2000-11-24
by Sue Kidd
Journal Reporter
Although the Marina Park Grill has been open for a few months now, those who knew the place as Davinci's may still be surprised when they encounter the swanky new restaurant.
We saw it happen while dining there recently. T-shirt clad patrons walked in looking for a place to watch the Sonics game. We saw them do a double take of the well coifed customers, the candlelit ambiance, the antique wood bar, dark wood tables topped with white linen napkins and swoopy booths covered in muted fabric. Jazz was playing softly in the background. We chuckled as we heard one guy ask the bartender, ``What happened to this place?''
What happened was that Kirkland has grown up. Gone is Davinci's, a casual Italian eatery which catered to a much younger crowd and served mediocre pizzas and pasta. The downtown core is becoming much more sophisticated, which is noticeable with the addition of new restaurants such as the more upscale 21 Central steakhouse and seafood-centric Marina Park Grill. The trio responsible for both restaurants is the same: Mike Brown and partners Dan Williams and Kelly Simonson.
But don't fear if you are young enough to enjoy the bar scene. There's still the Shark Club downtown, which caters to a much younger crowd in search of a nightlife (and surprise, surprise. The same trio owns that club too).
It's hard to say if Kirklandites have embraced Marina Park Grill. I haven't seen a packed house there yet, but then again I haven't eaten there on a weekend night either.
But I see no reason why Marina Park Grill shouldn't fly. It has all the elements of a great restaurant: a surf-centric menu with just the right amount of turf to round it out, a romantic and sophisticated atmosphere, efficient and warm servers and a decent location (despite the lack of parking).
Although the kitchen is still
See GRILL, page 28
working out the kinks, the food mostly is solid. The service was warm without being gushy or annoyingly attentive. The pace of a dinner at the Marina Park Grill is just as it should be, not rushed nor painfully long.
Chef Ricardo Jiminez has created a grilled seafood-focused menu with an eclectic range of touches: Asian, Italian, Mexican and even a few French touches thrown in for good measure.
The grilled seafood selection probably was the most appealing part of the menu, I thought. Diners can mix and match a variety of seafoods and sauces. For fish, the daily selection might include wild King salmon, Alaskan halibut, Mexican gulf prawns, sea scallops, Hawaiian mahi mahi or sashimi grade ahi tuna.
See GRILL, page 28
Sauces may range from miso ginger glaze, wasabi butter, champagne beurre blanc, sweet corn salsa, a grilled shiitake relish, a lobster cream sauce or a fresh herb and basil pesto. The grilled seafood selection is priced in the $22.95-$23.95 range, which isn't a bad deal for what you get.
The remainder of the menu is an assortment of seafood specialties with a few poultry dishes and steaks thrown in for good measure.
The starter menu is fairly predictable with the usual suspects: crab cakes, mussels and clams, calamari, yada, yada, yada.
I'm glad we ordered the Dungeness crab cakes as an appetizer ($12.50) instead of as a meal ($24.95). Had we eaten them as an entree, we would surely have been sorely disappointed with the mediocre cakes that were dully spiced and laden with barely cooked peppers. The basil buerre blanc sauce on the side strangely tasted not at all of basil, but rather just a heavy cream sauce.
The crispy calamari ($9) was nicely cooked, but nothing out of the ordinary. We noticed that the accompanying jalapeno aioli tasted nothing of jalapeno.
The wild Alaskan salmon chowder ($4.75) was the hit of the starters. The pastel pink creamy base was dotted with chunks of salmon and potato bits. Share a bowl because it's more than enough to feed two.
Entrees proved more reliable. The grilled Mexican gulf prawns with lobster cream sauce ($23.95) was a choice dish. Six huge prawns, with a lightly smoky grilled flavor, were offset beautifully by a slightly sweet lobster sauce. The accompanying mountain of garlic mashers was sinfully rich, but impossible to finish. We found the mashers to be superior to the other accompaniment choices: roasted red potatoes, rice or rosemary fries.
The kitchen proves it can handle both surf and turf with a deft hand. A 10-ounce filet mignon was nicely marbled and grilled a perfect medium rare as ordered and finished with a rich butter glaze. The accompanying mini lobster tails, steamed to tender perfection, were doused with a rich champagne butter sauce. The whole surf-turf shebang was well priced at $34.95.
For dessert, the selection wasn't as impressive as we expected. We opted for a light finish to a decadent meal: creme brulee with a strawberry sauce that didn't dazzle our tastebuds, but didn't underwhelm either. But who has room for dessert when there's so much seafood to enjoy?
One thing to remember about the Marina Park Grill is that it's located in a parking vortex of sorts. It seems that area never has enough parking during the dinner peak hours and weekend nights, although one server told us the restaurant was looking into valet parking service. My advice: get there early to find decent parking, or expect to hoof it.
PHOTO BY STEVE SHELTON, JOURNAL PHOTOGRAPHER. Seattle skline can be seen across Lake Washington from Marina Park Grill