magic at home. 

28 HOME + DESIGN 

Houseboats are about as Seattle as it gets. Here, two modern revivals 

demonstrate that these floating homes can be streamlined, art-filled and 

sleek. Bonus: learn how to incorporate art into your living space. 

34 MIND + BODY 

Just 20 years old, Cole Paton is hitting the mountain bike trails as a pro 

rider for Giant Bicycles. 

36 ARTIST IN RESIDENCE 

Linda Miller Nicholson, the “Lady Gaga of Pasta,” proves once and for all 

that pasta can be artistic and delicious. 

THINK 

42 STARTUP 

WISErg seeks to cut grocery stores’ food waste by turning it into highquality, 

organic liquid fertilizer. 

44 WHAT’S GOING UP 

Attractions around Washington await—from The Waterfront in 

Vancouver to The Spheres in Seattle. 

46 WHAT I’M WORKING ON 

You can help save the native bee population by helping the Xerces 

Society collect data for its Pacific Northwest Bumble Bee Atlas. 

48 MY WORKSPACE 

The Hops Whisperer of Segal Ranch is producing some of the most 

popular aroma hops in the world. 

50 GAME CHANGER 

Blue North seeks to provide fresh fish through a humane harvest. 

EXPLORE 

72 TRAVEL SPOTLIGHT 

Head to Washington State University for the state’s best ice cream and 

cheese, made by students. 

74 ADVENTURE 

Whether traveling by horse or by hayride, you are guaranteed to try 

some of the Yakima Valley’s best wines on this adventure. 

78 LODGING 

In Seattle, the Mayflower Park Hotel has been in operation for ninety 

years, and it retains its charm. 

80 TRIP PLANNER 

Leavenworth, Washington’s quirky Bavarian mountain town, will 

transport you to another continent. 

84 NORTHWEST DESTINATION 

Walk among the giants in California’s Redwood forests. 


SCAPE 

It’s closer than you think. 

STAY AND PLAY 

$239 

FROM FOR TWO 

Book your tee time today! 

Based on availability. All packages incur a 7% 

Tribal tax. Summer package rates expire 9/30/18. 

Visit cdacasino.com/golf for more packages. 

1 800 523-2464 | CDACASINO.COM | Worley, Idaho | 25 miles south of Coeur d’Alene

CONTRIBUTORS 

JAMES HARNOIS 

Photographer 


MIKE ALLEN 

Writer 


KATHERYN MORAN 

Photographer 

Gallery 

CORINNE WHITING 

Writer 

Trip Planner 

I love working with passionate 

people. I was so impressed to 

see how much time and care 

went into the art of brewing. 

As a cider drinker who cannot 

drink beer anymore because 

of the gluten, I’ve never 

wanted to try one so badly. 

True craftsmanship is alive 

and well here in the state of 

Washington. Cheers to that! 

(pg. 58) 

I do enough background 

research to come to my stories 

with a set of preconceived 

notions. What makes the 

reporting process worthwhile 

is when those preconceptions 

get torn up by reality. I’ve had 

plenty of traditional Belgian 

and American wilds, so I have 

come to expect sometimes 

bracing sourness in almost 

every bottle. But the direction 

Washington wild brewers are 

taking is entirely different— 

wild with restraint. A little 

yeast revolution is happening 

right now. 

(pg. 58) 

Driving out the country roads 

to find Triple Wren Farms was 

peaceful all on its own, but 

arriving on the farm property 

was so inviting and colorful. 

Sunflowers shining brightly, 

the widest variety of sweet pea 

flowers I have ever laid eyes on 

and a huge metal cooler painted 

with big yellow flowers welcome 

you as you come down the main 

drive. The owners of the farm 

told me how enlivened they 

are to have started this new 

life path and how much it has 

improved their quality of life. 

(pg. 64) 

It seemed fitting to research 

Leavenworth’s Oktoberfest last 

fall with my visiting Irish friend, 

since we had experienced 

the real festival together 

(in Munich!) many moons 

ago. Seeing Washington’s 

version of Bavaria through her 

eyes reminded me just how 

fortunate we are to have such 

culture and natural beauty 

in our midst. Leavenworth 

is a captivating destination 

in any season, and Sleeping 

Lady always leaves me feeling 

blissfully restored. 

(pg. 80) 


EDITOR 

MANAGING EDITOR 

CREATIVE 

MARKETING + DIGITAL MANAGER 

OFFICE MANAGER 

DIRECTOR OF SALES 

ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES 

BEERVANA COLUMNIST 

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS 

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS 

Kevin Max 

Sheila G. Miller 

Allison Bye 

Kelly Rogers 

Cindy Miskowiec 

Jenny Kamprath 

Cindy Guthrie 

Jenn Redd 

Jackie Dodd 

Mike Allen, Melissa Dalton, Nick Engelfried, Catie Joyce-Bulay, 

Lauren Kramer, Lauren Lofthus, Megan Morse, Ben Salmon, 

Cara Strickland, Corinne Whiting, Gina Williams 

James Harnois, Jim Henkens, Katheryn Moran 

Statehood Media 

Mailing Address 

70 SW Century Dr. 

Suite 100-218 

Bend, Oregon 97702 

Portland Address 

1801 NW Upshur St. 

Suite 100 

Portland, Oregon 97209 

1889mag.com/subscribe 

@1889washington 

Printed in Canada 

All rights reserved. No part of this publiCation may be reproduCed or transmitted in any form or by any means, eleCtroniCally or meChaniCally, inCluding 

photoCopy, reCording or any information storage and retrieval system, without the express written permission of Statehood Media. ArtiCles and photographs 

appearing in 1889 Washington’s Magazine may not be reproduCed in whole or in part without the express written Consent of the publisher. 1889 Washington’s 

Magazine and Statehood Media are not responsible for the return of unsoliCited materials. The views and opinions expressed in these artiCles are not 

neCessarily those of 1889 Washington’s Magazine, Statehood Media or its employees, staff or management. 


FROM THE 

EDITOR 

LIKE WALKING INTO the middle of a field 

of tulips, the color is what grabs you first in the 

pasta parade behind Linda Miller Nicholson, or 

“The Lady Gaga of Pasta.” We caught up with the 

pasta artist as she kneaded, rolled and cut pasta 

from sheets of dough in colors as rich as Tuscan 

summer sunsets. 

Welcome to The Bounty Issue of 1889 

Washington’s Magazine. Turn to page 36 to be 

inspired by the work of a woman who was once 

told, as a child, that she wasn’t artistic. Today 

Nicholson epitomizes art with pasta made in 

clever shapes and colors—from bonnets from 

The Handmaid’s Tale to multicolor sombreros. 

Your sense of beauty will thank you. 

Next, take a step into the wild with us, where 

wild fermenter Shane Johns is brewing Flandersstyle 

beers with yeast strains floating around in 

Tacoma. Now a yeastmeister who works with 

Engine House No. 9 brewery in Tacoma, Johns 

has spread his wings to make many beers from 

distinctly Pacific Northwestern yeast strains. In 

Fermenting Wilderness on page 58, we explore 

brewers who trek into the hinterlands of yeast to bring its 

bounty to beer drinkers in Washington. 

The foundational piece of The Bounty Issue, Local Love, 

takes us into Pike Place Market, across to the Olympic 

Culinary Loop, over to Wenatchee’s Stemilt Growers Retail 

Store and down the Hood Canal to Lilliwaup for the Hama 

Hama OysterRama and up to Port Angeles for the Dungeness 

Crab and Seafood Festival. If your sense of restraint isn’t 

already overrun, you are not a foodie. This feature dances 

through the heart of the Washington food scene and ends 

with recipes that showcase Washington bounty, including, of 

course, clam chowder. 

On Orcas Island, meet Girl Meets Dirt. Audra Lawlor 

left Wall Street to grow and harvest fruit that she turns into 

amazing jams and puckering drinking vinegars, or shrubs, 

under her Girl Meets Dirt label. (See page 22.) 

Walk into Brimmer & Heeltap near Ballard and you will find 

chef David Valencia preparing salmon caught off of Lopez 

Island by the sustainable farmers and fishermen of Jones 

Family Farms. In Tulalip Resort Casino’s Blackfish restaurant, 

chef David Buchanan deploys the time-honored Native 

American tradition of cooking salmon on sticks and over 

alderwood coals. These chefs and more honor us with their 

best salmon recipes on page 26. 

While this issue is a map to better culinary days, you may 

want to spend the end of yours at Rooftop Brewing Co., where, 

as our Beervana writer, Jackie Dodd, puts it, the “why” doesn’t 

matter, as long as you’re up on the rooftop. Cheers! 


1889 ONLINE 

More ways to connect with your favorite Washington content 

1889mag.com | #1889washington | @1889washington 

GEAR UP 

Show off your state pride with 1889 shirts, 

hats and more from our online shop. 

1889mag.com/shop 

#1889WASHINGTON 

What does your Washington look like? Connect 

with us on social media by tagging your photos 

with #1889washington. 

photo by Caleb Wallace 

Third Beach in Olympic National Park, Washington. 

washington: in focus 

Have a photo that captures your Washington experience? Share it 

with us by filling out the Washington: In Focus form on our website. 

If chosen, you’ll be published here. 

1889mag.com/in-focus 


SAY WA? 14 

FOOD + DRINK 20 

FARM TO TABLE 24 

HOME + DESIGN 28 

Jim Henkens 

MIND + BODY 34 

ARTIST IN RESIDENCE 36 

pg. 36 

Linda Miller Nicholson proves pasta can be art.

1002 W Riverside, Spokane WA 

Spokaneclub.org

say wa? 

Tidbits & To-dos 

mark your 

calendar 

Rite in the Rain 

Like a true Pacific Northwesterner, Rite in the Rain 

products are both environmentally friendly and 

able to handle precipitation. Based in Tacoma, the 

company’s special paper was initially designed to 

help loggers working in poor weather conditions. 

These journals defy Mother Nature. Rite in the Rain 

offers wood-based products and recyclable paper 

that can be exposed to water without falling apart. 

riteintherain.com 

Firefly Kitchens’ Fresh & Fermented Cookbook 

Washington State Fair 

With concerts, rides and a rodeo, the Washington State Fair 

has something for the entire family. Continuously ranked 

among the United States’ ten largest state fairs, this summer’s 

lineup includes big names like Kahlid, Florida Georgia Line, 

Brett Eldridge, Macklemore, Rascal Flatts and comedian Gabriel 

“Fluffy” Iglesias. Other highlights include an anatomical moving 

dinosaur exhibit and a farmer-for-a-day SillyVille interactive 

exhibit. The fair runs from August 31-September 23. 

Patrick Hagerty 

Based in Seattle, Firefly Kitchens is all about the 

healthy probiotics found in fermented vegetables, 

and its new Fresh & Fermented cookbook is no 

different. This beautifully illustrated book is full of 

simple recipes that will have you incorporating this 

versatile food not only into your main dishes but 

also in smoothies, cakes and oatmeal. 

fireflykitchens.com 

thefair.com 


say wa? 

Olympia Harbor Days 

The Olympia Harbor Days 

festival is entertainment mixed 

with natural vistas. Celebrating 

the world’s largest vintage 

tugboat races along the Puget 

Sound’s Port of Olympia, the 

festival also brings music, food, 

arts and crafts, and history 

over the three-day event. Say 

farewell to summer at this 

family fun event, which runs 

from August 31-September 2. 

harbordays.com 

Karla Fowler 

mark your 

calendar 

mark your 

calendar 

Squirrel Fest 

Known for its squirrel suspension bridges, Longview 

takes it to the next level with a Squirrel Fest on 

August 18. Start the day off at the “go nutty” parade, 

then explore the vendors, check out the squirrel cam 

and watch Circus Cascadia with the kids. Later, get in 

on the karaoke contest, relax at the beer and wine 

garden and end the evening at the main stage for a 

lineup of musical performances. 

lvsquirrelfest.com 

Tom Sawyer Country Coffee 

Savor a cup of bold coffee from Tom Sawyer 

Coffee Company, a roaster based in Spokane. 

This company takes pride in supporting and 

sourcing its beans from family-owned coffee 

farms. We love the single pour-over variety pack 

for summer camping excursions. 

tomsawyercountrycoffee.com 


say wa? 

Musician 

A Lifetime of Music 

Boat Race Weekend’s ties go way back 

written by Ben Salmon 

Alicia Hauff 

Listen on Spotify 

LOTS OF BANDS are centered around old friends from high 

school or college. 

And then there’s the bond that forms the core of Spokane’s 

Boat Race Weekend. Drummer Jay Orth and guitarist/vocalist 

Evan Kruschke first met all the way back in kindergarten. “I 

complimented him on his cool lunchbox,” Orth said, “and 

we’ve been best friends ever since.” 

Fast-forward a number of years—past the duo’s middleschool 

band Whizz*Bang!—and you’ll find Orth, Kruschke and 

another longtime pal, bassist Collin Price, enrolled at Gonzaga 

University, scrambling to prepare to play a coffeehouse show 

in place of an act that canceled. The trio learned seven covers 

in seven days and “made it work,” Orth said. That led to cover 

shows at campus houses, which led to the group writing its 

own songs, just for fun. 

It’s still fun, but now these guys take it seriously, as evidenced 

by Boat Race Weekend’s sophomore album, Near & Dear, 

which is packed with muscular 

guitar rock rooted in earnest 

Midwestern emo, thoughtful 

hardcore punk and the ambitious atmosphere 

of bands like Explosions in the Sky. Where the 

band’s debut—2015’s The Talisman—is a bit 

faster and harder, the new one slows down and goes for a more 

expansive sound, while lyrically tackling big life events and the 

associated big feelings. 

That’s the sound of a band maturing, developing and pushing 

outward, even after all these years. 

“We’ve grown as musicians (and as songwriters who know) 

how to achieve the sound we’ve been striving toward,” Krushke 

said. “We just love making music and sharing it with people. 

Art and music in general is a powerful force for change, and 

we hope to make music that people can connect to and form a 

relationship with.” 


OCTOBER 11-14, 2018 

CHANGE HAPPENS HERE. 

BendFilm.org

say wa? 

Bibliophile 

Class Up Your Campout 

New cookbook elevates camping cuisine 

interview by Sheila G. Miller 

Ryan Rober Miller 

The trio behind Dirty Gourmet 

make wilderness a little more tasty. 


say wa? 

AIMEE TRUDEAU, Emily Nielson and Mai-Yan Kwan have a message for the outdoorsy set—camping doesn’t have to be 

all franks and beans (though they have nothing against a good hot dog once in awhile). With their new cookbook, Dirty 

Gourmet, from Washington’s Mountaineers Books, the trio are helping you class up your next campout. We’re talking 

baked brie, roasted garlic and dutch oven sticky buns. With more than 120 recipes, Dirty Gourmet has tips and tricks for 

all food situations, whether you’re car camping, hitting the trail for a day trip or going into the backcountry. Kwan gave 

1889 the inside scoop on taste tests, lessons learned and the ever-elusive savory oatmeal. 

How did the idea to make this 

cookbook come about? 

We started the blog over eight years 

ago—it was just a little passion project 

we did on the side. Aimee and I had 

gone on a bike tour for four months 

and camped the whole way, from 

Los Angeles to Vancouver, Canada, 

and then across Canada. I continued 

on to Boston after that. During that 

time, Emily was an outdoor science 

instructor in Big Bear, so she was also 

living the camp life for three years, 

teaching and living in cabins. We were 

all living outside for extended periods 

of time and cooking outdoors. That’s 

how Dirty Gourmet started—when 

you get into situations where you’re 

outdoors a lot and you cook outside 

enough, beans and hot dogs and 

the classics are fine but you need to 

go beyond that at some point. I love 

to make myself a good old hot dog, 

but we tried to go beyond what you 

typically think of as camp food. 

Why is eating well while camping 

something that appeals to you? 

Aimee and I had a realization on our 

bike tour. You meet a lot of cyclists 

on the road and you end up camping 

together, and we would look at how 

other people were cooking and 

realized, ‘Whoa, our meals are pretty 

complicated.’ We would think all day, 

‘What are we going to make tonight?’ 

