Basho Cafe was the best find in my last trip to Vancouver!
Away from the hustle and bustle of Vancouver downtown, Basho is located in east Vancouver.
The wood decor gave an old style, rustic comfort, reminiscent of Kyoto’s sweets shop, and homeliness of a family run business.
Basho roasts their own coffee, and definitely serves one of the best coffee around.
We had mocha and it was absolutely smooth, roasty and delicious.
Finally made it to Starbucks Roastery and Tasting Room on Capitol Hill after 8 months of their opening.
What an impressive space!
Heard my friends talked about Café Lago being great for a very long time and still never been until last night!
Due to the romantic lighting in the restaurant, my food pictures did not do justice for the quality of the food.
Our friends ordered the appetizer Pomodori al Forno and they were amazing!
The garlicky toasts were very crisp and still maintained resemblance of bread.
I personally did not like toasts that were completely crunchy, hard, and cracker-like.
Spent our Labor Day weekend with friends in WA’s wine country, Walla Walla.
Walla Walla is about 4.5-hour drive away from the Seattle area. There are many towns known for their agricultural production such as cherries, stone fruits, apples etc.
Particularly, the Johnson Orchards in Yakima had mouth-watering juicy stone fruits. We had nectarines, white peaches, yellow peaches and pluots. They were all super sweet. Housed in a 1916 warehouse, it was a unique stop over. We also purchased some fruit pies made on site for desserts!
On our first afternoon, we visited Reininger, Cougar Crest, Seven Hills and Trio Vintners wineries.
Reininger came highly recommended from different sources. We were fairly disappointed.
We tasted a Merlot, Syrah and Camenere; a Chardonnay, SoRho and Sangiovese; and none of them were our taste.
I found the wines all had great aromas, and had very light body, which was expected from the varietal on the list.
The aftertaste of the wines were most unattractive to me. They were all very sour, astringent and bitter. Very high tannin, and not very pleasant.
Cougar Crest carried many wine spectator rated wines.
The ones we tasted were not rated and they were in general light body as well.