Are you looking to celebrate a birthday? Anniversary? Maybe you just want to revel in the countless forms of beef in all its juicy, seared glory. That’s reason enough in this food writer’s book to make an occasion of it and hightail it on down to your local steakhouse.
Until recently, there weren’t a lot of classic, high-end options for steak dinners in Snohomish County. Your best bet was making a special trip down to Seattle or Bellevue, which always makes any boring old day feel like a thrilling night out until you’re searching for parking.
But meat devotees now have two upscale new options close to home, thanks to a couple of chains exploring expansion into the PNW. Keep reading to learn more about these veritable temples to beef, and get prepped now by loosening your belt a few notches.
The Market Table spread at Fogo de Chão on Thursday, April 20, 2023 in Lynnwood, Washington. (Olivia Vanni / The Herald)
Fogo de Chão: Taste Brazil in Lynnwood, without leaving your seat
This new outpost of an international Brazilian steakhouse chain, its second in Washington, is tucked into a corner of the Alderwood Mall in Lynnwood. Upon walking through the doors at the new spot’s grand opening event, I was handed a passport, filled with stories of the chain’s founding in southern Brazil. “Bem Vindo Ao Brasil,” its inside cover proclaimed. Welcome to Brazil, indeed.
Helena Capucho, general manager of the Lynnwood Fogo, recommended we start with the restaurant’s signature cocktail, the caipirinha. Made with cachaça, a sugarcane-based liquor fiercely beloved in Capucho’s native Brazil, it’s traditionally a pretty simple drink that lets the slightly sweet cachaça shine through the tart lime juice. I selected the passionfruit variety, rich with pulpy orange fruit, and was instantly transported from a drizzly, overcast Washington day to the beaches of Rio.
The first thing that caught my eye in the cavernous dining room, decorated with Brazilian-inspired murals and relief carvings, was the absolutely towering array of fresh fruits and veggies on ice. It takes a lot to make me want to dive into a salad when the aroma of grilled meat fills the air, but Fogo de Chão’s market table understood the assignment: besides slabs of fresh, fragrant pineapple and marrow-like heart of palm, diners can pick from traditional build-your-own salad toppings and offerings like Brazilian potato salad and house-aged cured meats.
Let my follies be a lesson to you, dear reader, and moderate your grazing at the market table if you want to save room for the true star of the show. That would be the churrasco-style dining experience, carried on to the Lynnwood location from the chain’s first location in Porto Alegre, Brazil, in 1979.
Inside one of the dining rooms at Fogo de Chão on Thursday, April 20, 2023 in Lynnwood, Washington. (Olivia Vanni / The Herald)
Fogo’s gauchos and gauchas — named for the Brazilian cowboys whose cooking traditions inspire the cuisine here — train for weeks and months, learning to sharpen their own knives until they slice through a primal cut of beef like butter. Then the gauchos present their work to you at your table, tantalizingly dangling skewers of top sirloin and cuts of pork before you. Use the tiny silver tongs at your place setting to grab the slab of meat as the gaucho delicately slices it off for you, and drizzle with verdant, fresh chimichurri if you want to gild the lily.
When the gaucho approaches your table bearing a skewer of picanha, a Brazilian specialty sirloin cut, be sure the medallion on your table is turned over to the green “Sim, por favor” side, meaning “Yes, please, I’d love to test the bounds of the human stomach.” I asked for my steak rare and was granted a tender, flavorful slice, simply seasoned to let the flavors of the house-aged beef take center stage. Olivia Vanni, Herald photographer and my dining companion, ordered hers medium-well — a travesty among some beef purists, but in my opinion, the cuts were still juicy and bursting with flavor despite the lack of pink centers.
As gauchos brought us more and more cuts — citrusy pork loin chops, charred linguiça sausages, and endless cuts of beef — we were eventually forced to flip the medallion over, the red side warning our gauchos that we’d had enough. But when they broke out the Wagyu New York strip served on a slab of Himalayan rock salt, I was forced to give in once more. We ended our night with a slice of chocolatey, dense-yet-light-as-air brigadeiro, a sort of Brazilian cheesecake. I’m ashamed to say we couldn’t quite polish it off.
The churrasco dinner experience at Fogo will run you $66 per person, including all-you-can-eat tableside service and the market table. Kids under 6 eat free, and those 7 to 12 are half-price. For lunch, a slightly condensed version of the churrasco service is $45 a person, and the restaurant offers weekend brunch, too. Don’t miss the bar’s all-day happy hour featuring $4 Brazilian beers and shareable small plates like the queijo assado, grilled Brazilian cheese skewers drizzled in faintly peppery Malagueta honey.