We would plan our whole route so we 

could go to a grocery store and spend 

two hours grocery shopping. It was just 

really about what we like to eat and 

seeing what we could experiment with. 

Our mission is to inspire people to eat 

great food outdoors. People spend so 

much time planning trips, and then the 

food is just the last piece of it. We’re 

trying to put more emphasis 

on the food, which is a huge 

part of the experience when 

you’re outdoors. You’re 

connecting with nature 

and refocusing and that’s 

really a healing experience. 

Food becomes more 

important outside your 

comfort zone. 

How did you test these recipes? 

It was definitely trial and error. What 

we like to let people know is, we have 

made all the mistakes for you, so 

hopefully you’ll avoid making them 

again. We first tested the idea for 

skillet lasagna, a one-pot meal, on a 

snowshoeing day trip, and we had a 

bunch of people with us. We were so 

excited. We brought a thin backpacking 

pot and a single-burner camp stove. It 

just burned. Everyone had to eat burnt 

lasagna on that trip. So lesson number 

one, bring backup just in case it fails. 

Don’t try a recipe blind on the first 

time you go out there. 

One recipe I was working on that 

did not work at all is savory oatmeal. 

I like savory breakfasts. I was super 

determined, and I tried a bunch of 

combinations, with miso, with a 

Mediterranean flavor with pine nuts 

and sundried tomatoes. People could 

not even wrap their heads around it. It 

was, ‘No, I don’t want to eat this.’ That’s 

a fail. I’m going to move on from that. 

What advice do you have to set up 

campers for success? 

For something like car camping, I really 

encourage people to stick to recipes 

that are their go-to at home. Don’t 

try to do something you’ve never 

done before in the outdoors. Set up 

a camping pantry, a 

bin where you keep all 

those things you need, 

like a spatula and salt. 

That’s what happens 

when you go camping— 

those essential things 

have been forgotten, and 

something simple becomes 

quite complicated. Also 

premeasuring things in 

general, even for car 

camping. I always recommend that 

you portion everything out and put 

in Ziplocs or mason jars, which are 

watertight, so you don’t have to worry 

about them going into a cooler or a 

bin. Even eggs—crack them into jars. 

What’s the next step for you? 

We do small, intimate dinners for a 

dozen people or for more than 200 

people on multiday campouts. I think 

our next step is to figure out how to 

clone ourselves. We really have to 

scale that. The great thing is we’re in 

demand, people want us to come out 

and come on a trip and cook for them, 

but we need to build out our team. 

This summer, we’re teaching a handson 

backpacking cooking class, which 

will be set up for up to twenty people 

doing everything by themselves like a 

traditional cooking class but outdoors 

and backpacking. That’s a new thing 

for us. 

A little thing in the back of my mind 

is, we’ve made one cookbook and we 

had to really refine our cooking skills. 

I’m still developing new recipes, so I 

keep thinking, ‘OK, this would be good 

for our next cookbook.’ 


food + drink 

Cocktail Card 

recipe courtesy of 

ChocMo Chocolate Bistro 

Nocino 

Manhattan 

2 ounces Black Heron bourbon 

1 ounce Stone Barn Nocino 

1 ounce Carpano Antica Formula 

sweet vermouth 

2 dashes Angostura bitters 

Combine all ingredients in a 

shaker. Stir vigorously and strain 

into a martini glass. Garnish with 

a Luxardo cherry and enjoy. 

Beervana 

A Brew with a View 

written and photographed by Jackie Dodd 

Rooftop Brewing offers good beers and great views. 

CRAIG CHRISTIAN HAS a casual answer for why he won’t rent out his taproom 

for private events. 

“It would just be about the money, and that’s not why I’m here,” he said. That 

shows you what his bones are made of. A group of fiercely loyal regulars who form 

the pulse of the taproom, even on a typical drizzly Seattle day, matter to him in a way 

that speaks volumes. “All on their own they started a Facebook group called Rooftop 

Regulars,” he said, smiling like a proud parent putting an aced exam on the fridge. 

Christian has instant likability that you feel the second you meet him. It’s not just 

his disarming transparency, his quiet humility, or the way he creates a community 

wherever he goes. What reminds you—more than anything—that the owner of 

Rooftop Brewing is the sort that you want to run in the same circle with is how, even 

when he tries, he can’t talk about himself or his accomplishments for more than a 

few moments without turning the spotlight on someone else he adores. Maybe it’s 

the way Ladro coffee roasts their beans, or how Counterbalance Brewing is raising 

money for charity through the Beer Trumps Hate campaign (the one Christian 

started), or the way the food from the Vietnamese food truck that makes the rounds 

at Rooftop pairs so well with beer. 

“I put a roof deck on an A-framed Tudor-style house that had no business being 

there,” Christian said of Rooftop Brewing’s origin story. In reality, it all started in 

London decades ago. Before he was of legal drinking age in the United States, 

Christian found himself in the heart of the UK with a desire to learn how to brew 

and a country that was ready and willing to teach him. Is it that he learned to make 

beer in the hallowed ale-soaked terrain of England that makes his beer so good? Is 

it the multiple degrees in science that make it so consistent and flawless? Maybe. 

Or maybe it’s some other unidentifiable quality that keeps the awards coming and 

the fan base growing. But the “why” of it all doesn’t matter once you’re up on the 

rooftop of Rooftop with that cold Stargazer IPA in your hand. Don’t forget to grab 

a banh mi sandwich while you’re there. Christian will be the first to tell you how 

amazing they are. 

1220 W NICKERSON ST. 

SEATTLE 

rooftopbrewco.com 


E N L I G H T E N M E N T 

R A R E A Y R E . C O M 

Tours|Education|Exhibits 

1943 Columbia Park Trail 

Richland, WA 99352 

509.943.4100 

www.visitthereach.org 

OPEN 

Tues-Sat|10am-4:30pm 

Sun |12-4:30pm 

Closed|Monday

food + drink 

CRAVINGS 

MUSSELS 

There’s nothing quite like eating 

mussels in view of the water. At 

Front Street Grill, you can also eat 

them steeped in a spicy, satisfying 

green curry sauce, with or without 

linguini underneath. 

20 FRONT STREET 

COUPEVILLE 

fsgcoupeville.com 

PESTICIDE-FREE WINE 

It’s likely you’ve never had a 

wine-tasting quite like the one at 

Paradisos del Sol. Winegrower Paul 

Vandenberg follows the “sip, sip, 

bite, sip” tasting method. You’ll get 

a little plate with tiny paired bites 

and experience wines like the lightly 

bodied sangiovese or the fortified 

zort (perfect with chocolate). 

3230 HIGHLAND DRIVE 

ZILLAH 

paradisosdelsol.com 

Gastronomy 

Girl Meets Dirt 

written by Cara Strickland 

IF YOU WANDER in to Girl Meets Dirt for an informal tasting, you might 

just get to chat with Audra Lawlor (the girl who met the dirt). Her story is just 

as romantic as it sounds—she left a high-powered Wall Street job to build a 

life with her love on Orcas Island. Another of her loves can be found in the 

orchard, where she harvests island fruit, often historical varieties, and uses it 

to make old-school jams and preserves (without commercial pectin or refined 

sugar), most of them single varietal, to let the fruit speak for themselves. She’s 

also been making drinking vinegars, like the bitter lemon lavender. All this adds 

up to unique island flavor you can bring home and savor long after you bid the 

ferry goodbye. Buy straight from the source, online or in person, or at a few 

farmer’s markets on the islands and near Seattle. 

208 ENCHANTED FOREST ROAD 

EASTSOUND, ORCAS ISLAND 

girlmeetsdirt.com 

CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT Audra Lawlor is the 

girl behind Girl Meets Dirt. Shrubs, or drinking 

vinegars, are made from island fruit. Lawlor 

makes jams and preserves. 

BLUE CHEESE 

CHOCOLATE CAKE 

If you weren’t aware you could have 

a craving for blue cheese chocolate 

cake, you’re in for a treat at The 

Cheesemonger’s Table. A generous 

slice of decadent chocolate layer cake 

is topped with chocolate frosting (the 

middle layers have a kick of cheese). 

The whole thing is sprinkled with blue 

cheese, so you can have a little with 

each delicious bite. 

203 5TH AVENUE SOUTH 

EDMONDS 

cheesemongerstable.com 

UPSCALE 

COMFORT FOOD 

The perfect meal after a long day 

of wine tasting, Public House 124 

does hearty basics with a satisfying 

twist. Don’t miss the Kraut Kruga—a 

German dumpling stuffed with sweet 

onion, cabbage, grass-fed beef and 

horseradish creme fraiche. 

124 EAST MAIN STREET 

WALLA WALLA 

ph124.com 


food + drink 

BEST PLACES FOR 

CRÊPES 

PAVZ CAFE BISTRO 

If you think a crêpe should 

be a light meal, this probably 

isn’t the place for you. Try 

something savory like the 

spicy Italian sausage crêpe, 

stuffed with housemade Italian 

sausage, roasted red bell 

peppers, onions and Kalamata 

olives, topped with marinara, 

basil and a host of cheeses 

and baked in a small casserole. 

If you still have room, try a 

sweet crêpe, like the Black 

Forest, stuffed with chocolate 

gelato and cherries preserved 

in port wine. 

833 FRONT STREET 

LEAVENWORTH 

pavzcafe.com 

FLEUR DE SEL 

ARTISAN CRÊPERIE 

The James Beard-nominated 

chef Laurent Zirotti and his 

wife, Patricia, both from France, 

own this delightful crêperie. Try 

the Monte Cristo for breakfast 

(complete with rhubarb 

compote, if you desire), the 

Bison Meatloaf for lunch (with 

a kick of horseradish), or stick 

to a tangy classic with the 

lemon curd (you’ll want to add 

the optional blueberries). 

909 SOUTH GRAND 

BOULEVARD 

SPOKANE 

fleurdeselcreperie.com 

AB CRÊPES 

As they put it on their T-shirts, 

a crêpe “beats the fluff out 

of pancakes.” Try a sweet 

crêpe like the Apple Pie 

(flame-roasted Fuji apples, 

“ABC’auce,” graham crackers 

and cinnamon drizzle) or the 

savory ABCT (avocado, bacon, 

cheddar and tomato). 

1311 RAILROAD AVENUE 

BELLINGHAM 

facebook.com/ABCrepes 

Dining 

Cowiche Canyon Kitchen 

+ Icehouse and E.Z Tiger 


THE MENU AT E.Z Tiger advertises noodles, dumplings, cocktails and shelter. For 

Graham Snyder, a descendant of another Yakima Snyder you might remember from 

childhood bread, shelter means hospitality, a little bit of protection. When you walk 

into one of his restaurants, he wants you to know you’ll be cared for, something he 

refined during his time in the restaurant business in Los Angeles. That’s certainly 

the case at both of his wonderful spots, though they couldn’t be more different. 

Cowiche Canyon Kitchen offers fresh, innovative tastes of the region, while E.Z 

Tiger flawlessly borrows flavors from the Pacific Rim. The steam buns alone (with 

perfectly crispy pork belly inside, courtesy of chef Cameron Slaugh) are reason 

enough to return, but whatever you order, you can bet it’s made with care, and 

comes with a side of shelter. 

COWICHE CANYON: 202 E YAKIMA AVENUE 

E.Z TIGER: 222 E CHESTNUT AVENUE 

YAKIMA 

cowichecanyon.com 

ez-tiger.com 

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP E.Z Tiger’s dan dan noodles. 

Dumplings are an E.Z Tiger specialty. Cowiche Canyon 

Kitchen offers variety, including grilled artichoke. 


farm to table 

Farm to Table 

In Celebration of Salmon 

Finding time-honored traditions 

in modern-day meals from the sea 


ON A LAZY SUNDAY, you sit on the sun-dappled patio 

of Brimmer & Heeltap, a tucked-away gem between 

Seattle’s Ballard and Fremont. Cascading hibiscus 

dances in the breeze. Light slants into this secret 

garden. This is one of those meals that will linger long 

after your last bite. The true star of the show, without 

a doubt, is the salmon. 

Washington diners are spoiled by the myriad ways in which 

this fish shows up on their plates in almost any season. At 

Brimmer & Heeltap, chef David Valencia reaches back to his 

roots when preparing Alaska salmon aguachile, a popular 

option among the eatery’s loyal patrons. 

“I grew up eating ceviche and aguachile [a cold seafood dish, 

traditionally served with shrimp] with my uncles at Mariscos 

Chihuahua, a local restaurant in Arizona,” he said. “The acidity, 

raw onion and spice bring me right back to those warm days 

eating out of a cocktail glass in the parking lot.” 

Sustainable Harvesting 

Brimmer & Heeltap works with Mikuni Wild Harvest, which 

in turn sources from Jones Family Farms (JFF), a family-owned 

and operated business producing grass-fed meats and shellfish 

on Lopez Island. JFF also sources and distributes fine-quality 

Northwest seafood. 

Kevin Mock, sales associate for Mikuni, explained the 

allure of working with JFF. “They’re directly in contact with 

the producers, fishermen and farmers in their area,” he 

said. “They know the families, their stories, their industries, 

their struggles.” 

JFF has participated in sustainable practices of Puget Sound 

and Alaskan wild salmon for many years. “Due to recent 

inconsistencies in salmon runs, increasing costs and our 

changing business needs, we have cut back on our commercial 

fishing efforts while partnering with local, long-standing, 

quality-oriented fisherman to maintain a fish supply. In order 

to assure the highest quality salmon, fish are bled, dressed and 

iced immediately and handled with care.” 

Mock said the salmon tastes clean and fresh because it 

doesn’t have far to travel. “By eating that fish,” he said, “[diners 

are] supporting the local fishermen of the Salish Sea, who are 

the stewards of our local waterways.” 

JFF offers fresh salmon from May through late November— 

and frozen and smoked salmon year-round. As the basis of 

its own fishing operation, Fraser River Sockeye became the 

family’s first love. “Since time immemorial,” these fish have 

passed through the San Juans, and islanders have depended 

upon their bounty. The Joneses purchase as much as possible 

from Jack Giard, a Lopez Reef net fisherman, and Dan Post and 

Arn Veal, gillnetters from Lopez and Guemes Islands. 

“The Fraser fish are unlike any other sockeye; there is poetry 

to their flesh and we revere them as the historic lifeblood of our 

island community,” the JFF website states. “These fishermen 

also catch Fraser River pink salmon on odd years. These fish, 

too, are particularly lovely.” 

The company gets the bulk of its local Coho from the 

Finkbonner family, who catch the fish in Lummi nation waters. 

Because the fish feed primarily on crab larvae, the fish taste 

more like lobster than other salmon. 


farm to table 

CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT 

A Jones Family Farms 

worker tends to the boat. 

Waiting for the fish. 

Hauling in a reefnet. 

Honoring Tradition 

About 35 miles north of Seattle, Tulalip Resort Casino’s 

Blackfish is well-known for its signature preparation of the 

heritage salmon (AKA salmon on a stick). “It is based upon 

a time-honored and proven tribal technique for cooking 

salmon on sticks over alderwood coals,” chef David Buchanan 

explained. “We leave the skin on the salmon and use ironwood 

sticks to skewer the fillets—running the sticks tightly between 

skin and flesh.” After the fish has been seasoned, the sticks are 

angled over the coals. 

According to Buchanan, this slow-roasting method draws out 

the fish’s natural oils and lends a hint of smokiness to the flavor. 

Blackfish always serves wild salmon (never farmed), sourced 

primarily from Alaska and Washington. 

“The salmon on a stick preparation both reflects and 

maintains a portion of tribal history,” Buchanan said. “There 

is so much more here than just a piece of fish for dinner. It is 

about tradition, respect for Mother Earth, thankfulness and 

sharing with friends and family. A tribal member finds the 

ironwood locally by foraging for it in the wild. It is actually cut 

from oceanspray, which is indigenous to our area. A prayer of 

thankfulness is offered to the plant before harvesting only what 

is needed. He then hand-carves each stick.” 

Similarly, an annual celebration honors the salmon for 

providing sustenance and expresses gratitude for those who 

have harvested and prepared it. As part of tribal tradition, any 

salmon that falls from the sticks can’t be served. Instead, this 

piece of fish gets offered to ancestors by “feeding the fire.” “All 

these things are important to the culture of the tribe, and we 

have the opportunity to keep a portion of this culture alive 

every day,” Buchanan said. 

