Faux Reel

Every region has its own cuisine, most of which we recognize instantly — Chinese, Italian, Thai, Vietnamese, Ethiopian, and French — but what about food from the Pacific Northwest? If you passed a restaurant that said it served foods from Seattle, what would that be? One way to find out is to join in on a Savor Seattle Food Tour , which takes you on three tours that feature Pacific Northwest seafood, roasted coffee, artisan cheeses, microbrew beers, gourmet chocolate, and wines.

The Pike Place Market food tour takes you on a two hour behind-the-scenes journey to explore the 101-year-old historic site. Among the highlights, you’ll see Alderwood smoked salmon, nationally award winning Clam Chowder & Seafood Bisque as well as artisan handmade cheese. You’ll be able to sample the crab cakes of renowned chef Tom Douglas, fresh seasonal fruit, even Russian piroshky pastries. In addition, you’ll get to sample hot mini-doughnuts, and desserts inspired by cherries, as well as visit the original Starbucks store.

The Gourmet Seattle Food and Cultural Tour takes three hours, and allows you to sample Washington wine and craft beers, gourmet mini-burgers, artisan pizza, truffle-oil infused potato and leek soup, as well as a truffle-inspired dish, a seafood and saffron risotto, and seared duck cake and sangria. In addition, you’ll have the opportunity to taste spent-grain beer bread, and homemade gelato and sorbet.

A third tour explores Seattle’s indulgences with fine chocolate On this two hour walking tour, you’ll taste chocolate truffles and caramels, mini cupcakes and chocolate brownies, chef Tom Douglas’ Triple Coconut Cream Pie as well as gourmet popcorn made with chocolate, nuts and cocoa nibs. You’ll sip Colombian drinking chocolate and taste a chocolate cocktail, learning why Seattle is home to more than fifty chocolate artisans.

After these tours, you’ll undoubtedly have a better idea of what Seattle cuisine means — salmon, seafood, truffles, cheeses, chocolates, and wines — and be ready to return to the top Seattle hotels in order to take a nap or to look for the gym or sauna to work off the gourmet food and chocolate.

This is an age of speed.  These kinds of times come around every so often, and they have a kind of futurist sensibility connected to their scope and focus, where technology becomes as essential as a heartbeat.  At times it even seems as though they might be the same exact things, technologies and the heart.  We all know, or at least, those of us who still like to live in human skin, know that these things are not equal.  The human element can become lost in a shuffle of interest in how things work efficiently, and how to make things go faster.  In a place like Singapore, where technology is even more prominently at the forefront of culture, this is even more palpable.

There are remedies, however.  This site offers some fantastic restaurants that will help you slow down and get back into the pace of your own heartbeat, and also get in touch with the rhythms of nature.  It’s certainly possible to eat a large Japanese meal in a hurry, and there are places that will offer this kind of fast food approach.  It’s a great cuisine for when you are on the go, because it is very healthy, compared to other kinds of cooking, and it also happens to taste great.  Very few people there are, indeed, who do not take to it on their very first try.

However, the best way to eat Japanese food is to take your time.  There are so many different flavors, and ways that the tastes compliment each other, that it is very much like taking part in a conversation.  Or rather, it’s like having the conversation happen between your taste buds, and the food, and you get to be the extremely happy witness.  There is something that’s simply essential and elemental about eating slowly, taking your time, and savoring every moment.  This is where Japanese cooking really takes on its potential for helping to promote good health.  It is a very difficult thing to slow down these days, especially when there are so many things supporting speed and efficiency, so possibilities like eating slowly can help us to remember that efficiency is related to sanity, and that requires slowness.