O pioneers! - six of Northwestern States' top tastemakers

Sunset, August, 1997 by Schuyler Ingle

"I'm an American chef," Schreiber says with the intensity of a prizefighter, "and coming back home has given me the chance to turn inward and focus on that food tradition that reaches right down into my roots."

Wildwood Restaurant, 1221 N.W. 21st Ave., Portland; (503) 248-9663.

TOM DOUGLAS PALACE KITCHEN

Tom Douglas has lived in the Pacific Northwest for 20 years, which makes him a native. True, he did grow up in Delaware. But all he got there was a fondness for crab cakes. It was in the Pacific Northwest that he discovered what a glorious marriage a crab cake and a Dungeness crab could make. That and a good microbrew we're talking a little bit of heaven.

When Douglas was the chef at Cafe Sport in Seattle's Pike Place Market in the 1980s, he began incorporating food ideas from all the local places he liked to eat at which meant a lot of Asian influence. Nobody else was exploring and pushing the boundaries quite like Douglas. He had never been one to have a great meal out and then leave it at that. He was much too curious a soul, and too enthusiastic about getting his hands into the process. For Douglas, that great meal wasn't complete until he had brought the ideas home and tried a few things in his own kitchen. And then they would end up on the restaurant menu.

When he opened the Dahlia Lounge in 1989, Douglas brought in Shelley Lance and Steven Steinbock to share duties - not just on the cooking line, but in the development of those first few menus, which would take the flavors of the Pacific Northwest to another level. The three friends had worked together for years, giving each other permission to build wonderful, ephemeral palaces of flavor.

Douglas's next endeavor was a seafood restaurant named Etta's (after his daughter, Loretta), which he opened in 1995 in the Pike Place space once occupied by Cafe Sport. Then in 1996 he opened the Palace Kitchen, named one of the top five new restaurants in the country by the James Beard Foundation.

With three restaurants, Douglas may have established his own small culinary empire. But he's after far more than profits. "You ever have that feeling when you're eating a great meal, where passion and pleasure get all mixed up on the plate?" he asks. "That's one of the great bottom lines."

Dahlia Lounge, 1904 Fourth Ave., Seattle; (206) 682-4143.

Etta's, 2020 Western Ave., Seattle; (206) 443-6000.

Palace Kitchen, 2030 Fifth Ave., Seattle; (206) 448-2001.

HARRY YOSHIMURA MUTUAL FISH MARKET

As you might expect from its Puget Sound setting, there are a number of good fish markets in Seattle: Jack's Fish Spot in the Pike Place Market, which leans heavily toward salmon and shellfish; University Seafood & Poultry Co., which mixes high-quality seafood and poultry. But there's only one Mutual Fish - and it serves the most eclectic population in the city.

Waned Dick Yoshimura started the business in 1948, most of his customers were Japanese, though some Chinese, Filipinos, and African Americans bought their fish from him as well. A tight community. Supportive. "Back then," Dick's son, Harry, explains, "the Asian business community all worked together to help each other. A lot of the Asian restaurants came to my dad for fish."