Home Prep 

Valencia said his favorite way to prepare salmon is “smoked, 

low and slow.” “Buy fresh!” he advised. “And don’t be afraid of 

three things. One—season generously with kosher salt. Pepper 

the salmon after it is cooked so the pepper does not scorch during 

the cooking process. Two—heat your pan before you cook the 

fish, giving it a better sear. Three—eat it pink in the center.” 

There’s no denying that salmon from this region has made a 

name for itself—and for very good reason. “I think what makes 

it delicious is that it is a part of the Seattle culture, and, when 

I think of [salmon], I cannot separate the city from the fish,” 

Valencia said. 


farm to table 

Washington Recipes 

Salmon 

Worth 

Savoring 

Salmon Aguachile 

SEATTLE / Brimmer & Heeltap 

David Valencia 

SERVES 6-8 

FOR SALMON BRINE 

2 ¾ cups water 

¼ cup sugar 

2 ¼ tablespoons salt 

1 salmon fillet, 3-5 pounds 

FOR AGUACHILE 

1 white onion, charred 

1 bunch cilantro 

3 serrano peppers, charred 

2 ¼ cup fresh squeezed lime juice 

Salt to taste 

FOR PICKLED RADISHES 

10-12 radishes, sliced thin 

13 ½ tablespoons water 

13 ½ tablespoons red wine vinegar 

13 ½ tablespoons sugar 

2 teaspoons salt 

FOR SALMON BRINE 

Combine all ingredients until well dissolved 

and place salmon in brine for at least one 

day. Cut salmon to quarter-inch cuts. 

FOR AGUACHILE 

Char white onion and serranos on an open 

flame. Once charred, place in blender with 

cilantro and lime juice and blend. Season 

with salt to taste. 

FOR PICKLED RADISHES 

Combine water, sugar, salt and vinegar 

and pour over radishes. Let them pickle 

for at least a day or two. 

TO FINISH 

Place cut salmon in a bowl with a little 

aguachile to season fish. Place on plate 

with pickled radishes, fresh red onion 

and cilantro. 

Shio Koji Cured Grilled Salmon. 

Shio Koji Cured Grilled Salmon 

SEATTLE / Wa’z 

Hiro Tawara 

SERVES 2 

2 salmon filets, 2-4 ounces 

3 tablespoons shio koji (fermented 

rice) 

2 tablespoons grated daikon radish 

4 tablespoons “tosazu” vinaigrette 

FOR VINAIGRETTE 

4 teaspoon rice vinegar 

1 tablespoon mirin 

1 teaspoon Usukuchi (light color 

soy) 

1 tablespoon dashi 

Spread shio koji on both sides of the 

salmon filets and store in a resealable 

plastic bag. Marinate a minimum of 2 

hours or up to overnight. 

Set the oven to broil on high and grill 

the fish for 4 minutes on one side. Turn 

fish over and broil an additional 1 minute 

until cooked through. Time may vary 

slightly depending on the thickness of 

the filets. 

Mix the grated daikon radish with 

tosazu vinaigrette and put it next to 

the salmon. Other additions can include 

green strawberry, salmon egg and grilled 

garlic scapes. 

Alaskan King Salmon Crudo 

UNION / Alderbrook Resort & Spa 

Ben Jones 

SERVES 4-5 

16 1-ounce slices freshly sliced 

raw king salmon 

4 ounces lime juice 

4 ounces olive oil 

32 lime segments 

Lime zest 

Black pepper (2 twists from 

a grinder) 

7 tarragon leaves 

1-2 sorrel leaves, gently torn 

1 mint leaf, torn to small pieces 

½ teaspoon flaked sea salt 

Lavosh crackers long enough 

to cover the plate 

Place lime segments on top of the 

slices of salmon and also squeeze 

a little on top of each piece. Zest a 

quarter lime over each plate. 

Add black pepper, tarragon, sorrel, 

mint and flaked sea salt. Cover plate 

with Lavosh crackers and top with 

the crudo. 

MORE ONLINE 

For more Washington recipes, 

head to 1889mag.com/recipes

Meet the Locals 

Whether you’re a pro photographer or 

just serious about your Instagram, snap 

photos of all manner of wildlife all the 

way around the Loop. 

#wildlifeofthecascadeloop 

FREE Travel Guide 

cascadeloop.com 

Visit the island you can drive to! anacortes.org 360.293.3832

home + design 

Float On 

Houseboats have been a part of Seattle since the city’s 

early days—we step inside two modern versions 

written by Melissa Dalton 


home + design 


FROM LEFT The exterior of the South Lake Union houseboat features cedar siding, barn wood, red-painted metal and a large 

pair of eyes. Art is everywhere inside the houseboat. 

An Artistic Houseboat on South Lake Union 


Every remodel comes with its revelations. 

In 2011, a couple bought this floating home 

just a few slips down from their own, with 

the understanding that they would tweak a 

few fixtures and finishes to free the interior 

of its early ’90s aesthetic. (Think curved 

walls, glass blocks and institutional pink.) 

Upon finding water damage, however, the 

superficial makeover grew into a much bigger 

undertaking. “It was going to be a really light 

touch at first,” said architect Jim Graham 

of Graham Baba Architects, the firm that 

worked with the homeowners. Once the 

demolition started and the water infiltration 

was discovered, plans changed. “All of the 

walls were filled with mold,” Graham said. 

“That’s when [the project] really ballooned 

into, ‘All right, let’s change everything.’” 

Faced with a much more extensive 

renovation, the homeowners decided to 

personalize every inch of the houseboat 

to their taste, starting with the façade. The 

original exterior was a mishmash of features. 

“It was extremely dated and, stylistically, 

it was a Franken-house,” Graham said. He 

paired up with contractor Dave Boone to 

instill cohesiveness by swapping the kitschy 

green-painted shingles for streamlined 

horizontal cedar siding, inset panels of 

reclaimed barn wood and red-painted metal, 

and a stern wrapped in vertical zinc panels. “I 

wanted to make sense of the massing in a way 

that broke down the chunkiness of the box,” 

Graham said. 

Once the water damage was remediated 

inside, the team’s goal was to “clean up 

inefficiencies” and create the perfect backdrop 

for the owners’ creative decorative style. In the 

open-concept living area on the upper level, 

this meant first addressing the view. After all, 

the clients were moving down the dock for the 

new houseboat’s prime location. “It’s at the 

end of the dock so it’s not pinned in. It has this 

great outward approach where the view is so 

much better,” Graham said. “Those houseboats 

tend to be pretty hemmed in. You have your 

dockside and your water side that’s open, but 

this one has three sides” fronting the water. 

A poorly positioned fireplace and stingy 

windows in the living area, however, were 

the de facto focal point. So the team replaced 

the entire wall with 18 feet of Nano doors. 

These now open to a deck encased 

with a sleek cable railing, ensuring 

unobstructed sightlines from the 

kitchen and the couch. Quirky 


home + design 

Ed Sozinho 

FROM LEFT The Wards Cove houseboat’s kitchen has walnut and white polyester-finished cabinetry. Outdoor living is easy on a houseboat. 

additions, like a fire pole that connects the kitchen to the entry 

and a diving board off the deck, help to weave in the owners’ funloving 

personalities. 

Nowhere is this more apparent than in the artistic flair of the 

décor. Whether it’s the striking Tibetan Buddha eyes painted on 

the exterior or the wall in the living room swathed in a photo mural 

of the marina, there’s art at every turn. “The good thing is that it 

was full of mold,” Graham said of the houseboat’s transformation. 

“It gave us the ability to blow it all out, redo the plan, and clean it 

up.” And in the process, create a home that’s become the family’s 

work of art. 

A Social Hub in Wards Cove 

After a 2010 trip to Thailand, where Kevin Gaspari saw waterbased 

communities in Bangkok, he became enamored with life 

on the water. This was a feasible pursuit in his home city of Seattle. 

“Houseboats are quintessential Seattle living,” said Gaspari, 

who works as a Realtor. In 2012, he and husband Kent Thoelke 

purchased a slip in Wards Cove, a former salmon processing 

center on Lake Union that was converted into a private marina 

with twelve houseboat moorings, just across the waves from Gas 

Works Park. “We heard about Wards Cove being built, and it 

was supposed to be the last dock space available to build floating 

homes, so we pounced,” Gaspari said. 

The couple then teamed up with architect Brian Brand of 

Baylis Architects and Trend Construction to create their ideal 

modern floating home, which would depart from the look of 

Seattle’s early houseboats. “They started as logging shanties for 

the timber industry. People would build their houses on the 

logs and move them around the lake as they cleared the timber,” 

Gaspari said. “We wanted a more modern aesthetic.” 

Since there were height and width restrictions for the 

structure, it was “basically a cube,” said Brand, who endeavored 

to “break the box up a little bit” with a medley of metal and 

fiber cement panels, and cedar siding. Inside the main living 

area, there are no structural walls or columns, so a series of 30- 

foot steel beams provides the framework and sets the tone for 

the materials palette. Warm oak floors offer a counterpoint to 

the steel, and strategic window placement pulls the focus to the 

view outside. In the kitchen, walnut and white polyester-finished 

cabinets seem to float against the glass, while an entire wall of 

floor-to-ceiling glass doors overlooks the lake. 

The couple decorated the interior themselves. “I sell real estate, 

so I’ve been in lots and lots of homes. I’ve just picked up what I 

think looks great and works for us,” Gaspari said, describing their 

approach as “modern without being cold.” Classic Mid-century 

furnishings deliver striking silhouettes, while careful doses of 

color and pattern, such as the powder room’s bright orange 

sconces and inky wallpaper, personalize the scheme. 

Life on the water has its share of surprises, chief among them 

the amount of lake traffic that cruises by on a daily basis. The 

calls of the morning crew team could act as an alarm clock, 

Gaspari joked. “There’s always a moving view and it’s always 

really interesting to me,” he said. “It almost feels resort-like, like a 

vacation when we come home.” This is compounded by the ease 

with which they can entertain on the new houseboat, thanks to 

a roof deck and the indoor-outdoor flow, which has prompted 

another happy discovery—their tight-knit neighborhood 

community. “Our neighbors are fantastic,” said Gaspari, citing 

trips to Napa to bottle wine together (under the label Four Floats) 

and regular barbecues. “As a Realtor, I’m always ready to sell or 

buy, but I think this will be our forever home,” he said. “This is so 

unique that we wouldn’t want to leave it.” 


Ed Sozinho 


home + design 


DIY: Incorporate Art into Your Home 

THE ARTISTIC FLAIR in the South Lake Union houseboat has us inspired. Here’s 

how the homeowners achieve such an artful effect in their interior décor. 

1 

2 

4 

EXPLOIT TEXTURE 

The homeowners affixed a section of a vintage 

Golden Girl Cola sign to the front of the kitchen 

island. The texture of the sign lends an unexpected 

break in the fir cabinetry, while the colors relate to 

the nearby yellow-painted wall. 

THINK BEYOND WHITE PAINT 

The stairwell wall, dubbed the “Sunshine Wall,” was 

painted a bright yellow as a bright backdrop for 

various pieces of art. 

INCORPORATE FOUND OBJECTS 

Anything can become art if it’s displayed right. 

“For one of the doors we collected beer bottle caps 

from all over the world and just hammered them 

around a mirror,” said architect Jim Graham. 

SET THE MOOD 

The Plexiglass in the kitchen cabinets is lined 

with photos from the family’s travels and backlit 

5 

with interior cupboard lights. The goal, said the 

homeowner, was not to necessarily see the images 

clearly but to set the mood. 

CUSTOMIZE 

In a nod to the aquatic neighborhood, the 

homeowner worked with a lighting designer to 

create the silk fabric overhead lights in the living 

area, in order to evoke jellyfish or bubbles rising 

out of the water. Each fixture has various colored 

bulbs inside in order to cast a different glow 

depending on the occasion. 

SOURCE FROM FAR AWAY—AND CLOSE TO HOME 

Since the family loves to travel, they pick up 

treasures along the way and weave those into their 

décor. For instance, one bedroom has a handcarved 

door from Morocco. The photo mural of the 

marina in the living area was photographed by a 

good friend of the family. 


home + design 

Go Bold with Artsy Goods 

from Pacific Northwest Makers 

Artist Gina Coffman studied biology, art, and landscape architecture 

in college and graduate school, and her paper mobiles reflect her 

diverse background. Made from high-quality construction paper or 

cardstock, each design is a synergy of color, shape and movement 

that draws inspiration from the natural world. 

coffmanmobiles.com 

Brighten the inside of your 

cupboard with a handmade, 

8-ounce drinking glass from 

Glassybaby, a glass-blowing 

outfit with hot shops in 

Seattle, Lake Oswego 

and Berkeley. The glasses 

come in twenty-three 

hues across the spectrum, 

from a vibrant pink to an 

iridescent “fizz” color to a 

more mellow topaz. 

glassybaby.com 

Adorn the nearest wall with the 

distinctive Floe Hook from the 

Portland-based Bosque Design. The 

hooks are hand-cast in bronze in 

Oregon and have concealed hardware, 

all the better to keep the attention on 

the shape, which is intended to recall 

floating chunks of ice on a calm sea. 

bosque-design.com 


mind + body 

Cole Paton is a pro mountain biker for Giant. 

Reading, Writing 

& Professional Riding 

Cole Paton mixes college and pro cycling 

written by Sheila G. Miller 

MOST 20-YEAR-OLDS spend the summer between 

their sophomore and junior years of college slinging 

beers at a bar, perhaps photocopying endless packets 

at an internship. 

Then there’s Cole Paton, a professional mountain 

biker from Cashmere, Washington, who will 

spend his summer traveling the world with 

his team, the Giant Factory Off-Road Team. 

Cameron Baird 


mind + body 

So, not your average 20-year-old. Take 

heart, at least, that he’s the youngest guy 

on the team and one of two rookies (the 

other is his college teammate, Stephan 

Davoust, 23). In contrast, Giant’s third 

cross-country pro is a 43-year-old who 

has been biking professionally almost as 

long as Paton has been alive. 

Paton came to cycling in about 

the most natural way possible. His 

family owns Arlberg Sports, a bike 

shop with locations in Wenatchee 

and Leavenworth. 

“I was kind of always the little shop 

boy riding around chasing everyone,” he 

said. “My dad took me to a few of these 

local races around here, and I just fell 

in love.” 

In high school, Paton ran cross 

country competitively for a few years. 

“But then I decided that riding bikes 

is a lot more fun, so I made the switch 

over my sophomore year,” he said. “I 

started following the Pro XCT circuit 

and there’s been no looking back since.” 

Being on Giant’s factory team has 

helped Paton’s racing. 

“Giant is helping me get to a lot more 

races, and then we have factory team 

support at every race, mechanics and all 

the equipment and stuff we would need,” 

he said. “It’s just a lot more support 

from the team and the company, which 

is really nice and allows a lot more doors 

to be opened.” 

But just because he’s a bike 

wunderkind doesn’t mean he wanted 

to skip straight to life as a professional 

racer. He is currently studying at Fort 

Lewis College in Durango, Colorado. 

“I wanted to go to school, just because 

education is really important to me,” 

Paton said. “But I also wanted to go to 

a place that would allow me to continue 

cycling and bring me to another level. 

The only school I really could find that 

would really fit that was Fort Lewis, and 

I couldn’t be happier with that choice.” 

Fort Lewis College has a very active 

cycling program—more than 100 riders, 

including his Giant teammate Davoust. 

Plus, the season is from September to 

November, after he’s finished riding for 

Giant each year. 

“It’s pure collegiate racing,” he said. 

During the winter and early spring, 

Paton gets ready for the racing season 

with “more hours than intensity.” He 

also spends a lot more time in the gym 

working on strength. “I spend a lot more 

time putting myself under,” he said. 

Once the pro season starts, he 

averages about sixteen hours a week 

on the bike, but with more intensity. 

For the not so important races, Paton 

continues to train through them and use 

them as workouts. For more important 

races, the team tapers its training for 

several weeks. During the season, 

Paton visits the gym once or twice to do 

maintenance strength work. 

