Yesterday I invited my dad to take me out to dinner at Maynard's, the montrous new restaurant on Bucklin Hill in Silverdale. We had tried to go a couple weeks ago, but there was no room to park in the enormous lot -- so desperate are Silverdaleans for new dining experiences. That other time, we went to Hakata, a Japanese restaurant on Myhre Road, which he said used to be really crappy but has become good. At Hakata, he had a Bento box (I wasn't impressed, but he liked it) and I had Soba noodle soup, a deep hot bowl of chicken and thick chewy noodles, slurp.
So. There were fewer cars on a Wednesday. Some cooks were carrying three rolls of garden hose into the kitchen from a Hyundai's hatchback. I heard one call the bald guy "Chef." Just like in the restaurants Jacques Pepin and Anthony Bourdain wrote about, an actual dictatorial Chef that the peons call Chef! "I wonder what they're going to use that hose for," I said. "Maybe to make coffee," Dad said.
There's a high, plain, pale-gray door, and we were led to a round booth, with views of the black night beyond the tall windows looking toward Dyes Inlet. There's no art, but I saw some Navy wings hanging in the far wall near the bar. Many laminated beams supporting the angular planes of ceiling; one teal-painted wall; some wood-strip fencing above the banquette, upholstered in Insurance Company Waiting Room Blue-Beige Swirl.
The open-ish kitchen displayed many Chef types under glarey light just like on Top Chef. Waiter wore a gray Home Depot-ish apron with oversized grommets holding the orange straps. He struggled to fir the vinyl order-book back into its front pocket, and when I ordered the boneless fried chicken thighs, the way he said, "...and, some chicken," made me feel like he saw me as just another schmuck that's not creative enough to order anything else. In fact, the menu was basically American bar food with a few extra crunchy sprinkles: salami 'n cheese, salad with apples and hazelnuts, fried chicken, fried fish, a "Bucklin burger" (roadkill, perhaps?) a burger with Gorgonzola (but from Oregon, so it's cute because it's called Oregonzola)... a steak with aioli and mashers. A neighboring table thankfully ordered the smoked meats served "in a cloud of smoke" so we could see how they did it. It did not involve the hose. A glass wizard's hat was lifted off the plate at the table, and the smoke was swiftly carried away by efficient HVAC system.
Dad described the place as "like an airport," or "an upscale McDonald's," and he was right. It's aggressively inoffensive, trying so hard to seem like a great restaurant by having minimalist decor and putting the waiters in Home-Depot-ish aprons. But whatever that white sauce was gooped obver my undercooked, overlarge red potatoes, tasted like a badly-executed Hollandaise from a packet. The chicken was ostly hard crunchy breading, with not enough spicy sauce. Coleslaw was like what you get in a tub at Safeway and the mandolin-sliced pickles were nice. But the slender triangle plate was not cool enough to make up for the bad food.
Dad got rockfish, served on a mattress of chunky rice with a pineapple salsa he said was good but was clearly made with industrially produced pine-o-cubes. It was all served on a narrow oblong cutting board lined with a rectangle of banana leaf or imitation-banana-leaf plastic. Why not a plate? Because it wasn't very good. He had to take extra care not to spill food onto the bland easy-clean veneer tabletop.
There were several other diners there. It felt like a place designed to accommodate large numbers of aspiring Silverdaleans all at once. It felt designed for people who learn what good food is by watching cooking shows on TV, people who decide what "the good life" is based on the advertising that comes on the side of the Crock-Pot box or from the ads in Better Homes & Gardens.
I am one of those people. I used to study the coloir ad inserts in the Sunday paper, passionatly wanting to look like the bland, lanky-haired teens in the photos, wishing my house looked like the house in the Sears ads for patio furniture. I wanted that clean simplicity, blemish-free, the multicultural pals kicking up their heels in pleather boots from Target, right on this season's style trends.
The restaurant felt like a megachurch for wannabe foodies.
Some recommendations: Try the Bremerton burrito at El Balcon, on 4th and Park. Try that soba soup at Hakata, or go to la Fermata in Manette, where the light is low, the tablecloths heavy and white, and have some bolognese. Try the Paella place in Poulsbo. If you want fried fish, go to that place on Randall Way, beneath the forest of peach- and butter-yellow apartments full of fast-fashion devotees. Or hell, go to Seattle, go to Serafina or Carmelita, or the hom-bao place on Jackson, or the Mediterranean place that sells falafels out of a sidewalk window.
