BRAVO!: Water view livens menu

By Deborah Woolston

Sun Staff

With Memorial Day looming, the annual search is on for great outdoor dining spots. Once again, I'm baffled by a West Sound contradiction. How can an area with so much coastline have so few waterfront restaurants?

High on my marine-view list is The Madrona Waterfront Cafe, the former Saltwater Cafe under new ownership. The close-up of cozy Eagle Harbor looks like a 3-D poster called The Joy of Puget Sound Boating.

One corner of the former Winslow Commercial Dock has been remodeled to catch the scenery through two walls of windows and a spacious deck. Deck seating gets tight in warm weather.

The mood is Bainbridge Island casual, which can mean a variety of attire. The theme is island history, spelled out in photo blowups of old hotel dining rooms, tall-masted harbor traffic and a vacant, muddy Winslow Way. The table hardware reflects the cafe's mood  cloth napkins and padded vinyl table cloths.

About the food. The short answer is that it's pretty good, but the execution doesn't always equal the concept.

Owner Robert Morris, creator of the famous Seattle-area Kidd Valley Hamburger Co. fast food chain, has put together a menu that appeals to a broad cross-section of tastes. You'll find American standards like burgers, fish-and-chips, steak and Caesar salad. You'll find the obligatory Italian dishes from standard cheese ravioli and Italian sausage sandwich to more adventurous fried calamari rings and grilled eggplant with goat cheese.

And you'll find a sprinkling of ethnic dishes. Some are straight, like Thai peanut salad, seafood satay and Japanese udon noodles. Others are creatively fused, such as humus burrito, Szechuan pepper steak and tempura prawns and chips.

The best items in my two visits were modest dishes that are easy to get wrong. The vegetarian black bean chili ($2.50) was a cupful of flavors  cumin, garlic, beans and carrots topped with sliced raw scallions and grated cheese  not the usual leftovers passing for real food.

Other examples of simple dishes done right were the fried calamari with aioli  squid complete with tiny tentacles and garlic mayonnaise  and grilled chicken sandwich ($7). The calamari ($7) were dipped in a light seasoned batter and cooked to tender perfection. The skinless chicken breast tasted fresh off the grill and came embellished with prosciutto, pesto, lettuce, tomato, cheese, red onion and a chewy Italian roll.

The paella ($13) was a gutsy take on a Spanish seafood classic. The spicy sausage, hot herb rub on the chicken and powerful dose of saffron dueled for control over the more subtle fish, mussels, clams and shrimp. Overcooking pushed it off the A list.

Less than totally successful were several dishes with technical problems. They include delicious grilled eggplant overwhelmed by goat cheese and marinara sauce ($5), predictable house salad, overcooked steak with an uncaramelized onion relish ($14) and bread pudding ($3.50) microwaved to warm sponginess.

If you live for perfect food, there are better Bainbridge choices. But a few shortcomings won't keep me away from The Madrona Waterfront Cafe, especially this summer when I'm showing out-of-town visitors how we live the good life in Puget Sound.

A glass ($3.35 to $4.50) or bottle ($11 to $18) of West Coast wine, homegrown seafood and a harborside seat in the sun  I can't wait.