Depending on his workout, Paton 

changes his diet. If he does a hard ride, 

he eats plenty of carbs. If he’s taking it 

easy, it’s about healthy protein and fats. 

More than anything, he’s hungry all 

the time. 

“I cannot get enough food in,” he said, 

laughing. “I eat so much. That’s a main 

thing that concerns my coach, eating 

enough. I try to do that with healthy 

carbs and all that, but I’m taking in, like, 

5,000 or 6,000 calories a day. I’m still 

growing. It’s a real pain (to eat so much), 

but it works.” 

That’s made a bit more challenging 

with the beer-and-pizza ethos of college. 

“It’s nice because I’m not in the 

dorms anymore,” Paton said. “That was 

impossible. But being able to cook what 

I want to cook is a lot better.” 

Paton is currently targeting the U23 

U.S. national championships as his 

goal race this year. He’ll also compete 

in August in the Mont-Sainte-Anne 

Mountain Bike World Cup event in 

Canada, and in May he raced in Germany 

and Czech Republic in another world 

cup race. 

Long term, Paton has his eyes set 

on the Olympics—likely 2024, but 

he’s going to give 2020 a shot. Short 

term, he would like to win a national 

championship. 

“It’s been awesome to ride with Giant, 

and the team is a great environment,” he 

said. “I want to just keep having fun and 

riding bikes.” 

Cole Paton 

Professional Cyclist 

Age: 20 

Hometown: Cashmere, WA 

Current Location: Durango, CO 

WORKOUT 

• Riding 6 days a week. 

• Intervals 3 to 5 times a week 

• Long recovery ride once a 

week 

• Strength, balance and 

coordination training 2-3 times 

a week 

• Core training every day 

• Technical/skills training 2-3 

times a week 

• Stretching and self-massage 

every day 

NUTRITION 

Favorite pre-race meal: Rice 

and egg stir fry—it’s low fiber 

and easily digestible 

Favorite superfood meal: 

Grilled salmon with sweet potato 

and Brussels sprouts 

Performance foods: Beets, 

bananas, pickle juice, blueberries, 

fish (salmon), avocado, Brussels 

sprouts, nuts 

INSPIRATIONS 

The combination of being a 

competitor and loving to be on 

two wheels fuels my appetite 

for racing. 

I’ve had many mentors and 

figures inspire me to race, but, at 

the end of the day, the biggest 

inspiration always comes from 

within. I want to get better for 

myself, I want to succeed just 

as anyone would, and I want to 

reach my goals. When training 

gets hard (which it often does!) I 

remind myself that it’s supposed 

to be hard! Cross country 

mountain biking is an individual 

sport, and my motivation to 

succeed has always been my 

biggest inspiration. 


artist in residence 

Pasta maker Linda Miller Nicholson uses vegetable purées and other natural ingredients to create her tinted pasta dough. 

Oh, the Pastabilities! 

Linda Miller Nicholson turns pasta into high art 

written by Gina Williams | photography by Jim Henkens 

“YOU CAUGHT ME in high experiment mode today,” Linda Miller Nicholson said as she made me 

an espresso in the gleaming kitchen of her home near Snoqualmie Falls. 

Nicholson, also known as the “Lady Gaga of Pasta” and the “Pasta Ninja,” was a ray of sunshine 

on an otherwise dark, stormy day, dressed in bright reds and floral prints. She was ready for action, 

with rounds of crimson and white pasta dough placed on a large wooden work surface. 

An Instagram sensation (@SaltySeattle) with more 

than 150,000 followers, Nicholson is known for her 

highly expressive way with pasta. She created the “Girl 

with a Noodle Earring” after Johannes Vermeer’s famous 

work, and made a pasta version of Van Gogh’s “Starry 

Night.” Katy Perry’s manager asked her to make a pasta 

portrait of the singer for Perry’s “Bon Appétit” single 

album cover. Nicholson also contributes to Buzzfeed and 

the Food Network and teaches pasta-making workshops. 

She’s appeared on television shows such as “Harry” and 

“Home & Family.” Her first book, Pasta, Pretty Please, 

is coming out in October. Although she turned to pasta 

dough as her medium of choice for high art only several 

years ago, she first began earning her pasta chops as a kid, 

making thick noodles with her German grandfather. She 

also competed on a cooking reality show, “Masterchef,” 

in 2010 and honed her skills in the kitchens of Italy while 

living there as an English teacher. 

Nicholson pulled a handful of crimson dough from the 

round and began flattening it in her silver pasta machine, 

handling the dough with easy, flowing movements. “It 

is mesmerizing, isn’t it?” she said. “During productions, 

even the camera guys sometimes get caught up in 

watching the process.” 

A few minutes later, the project took shape, Nicholson 

revealing both her artistic talent and her rebellious 

side. She worked the dough like a dressmaker, carefully 

pleating it and working deftly with the drape as if it was 

fine fabric rather than a sticky mixture of flour 

and eggs. Next, she made little white cones, 

glancing occasionally at images on her phone 

to help with styling. 

36 1889 WASHINGTONS’S MAGAZINE AUGUST | SEPTEMBER 2018


Linda Miller Nicholson holds a tray of her 

pasta creations. She started experimenting 

with unusual shapes and colors when her 

son went through a picky food phase. 


Creating striped ravioli is a multi-step process.


“I finally found my medium. I’ve been making pasta my entire 

life, but nobody said that’s art. Keep doing what you’re doing 

if you’re passionate about it. What I’m doing now is the 

culmination of everything that led up to this point.” 

— Linda Miller Nicholson 

“Today is the only day I have to do what 

I want to do,” she said, continuing to pleat 

and fold the red garments. 

Busy with appearances, workshops and 

handling the business side of her work, 

Nicholson also remains in high demand 

for commissions. 

At the top of her “Who I’d most like to 

have over for dinner and make a pasta face 

of” list is Ellen DeGeneres. She said the 

very idea is intimidating. “I can’t get Ellen 

wrong!” Next is Christopher Walken. 

“Wouldn’t he be great?” Last but not least, 

Yoda. “He won’t be upset if I get it wrong.” 

“I think I’ll do Ellen first,” she said. 

Soon, Nicholson’s full vision for 

the day’s experiment came into view, 

as she put the pieces together and— 

voilà! Suddenly, we weren’t in northern 

Washington anymore, but Gilead, as a 

group of perfectly formed tiny women 

in crimson robes and white bonnets ala 

“Handmaid’s Tale” appeared to march 

across the flour-dusted counter. All of 

Nicholson’s work is edible, and later, 

she would lightly boil the “maids,” pipe 

a ricotta mixture into the robes and 

perhaps plate them with a red sauce— 

another delightful meal with a message. 

Nicholson said she was told early on 

she wasn’t artistic, but the desire to create 

never left her. 

As a teen, she tried her hand at sewing 

clothing. “My magnum opus was a pair 

of patchwork bell-bottom pants that I 

literally sewed polished brass bells onto 

the bottoms of,” she said. She cinched 

them up with a drawstring and wore them 

to school. The bells made such a ruckus 

she was sent home. 

MAKE YOUR OWN 

Pasta, Pretty Please: 

A Vibrant Approach to 

Creative Handmade Noodles 

Linda Miller Nicholson’s 

first book will be 

published in October. The 

book, full of recipes for all 

levels of home cooks, will 

feature instructions for 

twenty-five colors of pasta 

dough, tinted with natural 

ingredients. 

The “playful and inviting” 

book will include recipes, 

techniques, tips and inspiration 

for doughs, shapes 

and sauces—from “Hearts 

and Stripes Pappardelle” 

and “Emoji Ravioli” to 

“Golden Milk Ragu” and 

“Pepperoni Pizza Filling.” 

Learn more about Linda 

and her art, workshops, 

video tutorials and more at 

saltyseattle.com. 

She first began experimenting with 

pasta when her son, Bentley Danger, 

went through a picky food phase. She 

began making nontraditional pasta 

shapes and brightly colored dough using 

natural ingredients like turmeric, harissa 

and vegetable purées, such as beet and 

spinach. At that point, her creativity 

took off. 

“I finally found my medium,” she said. 

“I’ve been making pasta my entire life, but 

nobody said that’s art. Keep doing what 

you’re doing if you’re passionate about it. 

What I’m doing now is the culmination of 

everything that led up to this point.” 

Nicholson, who never turns away from 

a pasta pun, good or bad, said that with 

pasta as her medium, not only are the 

artistic “pastabilities” endless, but creating 

with food allows her to accomplish her 

larger goal of bringing people together, 

opening authentic conversations and 

making the world a better and more 

beautiful place. 

Much of her work is whimsical and 

fun—bright rainbow pasta, colorful 

figures and brilliant geometric designs— 

inspired by her love of fine art, nature and 

fashion. But Nicholson doesn’t shy away 

from the occasional political message or 

bold statement. And all her work is “more 

than dough deep.” 

“It’s more than just a pretty piece of 

pasta,” she said as she carefully adjusted 

the bonnet on one of the handmaids. 

“Not everyone has to appreciate art, but 

everyone has to eat. It gives me a bridge. 

I like that what I do has the power to 

bridge gaps and foster togetherness across 

political lines.” 


STARTUP 42 

WHAT’S GOING UP 44 

WHAT I’M WORKING ON 46 

MY WORKSPACE 48 

GAME CHANGER 50 

pg. 48 

Meet the hops whisperer of Segal Ranch.

startup 

The Leftovers 

WISErg seeks to eliminate food waste 


WISErg’s liquid fertilizer is being used 

throughout North and South America. 

TAKE A GROUP of high-tech software experts, add a few scientists and an interest in eliminating food waste. 

What do you get? WISErg, a company that is taking grocery stores’ leftover food and converting it into highquality 

organic fertilizer. 

It started with an idea to measure food waste in local grocery stores. Brian Valentine, WISErg’s CEO and a 

former Microsoft and Amazon executive, tells it like this: In 2009, Jose Lugo and Larry LaSueur approached 

Valentine with an idea. The three had all worked at Microsoft together (“We’re software people,” Valentine said) 

and LaSueur and Lugo had an idea to collect data on food waste. “Can we collect data on what is being thrown 

away behind grocery stores that we can give back to the grocery store manager?” Valentine asked. “Then that 

will help them to manage their inventory better. That was the original concept.” 

“Like most startups, if anybody tells you they had a clue 

where the idea would take them, they’re lying to you,” Valentine 

said, laughing. 

The company has grown from there. 

WISErg has found a value stream in food waste, and Valentine 

believes there are other businesses to develop from that. “We 

definitely want to continue to expand,” he said. “There’s so much 

of this waste out there. The more we can upcycle, as opposed to 

recycle or throw away, it’s just better.” 

He points to three prongs of eliminating food waste. The first 

is upcycling, like WISErg does. The second, which Valentine 

said we don’t do very well, is diverting waste—whether by 

sending edible leftovers to food pantries or otherwise diverting 

it from the landfill. 


startup 

“If you can make money, great,” he 

said. “But socially we should all be 

appalled by how much of this waste 

could be eaten by humans.” 

we could make a gallon of liquid 

fertilizer. The next step was, ‘How do 

you scale that from a manufacturing 

standpoint?’” 

The third prong is reduction—how 

Those fifteen stores produce 

to avoid having leftover produce at 

enough food waste to create 

grocery stores, for example. 

5 million gallons of fertilizer 

Those three prongs—diversion, 

each year. 

reduction and upcycling—done 

“The problem isn’t acquiring the 

correctly, result in so little waste that 

it’s “not even really waste anymore,” 

Valentine said. 

To measure the food coming out 

of the back of the store, the company 

developed the Harvester, a selfcontained 

unit that takes a large 

volume of food scraps otherwise 

material,” Valentine said. “There are 

4,000 grocery stores on the West 

Coast. The challenge as a company 

is getting the product accepted in 

the market.” 

WISErg’s fertilizer is 100 percent 

sustainable from a waste resource, 

making it different from most 

headed for the landfill and turns 

other fertilizers. Many organic 

those scraps, including hard stuff 

like bones, into a liquid that is used 

for fertilizer. Three generations of 

the machine later, the Harvester is 

in fifteen locations around Seattle— 

at the back of some Whole Foods, 

PCC Markets and Costcos around 

the region. 

During the design process, a 

The Harvester turns food waste to liquid. 

fertilizers are fish-based, which isn’t 

sustainable because of overfishing. 

Other organic fertilizers are made 

with manure, which raises foodsafety 

issues. 

“The first thing that happens 

when you walk onto a grower’s 

property is they look at you like 

the latest snake-oil salesman who 

professor at the University of Arizona asked the obvious 

question: “What do we do with what comes out of the back 

of the machine?” It seemed a shame to let such high-nutrient 

material go to waste. At first, the company considered turning 

the processed food waste into some sort of bio-gas. “That went 

on for a couple years and didn’t really pan out,” Valentine said. 

Eventually, someone suggested the food waste be converted 

into liquid, organic fertilizer. 

“All of the material in the food waste is super high nutrient,” 

Valentine said. “We had to figure out how to capture the 

nutrients, not let it get away.” When food sits in a curbside 

dumpster in the sun, it rots and those nutrients disappear. 

Most of the food that’s thrown away at grocery stores is 

taken off the shelves because it’s at or past its sell-by date, not 

because it has gone bad. The Harvester captures the food while 

it’s still fresh and full of nutrients. Because it’s self-contained, 

there are no odors, no pests, and no leaks into storm drains. 

“We solve a bunch of problems for grocery stores,” Valentine 

said. Plus, grocery stores pay the company for the material. 

The company created a biological process that stabilizes 

the food inside the Harvester to prevent the nutrients from 

disappearing. Finally, the company developed a process to turn 

the stabilized food waste into a liquid that can be turned into 

fertilizer that is 100 percent certified organic. 

“It took about five years to figure all that stuff out,” Valentine 

said. “Then, finally, we had developed the biology so that 

promised the world but couldn’t deliver,” Valentine said. “This 

is an industry of crazy product promises that couldn’t deliver. 

So you have to get through that first.” 

The agricultural business community can be a little slow 

to adopt new products. It takes trial cycles, and a cycle is a 

growing season. Many farmers have agreed to try the fertilizer 

on small sections of their land as a trial. 

“By the second trial they’re typically now starting to believe,” 

Valentine said. Though there’s little data, Valentine said he 

believes WISErg is the largest liquid certified organic fertilizer 

exporter to Mexico and the second largest on the West Coast. 

Today, the company has a plant in Redmond that converts 

4 million gallons of liquid fertilizer a year. The company is 

selling fertilizer in Central and South America, the U.S. and 

Mexico. “We just started shipping product to Costa Rica and 

Chile,” he said. 

As the fertilizer gains in popularity, Valentine said, there are 

stores lined up to install a Harvester. 

In the meantime, Valentine said it’s about feeling like you’re 

doing something that helps the planet. Valentine has worked 

for Amazon and Microsoft—he’s seen innovation before. “But 

nothing is as satisfying as this,” Valentine said. “My wife asks 

me, ‘How was your day today?’ And the joke in our family 

has become, ‘Just saving the world one day at a time!’ It’s a 

different feeling, being able to do something like that, that 

might make a difference.” 


what’s going up? 

The Spheres, Amazon’s collaborative 

workspace in Seattle, has plants and water 

features throughout the building. 

Coming Attractions 

New reasons to visit Washington cities 


Photos: Jordan Stead/Amazon 

IF YOU’RE TAKING advantage of the warm weather to head out on a road 

trip, we’ve got a few recently completed or in-progress attractions for you. 

SPOKANE 

In Spokane, Riverfront Park is in 

the midst of redevelopment. The 

park was the site of the World’s Fair 

Expo ’74, but hadn’t been updated 

in more than forty years. In 2014, 

Spokane passed a $64 million bond to 

redevelop it. Improvements include a 

skate ribbon that opened last winter 

and changes to the building that 

houses the carrousel, also complete. 

Construction will continue 

through late 2020 on the U.S. Pavilion 

event centers, and through 2019 on a 

large playground devoted to telling 

the story of Ice Age floods. Other 

upgrades to the area are ongoing. 