Dad and I talked about Tom Douglas. He said he should have just not let people tip, in his restaurants.
Anyway. Maynard's. If you like it, don't tell me, because I will judge you. I found it depressing. Just more phony bullshit masquerading as a life well lived.
So. There were fewer cars on a Wednesday. Some cooks were carrying three rolls of garden hose into the kitchen from a Hyundai's hatchback. I heard one call the bald guy "Chef." Just like in the restaurants Jacques Pepin and Anthony Bourdain wrote about, an actual dictatorial Chef that the peons call Chef! "I wonder what they're going to use that hose for," I said. "Maybe to make coffee," Dad said.
There's a high, plain, pale-gray door, and we were led to a round booth, with views of the black night beyond the tall windows looking toward Dyes Inlet. There's no art, but I saw some Navy wings hanging in the far wall near the bar. Many laminated beams supporting the angular planes of ceiling; one teal-painted wall; some wood-strip fencing above the banquette, upholstered in Insurance Company Waiting Room Blue-Beige Swirl.
The open-ish kitchen displayed many Chef types under glarey light just like on Top Chef. Waiter wore a gray Home Depot-ish apron with oversized grommets holding the orange straps. He struggled to fir the vinyl order-book back into its front pocket, and when I ordered the boneless fried chicken thighs, the way he said, "...and, some chicken," made me feel like he saw me as just another schmuck that's not creative enough to order anything else. In fact, the menu was basically American bar food with a few extra crunchy sprinkles: salami 'n cheese, salad with apples and hazelnuts, fried chicken, fried fish, a "Bucklin burger" (roadkill, perhaps?) a burger with Gorgonzola (but from Oregon, so it's cute because it's called Oregonzola)... a steak with aioli and mashers. A neighboring table thankfully ordered the smoked meats served "in a cloud of smoke" so we could see how they did it. It did not involve the hose. A glass wizard's hat was lifted off the plate at the table, and the smoke was swiftly carried away by efficient HVAC system.
Dad described the place as "like an airport," or "an upscale McDonald's," and he was right. It's aggressively inoffensive, trying so hard to seem like a great restaurant by having minimalist decor and putting the waiters in Home-Depot-ish aprons. But whatever that white sauce was gooped obver my undercooked, overlarge red potatoes, tasted like a badly-executed Hollandaise from a packet. The chicken was ostly hard crunchy breading, with not enough spicy sauce. Coleslaw was like what you get in a tub at Safeway and the mandolin-sliced pickles were nice. But the slender triangle plate was not cool enough to make up for the bad food.
Dad got rockfish, served on a mattress of chunky rice with a pineapple salsa he said was good but was clearly made with industrially produced pine-o-cubes. It was all served on a narrow oblong cutting board lined with a rectangle of banana leaf or imitation-banana-leaf plastic. Why not a plate? Because it wasn't very good. He had to take extra care not to spill food onto the bland easy-clean veneer tabletop.
There were several other diners there. It felt like a place designed to accommodate large numbers of aspiring Silverdaleans all at once. It felt designed for people who learn what good food is by watching cooking shows on TV, people who decide what "the good life" is based on the advertising that comes on the side of the Crock-Pot box or from the ads in Better Homes & Gardens.
I am one of those people. I used to study the coloir ad inserts in the Sunday paper, passionatly wanting to look like the bland, lanky-haired teens in the photos, wishing my house looked like the house in the Sears ads for patio furniture. I wanted that clean simplicity, blemish-free, the multicultural pals kicking up their heels in pleather boots from Target, right on this season's style trends.
The restaurant felt like a megachurch for wannabe foodies.
Some recommendations: Try the Bremerton burrito at El Balcon, on 4th and Park. Try that soba soup at Hakata, or go to la Fermata in Manette, where the light is low, the tablecloths heavy and white, and have some bolognese. Try the Paella place in Poulsbo. If you want fried fish, go to that place on Randall Way, beneath the forest of peach- and butter-yellow apartments full of fast-fashion devotees. Or hell, go to Seattle, go to Serafina or Carmelita, or the hom-bao place on Jackson, or the Mediterranean place that sells falafels out of a sidewalk window.
Dad and I talked about Tom Douglas. He said he should have just not let people tip, in his restaurants.
Anyway. Maynard's. If you like it, don't tell me, because I will judge you. I found it depressing. Just more phony bullshit masquerading as a life well lived.