Tag Archives: bremerton

Wine Festival Coming to Kitsap

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Bremerton Fountain Park

This summer, the Bremerton fountain park will host a Kitsap Wine Festival that will benefit Harrison Medical Center. For $45, you can take tastes of more than 20 wines from Washington wineries, though of the 23 wineries listed on the site for the Kitsap Wine Festival, not a one is from Kitsap. The closest they get is the Olympic Peninsula. Maybe Kitsap wineries will be included in the “and more”.

While the festival may lack local wine (so far), it will have local food. You can eat food cooked by chefs from the Harborside Conference Center and Anthony’s and local vendors including Amy’s Chocolates of Bremerton, Crimson Cove of Poulsbo, who you also can find at area farmers markets, and Monica’s Waterfront Bakery of Silverdale.

The festival will be from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. Aug. 23.

For more info, go to the site or cal 360-473-5555.

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Food Competition and Festival Goodness This Weekend in Bremerton and Poulsbo

One of my favorite things about local festivals is the food. (Big surprise, huh?) In addition to all those fantastically awful-for-you goodies like Elephant Ears, cotton candy and the like, many of them have food-centric events.

This weekend’s Armed Forces Day festival in Bremerton and Viking Fest in Poulsbo won’t disappoint.

On Saturday in Bremerton, as part of the city’s celebration of the armed forces, food service specialists stationed in the Northwest will engage in a culinary competition in the Bremer Center of Olympic College.

And we’re not talking about some assembly-line fare here. The competition (really multiple competitions) are split into hor d’oeuvres, sugar art display, chili cook-off, decorated cake, ribs and corn bread as well as a main “Iron Chef”-style event.

Food displays from portions of the competition will be set up Saturday morning, and doors open to the public at 10:30. No word on taste-tests. The Iron Chef competition runs from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., though people won’t be able to watch them cook because of space limitations. You can, however watch them judge the “Iron Chef” results and award presentations that follow, starting at 1 p.m..

More importantly (to me), however, will be the public tastings starting at 2 p.m.

One sad note to report is that the Iron Chef competitions for Viking Fest were canceled. But Viking Fest isn’t without its food allure. For a taste of Scandinavian fare, the Sons of Norway Lodge host a luncheon and offers baked goods and pea soup.

And of course, there’s lutefisk eating. I dusted Derek Sheppard’s photo slideshow of the lutefisk eating contest. If you’re interested in gorging on lutefisk, this year’s it’s at 2:15 p.m. Sunday.

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Some Tasty Tamales in Bremerton

Cellphone pic of my tamales
Cellphone pic of my tamales

A couple friends have been raving about the food at the La Poblanita Mexican Store on Sixth and Callow, but I somehow I always seem to forget.

Until last week.

When I had: The. Best. Tamale. Ever.

I was meeting friends at the Hi-Fidelity Lounge, and rather than drink on an empty stomach, I swung in to the store/restaurant for my first time.

You walk in the door to a glass case of breads, sweetbreads and pastries, brought in from bakeries in Tacoma and the East side. A little Telemundo TV action sets the mood of the little dining area in the back, along with Mexican art.

I took a seat under a painted portrait of Freida Kahlo and ordered three tamales, because I’ve decided (arbitrarily) that tamales and mole are the only way to judge the quality of Mexican restaurants. (Plus, I really loves me some tamales.)

Admittedly, I was pretty hungry and wasn’t expecting a whole lot out of a $1.25 tamale. But within minutes the three I had ordered came out steaming on a plate. They were pretty decent-sized tamales (about the size of a packed wallet) and smelled of chiles and chicken

The impressive thing about these for me is the masa casing itself. Some places drown their tamales in sauce trying to hide the fact that the masa is bland, but these bad boys can stand alone, eaten freshly peeled from their corn husks.

They’re appropriately spicy, meaning water is nice to have on-hand, but not necessary if you have some cojones. And if they’re not hot enough, on the tables are bowls of mouth-searing red sauce and a less-searing (actually not really that hot at all) salsa verde.

They hand-make the tamales every day, and also have tasty traditional tacos (good according to others in the neighborhood) and other food plates. The store also is a grocery with the aforementioned breads, Coke made with real sugar (sometimes) and other items.

Any of you out there have suggestions for other great tamale or taco offerings in Kitsap?

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Kitsap Food Co-op Hosts Public Meeting

I saw that Kitsap Food Co-op, group was hosting another public meeting about their efforts this Saturday (Feb. 21), and thought it would be a good time to catch up with how they’re doing.

The group has been working for more than a year to lay the groundwork for a community-supported and member-owned grocery store that would specialize in locally grown, natural and organic foods.

They’ve been fundraising and doing some basic market analysis since that time, and they are currently on the cusp of incorporating, said Laura Moynihan, one of the co-op organizers. Incorporation will allow them to start signing up members and collecting membership fees to help fund further progress.

They’ve decided memberships will be structured as an annual fee system —  as opposed to a large, one-time fee —  where members will get discounts and a profit refund, similar to the way REI sets up its member dividends.

The next step will be to do a feasibility study that will help them focus on where would be the smartest place to build, among other things.

“We’re still a ways off from having a physical building,” Moynihan said.

But it’s still a good time to try and start the co-op, despite the economic downturn, she said.

They may, for example, be able to take advantage of newly affordable real estate. And though the desire to save money may drive shoppers to discount grocers like Wal-Mart, having an organization that supports local foods in a down economy becomes additionally important, Moynihan said.

“When you shop at a food co-op, when you use local producers, farmers, craftspeople who shop local for feed and seed and other products,” she said. “That’s when the community really gets to hold on to its money” rather than having those dollars go to Arkansas or China.

