We are getting ready to go on a trip and that means lots and lots of preparation.
Work continues to keep us both super busy and then we need to get the house ready for house guests who will look after our digs as well as Alessandro, Chloe and Bullwinkle is our absence. I just finished the novel I am calling Kitty Care 2011. It is rivaling War and Peace…

But we gave ourselves a little breather yesterday – went and had some delicious wine and pizza at Tom Douglas’s Serious Pie and then took a little “digestion” walk around Queen Anne. Our timing was perfect – a golden glow everywhere and a special “Photo App” that Marc has on his camera helped to make a common street look a little uncommon.
I love being able to just enjoy stepping outside our front door and making these little discoveries!

Miss Cozy is still working way too hard at her new job and the little summer we have had here in Seattle is just slipping by. I was in the mood for a summer BBQ this weekend and by putting the bug in the right person’s ear (that would be Gavin whose sister Kimberly and boyfriend Robert have the perfect backyard for a get together) last night we whipped up a quick BBQ potluck under the stars!

Inspired by my favorite Seattle store Metropolitan Market I knew I had to make something with peaches as it is Peach-o-rama here in Seattle! A free sample more than convinced me to buy the organic variety from Frog Hollow Farm- they could have been the best peaches I had ever eaten! Look how beautiful Frog Hollow Farm looks!

I had peach shortcake on my mind but shortcut style – I bought a pound cake from the bakery section but of course did make fresh whipped cream. Deviled eggs were also a nostalgic must along with a big piece of King Salmon we would take to throw on the grill – a Seattle specialty we just cannot get enough of. I was not the only one who was thinking of peaches – friends Anton and Lisa cut fresh pieces in half threw them on the grill and served them with a scoop of good vanilla ice cream!

Needless to say we did a great job of breaking in the new portable Coleman grill that Gavin picked up at Fred Meyer’s (Seattle’s alternate to Target), ate a lot of yummy food and consumed many bottles of wine. Lots of neighbors joined in and except for the party crasher from the “Hemp Fest” (I”m serious!) it was definitely the more the merrier!
Now that I’ve lived in a four seasons climate I still think that it doesn’t really feel like summer unless you are able to take a summer vacation – rent a house by the lake or at the beach. Next year we’re gonna make that happen. In the meantime there’s still lots of peaches. raspberries, corn on the cob, potato salad and yes, more deviled eggs to enjoy and we’re gonna do just that!

We finally saw the new Woody Allen movie “Midnight n Paris” and if you are a Woody fan as I am then I think you will LOVE this movie! And guess what, even if you are not, I still think you will love this movie!

Midnight in Paris has an incredible cast starring Owen Wilson who I really don’t even like! But I have to say although I’m pretty sure Woody Allen wrote this with himself in mind to play the role if he was about 40 years younger (!) Owen Wilson does a pretty good job of making neutotic and awkward charming. Still I could just hear the dialog coming straight out of Woody’s stammering mouth. Rachel McAdams is also good as perhaps many could but Marion Cottillard is perfect as the mistress of Picasso and so are the many actors (Adrien Brody) who play the great great artists of Paris in the early 20′s!

Allen newbie – Lea Seydoux (see her in the Prada “Candy” fragrance campaign).

Clearly a personal fantasy of Allen’s to be able to go back in time and mingle with Gertrude Stein, F Scott and Zelda Fitzerald, Picasso, Dali, Gaugin and of course Hemingway.

Whats next for Woody Allen? Continuing his European trend he we can look forward to The Bop Decameron set in Rome and starring Ellen Page and Jesse Eisenberg with Penelope Cruz (again!), Alec Baldwin, Roberto Benigni and finally Woody himself. As always, a fabulous ensemble cast – I can’t wait!

Not such a bad combo, right?
These local raspberries were bought at my favorite store Metropolitan Market in upper Queen Anne.Yes, this store can be expensive but they also get great deals like these berries which incidentally were incredibly sweet! I don’t think I’d really ever had golden raspberries before – exactly as delicious as their red sisters!

Now living in Seattle a full year I definitely see the growing trend of flowers.
The order goes something like this: crocus, daffodil, tulips followed by irises followed by roses with hydrangea following close behind. Now that all the roses are out I make it my duty to smell them as we walk around the neighborhood. Funny how some smell amazing and others like nothing at all. Gavin, thanks for the beautiful bunch of hyndrangea and roses, it made the apartment very cozy!

Once again, where does time go? Before too much dust settles on our Walla Walla weekend let me just wrap it up by telling you about two more wonderful places you must visit when you make the trip!

First, pictured above is the very well known Whitehouse Crawford restaurant. Situated in an old Mill/furniture factory this restaurant is unique and fabulous and I think a quintessential Walla experience. The restaurant is a huge open space with towering ceilings decked with wooden beams.

Amazing fresh, local food, a bar to sit and watch the chefs cook and another bar to just people watch and drink what looked like delicious cocktails! Do not miss this restaurant!
Another not to miss place is Dunham Cellars. What a fun surprise this winery was!

