Pastrami

This is what I had for lunch today.  5 South Colville. 10am to 3pm.

Cheers

Dinner at Graze

Barrel Tasting Weekend Saturday Night December 5th, Graze (look at all those capitals) will host its first dinner... ever.  For three years we have been schlepping our stuff to wineries, houses, and fields.  This time we are home.

Join us for dinner.  We can seat around 24.  Arrive at 6:15, share a glass of bubbly and a few appetizers, dinner to start in a timely fashion thereafter.  Menu goes something like this: bi-colored soup, white and purple salad, something that went baaaaa, and dessert from the Colville Street Patisserie. (menu accomodations made if possible.)

Price: $50 a person, beer and wine not included, wines promise to be yummy and attractively priced.  All guests seated family style, bring good cheer and conviviality, if you bring wine corkage is $10 and sharing will be... expected?... required?... who wouldn't want to share with so many new friends? 

Email for reservations and our long list of requirements at info@grazeevents.com

Here we go

Ok, practice week is over.  Guess its the real deal Monday.  Three days of practice in our new space has done wonders.  We may not be the quickest kids on the block yet, but we'll get there. 

A few notes on the menu.  The pastrami is very good... so good I can't even really work out how we can make it much better... and that kind of bothers me (this pastrami thing has become an obsession, anything that takes twenty-some days to cure gets under your skin).  The meatballs make me happy, as they did to the couple of new yorkers who stopped in the other day.  I want to eat the chimichurri sauce for the flank steak on nearly everything.  And thank goodness Becca made a beautiful little roasted pear salad at home a few weeks back... its my favorite adding grilled chicken; a lovely light lunch.  If there is a better condiment to place on a sandwich than Mama Lils Peppers I would like to eat it.  And the silly paninis we served at the farmer's market the last couple of years are still mighty tasty. 

All in all I think it is a place I would like to eat at (hope you feel the same)... now if I could only find some time to sit down and do that I will be a very happy man. 

Cheers

Open... kind of

We opened Monday for delivery.  Did three orders.  The most panicked and frightened three orders you could possibly see put together.  I do weddings for 250, wine dinners for 50, appetizers for hundreds... three orders freaked me/us out.  Tuesday was calmer and did 18 or so.  Wednesday we moved all our stuff from the catering kitchen to the storefront so everything has a home at least, and a sense of calm set in. 

This morning we will walk in and it should resemble 'a normal, what everyday should look like', day.  We may even let a person or two walk in and order.  Monday is the official open day.  Woo hoo.

Cheers

Failure

We failed our final inspection.  Eleven failures.  But not to worry.  All will be tidied up by Monday, and a re-final will be attempted (and passed) Tuesday.  Same goes for the health department inspection Tuesday.  So Wednesday we will have all the rules, regulations, hoop jumping, T-crossing, i dotting, fee paying - silliness completed. (Until some unbeknowst to us public entity demands forms, fees, and more hoop jumping... opening a business is the fastest way to joining the Libertarian Party.)  Unless you count the beer/wine license which is still working its way through dark and murky government channels.

First all employee meeting today, which consisted of ten minutes of form filling out, five minutes of rambling and confusing "leadership talk", and two hours of intensive cleaning.  Monday we start delivery service for businesses (permit to cook in our storefront still in limbo, the cooking will be done at our catering kitchen).

This really is happening... Becca walked through the sandwich shop kitchen today and said "Frances, look around, here is your college tuition".  I wonder if its jc or university grade?

With all the crazi-ness of getting the storefront ready the catering keeps on ticking.  A luncheon for the Blue Mountain Action Council, dinner for Stores Online, and the pic above dinner at Waters Winery.

For Waters Winery we did five courses: a roasted pear and greens salad, sauteed scallops and apples and quatre epices spices, cauliflower soup and duxelle cream, and the main of beef tenderloin with red wine reduction sauce, brussels, yukons sauteed in clarified butter and brussel sprouts, patisserie dessert... quite yummy.

Cheers

Your Mile is My Inch

Lots of people still have lots to do.  But its getting closer.  Deliveries start Monday November the 2nd. 

It may not look like it, but we are really close... at least that is what I keep telling myself.

Cheers

primer to floor color

Cheers

Progress

Logo on the door. 

Floor color to primer color

Cheers

dun Dun Dun DUUUNNN... the menu

Here is the menu, so far, pricing is semi-accurate, as is the ingredient list.  Of course a lot will change as the official week of full blown test cooking arrives.  Monday November 2nd we begin delivery service only.  So if you want a sandwich you are going to have to call one in.  Here is the number 509-522-9991.

hot ones
meatball, hoagie roll, roast garlic marinara, whole milk mozzarella, garlic 6.95
pastrami, house cured sauerkraut, russian dressing, swiss cheese 7.95
porchetta pork loin, aioli, lettuce * 6.95

panini ones
turkey, bacon, provolone 6.35
italian meats, sun dried tomato spread, whole milk mozzarella 6.35
portabella mushroom, roasted red peppers, basil, provolone 6.35

cold ones
italian hoagie, mortadella, sopprasetta, salami, coppa, 7.95
mama lils peppers, shredded lettuce, provolone, oil and vinegar
rotisserie turkey, avocado, green leaf lettuce, provolone 6.95
flank steak medium, chimichurri, mama lils peppers 7.95
roast beef, blue cheese, caramelized onions green leaf lettuce 6.95
grilled chicken, basil mayonnaise, tomato, green leaf lettuce 6.95
veggie, hummus, cucumber, feta, kalamata olives, red peppers, sprouts 6.95
garden delight, seasonal vegetables, changes often

salad ones
caesar, chopped romaine, croutons, parmesan, (add grilled chicken) 5.95 / 7.75
green leaf, roasted pears, blue cheese, candied nuts, vinaigrette 5.95 / 7.75
(add rotisserie turkey or sautéed chicken)
spinach, provolone, toasted almonds, sun dried tomatoes, 5.95
roasted onions, balsamic dressing
mixed green, carrots, cucumber, red peppers (choice of dressing) 4.95

hot liquid ones
two soups made daily, always one vegetarian (6 oz, 10 oz) 3.50 / 5.00

sugar ones
double chocolate brownies 1.25
chocolate chip cookie, coconut cookie, pecan chocolate tartlets 1.10

Cheers

Progress... still progress

The drywall is done, hvac goes in a couple of days, finish plumbing next week, concrete patching in a day or so, big equipment comes next week, and we interviewed for employees yesterday.  So many nice folks, I wish we had more positions to fill, its going to be hard to select our opening crew.

This weekend we did a few smaller events: a 40th birthday party at Mannina Cellars, a drop off dinner for some Whitman folk, box lunches for a bunch of geologists on a wine terrior field trip, and a wine dinner at Dunham Cellars for a group from Seattle.  Here is a photo of the soup at Dunham, pureed cauliflower (actually quite light, chicken stock and half and half, no cream) with a mushroom duxelle cream, truffle salt, and cauliflower croutons.  Pretty yummy.

Sandwich shop menu is coming along nicely.  Three paninis, two hot sandwiches, seven cold sandwiches, three salads, and two soups (rotating daily).  Soups aren't quite this elaborate, soups for the storefront fall more in the cauliflower, beer, cheese category of soup making.  Sample menus to businesses that call in deliveries go out this week.

Cheers