Food Co-op members will talk more about the economy’s effect on the co-op at Saturday’s meeting.

The meeting will be from 3 to 5 p.m. at Seaside Church in Bremerton, near Evergreen Rotary Park. They’ll be talking about the economy as well as hold a silent auction for items, such as a quilt, free tree-trimming, haircut, yoga classes and other services.

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The ULTIMATE Thanksgiving Cooking De-Stresser

you can go out and battle the lines this weekend at the grocery stores, but if you really, really want to take the stress out of shopping AND cooking on turkey day, but don’t mind putting down a little cash, area grocers offer some take-home solutions. Actually, some of them look cheaper than making it yourself, though you may have to fill in a few sides.

I checked in with the stores and got some info on prices and content for you. I didn’t call every single store, so you should probably check ahead

DEADLINE ALERT: If you’re in Poulsbo or just want a Central Market meal, you have until Saturday to order one of these dinners. Details below. Safeway’s orders have already started filling up, so ordering earlier would be better.

ALBERTSONS
You can order through the day before Thanksgiving, but the deli needs time to thaw a turkey so don’t expect to call Thursday morning. They also have ham and rib dinners, but I think that’s just sacrilege.

Classic Turkey Dinner – $44.99
This includes a 12-pound turkey, 2.5 pounds stuffing, 3 pounds mahsed potatoes and 30 ounces of gravy.

Ultimate Turkey Dinner – $59.99

You get all that comes in the classic turkey dinner plus 2.5 pounds green been casserole, cranberry sauce and a pumpkin pie.

CENTRAL MARKET
I knew someone who did this one year and said the food was fantastic. At $100 bucks, it should be, though when you think about it, it comes out to about $12.50 per person and Central Market usually does a pretty good job with their prepared foods.

Dinner for eight is $99.99, which includes a 12-14 pound turkey, 2 quarts each of stuffing, mashed poatoes, yams and green beean casserole, cranberry sauce and gravy. (I may have missed something because my notes became illegible at this point as I started daydreaming about and drooling over all that food.)

The latest they’ll take orders is on Saturday. No more orders after Saturday.

DREAM DINNERS POULSBO

So this isn’t as free-wheeling as just ordering the whole thing via phone, but it may make you feel better about at least helping to prepare the food. If you’ve never heard of the Dream Dinners in Poulsbo , they’re a company that puts together the ingredients and instructions and you come in and do up the rest in freezer-friendly packets. You reheat the night or day you want to eat it.

They offer a Holiday Side Station option that’ll serve 6 modest portions for $36.45 (you could always double it). It includes a savory stuffing with sausage and pecans, a green bean casserole, ) home styled mashed potatoes with rich gravy and buttermilk biscuits.

The one catch is that when you set up a Dream Dinners thing, you have to commit to buying and make enough dinners for 36 servings. They don’t all have to be the holiday sides, you can make a bunch of different dinners for beyond Thanksgiving.

You also have to sign up for a session to make it and the only options before Thanksgiving are at 5 p.m. tonight and 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. Saturday.

FRED MEYER

The traditional dinner serves six to eight people. It’s $39.99 for a 12-pound turkey, 2.5 pounds of mashed potatoes, two pounds of stuffing, gravy, a green been casserole and an apple or pumpkin pie.

For $20 more ($59.99) you can up the sides to five pounds of mashed potatoes, four pounds of stuffing, more gravy and 3.5 pounds of green beans and a big pie.

They also offer spiral ham. But again: turkey.

SAFEWAY
Call the deli to order. I read a few online reviews of the Safeway dinners, and people said it was so-so, but it’s pretty inexpensive and the stress savings might be worth it. Each store has a limited number of dinners they make, so I would order soon. The Port Orchard store said they only had about 10-12 order open.

Dinner is $39.99 for an 8-12 pound turkey, two pounds of stuffing, two pounds of mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberry sauce, a dozen diner rolls and an 8-inch pumpkin pie.

TOWN AND COUNTRY
The Bainbridge store said they’re not doing turkeys this year, but they will have all sides available in the deli case, and they’ll be open on Thanksgiving Day until 3 p.m. They’ll have hot case dinners, just not turkeys.

Note: If you’re still wanting recipes out of me, they’re coming. I’m going to focus mostly on sides, and I’ll make a little video about how to prepare a bird, though I’ll be demonstrating on a chicken.

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Finding Fresh Farm Eggs and Other Farm Goods in Kitsap

EggsA reader had suggested I tell people where to find fresh farm eggs in Kitsap County. I started searching around the Internet and came across a very cool interactive farm map created by the  Kitsap County Extension of the Washington State University

Well, that made it pretty easy for me to share info with you.

You can search for farms that grow or sell local food by product.

Here’s what they had to say about eggs and other dairy:

I organized it by region of the county:

Poulsbo/North Kitsap

  • Greenwoodes Farm – Sells eggs and vegetables if you join their CSA program
  • Harley Bob’s Eggs – Eggs are sold off the farm and delivered to restaurants and retail buyers. They also have a farm stand, but they ask people to make an appointment.
  • JJJ Farm – They sell by special order and are closed to the public
  • Kowalski Farm in Kingston – They sell by appointment

Bainbridge Island

Silverdale/Central Kitsap

Port Orchard/South Kitsap

In Bremerton, I didn’t see any farms to buy fresh eggs, but CJ’s market on Park Avenue apparently sells eggs from Pheasant Field Farms as well as other locally grown or made products.

And since we’re on the subject of eggs, I’ll be trying out some new tips I got on making the perfect (or at least a better) omelette. I’ll let you know how it turned out soon.

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