VANCOUVER 

In Vancouver, The Waterfront is 

32 acres of south-facing waterfront 

real estate. The $1.5 billion mixeduse 

development, which began 

construction in 2015, will provide 

new green spaces like public parks, 

walking and biking trails. In addition, 

there will be apartments and 

condominiums, up to 1.25 million 

square feet of commercial space, 

Hotel Indigo and The Shops on 

Waterfront Way. 

SEATTLE 

Finally, in Seattle, Amazon 

has completed The Spheres, a 

collaborative workspace with 40,000 

plants from around the world, 

water features, even paludariums, 

sometimes called garden aquariums. 

The structure opened at the end 

of January, and a restaurant from 

chef Renee Erickson, is expected to 

open this summer as well. There’s 

a visitor center called Understory 

at the base of the building, and the 

general public can schedule weekend 

visits to the building by going to 

seattlespheres.com. 


Ocean Shores 

MORE THAN A BEACH! 

SHOP • PLAY • DINE • STAY • FAMILY FUN 

VISITOCEANSHORESWA.COM

what i’m working on 

Washingtonians from 

around the state are 

being trained to monitor 

bumble bee populations. 

Mapping Washington’s Bumble Bees 

Volunteers work to monitor the 

state’s bumble bee population 

interview by Nick Engelfried 

FOR RICH HATFIELD, senior conservation 

biologist with the Xerces Society for 

Invertebrate Conservation, the Pacific 

Northwest Bumble Bee Atlas marks the 

culmination of two decades of work 

studying wild pollinators. The project will 

enlist volunteers to monitor bumble bee 

populations across the region, gathering 

data for conservation projects. In early 

June, Hatfield led a training for volunteers 

in Wenatchee in partnership with the 

Washington Department of Fish and 

Wildlife. Another Washington training will 

take place west of the Cascades in 2019. 

How did you end up studying pollinators? 

Between undergrad and grad school I worked with Dr. Claire 

Kremen, then at the Center for Conservation Biology at 

Stanford University, comparing insect pollinators on organic 

versus conventional agricultural lands (Dr. Kremen is now at 

University of California, Berkeley). Through that project, I 

realized pollinators and benefits they provide create a strong 

conservation message. You can attach a dollar value to 

pollinators due to their clear ecosystem services, an economic 

piece that was missing from many other conservation projects. 

That really got me interested in continuing to study bees. 

What’s the significance of bumble bees? 

Not everyone realizes honey bees are a non-native species 

imported from Europe. We have about 3,600 North American 

native bees, including around fifty bumble bees. However, 

many native bees are tiny, and in grad school, I realized how 

hard it is to identify most without doing a whole PhD on them. 

Bumble bees are a workable group to identify and 

good ambassadors for native pollinators. They’re also 

major pollinators of crops like tomatoes, blueberries 

and cranberries. Eighty-five percent of plants require 


what i’m working on 

FROM LEFT Rich Hatfield trains volunteers on how to monitor bee populations. There are about 3,000 North American native bees. 

“I realized pollinators and benefits they provide create a strong 

conservation message. You can attach a dollar value to pollinators 

due to their clear ecosystem services, an economic piece that was 

missing from many other conservation projects. That really got 

me interested in continuing to study bees.” 

— Rich Hatfield, Xerces Society senior conservation biologist 

pollinators, and it’s not honey bees 

doing most of that work. Mostly it’s 

native pollinators. 

Can you tell me about the Bumble 

Bee Atlas? 

In 2014, we started Bumble Bee 

Watch, an online citizen-science 

platform where people submit photos 

of bumble bees they’ve spotted. 

We’ve had some 25,000 records 

submitted. The problem is they 

mostly correspond to population 

centers where people submitting the 

photos live, and from a conservation 

biology standpoint that’s not terribly 

useful. For the Bumble Bee Atlas 

we’ve divided Washington, Oregon 

and Idaho into 50-by-50-kilometer 

transects. We’re asking volunteers to 

adopt a grid cell and sample it at least 

twice a year using our standardized 

protocols. The idea is to conduct a 

more systematic survey. 

How can people help native 

pollinators? 

One great thing about pollinator 

conservation is you actually can do 

something about it. If you live in 

an apartment and put flowers in a 

pot on the porch, bees will show up. 

Good bee habitat means flowers 

blooming spring through fall, bare 

patches of ground and wood for 

nesting and overwintering sites, and 

having flowers be pesticide-free. 

Native plants are best because that’s 

what native bees evolved with. Visit 

the Pollinator Conservation Resource 

Center, bringbackthepollinators.org, for 

more information. 

What’s next for you and the Bumble 

Bee Atlas? 

I’ll be encouraging people to sign up 

as volunteers, because I can’t do this 

project without help. It would take 

me years to collect the data we’ll be 

gathering. Joining the project is a 

great way to learn how to become a 

wildlife watcher anywhere, even in your 

backyard or neighborhood park. A 

whole safari is waiting for you out there. 

I’ve raised my kids this way and it’s been 

huge for them, realizing they can go in 

the yard and find insects. If kids can 

grow up as little entomologists instead 

of being afraid of bugs, that’s a big deal, 

in my opinion. 


my workspace 

Martin Ramos, ranch manager of thirdgeneration 

hop farm Segal Ranch, has been 

working with hops for more than thirty 

years. Once dubbed the “hop whisperer,” 

Ramos was trained by USDA hop research 

scientist Chuck Zimmerman, a renowned 

innovator in creating new hop varieties. 

“I don’t think I possess any magical 

capabilities,” Ramos said. “I wish I did.” 

The 470-acre ranch grows ten 

varieties of aroma hops. “It’s 

a unique plant,” Ramos said of 

the perennial bine that grows 

on 20-foot poles throughout 

the Yakima Valley. “A lot of 

people, when they drive by 

and see all those poles, they 

wonder what it is.” 

My Workspace 

Among the Bines 

Life on a hop farm at Segal Ranch 

written and photographed by Catie Joyce-Bulay 


my workspace 

Martin also tends two small vegetable 

gardens on the farm, where he grows 

several types of hot peppers, including a 

variety he acquired on a trip to Mexico ten 

years ago. Every harvest, the brewers Segal 

Ranch works with are invited to a Mexicanstyle 

barbecue, with tortillas made fresh 

on-site and Ramos’s peppers flavoring the 

dishes, all complemented by the hoppy 

beers the brewers bring to the party—one 

of Ramos’s favorite parts of harvest. 

With the scent of fresh hops strong 

in the air during harvest, brewers 

gather at the ranch for selection, 

where they do the rub-and-smell 

test on different varieties harvested 

at different times to decide which 

they want to brew with. Ramos 

won’t make crop predictions at 

the beginning of the year—“Just 

when you think you understand 

this plant, it will surprise you”— 

but once the crop is harvested and 

he watches the brewers inhale the 

earthy aromas, he’s not nervous. “I 

know the hops are good.” 


game changer 

Hooked on Sustainability 

Following a new school of thought with 

line-caught, sustainable Pacific cod 


Blue North has efficiencies 

that make it sustainable. 

IN THE NORTHWEST, a pair of industrious, forward-thinking 

brothers continue to make waves in the fishing industry—in all 

the best ways. Originally from upstate New York, the duo felt 

the pull of Alaska in the ’70s, when they first dove deep into the 

world of fishing. They haven’t stopped since. 

In 2015, they launched the Humane Harvest Initiative, 

which “seeks to increase the recognition of fish as deserving 

of the same treatment standards that are already in place for 

livestock.” Then, in 2016, they put one of the most efficient, safe 

and sustainable hook-and-line fleets onto the clean waters of 

the North Pacific. 

Highlights of this revolutionary craft include modern crew 

accommodations and amenities, low greenhouse-gas emissions 

(fuel efficiencies and heat recovery) and processing efficiencies 

designed to fully utilize resources. “Although the vessel is the 

most modern long liner in the world, we still catch the cod fish 

the same way they did 150 years ago—on a hook, one at a time,” 

founder and vice-president Pat Burns explained. “That’s why 

this fishery is so sustainable.” 

Consumers can now enjoy what the Burns describe as “the 

highest-quality, frozen-at-sea products around.” Thanks to 

advanced technology, the fishermen use humane practices 

that “eliminate stress hormones to ensure less pain and fear 

for the fish at the time of harvest.” The result? According to 

a blind study conducted by the School of Food Science at 

Washington State University, a higher-quality, flakier fish that 

retains more health benefits than those exposed to traditional 

harvesting methods. 

Blue North’s Humane Harvest filets, which are processed 

within three hours of coming out of the water, are available at 

Town and Country and Central markets in the Puget Sound area, 

as well as several Seattle restaurants, like Pike Place Market’s 

Etta’s and Dahlia Lounge. “For those who are concerned about 

the ethical treatment of fish, the safety of fishermen and the 

health of our oceans, Humane Harvest is the gold standard for 

wild, line-caught Pacific cod,” founder and chairman Michael 

Burns said. 

The brothers agree that in order to make wise choices, 

consumers need to know where their food comes from and 

how it was raised, gathered or processed. “Get to know your 

fishermen, ask questions, and demand a high standard for 

yourself and family,” Mike Burns said. Pat Burns added, “Our 

job is not done yet. I’m concerned with how America eats, and 

I want to put every pound of cod fish that we catch onto a plate 

in the U.S. for all of us to enjoy this healthy, sustainably caught, 

humanely harvested, wild protein source.” 

“The Bering Sea fisheries are some of the best managed 

fisheries in the world,” he said. “We’ve constructed the Blue 

North with an eye to future. We are in it for the long haul. … 

The future of the cod fishery is very bright.” 


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Plan ahead. 

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The Heart of the Olympics from Sea-to-Summit & Canal-to-Coast

LOCAL 

LOVE 

WASHINGTON’S 

FOOD SCENE IS A 

CELEBRATION OF 

LOCAL FLAVORS 

written by 

Corinne Whiting 


WHEN IT COMES TO SOURCING 

INGREDIENTS IN WASHINGTON, 

GOING LOCAL SEEMS NON-NEGOTIABLE. THANKS TO THE REGION’S RICH TERRAIN, TEMPERATE CLIMATE AND 

NETWORK OF TALENTED FARMERS, GROWERS AND FISHERMEN, RICHES ABOUND WHETHER WE’RE TALKING 

HOPS FOR BEER (THE STATE GROWS NEARLY 80 PERCENT OF THE COUNTRY’S SUPPLY) OR SEASONAL FAVORITES 

FROM CHERRIES AND APPLES TO WALLA WALLA SWEET ONIONS. 

Some products, however, fly under the radar. 

Washington, for example, is the highest blueberryproducing 

state in the country, having yielded about 

120 million pounds in 2016. Washington asparagus, 

which comes in several varieties and is one of the first 

products to arrive each spring, supported the local 

economy in 2017 by bringing in $45 million. 

Sara Morris, president of The Beecher’s Foundation, 

launched by creative food company Sugar Mountain 

(famous for its award-winning Beecher’s Handmade 

Cheese), said food grown here proves so remarkable for 

many of the reasons the region is also home to countless 

entrepreneurs and tech pioneers. “There’s something 

in the water,” she said. “This region attracts a certain 

profile, and the rest of us get to benefit from that.” 

“Washington’s climate is ideal for organic production 

because there aren’t too many insect pests,” said Susan 

Ujcic, co-founder of Helsing Junction Farms (located 

outside of Olympia) with Anna Salafsky. “We also 

have a long growing season and summers that usually 

aren’t too hot.” 

In the educational yet approachable workshops 

Beecher’s Foundation hosts for adults and 

schoolchildren, Morris and her team discuss how food 

has evolved over time. The way Americans eat today, 

she noted, has dramatically shifted from how humans 

ate for centuries, leaving us far removed from “pure, 

real, true food.” She and her team recently launched 

a ten-year campaign “to change Puget Sound’s food 

for good.” 

“When we buy local or grow our own,” she said, “we 

are getting that much closer to the food source. … We 

know what we’re putting in our body and not harming 

the earth while we’re at it.” 


RESIDENTS AND 

VISITORS NEED 

ONLY STEP FOOT 

INTO BUSTLING PIKE 

PLACE MARKET TO 

EXPERIENCE THE LOCAL 

FOOD SCENE WITH ALL 

THEIR SENSES. 

Matthew Mornick 

ABOVE Pike Place Market 

visitors look at pepper 

wreaths and garlands. 

SAVORING LOCAL FLAVORS 

Residents and visitors need only step foot 

into bustling Pike Place Market to experience 

the local food scene with all their senses. The 

market formed in 1907 when Seattle citizens 

became outraged at a ten-fold price increase in 

onions—as a result, farmers started selling their 

products on a vacant wooden roadway. Today 

the much-expanded Pike Place remains one of 

the oldest continuously operating markets in 

the country. 

Outside the city, foodies enjoy meandering 

along the Olympic Culinary Loop, a tasty trail 

showing off the Olympic Peninsula’s diverse 

microclimates, coastal proximity and Native 

American heritage. In Wenatchee, the Stemilt 

Growers Retail Store lets visitors sample the 

bounty of one of the state’s premier apple, pear 

and cherry growers. In every season, events 

honor the state’s most celebrated products, 

ranging from the Hama Hama OysterRama, held 

each spring in Lilliwaup, to the Dungeness Crab 

& Seafood Festival, held each fall in Port Angeles. 

URBAN FARMING 

In downtown Seattle, restaurants like Urbane 

pride themselves on using local ingredients and 

purveyors. Since opening its doors, Urbane has 

counted Tonnemaker Farms of Royal City, just 

east of Ellensburg, as part of the family. It’s clear 

that chef Brian Pusztai couldn’t agree more 

with the eatery’s philosophy. “For me,” he said, 

“I’ve always felt sourcing locally is the right 

thing to do. You’re working with the flavors 

of the Pacific Northwest that haven’t had to 

travel far, meaning they are the freshest they 

can possibly be. I also take interest in knowing 

exactly where my food is coming from.” 

Pusztai loves working with local, fresh 

seafood, especially Penn Cove mussels and the 

Taylor Shellfish shigoku oysters. “My family 

and I often make the visit to Taylor Shellfish’s 

Chuckanut farm in Samish Bay, right outside 

of Bellingham,” he said. “I also really enjoy 

working with geoduck because it is such a 

unique ingredient to the Pacific Northwest 

that tastes delicious. Oh, and we can’t forget 


DIGGING DEEP WITH LOCAL FARMERS 

FROM TOP Planting time at Helsing 

Junction Farms. Tonnemaker Farms 

works with Urbane in Seattle. Mussels 

are a Washington specialty. 

ANNA SALAFSKY & SUSAN UJCIC 

HELSING JUNCTION FARMS 

Anna Salafsky and Susan Ujcic, 

who began Helsing Junction Farms 

in 1992, remain deeply committed 

to organic farming and their community. 

Located 20 miles south 

of Olympia in Rochester, on the 

Chehalis River, the farm sells most 

of its produce through a Community 

Supported Agriculture 

(CSA) program, but it also hosts 

weddings, an annual music festival 

and farm-to-table experiences in a 

lovely event space. 

The farm grows more than 150 

varieties of organic vegetables, 

fruit, flowers and herbs. “We’ve 

been farming together for over 

twenty-five years,” Ujcic said, “so 

we bring a lot of experience to the 

table, but we also love trying new 

things. We focus on the health of 

our soil, so everything we grow 

tastes and looks its best.” 

Both have strong design 

backgrounds and a deep love of 

food—once they began farming, 

they were hooked. “Working with 

the earth and feeding people is 

deeply rewarding; we really enjoy 

sharing the farm with our community,” 

Ujcic said. 

TODD VAN MERSBERGEN 

HMV BERRIES 

Todd Van Mersbergen’s family 

farms 200 acres north of 

Lynden, about 1 mile south of the 

Canadian border, where they’ve 

been working since the early 

1900s. “You could say I was born 

to farm,” Van Mersbergen, who 

has been directly involved for the 

last twenty years, said. “ I am the 

fourth generation to farm here 

in Lynden, and many generations 

before that were involved in 

agriculture in Holland. We started 

as dairy farmers and diversified 

into raspberries in 1995 and into 

blueberries in 2006. It’s great to 

be your own boss and really see 

the rewards from your planning 

and labor during harvest.” 