We originally wanted to visit after reading an article in Food and Wine about how actor Kyle Maclachlan has collaborated with winemaker Eric Duhman to create a Cabernet called Pursued by Bear (a Shakespearean acting term!). We wanted to taste this $65/bottle of wine and although this was not included in their tasting the really friendly and funny woman doing some of the pouring was happy to sneak us a sip. She also told us that Kyle just released another wine called Baby Bear in honor of the birth of his first child!
A framed shot of Eric Dunham and Kyle Maclachlan.

Eric is also an artist and painter and his work is all over the huge old barn – a little bit like Pee Wee’s Playhouse in the wine country for adults!

Lots of fun and a big surprise. Of all the wineries we visited on this trip this was definitely our favorite – good wines and a lot of fun. The Walla Walla wine country is divided into North, South, East and West and we barely scratched the surface. We will definitely be back but do wish the drive was a little shorter like the 2 1/2 hours we used to drive from LA to Santa Barbara. We are still in search of the perfect 1-2 hour getaway from Seattle and I am certain that Miss Cozy will (eventually) find it!

Miss Cozy has been more than busy with another thing that starts with “W” and that would be work. That’s not always a bad thing it just keeps her from things she considers Cozy. Like the wine weekend we spent in Walla Wall now 2 weeks ago – Geez Louise where does time go?

I want this post to serve as a very general outline for someone who also want to explore Washington’s premiere wine valley aptly named Walla Walla (which means rapid streams or many waters).
The drive from Seattle takes 4.5 hours. All of it is a pretty drive and really wasn’t so bad at all. The funny thing is is that you soon enter Washington’s “desert” climate – the landscape reminded me of Calabasas, California – lots of dried rolling hills the only difference being the beautiful snow capped mountains in the background!

Get this – opposite to Seattle, Walla Walla receives minimal rainfall and is also called “the Palm Springs” of Washington. It totally felt like that just without cacti and Palm Trees! Our weather was absolutely blue sky gorgeous!
And just like California, Washington grows lots of lavender too!

We stopped for lunch in the town of Yakima, a wine region unto itself but this was nothing to write home about. Perhaps we will learn more about this area in the future but we are definitely rushing back anytime soon…

We would soon find out that the town of Walla Walla, on the other hand, was really cute and quite charming! But first a stop at our first winery – L’Ecole No. 41. L’Ecole N° 41 is a second generation, family-owned artisan winery located in the historic Frenchtown School depicted on the label. Founded in 1983, it is the third oldest winey in the Walla Walla. It was interesting being in a wine country that was still so young! My research maestro Marc put L’Ecole on the map as our first stop since we had enjoyed a lovely bottle of the chardonney depicted in my recent Orcas Island post! We had a great time here but soon it was time to hit the road!

Walla Walla is not built up anywhere near Napa or even Santa Barbara so there are not a whole lot of hotel options. The big hotel in Walla Walla is the Marcus Whitman Hotel. Rooms start at $99 but as it was a holiday weekend and only pricey sweets were available we opted to spend more on dinner and stay at the Holiday Inn Express. Big rooms and non-ugly bed spreads. I was totally fine with this and about 3 minutes driving from town!
Rock n’ Roll – this place is so cool – our first stop in town was the brand new Charles Smith tasting room!

Charles Smith is a far cry from Charles Shaw aka Two Buck Chuck. No comparison whatsoever! We discovered these wines back in L.A. and served them at our going away party – a combo of great wine and pretty cool marketing – Charles Smith used to manage bands in Scandanavia for 11 years. This space looks like it could hold some pretty kick ass parties that is for sure. When we asked if they had a wine club we were told they didn’t – Charles wants everyone to be able to attend his events.

We found out that Charles ex-girlfriend is the one who designs all the labels…does she really think he deserves a halo?

Still in the mood to explore a little bit we decided to hop in the car and drive around a bit – we had a lot to explore and not very much time!

This map above is of the overall wine country but Walla Wall itself is divided into North, South, East and West. We decided to drive to the Southside winery area, getting a feel for the area and finally checking out Va Piano.

This winery had a bit of a Tuscan feel but was not so cozy on the inside and we decided not to stick around for a tasting.

We also saw several modern wineries which although might have had delicious wine did not beckon us to come in. All this talk of wine was making us hungry and luckily we had a 7:30 dinner reservation at Brasserie Four located right in the heart of downtown.

What a perfect dinner we had here! I honestly had one of the most delicious chicken dishes I’ve ever had (with sherry and tarragon and lots of perfectly little cubed vegetables and flowers!) and Marc went traditional delicious steak with perfect frittes!

I have to mention that I also had a super fresh salad of julienned golden and red beets, fennel and carrots and we shared some yummy dessert with rhubarb (very popular this time in the Northwest).

As we left the restaurant a table on the outside patio asked how we enjoyed out meal. I had noticed these 2 women and a man waiting to be seated – they looked very posh and snobby and I was so delighted to find them absolutely friendly and funny giving us tips for our explorations for the following day.
We could hardly wait for Walla Walla day #2 – we had Dunham Cellars on our list and dinner at the much talked about Whitehouse Crawford! More soon!

Need I say anything more? I’ve been trying to continue writing about our trip to Walla Walla, I’ve just run into a few minor and very cozy road blocks…