Friday Food Porn: Through the Looking Glass With The Walrus and the Carpenter

Photo courtesy Joshua Huston

This week's review of The Walrus and the Carpenter was contentious, to say the least. There are people who love this place--who seem to have sworn some kind of personal blood oath of allegiance to the few bar seats and handful of tables that make up its dining room and will turn on anyone who says it is anything less than the greatest restaurant in the city.

And I get it. I understand that kind of loyalty, and have felt it before myself. To a certain extent, I can even agree with them: The oysters here are outstanding, the vibe so rustic and vital that there are moments where The Walrus and the Carpenter can feel like the new, warm, and juicy center of the Ballard restaurant scene.

Unfortunately, I also had some problems with the place, which is where me and the acolytes diverge . . .

Photo courtesy Joshua Huston

"He orders carefully, in a pattern that makes sense only to him--bouncing around among the 10 or so different varieties on offer, pairing this with this and that with that. He talks to the server working the bar, asking her about the different properties of the Kusshi, the Eagle Rock, and the Olympia--which are sweet, which are metallic, and which carry the sharpest, most flooding sting of the sea. To her credit, she is able to answer most of his questions. She helps him pair wines with them, and goes into detail about the home addresses of many of his selections.

The Blue Pool oysters are from Hood Canal, grown in bags and tumbled clean. They're small, salty in the liquor, and briny in the meat. The Sweetwater are from Lopez Island, the Kusshi from Deep Bay, B.C., with long, deep shells and a delicate, clean flavor. With them, a bottle of white, a French petit Chablis, or a Pouilly-Fumé."