Food & Drink: Danielle Custer's Picks

Chefs come and go, and once they go, we usually forget them quickly. An exception is DANIELLE CUSTER, who blew into town two years ago and set the local restaurant bar a few notches higher with her imaginative, spectacular, and just plain terrific menu at 727 Pine. Unfortunately for Custer fans, 727 is in the Grand Hyatt Hotel, and the corporate bean counters found they couldn't bag enough beans to suit their bottom line with her in charge. But a year after her departure from the public dining scene, a week rarely passes without a plaintive note from a reader asking what she's up to these days and how soon her cuisine's going to be available to the public again. Answer: Custer's been taking it easy, doing some consulting, and waiting for the right job to present itself. Best news of all: She's planning to stay right here until it does. Following are her notes on what she's discovered about her adopted home town that made her decide to dig in.Katie Millbauer

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DANIELLE CUSTER'S PICKS

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BEST RESTAURANT SUPPLY: "I have been using the Seattle Restaurant Supply store on Aurora a lot in the last year, and they have been incredibly helpful and have had everything I've ever needed. And their prices seem to be really terrific."

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BEST COOKING SUPPLY: "I've always loved Sur la Table. And I love their cooking school [in Kirkland]I think they do a really terrific job."

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BEST RESTAURANT FOR A FIRST DATE: "That's a really tough one. I think Oceanaire could be a great restaurant for a first date. It's a great scene. You can have a wonderful martini, and then you have to have one of [chef Kevin Davis'] Maryland crab cakes that are to die for, and you need to share that. And then you have to have the Angry Crab, and it's huge and it's a share thing, and it's one of those things where you get a little messy. It's a whole Dungeness crab that's covered in hot spices, and then you have to crack them and eat them, and as you lick your fingers, that's where all the spice is. It's something that you kind of get into, and you get a little dirty and messy. I think it brings out how one eats and how people respond to sharing food."

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BEST RESTAURANT TO DINE ALONE: "Chiso, which is my favorite sushi restaurant, the Harvest Vine, and Eva. I think any restaurant that's neighborhoody that has either a kitchen counter or a comfortable bar.

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BEST DESSERT IN TOWN: "I think that [executive pastry chef] Sue McCown's desserts at Earth and Ocean are awesome. I just think that they're incredibly fun and whimsical. But I have to say that I have an incredible weakness for Tom Douglas' mini coconut cream pies at his bakery. And you have to have the mini ones. I had a slice of the coconut cream pie when I was in for dinnerwhich was very good, mind youbut there's something about the minis where it's the perfect balance between the crispy shell, the custard, and the cream and the coconut."

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FAVORITE DISH IN TOWN: "I regularly crave the sweet bread salad at Zo뮠I will sit at the bar and order the sweet bread salad and a Pim's cucumber kamikaze and be a really happy girl."

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BEST BRUNCH: "I really enjoy going down to Macrina on a Sunday afternoon. But I think what I do the mostit's not really brunchbut I love going over to Caf頂esalu here in Ballard. He does the best ginger biscuit in the world and his quiches are irresistible. And their coffee's great."

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BEST BAR TO MEET WITH FRIENDS: "I like the Zig Zag. I actually just celebrated my belated [35th] birthday party there. Il Bistro and the Alibi Room are great. But there's a new bar that I've discovered as I'm getting to know my neighborhood [Ballard]. There's a restaurant called Thaiku, owned by the same people that did Fremont Noodle House. They've got a wonderful bar [Fu Kun Wu]. I've been going there a lot lately, and I've been drinking the Radiant Flower, which is a gin drink."

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BEST PLACE IN SEATTLE TO GET A TASTE OF CUSTER'S FORMER TEMPORARY HOME, THE SOUTHWEST: "Kingfish for the taste of the South. There's a great taqueria [called Malena's] across from the Macrina on McGraw on Queen Anne. That reminds me of the really amazing Mexican food that we had in Texas. I ate a lot of Mexican food in TexasI miss that desperately. I thought Jones Barbecue was really wonderful and quite reminiscent of good barbecue in the South."

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