Home sweet home

Yes, Worcester's high-end cuisine stacks up to Seattle's

by Jim Johnson

Since August, business and pleasure -- in a 5:1 ratio -- have absented me from Worcester at least 20 days of any given month. Right now, I'm sitting in Seattle, where the nation's highest concentration of fine, offbeat, and unusual restaurants makes dining out a requirement. Bearing in mind the difference in population between Worcester and Seattle, I've found it interesting to compare the two cities' culinary scenes.

I've quickly realized that Worcester's high-end restaurants can hold their own with Seattle's. While we may lack numbers and variety, we match some of the best in quality of cuisine and setting. One restaurant that constantly makes Seattle's Top Ten lists is ObaChine, Wolfgang Puck's "Asian Restaurant and Satay Bar," where sesame-crusted oysters, Dungeness crab shumei, and similar delights dominate the menu. I loved it there, but was it better than dinner at Harrington Farm or Sonoma? I think not.

Fusion is a dominant theme at Seattle restaurants, and Sonoma applies the same successful strategies. For example, swordfish, so familiar to New Englanders, takes on French flair when served with a sauce of raspberries and black currants. And Harrington Farm has something no Seattle restaurant can offer: a sense of history -- the kind that goes back to colonial days. Ditto for Publick House, the Bull Run, and the Wayside Inn, among many others.

When it comes to seafood, both cities can be proud. At Chandler's Crabhouse, crab is served fresh in a dozen dishes, with salmon a close second. In Worcester, the Sole Proprietor meets almost every seafood need; name a North Atlantic fish, and you can get it fresh -- and prepared almost any way you like.

Worcester's Italian restaurants approach seafood with their own brand of fusion. Stop anywhere on Shrewsbury Street, and you'll have no trouble finding shrimp scampi, sole stuffed and rolled like a bracciole, and ciopinno, that hearty fish stew that packs them in at Mac's Diner and East Park Grille.

Other ethnic fare abounds in Seattle, too, from Afghanistani to Zairian. Just yesterday, I navigated Seattle's International District before settling on dim sum at Top Gun Seafood, where the hungry and curious choose appetizer-size portions of shrimp dumplings and sautéed chicken feet (not to be confused with chicken fingers) from an endless parade of carts.

Although I've yet to find dim sum locally, Worcester should still be proud of its range of ethnic restaurants. Our Asian neighbors tempt with flavors that are subtle and fiery, and with dishes that tempt and challenge local palates. Few meals warm a winter's evening like pho, the Vietnamese soup that always arrives steaming with aromatic broth and a mix of exotic ingredients. I've had luck both at established restaurants like Pho Saigon and at many of the tiny side-street storefronts. For Vietnamese cuisine, Da Lat has few peers (I love the pork hot pot).

I challenge any restaurant anywhere to top Rosamaria's Café for authenticity. Indeed, you can eat the same dishes the Spanish found when they landed in the New World 500 years ago. Your meal may feature the subtle flavorings of some of the 25 different kinds of chili peppers Rosamaria Fanning uses in her tortillas formed from cornmeal she ground this morning.

Friends say French restaurants abound in Seattle, but I've seen few advertised and none that appealed to me. Not so in Greater Worcester, where Chez Claude and Le Béarn present authentic offerings like frog legs, bouef bourguignon, veal cordon bleu, coq au vin, and roast duckling.

And Indian? The options keep expanding, though my heart belongs to Sweetheart.

Worcester's greatest shortcoming is its lack of breakfast options. This morning, I headed to Coastal Kitchen, where I savored eggs scrambled with asiago cheese, caramelized onions, and red chard sautéed in garlic. Another strong contender was poached eggs over crabmeat hash -- with real crabmeat.

I won't have those morning choices again anytime soon -- at least not in Worcester. The city that calls itself the diner capital of the world offers little beyond the most basic in breakfast. Still, I've proudly taken guests to Miss Worcester for authenticity and to the Restaurant at Tatnuck Bookseller or Sahara for peaceful relaxation. And I've also spent many delightful Sunday mornings sampling the bountiful brunch buffets at the Beechwood's Harlequin and at Club Maxine at Maxwell Silverman's.

Vegetarian is big in Seattle, with whole restaurants devoted to varying degrees of non-meat dining. At the Gravity Bar, I enjoyed brown-rice salad with fresh vegetables and non-fat citrus vinaigrette. As a chaser, I ordered "Paradox," a fresh-from-the-juicer mix of carrot and papaya. Seattle even has kosher vegan Chinese food. Although I'm the ultimate carnivore, I'd love to see more vegetarian options in Worcester. The Living Earth and Quan Yin don't offer nearly enough.

Seattle's size also offers certain demographic advantages. Getting ready for your Mensa test? Head to Entros, a sort of 21st-century indoor amusement park for adults, where you switch between stretching your mind and belly. Thumpers, "Seattle's oldest gay-owned restaurant and bar," has been offering "fine dining, fine music, and fine friends" for nearly 40 years. Surrounded by lakes and sounds, Seattle also has abundant waterfront dining. In Worcester, we're pretty much restricted to lakefront views, including a wasted one at East Side Mario's. If we'd built along the Blackstone River, instead of paving it over, we'd have more options, like in Providence, where they created a vibrant new waterfront by rerouting rivers.

Regardless of its shortcomings, Worcester's dining scene offers the complementing comfort, predictability, and occasional pleasant surprises that I can't get one the road. When I'm traveling, I can't grab a friend and head to Arturo's, Tiano's, or the Struck. I miss that.