Last night I went on a third date to the Black Bottle gastro-tavern. I mention that it was a third date only because I don’t think that this would be the place to go for a first or even a second one. The menu is “family style,” which means that you really have to share, and the restaurant is very noisy and requires leaning very close to your dining companion in order to have a conversation. It’s all just a little too intimate for a first date.

The restaurant is located in the former Two Dagos space on 1st and Vine, and has been converted into one long, thin room with a brick wall on one side and a strange kinetic sculpture that strongly resembles an eye at one end. (The waitress, when presented with the question, “Does that move because of a ghost or a hobgoblin?” answered firmly that it was a hobgoblin, although she did quickly admit that there was also a fan in the space behind it.) The place was full when we arrived, but we scored a little table in a back corner surprisingly quickly.

Everything on the menu is priced at $8, except the desserts, which are $7. A request for a recommendation from the waitress ended up with a warning against the fresh salmon and fontina cheese balls, which are apparently made from farmed salmon. Forewarned, we ordered the prosciutto and bechamel flatbread and the mussels marseilles-style.

The flatbread, served in a cute scallop-sided dish, was rich and quite salty, which was just right for the cold evening. The mussels came in an oddly spicy sauce, not bad/odd so much as surprising/odd. I assume that’s what the marseilles-style is, and the triangles of bread that came along for the ride were perfect for dipping in the leftover sauce once we’d demolished the mussels themselves. Our cocktails were strongly poured, and the whole experience was just plain yummy. The wait staff was friendly and took my companion’s deadpan jokes in stride, although the guy doing the water refilling wandered around looking really confused.

Aside from the food itself–which was really quite scrumptious–what I liked about the Black Bottle was that it didn’t feel like Belltown. I admit to being irrationally prejudiced towards Belltown, and as a result I don’t spend a whole lot of time there. But the Black Bottle was comfortable, like no one was there just to be seen, and everyone was intent on their own conversations. I will definitely be adding it to the list of places I take my out of town guests to when I need to convince them that my fondness for this town is justified.