Today the Van Mersbergens 

farm about 100 acres each of red 

raspberries and blueberries. “The 

cool maritime climate and long 

days during the growing season 

make Whatcom County an ideal 

place to grow blueberries,” Van 

Mersbergen said. “Couple that 

with rich, well-drained soil, and it’s 

no wonder we can get the most 

tonnage per acre and highest 

sugar content in our berries.” 

“The best part about farming 

is taking my wife and kids out to 

the field and driving down the 

rows, being able to be outside 

with them and watch the plants 

go through their phases,” he said. 

“The farm is a great place to learn 

about life. That’s the other part 

I love—the seasonal nature of 

farming, and getting to work with 

the environment and the weather. 

No two days are ever the same.” 

GARY LARSEN 

LARSEN FARMS, INC. 

Located just north of Pasco, 

this family farm has fantastic 

views of Juniper Dunes. The Larsens 

have been here since the early 

’60s, when they broke the ground 

out of sagebrush and bunchgrass, 

and the only roads were two-track 

trails used by sheepherders. 

Larsen’s family is one of the 

seventy remaining asparagus 

farmers in the state. “In ’85 

when we started with asparagus, 

there were 32,000 acres of it 

in the state, and now there are 

4,400 acres,” he said. He credits 

an abundance of good quality 

water, rich soils and changing 

seasons for making Washington 

“the premier state for growing 

asparagus.” He praises the region’s 

rich volcanic soils and the fact 

that asparagus here go dormant 

in the winter, allowing nutrients 

and carbohydrates to move to the 

crowns (roots) for sweet crops 

the following year. 

The most rewarding part of 

his job? “Seeing the success and 

breaking some of the traditional 

ways of growing asparagus,” 

Larsen said. “Also, seeing people 

come back year after year to buy 

our crops and saying, ‘We have 

tried other asparagus and none 

compare to the sweetness and 

quality of yours.’” 


cooking with 

washington's 

best foods 

WILD RICE & APPLE SALAD WITH BEECHER’S FLAGSHIP RESERVE & MAMA LIL’S PEPPERS 

SEATTLE / BEECHER’S HANDMADE CHEESE 

Kurt Beecher Dammeier 

SERVES 4-6 AS A SIDE 

1 cup uncooked 

wild rice 

3½ cups water 

1 teaspoon kosher 

salt, divided 

½ bunch fresh 

flat-leaf parsley, 

roughly chopped 

½ bunch fresh 

cilantro, roughly 

chopped 

In a fine-mesh strainer, rinse rice under cold water. Combine rice, ½ teaspoon 

salt and the water in a medium or large saucepan. Over medium-high heat, bring 

rice to a boil. Stir, reduce heat to low, cover with a tight-fitting lid and simmer 

for 30 to 50 minutes. The grains will burst and show a white interior when done. 

Fluff the rice with a fork and transfer to a container. Store in the refrigerator 

until completely cool. 

In a large mixing bowl, combine rice with remaining ingredients. Using a large 

spoon, mix until well combined. Add seasoning as needed. 

FENNEL AND APPLE SALAD 

SEATTLE / BEECHER’S FOUNDATION 

SERVES 4 

FOR SALAD 

1 box pepper greens 

½ bunch lacinato 

kale, chiffonade 

1/4 bulb fennel, 

shaved 

Fennel stems, thinly 

sliced 

Fennel fronds, 


1 bunch green 

onions, sliced 

½ cup roughly 

chopped Mama 

Lil’s Peppers, plus 

2 teaspoons of oil 

1 cup coarsely grated 

Beecher’s Flagship 

Reserve cheese 

1 medium apple, 

cored and chopped 

½ apple, matchstick 

½ bunch parsley, 


½ bunch tarragon, 

finely chopped 

FOR DRESSING 

¼ cup rice wine 

vinegar 

½ teaspoon honey 

3 tablespoons apple 

cider vinegar 

¼ cup expeller-pressed 

safflower oil 

¼ teaspoon 

granulated garlic 

⅛ teaspoon black 

pepper 

Pinch of chili powder 

¾ cup extra-virgin 

olive oil (ideally 

first cold pressing 

or cold pressed) 

½ teaspoon Dijon 

mustard 

Salt and pepper, 

to taste 

Start with pepper greens and add each new vegetable as you chop it. 

FOR DRESSING 

Whisk all ingredients except oil until combined. Slowly whisk in oil to emulsify. 

If you want to take a foolproof shortcut, you can use an immersion blender 

to emulsify any dressing. 

GEODUCK CLAM CHOWDER 

SEATTLE / AQUA BY EL GAUCHO 

Wesley Hood 

YIELDS 12 BOWLS 

½ cup bonito broth, 

or dashi 

4 ounces geoduck, 

belly diced, syphon 

puréed 

4 ounces razor clam 

meat, belly diced, 

syphon puréed 

3/5 pound manila 

clams, juice 

reserved, meat 

cooled and 

chopped, shells 

discarded (reserve 

a few steamed 

clams for garnish) 

3 ounces bacon 

3 ounces onion 

1½ ounces celery 

5 ounces potato 

1 bay leaf 

1 sprig fresh thyme 

½ tablespoon garlic 

1¼ ounce rice flour 

2 ounces butter 

¼ teaspoon black 

pepper 

4½ cups heavy cream 

1 ounce butter 

1 tablespoon chopped 

parsley 

FOR BEURRE MANIER 

1¼ ounce rice flour 

2 ounces butter 

FOR FINISH 

4½ cups heavy cream 

1 ounce butter 

1 tablespoon chopped 

Cross-slice the bacon thinly and add it to a thickbottomed 

pot. Cook on medium-high heat until 

browned, scraping up and stirring periodically with 

a wooden spoon. Meanwhile, dice onion and celery 

to ¼-inch pieces. Tie up bay leaf and thyme in a 

sachet, then quarter and thinly slice the potatoes 

into ¼-inch pieces. 

Once bacon is browned, add celery and onion and 

cook until vegetables are translucent. Add garlic and 

cook for another minute. Add bonito broth and all of 

the clam juice to deglaze, scraping up the fond with 

the wooden spoon. Reduce heat to a simmer. Add 

sachet of bay leaves and thyme to pot. Add black 

pepper, and simmer for 10 minutes. 

Add the clam purée, and potatoes and simmer 

for 7 minutes. When potatoes are almost tender it’s 

time to thicken it with the beurre manier. Remove 

herbs and discard. 

FOR BEURRE MANIER 

Mash together rice flour and warm butter by hand 

until a smooth paste is formed. If it is not smooth, 

you will have lumps of flour in your chowder. 

Remove 1 quart of the simmering liquid from the 

chowder and add it to the bowl with the butter and 

flour mixture. Whisk until smooth. Add this mixture 

back into the chowder pot. 

Increase the heat and stir constantly until 

thickened, approximately 185 degrees. 

Cool immediately. 

FOR FINISH 

Shortly before serving, add cream to above base, then 

add reserved belly meat. Combine butter, parsley and 

clams, then add steamed clams on top as garnish. 

MORE ONLINE: Find a recipe for Ash-roasted Walla Walla Onions with Basil Ricotta, Cherries, Prosciutto & Mustard Greens at 1889mag.com/locallove 


Travis Gillett 

Travis Gillett 

fresh foraged mushrooms. There are so many 

varieties that are right in our backyard, like 

morel and yellow chanterelles.” 

Not far from downtown, culinary 

aficionados enjoy a ten-block stroll in the Pike- 

Pine neighborhood between Melrose Market 

and Chophouse Row, two buzzing hubs for 

talented local growers, makers and collectors. 

Highlights among the markets’ many vendors 

include Rain Shadow’s famous bacon, cuts of 

beef, charcuterie and terrines, not to mention 

its selection of in-season produce (think 

blueberries, peaches and apples from the 

Yakima Valley). Visitors can also dine on the 

rooftop of Terra Plata, surrounded by organic 

gardens, or enjoy a pairing of fresh crab and 

pinot gris at Taylor Shellfish. 

“Not only do we celebrate local bounty— 

everything from hand-foraged mushrooms 

and fiddlehead ferns at Sitka & Spruce (the 

menu changes daily to reflect only whatever 

is in season) to the abundance of crab and 

shellfish, often caught that day, straight from 

Taylor Shellfish Farms in the waters of Puget 

Sound,” Melrose Market and Chophouse Row 

owner Liz Dunn said. “But in some cases, over 

its more than ten years, Melrose Market has 

made certain local foods famous.” Among these 

items—the Plane Bread and hand-churned 

butter that have anchored Sitka’s menu from 

the get-go and the handcrafted cheeses from 

Kurt Timmermeister’s cows on Vashon Island 

and Richard and Louise Yarmuth’s goats 

in Darlington. 

GOOD TO THE LAST BITE 

When it comes to the benefits of living here, 

there seems to be a consensus—amazing food 

that’s inextricably linked to the landscape and 

culture. “Being so close to so many amazing 

products in the Pacific Northwest, from the 

produce to the beer and wine,” Pusztai said of 

why he lives here. “The summers are amazing, 

and I love to get out in the sun while boating, 

crabbing or swimming in Lake Washington. “ 

Plus, customers are looking for a place they 

can call home, and Washington’s farmers, 

ranchers, chefs and others are providing that. 

“There’s more latent demand than ever for 

locally sourced, hand-picked product. And 

I mean handpicked in both senses—sourced 

directly from the fields, forests and waters of 

the Northwest, and also hand-curated by our 

vendors,” Dunn said. “Here’s why it matters to 

customers: In an increasingly digitized, onlinedriven 

world, people are hungrier than ever for 

a sense of place.” 

ABOVE, CLOCKWISE 

FROM LEFT Chophouse 

Row and Melrose Market 

offer local food to visitors. 

Rain Shadow meats are 

among the markets’ 

delicacies. 


Fermenting 

Wilderness 

EXPLORING THE WILD BEERS OF WASHINGTON 

written by Mike Allen 

photography by James Harnois 


An E9 Brewery employee pulls a sample 

for barrel blending for future fruit beers. 

T 

TEN YEARS AGO, SHANE JOHNS WAS GIVING 

away wild beer for free. The biology 

major turned brewer was working at 

Tacoma’s Engine House No. 9 with head 

brewer Doug Tiede. The pair captured 

wild yeast from a friend’s Tacoma-area 

backyard, and used the resulting culture 

to brew batches of funky, tart ales in 

the Flanders tradition, aging them in 

5-gallon oak barrels. There was so little 

interest at the time that the wild beers 

never made it to the tap list. Instead, the 

pair bottled them up and drank them or 

gave them to friends. But Johns kept at 

it, harvesting another yeast strain from 

inside the brewery and growing that 

into another house culture. 

When Tiede left the company in 

2009 and new ownership took over, 

Johns presented them his wild brews 

and was rebuffed. So he plugged 

away at the brewery’s catalog of 

conventionally fermented beers until 

X Group Restaurants, Tacoma-based 

restaurateurs, took over Engine House 

No. 9 in 2011 and rebranded the brewery 

as E9. 

“They were more wine guys,” 

Johns said of X Group. “I was able to 

present them with five beers that were 

completely finished.” 

The persistence paid off, and the time 

was finally right. “They said, ‘If this is 

1889 WASHINGTON’S MAGAZINE 59

what you want to do, then let’s do it,’” 

Johns said. Now they have 100 oak 

barrels aging all the time, and plan to 

bring in 150 more. 

There’s a microscopic wilderness 

all around us, floating on air currents, 

teeming on fruit and flowers, leaves 

and even bark. Apart from the visible 

“bloom” of yeast on grapes and 

blueberries, it’s a wilderness most of us 

will never experience in any meaningful 

detail. But in wild fermentations, we can 

taste it. Each strain of yeast or bacteria, 

even of the same species, produces its 

own byproducts during fermentation. 

Yeast from Yakima apples will lend a 

different background flavor than that of 

Cascades rose hips. Microbes harvested 

from the air just outside of Tacoma 

lend peach notes to E9 brews, while 

those from inside the brewery are more 

cherry pie. 

Johns was among the first of a 

cadre of Washington brewers to 

go beyond the catalogs of the yeast 

laboratory and harvest distinctly 

Northwestern microbes from which to 

craft distinctively Northwestern beers. 

While American wild brewers took 

their first cues from the traditional 

brewers of Belgium, northern France 

and Germany, who have long relied 

on ambient yeast to ferment their tart, 

funky and refreshing beers, it’s far from 

where they stopped. 

One purist definition of “wild beer” is 

“spontaneously fermented.” This means 

the wort is cooled slowly in an open 

environment, in a wide, open metal 

tray called a “coolship,” an anglicization 

of the Flemish koelschip. As it cools, 

the hope is that airborne yeast and 

bacteria collect on the surface and make 

themselves at home in the nutrient-rich 

environment. This method produces 

beers that are definitely wild. But 

without the decades- or centuries-old 

breweries and equipment of Europe— 

which are already crawling with 

the “right” (and arguably somewhat 

domesticated) microbes—it’s also dicey. 

“Wild” here involves a few different 

processes, from coolship inoculation, to 

wild harvesting, to hybrid inoculations. 

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP The exterior of the historic 

Engine House No. 9. The bottle-labeling machine at 

E9 Brewery. E9 head brewer Shane Johns. 

The Northwest has long had the right stuff for crafting fermented beverages. 

Even the weather helps contribute to successful fermentations, 

which is especially important for the long cooling and 

extended aging often required for wild brews. All these factors 

brought Ron Extract and Amber Watts from Austin, Texas, to 

Burlington, Washington. 

“When we started thinking about places, we thought about 

where everything exists for making beer,” Watts said. In 

addition to the “very unique, beautiful malt,” hops, and fruit, 

the Skagit Valley climate is “perfect for minimal temperature intervention 

for fermentation,” she said. 

Watts and Extract became well-known for expanding the milieu of 

artisan beer at Austin’s renowned Jester King brewery. Progressing from 

Jester King’s tradition of incorporating plenty of fruit and herbs into the 

mix, their fledgling Garden Path Fermentation will produce not only 

beer, but mead, fruit wine and cider—a veritable universe of alcoholic 

fermentation. Also, unlike most wild brews, Garden Path’s beers won’t 

necessarily be sour. Most of them will be what might be described as 

“clean drinking.” 

“We’re actually exploring the softer side of fermentation,” Extract said. 

“If people come up to us at a festival and expect a beer that’s going to 

dissolve the enamel off their teeth, they’re not going to find that.” 

There’s a misconception that “wild” is synonymous with “sour,” and 

indeed the guezes and lambics of Flanders are usually quite sour, so the 

terms are sometimes used interchangeably. But a brew can be quickly 

soured with fruit juice, or by adding commercial preparations of lactic 

60 1889 WASHINGTON’S MAGAZINE

Yeast is transferred to a foudre for fermentation 

at Garden Path Fermentation in Burlington.

acid-producing bacteria. Conversely, 

beer brewed with wild microbes needn’t 

necessarily be sour. 

Different microorganisms prefer 

different environments, Garden Path’s 

head brewer Jason Hansen explained. 

By providing the right environment 

for the organisms the brewer wants to 

encourage, while discouraging others, 

he can achieve a desired result with a 

mixed bag of bugs. 

For example, Hansen said, “If we want 

to select for saccharomyces (the cleanfermenting 

genus of domesticated 

yeast), we might use more hops. If we 

want more brettanomyces (the wild 

yeast genus that produces funky aromas 

and tartness), we’ll use less.” 

Garden Path is creating coolshipinoculated 

beers, but they’ll also ferment 

with yeasts harvested from fruit, flowers 

and the air around the Skagit Valley. By 

inoculating small batches of wort, they 

can grow wild yeasts and bacteria up 

into cultures, sometimes called “yeast 

wrangling.” The rest is in the aging 

and blending of beers from different 

barrels—what Extract refers to as a 

“curating or editing process.” 

That curating process means some 

brews will never make it to the public, 

since they may never be “presentable.” 

It also means that brewing wild can be 

spontaneous in more than one way— 

the brewer regularly tastes and reacts 

to the state of the brew, rather than 

working on a specific and predictable 

timetable. For this reason, it’s hard to 

say precisely what will be on offer when 

the first beers come out of production, 

hopefully this fall. 

