El Diablo!

El Diablo is why Tango is famous. It was featured on the front page of the Seattle Time's Sunday food section a while ago with a full page shot. It's a cake, but with the consistency of chocolate mousse. It's served over a burnt maringue and caramel sauce, accompanied by toasted almonds. But what gives it the kick is that it's dredged in cocoa powder and cayenne pepper!

So here's how you eat this thing - you spoon off a chunk of the cake, then drag it through the caramel and maringue, making sure to pick up an almond on the way to your mouth. The sweetness of the cocoa and caramel play nicely with the saltiness of the almond. Then, once you've interpreted those sensations, you get a mild cayenne burn at the end. It's awesome. Cool it out with a nice Malbec, and you're in heaven.

Queso Azul

Tango is a tapas restaurant. Tapas is a Spanish style of food that has become very popular over the past few years. Basically it's a menu arrayed with small servings of various dishes. This Queso Azul is one of my favorites there - it's a blue cheese souffle with a berry compote. I could eat about a million of these.

Tango!

Before we went to Tony Bourdain's show, we (Kyra, Josh, Katie, Scott, Heather and myself) dined at one of my favorite local restaurants: Tango.

Tony Bourdain in Seattle

If you hang around me for any period of time, odds are you're sick of hearing me quote Tony Bourdain. I've learned a lot about food and the culture surrounding it by reading his books and watching his shows. A few weeks ago Tony came to Seattle and did a lecture at The Moore. He talked for about an hour regarding his show No Reservations, as well as other topics food related. Then he took a question and answer for about half an hour. Unfortunately I couldn't really think of anything relevant to ask the man, but that didn't seem to stop most folks.

CarneVino is Mario Batali's newest restaurant. Very, very good food here - I highly recommend the Ossobucco.

Vegas!

Scott, Elli, Stephanie, Eric and myself spent last weekend in Vegas. This was Eric and Stephanie's first time in Vegas. I think they had a good time, but clearly we didn't drink enough!