March 14, 2008
Quinn's Is Open for Lunch, Bring Your Largest Wallet
You haven't heard much from us about Capitol Hill's new "gastropub" Quinn's (owned by Scott and Heather Staples, who also own Restaurant Zoe).
It's not their fault--it's just like if you're the fourth Californian to move to Ballard in a month, people look at you funny. (We're on a Ballard kick today.) When it opened, we wandered over to 10th and Pike and glanced at the menu plastered with a raft of hip foodie terms, noted the prices on the "small plates," and felt a little part of ourselves die. Not that La Puerta, the previous tenant, was pure magic. But it never tried to be as school-picture-day perfect as the chi-chi Quinn's. "Oh, look, it's like eating in a Merchant Ivory movie." To be fair, 91% of the Urban Spooners love it.
Today we noticed they were open for lunch. Lunch oughta be cheaper, we thought. There's a lunch menu (11am-3pm) posted in the window, along with instructions (how Seattle) on how to order: it's counter service, order there, they'll bring the food to your table. You wrangle your own cutlery (unless you sit at the counter, which comes with settings). We skipped over the beet salad, the wild boar sloppy joe (the real menu highlight, Seattlest Audrey tells us, too late), the fish (true cod) and chips, and settled on a Wagyu-beef burger with fries ($12). And a cup of Caffe Vita coffee ($3). The burger was a little too rare for "medium rare," but otherwise delicious and filling and besides it stopped mooing after the third bite. The fries were a revelation, fried in beef fat. It was with an act of pure will that we pushed them away.
The lunch total with tip for burger, fries, and cup of coffee, with no wait service? $18. We love that the Stranger's review calls it "affordable food." They're obviously paying their food critics more than they used to. We'll try the wild boar sloppy joe once we've gotten our IRS check.
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$12 for Wagyu beef?
Thats dirt cheap...
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Fries in beef fat? Is that even legal anymore?
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I'm intrigued by the menu, but the high prices and hordes of yuppies in there totally turn me off.
I noticed when I was walking by the other day that they had a posted a sign about offering lunch soon, and I thought...hmmm...might be a good way to try it when it's not mobbed with douchebags...but if I pay almost $20 for a lunch, I expect full table service. Yikes.
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jessejb: BOKA's is also $12, so that price not unprecedented. It's high-end beef, and that's fine.
I'm just saying that $18 is more than I'd want to end up paying for a service-free lunch. And $3 for a cup of brewed Vita coffee? Vita's next door. I'll just walk the ten steps next time.
Charles: it's legal so long as you don't claim the fries are vegetarian.
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I've heard mediocre things about the burger too, but the wild boar sloppy joe is *the* way to go at Quinn's! It's on the small plates menu, but it's a full-size sandwich ($10, at least at dinner). Get it with a side of the cooked spinach and you're golden.
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I agree with Audrey. The wild boar sloppy joe is great! But I also agree the rest of the food on the menu is a little high-priced.
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Seriously, MvB! I know prices of coffee have jumped up a bit, but $3!
Honestly, there needs to be some collars dyeing themselves blue here!
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ugh, the burger is awful. i'm sure it's part of the charm, but when i ordered the burger it was far too "meaty" for me, and i couldn't even finish it. the sloppy joe is definitely the way to go, but it needs to come with fries and not just be a sandwich on a plate (maybe they've changed that by now). if the smoked trout salad is still on the menu, that's also pretty great.
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hmm, sounds like mcdonalds is much more your style, you should go there next time. they even have a value menu so you don't have to wait for your irs check.
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Donte: yeah, the burger is 8 oz., I believe, which is a mouthful. You have to take a couple of deep breaths to work your way through it. And if it's the rarer side of medium rare, the center is gooey.
Smoked trout salad, eh? I could be talked into that.
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Just returned from dinner at Quinn's. My gal had the hanger steak, I had the burger. When the plates arrived we both mentioned that we should've ordered something with a bit more green on the plate. Ten seconds, that statement was irrelevant as we oo'd and ahh'd our way through pure bliss...damn, that burger is insanely flavorful.
We'll be heading back from the smoked trout salad and wild boar joe.
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stopped by a couple weeks after they opened. the fish part of the fish and chips was one soggy cube. didn't have most condiments. my medium rare burger was burnt to a crisp. server never came back after dumping the food on us. I'll take McDonald's any day over that bullshit.
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I didn't love the burger either but everything else I've had there has been amazing. The pork tenderloin left me speechless with my eyes rolled back in my head.
I know it's not "cheap" per se, but it's incredibly inexpensive for the quality of food they serve.
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All I know is that Skillet says they are coming to the Hill! That's all we really need!