The other obstacle is that wild takes a 

while—up to three years in the case of 

some spontaneously fermented, barrelaged 

beers. While saccharomyces works 

quickly to digest sugar into alcohol, other 

microbes work slowly, and the beer 

takes time to “mature,” sometimes going 

through unpalatable stages to emerge as 

something more glorious. Meanwhile, 

brewers who haven’t been toiling away 

in an established brewery have to sell 

more quickly fermented beers, or find 

ways to shorten the timelines. 

CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT Garden Path Fermentation 

co-founders Ron Extract and Amber Watts. Extract 

harvests yeast from flowers. Yeast capture and 

fermentation experiments at Garden Path. Mead 

ferments in a barrel at the brewery. 

62 1889 WASHINGTON’S MAGAZINE

Dwinell 

Country Ales 

Open for less than a year, Dwinell 

Country Ales in Goldendale 

is pouring a lineup of 

quenching, slightly tart 

and funky brews, perfect 

for drinking under 

Goldendale’s famously clear 

desert skies. Cofounder and 

brewer Justin Leigh said 

Goldendale, an agricultural community 

of fewer than 3,500 residents, makes 

more sense for a country brewery than 

“under the train tracks,” in say, Chicago. 

Much of what’s now on tap has been 

fermented using the “wild” inoculants 

now offered in the catalogs of most 

major yeast labs, with a steady trickle 

of brews incorporating local fruits and 

their yeasts. Leigh takes an experimental 

approach to wild fermentation, finding 

ways to merge laboratory sophistication 

with hand-harvested yeasts from 

the countryside. For example, he 

and cofounder-wife Jocelyn Dwinell 

Leigh picked Yakima Valley apples, 

spontaneously fermented them into 

cider, and had the yeast analyzed and 

propagated by Gresham, Oregon’s 

Imperial Yeast. He’s incorporating 

these local wild yeasts and bacteria 

into shorter fermentations, adding 

complexity and soul to clean-drinking 

and accessible ales. 

In the brewery behind the airy, 

sunny taproom, an old dairy tank—his 

makeshift coolship—sits in the middle 

of the room as a wall of oak barrels sits 

aging various spontaneous and handharvested 

wild ales. These are the longterm 

projects, which will eventually be 

blended with one another or with local 

fruits and re-fermented. The beers on tap 

already taste like the place where they’re 

made and served, and with time spent 

living here, taking on the microscopic 

wilderness all around, they’ll become 

part of the landscape. 

1889 WASHINGTON’S MAGAZINE 63

FLOWER 

POWER 

photography by Katheryn Moran 

Among Washington’s bounty, flowers may sometimes 

be forgotten. Not so at Triple Wren Farms just north 

of Bellingham. Owners Steve and Sarah Pabody truly 

fell into flower farming after a friend asked them to 

look after his apple orchard. Today, they run a small 

cut-flower farm and florist and grow all kinds of 

vibrant, interesting flowers.

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT Owners Steve and Sarah Pabody stand with 

their kids—Chloe Wren, 7, and Trey, 11—who also help out around the farm. 

First-year field crew member Caroline Arnhart trims larkspur. 

Arnhart checks on sweet peas in the Triple Wren greenhouse. 

Snapdragons are just one of the various flora grown at the farm. Triple 

Wren also offers seasonal u-pick blueberries and a pumpkin patch. 

In addition to growing flowers, the Pabodys do arrangements and 

consultations for weddings, offer an internship program and hold 

workshops to help teach and support other farmer-florists like themselves. 



FAR LEFT A field crew member 

trims sweet peas at Triple Wren 

Farms. 

TOP RIGHT Once trimmed, 

flowers are arranged into buckets. 

BOTTOM, FROM LEFT Triple 

Wren peonies. Sarah Pabody 

designs a custom bouquet. The 

finished arrangement. 


TRAVEL SPOTLIGHT 72 

ADVENTURE 74 

LODGING 78 

TRIP PLANNER 80 

NORTHWEST DESTINATION 84 

pg. 74 

At Cherry Wood Bed, Breakfast & Barn, get 

up close and personal with the horses.

In Eastern Washington, 

Pullman is the place to be 

Ken Carper, kencarperphotos.com 

Ask for more 

Pullman Chamber and Visitor Center 

pullmanchamber.com 

800-365-6948

travel spotlight 

Travel Spotlight 

On-Campus Creamery 

Washington State University’s 

ice cream shop and cheesemaking 

facility is a foodie’s dream 


WASHINGTON STATE UNIVERSITY has a 

delicious secret—OK, maybe it’s not much of a 

secret, but it’s definitely delicious. Tucked away 

on campus is the Food Quality Building, which 

houses the WSU Creamery and its partner ice 

cream store, Ferdinand’s Ice Cream Shoppe. 

The ice cream shop opened in 1948 and serves 

more than a dozen flavors, including specialties 

like Apple Cup Crisp and Cougar Tracks. 

In addition to ice cream, students and faculty 

at the working creamery make Cougar Cheese, 

flavorful wheels that come in a can. The go-to is 

a white cheddar called Cougar Gold, but there 

are eight flavors for sale, ranging from smoky 

cheddar to hot pepper. The cheesemakers also 

create limited releases each year. 

The milk for the dairy creations come from 

the university’s own dairy farm. A group of 

students, the Cooperative University Dairy 

Students (CUDS, get it?), raise and manage the 

dairy cows. 

The Marc P. Bates Observation Room is open 

from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on weekdays. Visitors 

are likely to see students and faculty making 

Ferdinand’s ice cream and Cougar Cheese. The 

observation room also has videos to show the 

cheese and ice cream-making process at the 

WSU Creamery, just in case no one is working. 

Don’t want to leave it to chance? Call ahead to 

find the production schedule. 

If you have a group of twelve or more, you 

can reserve the room for a specific day and 

time, then enjoy a hosted visit, cheese curd 

samples and discounted ice cream. 


adventure 

Adventure 

Washington’s Fruit Basket 

Explore and taste wine by horse or by hayride 

written by Lauren Kramer 


adventure 

Cherry Wood BB&B offers 

wine tasting by horseback. 

ON A RECENT EVENING in Zillah, a small town 20 

miles southeast of Yakima, I sat outside absorbing 

the quiet serenity of a valley bathed in soft light. 

Before me orchards filled with neat rows of 

cherry, apple and peach trees stretched for miles, 

their lush fruit ripening as one hot day rolled into 

the next. Mount Adams and Mount Rainier were 

still heavily snowcapped, their peaks like ghosts 

in the far-off distance. Behind me, the door of my 

teepee flapped in the breeze, revealing a king bed 

decked in white linens, a sanctuary for the night 

and a place where I would wake to the sounds of 

horses grazing in the early morning. 

The Cherry Wood Bed, Breakfast & Barn, run by 

Pepper Fewel on her family’s working fruit farm, was 

my home for the night. A woman with a deep love of 

horses, Fewel runs the B, B & B to finance the care of 

twenty-six horses she’s rescued from the feedlot. She 

brings them to Cherry Wood to live out their final 

years grazing peacefully in her meadows and escorting 

guests on horseback wine-tasting tours through the 

orchards. Under her stewardship they receive love from 

both Fewel and her daughter, Tiffany, a Feldenkrais 

practitioner whose healing touch reduces both 

equestrian and human pain. 

On my first visit to Cherry Wood several years 

back, I ventured out on a horseback ride with Tiffany, 

stopping to admire the fruit hanging heavily from the 

tree boughs in the heat of summer. This time, I board 

Fewel’s alternative mode of transportation, a “cowboy 

limo” composed of a Jeep pulling a hay-filled wagon. 

Guests sit on cow hides in the wagon as they’re pulled 

through the orchards, stopping to sample wine at a 

handful of Zillah’s many wineries. 

Fewel launched the cowboy limo after a group of 

guests from the East Coast found themselves physically 

unable to get astride the horses. “They so wanted to 

tour through the orchards,” she recalled. “I had to find 

another way for them to get there. I tell my guests 

they’re welcome to board the limo—as long as they can 

stay on the wagon!” 

Staying on the wagon can be tougher than it sounds 

when you’re tasting wine. We drove slowly through the 

orchards, sampling cherries from trees whose fruit is 

just weeks away from being picked. Over the 

course of three hours we visited four wineries 

for tastings, and while all produced different 

wines, the experiences had one thing in 


adventure 

BEST BETS 

WHERE TO EAT: Don’t 

miss the incredible pizzas at 

Hoptown Wood Fired Pizza 

(hoptownpizza.com; 2560 

Donald Wapato Rd., Donald). 

Provisions Restaurant & 

Market (provisionsyakima. 

com; 2710 Terrace Heights Dr. 

Yakima) is a locavore’s haven 

with healthy comfort fare 

served in a classy setting. 

WHERE TO SLEEP: Cherry 

Wood Bed, Breakfast & Barn 

delivers a soft adventure 

with no sacrifice to comfort, 

luxury or fine breakfast 

foods. Rates start at $185 

per person per night. 

(cherrywoodbbandb.com) 

WHAT TO DO: You’ll never 

look at fruit the same way 

once you’ve toured the 

orchards where it’s grown 

and seen it ripening on the 

tree. Take a horseback tour 

of the vineyards or hop on 

the cowboy limo if riding 

is not your forte. Both 

deliver a mellow, enjoyable, 

safe tour of the wineries. 

For reservations visit 

cherrywoodbbandb.com. 

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP For a horse-free 

adventure, try the Cowboy Limo. Cherry Wood 

has rescue horses. Two Mountain Winery is 

one of the stops on the tour. 

Lauren Kramer 

common—each visit was filled with a personal touch. We 

met owners and winemakers eager to chat and share their 

stories, describing how their winery came to be and what it 

means to them. 

At Two Mountain Winery, Patrick and Matthew Rawn toil 

on farmland first planted by their grandfather in 1951. “With 

five generations of Yakima Valley farming pulsing through 

our veins, we are predisposed to have dirty fingernails and an 

inherent love of the land,” Patrick said. “We live, breathe and 

drink our work.” Today one brother grows grapes on 26 acres 

of vineyards while the other makes estate wine sold across 

nineteen states. 

Back on the limo, we rode the dusty back roads to Cultura, 

a winery owned and operated by Fewel’s son and daughterin-law, 

Tad and Sarah. The couple purchased their first fruit 

in 2005 and replanted a section of family farmland with 

zinfandel and cabernet franc before opening the tasting 

room in 2008. “We’re still learning,” he said. 

At Dineen Family Vineyards, we stopped to admire 

immaculately groomed gardens and the rows of healthy 

vineyards outside the tasting room. “We make just 600 cases 

of wine a year, so we’re mostly grape sellers,” spokesman 

David Rodriguez said as he walked us through the vineyards. 

One of the interesting details at the vineyard is the falconer 

it has hired, whose raptors control the populations of birds 

and sage rats that feed on the grapes. It’s also a sacred place 

for community gatherings. Saturdays in summer, local chef 

Chris Guerra helms the outdoor pizza oven steps from the 

Dineen tasting room, and valley locals flock to the vineyard 

for picnics on the lush lawns. 

That sense of warmth, family connection and close-knit 

community is a common thread wherever we ventured in the 

Yakima Valley. Visitors come to this arid corner, the veritable 

fruit basket of Washington, to relish the great wines, but 

leave touched by the stories, the lineage and the warm heart 

that beats a steady welcome. 


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photo by Mitchel Osborne 

BEAUTIFUL BOATS | DEMOS | LOCAL FOOD | GREAT MUSIC 

ON-THE-WATER FUN | SPEAKERS | KIDSʼ ACTIVITIES

Photos: Mayflower Park Hotel 

Lodging 

Mayflower Park Hotel 


THE YEAR 2017 marked ninety years of continuous operation for 

this downtown Seattle gem. Though the hotel has been refurbished 

over the years, you’ll still feel like you’re stepping into the past, 

and the luxurious past at that. Through the doors, you’ll begin to 

experience an oasis of calm right in the heart of the city. 

405 OLIVE WAY 

SEATTLE 

mayflowerpark.com 

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT The lobby features 

Queen Anne-style furniture. Rooms have been 

refurbished. Oliver’s is the perfect spot for a cocktail. 

ACCOMMODATIONS 

The 160 guest rooms come in a variety of 

options, from a classic guest room featuring 

signature extra-deep bathtubs, original 1927 

tiled bathroom floors and elegant Queen 

Anne-style furniture, to well-appointed suites 

for those who might be celebrating, need 

room for a private business meeting, or just 

want a panoramic view. 

DINING 

If you’re staying on a Wednesday, be sure 

to catch the complimentary wine reception 

starting at 4:30 p.m. Pop into Oliver’s Lounge 

for light bites, lunch and cocktails seven 

days a week from 11:30 a.m. to 2 a.m., with 

complimentary appetizers served during happy 

hour, 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. every day but Sunday. 

Be sure to ask about the history of the large 

windows—a response to new laws in the 1970s 

that allowed bars to operate in public view, 

rather than closed off from natural light and 

passersby. Those windows, along with their 

cocktails, made Oliver’s a landmark in the city. 

For breakfast and dinner, check out Andaluca, 

serving Northwest food inspired by the flavors 

of the Mediterranean. Don’t want to leave 

your robe? Room service is available twentyfour 

hours a day. 

EVENTS 

There’s nothing like a historic backdrop for 

a special occasion, and the Mayflower Park 

delivers on one-of-a-kind wedding photos in 

a central location. Make your next meeting a 

little more aesthetically pleasing with meeting 

spaces for a variety of group sizes. 


trip planner 

Leavenworth is the Washington version of Bavaria. 

Icicle TV 


trip planner 

Welcome to Leavenworth 

Washington’s quirky Bavarian mountain town 


CRAVING A EUROPEAN FIX (with a twist) in the Pacific Northwest? Leave your passport at home 

and journey to Leavenworth, where Washington’s version of Bavaria bustles with quirky charm in a 

stunning mountain setting. From Seattle, travel two and a half hours east over the pass to this popular 

destination—one whose draws extend far beyond bratwursts and beer. Outdoor enthusiasts flock to this 

region for the endless recreation options that range from fishing and rafting on the Wenatchee River 

that flows through town, to mountain biking, hiking, rock climbing and other adrenaline-fueled pastimes. 

Lori Vandenbrink, director of sales and marketing at 

Sleeping Lady Resort, has lived here with her family for 

fourteen years. “I love most everything about Leavenworth, 

but if I had to narrow it to a couple of things it would be 

the community, being surrounded by mountains and the 

access to recreation,” she said. She marvels at the lengths 

residents will go to attain their desired lifestyle here— 

working multiple jobs, sometimes below their ability level, 

or commuting to Seattle a couple days a week, solely to call 

this beautiful place home. 

Let it be known—this carefully planned tourist 

destination, tucked at the base of Washington’s north 

central Cascade Mountains, has not always boasted 

Bavarian-alpine architecture or annual Maifest and 

Oktoberfest celebrations. Initially, native Yakama, Chinook 

and Wenatchi tribes lived here, enjoying the beauty and 

bounty of the land as they hunted for deer and elk and 

fished for salmon in Icicle Creek. 

In 1890, however, Icicle Flats was born as settlers 

descended upon the area in search of promised gold, timber 

and furs. Near the turn of the century, the arrival of a rail 

line led to booming business for the logging and sawmill 

industries. When the railroad rerouted and left the region, 

though, Leavenworth nearly became a ghost town, teetering 

on the brink of extinction. To lure visitors back in the early 

1960s, town leaders gave the town a Bavarian facelift. 

“I know it’s probably hard to believe, but after you live 

here for a while, the Bavarian architecture fades into the 

backdrop of the surrounding mountains and it looks like it’s 

always been there,” Vandenbrink said. “Many locals enjoy 

and partake in the theme, painting their home or business 

with murals, dressing in Trachten for work or festivals 

and participating in traditional customs such as Edelweiss 

Tanzgruppe, the local Bavarian folk dance group.” 

