October Food Events

  • Tacoma’s 52nd Annual Greek Festival
    October 4-6. Authentic Greek Cuisine, dance, music and more. Free admission. S. Yakima and 15th Street, Tacoma. Fore more information, visit them online.
  • Harmon Brewery & Restaurant 16th Annual Brewmaster’s Dinner
    October 3, 6 p.m. 5 course meal paired with 5 Harmon ales for only $35. Please call 253-383-2739 for reservations.
  • Harvest Fest
    October 5, 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Fall fun and good food for all at Tahoma Farms, 21108 Orville Rd E, Orting. Chow down on locally sourced, Southern-inspired fare with a modern twist from the food truck Seattle Biscuit Company. Savor fall ice cream flavors from Ice Cream Social and snack on organic kettle corn and corn dogs from the Organic Kettle Corn Company. See where your food is grown and meet the farmers who harvest it in person! Peruse our farm stand and buy fresh produce from the very farm where it was grown. Plus, browse our market area and purchase items from artisan vendors like OlyKraut . $15 per carload (includes a pumpkin!). Pay at the gate or online.
  • Puyallup Art and Wine Walk
    October 5, 2 p.m.-6 p.m. Enjoy wine & food pairings, along with live music and an art show. Tickets are $25/advance or $30 the day of the event. Purchase tickets online.
  • Tacoma Chocolate Festival
    October 4-5. Cupcake Clash Bake-Off, chocolate cocktail hour, chocolatier demonstrations and more in Tacoma’s Proctor District. Tickets are $5. For ticket locations, see the Proctor Neighborhood Facebook.
  • Toscanos Fall Wine Dinner
    October 9, 6:30 p.m.
    Toscanos first Wine Maker’s Dinner of the fall will be hosted by Charles Cline, Owner of Cline Cellars & Jacuzzi Family Vineyards. Mr. Cline will be showcasing some unique wines from both wineries. A four-course dinner will be prepared by Toscanos Chef, Tom Pantley. Each course is designed to highlight these wonderful wines. The cost of the Wine Maker’s dinner is $70 per person, tax & gratuity included. No-host cocktails are at 6:30pm, followed by the dinner at 7pm. For reservations, call (253) 864-8600.
  • Tacoma Farmers Market 2013 Banquet of Bounty, A Farm to Fork Fundraising Celebration
    October 11, 6:30. The Tacoma Farmers Market Board presents “Banquet of Bounty”, an annual fundraising dinner that connects our community to our farms. Dinner will be prepared by Chef Matt Stickle at the Hotel Murano, and will feature the bounty from local farmers and producers. The special guest speaker Molly Wizenberg, award-winning food blogger (‘Orangette’) and author of New York Times bestseller ‘A Homemade Life’. $75/person. Tickets are available online.
  • Primo Grill Cooking Classes
    October 12th, The Cuisine of Tuscany. $65 inclusive of recipes, instruction, lunch, a glass of wine, tax and gratuity. Call 253-383-7000 to reserve.
    October 19th, The Cuisine of Spain. $65 inclusive of recipes, instruction, lunch, a glass of wine, tax and gratuity. Call 253-383-7000 to reserve.
  • Bayview School of Cooking Classes
    Various days and times. See their class schedule for more information.
  • Tacoma Food Co-Op Party
    October 16, 6-9 p.m. At Bluebeard Coffee and Cork! A Wine Bar, located next to each other on 6th & State. All are welcome to attend! There will be live music by Billy Pratt, fabulous food, and drinks, and member-owners will have their last chance to vote for the new TFC board members. Free to attend.
  • Dishcrawl
    October 16. 6th Avenue Tacoma Dishcrawl. Eat your way through various restaurants on 6th Ave. Restaurants are kept a secret until two days before the event, at which time the meeting location is revealed to ticket holders. Reservations are $45 a person and can be purchased at dishcrawl.com/theave.
  • Nordic Lutefisk Dinner
    October 20, 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Includes, all you can eat Lutefisk, Meatballs,
    Lefse and all the trimmings. Adults $ 20.00, ages 7-12 $ 10.00 , 6 and under are free. For more information, see their Facebook page.

Pickle with Duris Farm

I thought I’d do a little re-blog of this post I did a few years ago on my cooking blog, A Big Mouthful, about Duris Farm in Puyallup and their amazing refrigerator dill pickle recipe.

Duris is now open for the summer — and it’s the perfect place to get all your pickling supplies! If you’ve never pickled before, don’t worry. It’s actually super easy with their recipe (below), and you can pick up everything you need as a one-stop-shop at their stand.

They also have other vegetables and their own canned and pickled items for sale.

Over the years, this has become my go-to pickle recipe. Give it a try!

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I Wanted to Dislike Yeti Yogurt, but…

I previously wrote about how there are way too many frozen yogurt shops in Tacoma, and I still do believe that.

Yeti Yogurt, a Pacific Northwest chain, opened up shop kitty corner to Gibson’s Frozen Yogurt in Tacoma’s Westgate neighborhood. They’ve also opened one in Fircrest, and in Puyallup.

I wanted to dislike Yeti Yogurt.

I really did.

But then I tried it.

Maybe it was the glowing frozen yogurt dispensers, modern interior or what seemed to be a mile of fun toppings…but what really sold me were the flavors.

18 flavors at a time.

Flavors like Nutella, cookies and cream, salted caramel, bananas foster, baklava…and that’s just the tip of the fro yo iceberg.

Do yourself a favor. DON’T go there. It’s too good.

CARE to Dine Event

The inaugural Care to Dine event is this Tuesday, July 23, and benefits the South Sound CARE Foundation, which raises money to provide cancer clinical trials to residents in the Pierce County and South Sound communities.

Participating restaurants will donate 20 percent of proceeds raised on July 23 to the foundation.

Restaurants include:

Adriatic Grill
HG Bistro
Pomodoro
Savor Creperie
Ben Dew’s Clubhouse Grill
Moctezuma’s in Tacoma and Gig Harbor

It’s always a great reason to dine out when charity is involved!

SPOTTED: Yet Another Frozen Yogurt Shop

Since Coldstone Creamery closed, I’ve had my eye on the now-vacant space next to Round Table Pizza in Westgate for a while. I’ve hoped it would turn into a little neighborhood deli or cafe…or something…anything,  except perhaps a frozen yogurt shop. Lo and behold today I see signs go up for Yeti Yogurt, a Pacific Northwest chain with four current locations and six more locations slated to open in the coming months.

I don’t hate frozen yogurt. In fact, I like it very much. Your choice of flavor and toppings, with less calories than ice cream…all good things. But there is a Gibson’s Frozen Yogurt kitty corner to this location. Aren’t two frozen yogurt shops in one block a little much? Not to mention, the countless frozen yogurt shops popping up all over Tacoma and the South Puget Sound and the soon-to-be Gibson’s Frozen Yogurt Truck coming next month (see my article in the Weekly Volcano on that here).

Too much of a good thing? Maybe. Either way, Yeti Yogurt in Westgate is slated to open this summer, as is another location in Fircrest. There’s a location at 176th and Meridian in Puyallup that’s already open.