Fogo de Chão, 18602 Alderwood Mall Blvd, Ste 1110, Lynnwood. Hours and reservations: fogodechao.com/location/lynnwood, (425) 539-0444.
The Associate, which is a dinner board presented on a lazy susan, comes with three cuts of beef and an assortment of delectable accoutrements at Rare Society on Tuesday, April 25, 2023, in Mill Creek, Washington. Wood Fired Broccolini, left, and Potatoes Au Gratin, right, were ordered as side dishes. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
Rare Society: Simple, sunkissed California steak
Brad Wise, owner and head chef of the California-based steakhouse chain Rare Society, told me the chain’s new Mill Creek location sits on what was once a buffalo farm. What better place, then, to truly give in to your basest red meat cravings?
The new spot is the restaurant’s fourth location, and its only one outside of Southern California. Wise said Rare Society is his loving tribute to Vegas Strip-style steakhouses in all their glitzy glory, and the gold accents and cushy booths inside the dining room sure make you feel like Sinatra might start crooning from a corner at any moment. When I visited Rare Society early one Tuesday evening, most of the other patrons were couples, friends or small groups dressed casually — no need for full Las Vegas glam for this night out.
The food itself doesn’t need a lot of dressing up to stand out. Wise’s Santa Maria technique has the premium cuts of steak, which you can see dry-aging in a cooler just beyond the dining room, slow-roasted over red oak, giving the juicy morsels perfectly charred outer crusts and a lingering smoky flavor without outshining the meat itself. Rare Society offers a selection of oysters, ahi tuna tartare and more on its raw bar menu, designed to take advantage of the Washington location’s proximity to the freshest seafood, but we knew what we were after.
Our server, Moriah, tipped us off that the gochujang-glazed bacon appetizer ends up on “at least 97%” of tables, so naturally we ordered it. Moriah also let us in on another secret: sandwich a piece of the pork between a warm Parker House roll for a nearly unholy slider.
Both starters lived up to their reputations, alone and together. The sweet-spicy bacon literally melted in our mouths, prompting Herald photographer Ryan Berry to proclaim it “far more than just bacon.” The rolls, doused generously in truffle butter, were golden, comforting perfection.
But the real star, naturally, was the Associate Board, a sort of “steak charcuterie” that allows diners to sample the steak Rare Society is known for. The board even comes with its own little stage, a custom lazy Susan, so everyone at the table can get a bite of the action.
A slice of the most popular appetizer — Bacon in gochujang glaze — is plated alongside a roll at Rare Society on Tuesday, April 25, 2023, in Mill Creek, Washington. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
The board features a chef’s selection of cuts that change nightly, plus béarnaise, house-made steak sauce and Santa Maria salsa for dipping. Ours was loaded with filet mignon, tri-tip and Wagyu Denver strip, all cooked perfectly rare, and a segment of marrow-rich bone. Strangely enough, this was my first time trying bone marrow, and I found it to be a satisfying umami-rich topper for a bite of filet.
But the butter — oh boy, the butter. Infused with beef fat and ever-so-faintly seasoned with sage, the only way I can describe this butter is that it tastes like a whole meal in itself, and dolloping it atop bites of steak felt almost queenly. It’s like the three-course-dinner chewing gum from “Willy Wonka,” only even better and without the devastating blueberry side effects.
Diners definitely flock to Rare Society for the meat, but the sides nearly threaten to steal the show. We ordered potatoes au gratin, layered with rich, cheesy, truffled sauce, and wood-fired broccolini. Charred till crisp, layered on sumac-spiced yogurt and doused in lemon juice, Moriah said the broccolini is her go-to “acid reprieve” after downing so many rich morsels of steak. We found the tart, green crunch to be much needed, and I may even try and replicate it at home.
The icing on top of the meal, literally, was the house-made butter cake, topped with cream cheese buttercream and pleasantly tangy sour cream ice cream. According to Moriah, Rare Society’s butter cake was a happy accident: a pastry chef was making pound cake and in a delightful twist of fate added double the butter to the recipe. The dessert was expertly balanced between richness, lightness and tanginess. But again, we were forced to admit defeat. I was still riding the steak high when I got home — but I definitely took my dog for a couple extra laps.
Rare Society, 13223 39th Ave SE, Mill Creek. Hours and reservations: raresociety.com/mill-creek, (425) 777-4590.
Riley Haun: 425-339-3192; riley.haun@heraldnet.com; Twitter: @RHaunID.
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