Day 

SLEEPING LADY • ART WALK • CHIHULY 

Crank up the radio and climb into the mountains. If 

you’re driving over Stevens Pass, shortly after you crest 

the summit, be on the lookout for a display of color on 

the north side of Highway 2 between Lichtenburg and 

Smithbrook. Once arriving in Leavenworth, enjoy dinner 

at Watershed Café, where the menu features Hama Hama 

oysters, or Mana, a cozy yellow house in which diners enjoy 

a “three-hour, eight-course journey through the senses.” 

Afterward, savor a good night of sleep at Sleeping Lady (or 

up the Icicle, if a Thermarest is more your style). 

Located at the base of the Icicle canyon and 

on the peaceful banks of Icicle Creek, Sleeping 

Lady’s dreamy mountain resort features 


trip planner 

Icicle TV 

Dzhan Wiley 

Dzhan Wiley 

CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT Hiking abounds near Icicle Creek. The Bavarian theme pervades at Icicle Brewing. Get your fix of beers and brats at München Haus. 

Kingfisher Restaurant & Wine Bar, a renowned performance 

center and a self-guided art walk, showing off the magnificent 

permanent installation by legendary glass artist Dale Chihuly. 

Long known for its sustainable and ecologically minded 

practices, this Certified B corporation resort, also offers enticing 

amenities like an on-site spa and heated pool. 

Its mission which incorporates nature, art, recreation and 

healthful dining is so special,” Vandenbrink said. Harriet 

Bullitt, a multitalented entrepreneur and longtime supporter 

of the arts and environmental conservation in the Pacific 

Northwest, started the Sleeping Lady. “I want people to leave 

here and feel as though they can change their corner of the 

world,” she once said. 

Day 

FAT BIKES • BREWS • BRATS 

Those staying at Sleeping Lady start the morning with a 

vibrant, seasonal breakfast spread included in their package. 

Otherwise, mosey into town for espresso with a view at 

Argonaut—try the Namaste Latte with turmeric and honey 

accompanied by the tiny café’s granola bars or seasonal 

toasts. Afterward, locals suggest hiking up Icicle Ridge or out 

Red Bridge, the two main town trails, or hitting the Stuart 

or Colchuck trails. Other options include arranging a river 

adventure with Osprey Rafting or taking a fat bike onto the 

Leavenworth Winter Sports Club trails. 

After getting out into nature, relish an après beverage and 

snack at Blewett Brewing, Boudreaux Cellars, 37 Cellars, Blue 

Spirits Distilling or Icicle Brewing Company. At Icicle, a friendly 

twenty-five-barrel brewhouse, waitstaff serve giant pretzels 

dipped in Beecher’s cheese and colorful salads topped with 

manchego, Applegate turkey and Chukar cherries. The venue 

draws loyal fans thanks to a bustling scene, live music sessions 

and seasonally rotated beers made with Icicle Creek water, 

which flows into the Wenatchee River less than a mile from 

the venue. Get a sampler to try an array of brews ranging from 

lagers to porters and IPAs. 

If you still have steam for an afternoon adventure, consider 

mountain biking up at Ski Hill, riding the new Up Trail and 

then down either Fruend or Rosy Boa. On scorching days, cool 

off with a dip in the Wenatchee River. “The best thing about 

Leavenworth is the incredible mountain setting and endless 

recreational opportunities at its doorstep,” Vandenbrink said. 

For a casual dinner, order a brat at festive München Haus, 

or change things up entirely with a Mexican feast at South, 

where grilled street corn, sweet potato enchiladas, steak tacos 

and “mangorita” cocktails prove a well-deserved reward after 

an active day. Sleeping Lady guests take advantage of dinner at 

Kingfisher Restaurant, included in their package—here, chefs 

create gourmet meals from the freshest local ingredients, many 

from the resort’s own 2-acre organic garden. 


trip planner 

Leavenworth Chamber of Commerce 

LEAVENWORTH, WASHINGTON 

EAT 

Mana 

manamountain.com 

Watershed Café 

yodelinrestaurantgroup.com 

Kingfisher Restaurant & Wine Bar 

sleepinglady.com/kingfisherrestaurant-wine-bar.php 

South 

southrestaurants.com 

STAY 

Sleeping Lady 

Mountain Resort 

sleepinglady.com 

LOGE 

logecamps.com/leavenworth-wa 

Posthotel 

posthotelleavenworth.com 

PLAY 

Leavenworth Community 

Farmers Market 

leavenworthfarmersmarket.org 

Day 

OKTOBERFEST • SHOPPING • COFFEE 

Oktoberfest runs on the weekends in October, and that includes parades. 

Icicle Brewing Company 

iciclebrewing.com/home 

Blewett Brewing Company 

blewettbrew.com 

Oktoberfest 

leavenworthoktoberfest.com 

If you happen to be in town during 

Oktoberfest (October 5-6, 12-13, and 19- 

20), head to the gathering’s four venues to 

eat, drink and be merry. A Keg Tapping 

Ceremony led by the town’s mayor happens 

at 1 p.m. on Saturdays, and throughout 

the fest, enjoy live tunes by Musikkapelle 

Leavenworth and other groups from the 

U.S., Canada and Germany. (Children under 

12 enter for free, as do military members 

with I.D. Minors, allowed until 9 p.m., will 

enjoy the designated Kinderplatz area.) 

Vandenbrink offered some insider tips 

for negotiating Oktoberfest crowds, like 

walking or taking a shuttle from one’s hotel. 

(Sleeping Lady offers a complimentary 

shuttle for guests on Saturdays.) Other tips— 

go early if you seek a mellow experience, 

know that Friday is cheaper than Saturday, 

and sit at Icicle Brewing Company, Sulla 

Vita or the Goose Ridge tasting room for 

the people watching. 

In general, cycling is a good way to get 

around in high season. “The trickiest part of 

living in Leavenworth is navigating around 

town during peak periods,” Vandenbrink 

said. “In the spring and summer, I just jump 

on my bike, so sitting in traffic or parking 

aren’t an issue.” 

After checking out the festival revelry, 

pop into stores like Posy Handpicked 

Goods, where the owner raves about her 

location along a “row of small-production 

companies that have a lot of soul and speak 

their own vibe.” This woman-owned shop 

supports small businesses mostly from the 

Pacific Northwest. Next door, The Hunter’s 

Wife serves healthful takeaway fuel, ideal 

for commencing your journey home. 

(Think plant-powered meals and refreshing 

smoothies with names such as “Mystic 

Matcha.”) 

On the drive back to Seattle, treat yourself 

to a coffee pit stop at Little Red Shed, about 

halfway between Leavenworth and the pass. 

Or—as a nod to your Americana road trip— 

tuck into a burger and fries, served out of 

the 59er Diner food truck, as memories of 

your blissful Bavarian getaway fade in the 

rearview mirror. 

Leavenworth-area trails 

leavenworth.org/trails 

Arlberg Sports Haus 

arlbergsports.com 


northwest destination 

California Redwoods 

History and therapy among the giants 

written by Kevin Max 

CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT Driving through the trees 

elicits a big “wow.” Battery Point Lighthouse dates to 

1856. Guinness enjoys the trails through the Redwoods. 

THE CALIFORNIA REDWOODS are tree history writ 

large. The first time you drive through the giant sequoias 

and walk beneath them brings, at first, a silent shock 

that recedes to awe—being humbled in the presence of 

something extraordinary. 

The exclamation “Wow!” must have been uttered here first, 

summoned from pure reaction without diction. The sheer size 

of a Redwood—wow! The 16-foot trunk is wider than my car. 

This one is twice the width of my car. Getting out of the car, the 

next dimension unfolds—wow! This tree is 300 hundred feet 

tall and as thick at the top as at the bottom. 

The Redwoods are 206 square miles of massive stakes driven 

into the forest floor as a history marker of America. The oldest, 

at 700 years old, were there when Karuk, Yurok, Hupa and 

Tolowa tribesmen hunted among them. They were there when 

Spaniards sailed in, bringing religion and disease, as the number 

of humans in their shadows were culled by 90 percent. They 

were there at the arrival of people with paler faces after the 

Mexican-American War and the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, 

then the passage of horses and carts carrying gold-miner pans 

and broken dreams on the unwitting march to manifest destiny. 

Trees store sugar, cellulose and carbon, even environmental 

data. Imagine if they could play back memories. 

Then there’s me, standing in awe of it all. Just be in the 

Redwoods, I tell myself, and you, too, will be part of the historic 

memory, another atom cast in carbon and stacking up through 

the canopy like a natural Tower of Babel. 

As we drove south from Oregon, we stopped on a whim in 

Cave Junction. Good things happen here. Cave Junction is home 

to Taylor’s Sausage, a fifth-generation craft salumi. The deli’s 

walls are made of carnivore dreams—refrigeration cases filled 

with packages of beer sausage, bockwurst and boudin blanc. 

We grabbed a pack of jalepeño sausages and Taylor’s version of 

English bangers, hoping to impress a British friend at dinner in 


northwest destination 

CALIFORNIA REDWOODS 

EAT 

Hiouchi Cafe, Crescent City 

hiouchicafe.com 

Taylor’s Sausage, Cave 

Junction 

taylorssausage.com 

SeaQuake Brewing, 

Crescent City 

seaquakebrewing.com 

STAY 

Jedediah Smith State Park 

parks.ca.gov 

Redwoods RV Resort 

redwoodsrv.com 

PLAY 

Hiking in the Redwoods 

nps.gov/redw/planyourvisit/ 

hiking.htm 

Take a guided kayak tour 

on the Smith River 

redwoodrides.com 

Scenic drives through 

the parks 

parks.ca.gov 

a couple of nights. Across the deli and on a stage surrounded 

by dining tables was a two-person music act. They crooned 

“Sweet Melissa” to a hopping scene on a Thursday night. 

Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park was full, so I reserved 

a spot at Redwoods RV Resort, a surprisingly quiet camp 

outside Crescent City and along the Redwood Highway, a 

scenic byway. We honored our Taylor sausage with one of the 

best comfort camp meals—Pigs in Space, grilled sausage cut to 

bite size then folded into mac’n’cheese. We drank an IPA that 

brought tropical flavor to the cool Northern California night. 

After the dimensional daze of the size, scale and age of the 

Redwoods waned, we woke up and put on our trail running 

shoes for forest therapy, a psychological designation just 

now gaining foothold. Hiouchi Trail wound underfoot, with 

glimpses of the Smith River. This out-and-back with an 

additional leg on Howland Hill Road accounted for more than 

6 miles, and an hour of mind-clearing therapy. 

Part of our Redwoods weekend retreat involved a breakfast 

stop at the Hiouchi Cafe just a couple of miles back up the 

Redwoods Highway, in a little red wood building. Serving its 

customers since 1931, the town’s history was plated alongside 

pancakes and bacon. 

In the Redwoods is Crescent City, a hidden gem on the 

California coast. We’re suckers for lighthouses and Crescent 

City has the Battery Point Lighthouse, open and walkable 

during low tides. Dating to 1856, the Fresnel-lit lighthouse 

was among California’s first. 

At the terra firma end of the lighthouse pier is SeaQuake 

Brewing, a charming little brewery with a killer 9.2 Burger 

with homemade bacon jam and Wicked Aunt Tammy double 

IPA, brewed with water from the Smith River. 

From Crescent City, we headed back into the Redwoods 

with a few scenic drives in front of us—and a mouthful 

of wows. 


1889 MAPPED 

The points of interest below are culled from 

stories and events in this edition of 1889. 

Oroville 

Forks 

Friday Harbor 

Port Angeles Coupeville 

Port 

Townsend 

Bellingham 

Mount Vernon 

Lakewood 

Marysville 

Everett 

Okanogan 

Republic 

Colville 

Newport 

Aberdeen 

South 

Bend 

Shelton 

Montesano 

Port Orchard 

Cathlamet 

Longview 

Olympia 

Chehalis 

Kelso 

Seattle 

Bellevue 

Renton 

Kent 

Federal Way 

Tacoma 

Ellensburg 

Yakima 

Waterville 

Wenatchee 

Ephrata 

Prosser 

Richland 

Pasco 

Wilbur 

Kennewick 

Ritzville 

Dayton 

Walla 

Walla 

Davenport 

Spokane 

Colfax 

Pomeroy 

Asotin 

Vancouver 

Stevenson 

Goldendale 

Live 

Think 

Explore 

15 

Olympia Harbor Days 

42 

WISErg 

72 

Washington State University Creamery 

16 

Boat Race Weekend 

44 

The Waterfront 

74 

Two Mountain Winery 

22 

Girl Meets Dirt 

46 

Xerces Society training 

78 

Mayflower Park 

23 

E.Z Tiger 

48 

Segal Ranch 

80 

Leavenworth 

34 

Arlberg Sports 

50 

Blue North 

84 

Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Park 


LIVE FRIDAY SEPT 7 8|7C 

STANDUPTOCANCER.ORG 

American Lung Association’s LUNG FORCE, Breast Cancer Research Foundation, Canadian Cancer Society, Canadian Institutes of Health Research, 

Cancer Stem Cell Consortium, Farrah Fawcett Foundation, Genome Canada, Laura Ziskin Family Trust, LUNGevity Foundation, National Ovarian Cancer Coalition, 

Ontario Institute for Cancer Research, Ovarian Cancer Research Fund Alliance, Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer 

STAND UP TO CANCER IS A DIVISION OF THE ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRY FOUNDATION, A 501(C)(3) CHARITABLE ORGANIZATION. IMAGES ARE FROM STAND UP TO CANCER TELECASTS AND EVENTS. 

THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR CANCER RESEARCH (AACR) IS STAND UP TO CANCER’S SCIENTIFIC PARTNER.

Until Next Time 

More Than Just Coffee 

written by Lauren Lofthus | illustrated by Allison Bye 

I REMEMBER SITTING in the stands at some kind of sporting event, cotton candy in one hand and 

my mom’s leftover coffee in the other. I would shove a clump of cotton candy in my mouth and wash 

it down with the coffee. This was my introduction to the bitter bean, and I’ve loved it ever since. 

Coffee is culture around Seattle. When you’re sitting 

in a coffee shop, you can often look out the window and 

see another coffee shop just down the street. I’m sure it 

seems weird to out-of-towners. 

Sure, our Washington clouds and cold mornings 

encourage the habit, but it goes deeper than that. If coffee 

was just about the warmth, we could drink tea. If coffee 

was about sugar, we could all get together for cupcakes. 

It would be hard to have a serious conversation while 

stuffing your face with cake, but that could be part of 

the fun. 

No, coffee is more than that. 

Coffee is about finding new places. Whether you 

want bright, fresh and airy, or cozy and dimly lit, you 

don’t have to look far to find a coffee shop that shares 

your aesthetic. Often they reflect something about the 

community around them. A Snohomish coffee shop 

might display an antique or two. An Everett coffee shop 

might have a more modern look. Coffee shops are a 

good starting point when you’re trying to get to know a 

city’s personality. 

Coffee is about family. My dad taught me how to make 

French press coffee. My mom taught me how to make 

drip. My brother taught me how to make pour-overs. 

Even though my husband doesn’t drink coffee, he still 

makes an amazing brew. We put a pot on for all of our 

family gatherings, and when we go on vacations we find 

new favorites together. 

Finally, coffee is about making new friends. Around 

here, you do coffee if you’re just starting to get to know 

somebody. To be fair, you also do coffee if you’ve been 

friends for thirty years. Meeting at a coffee shop is a great 

way to set up a casual interaction before you’re good 

enough friends for something dramatic—like dinner. 

So, as much as I enjoy a rich cup of coffee (maybe 

mixed with cinnamon and orange, maybe topped with 

whipped cream) coffee isn’t really about coffee for me. 

Coffee is about living life. 


CAN YOU 

BELIEVE 

WHAT YOU 

READ? 

Sources: 2016 Survey, Pew Research Center; GfK MRI, Spring 2016. 

MAGAZINE 

MEDIA 

Better. Believe It. 

With fake news leaving most Americans 

confused about even the basic facts, 

magazine media keeps it real. Whether in 

print, online, on mobile or video, people 

trust it to be expertly researched, written 

and fact-checked. No wonder magazine 

readers are more engaged and more likely 

to recommend advertised products. 

Being real matters. That’s a fact. 

#BelieveMagMedia | BelieveMagMedia.com

1889 August | September 2018

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