Tag Archives: travelers tea co.

Beacon Bits: Food Forest, food for kids, food for thought

Someone spinning on his head at Jefferson Park in the late afternoon sun. Photo by Robinette Struckel in the Beacon Hill Blog photo pool on Flickr.

We’ve been holding on to some of these Bits for a while, so no time like the present… here goes!

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The Beacon Food Forest was featured recently in Crosscut, where Robert Mellinger writes:

“There is no other project of Beacon Food Forest’s scale and design on public land in the United States — a forest of food, for the people, by the people.”

The article gives a thorough background on the bureaucratic issues that the Food Forest organizers have had to deal with so far, as well as an overview of future plans.

The Food Forest was also featured in Take Part this week.

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Travelers Thali House was recently touted in the Seattle Weekly‘s Voracious blog as “colorful food kids will eat.”

Travelers was also mentioned in the March issue of Sunset, on page 17. The blurb mentions that Travelers serves Indian street food and gives a couple of examples.

Back to Voracious, where Travelers was featured yet again this week in a “Sexy Feast” review by Jay Friedman:

“My thali looked like an edible artist’s palette. Instead of a paintbrush, I’d dip my fork into the various metal bowls, sampling each carefully and seeing how it blended with the next…

“Exploring and enjoying different tastes and textures, with varied sequences of bites, nibbles, scoops, and swirls, made this a delicious experience.”

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7×7 listed Beacon Hill as “one of the 7 best neighborhoods in Seattle” — specifically, “best for families.” Writer Alida Moore cited our parks, playgrounds, library, diversity, and light rail as reasons the Hill is great for kids, along with one highly-rated school: Mercer.

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Have you noticed that MacPherson’s doesn’t sell sprouts anymore?

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Neighbor Lesley Ernst writes:

“You know the neighborhood is changing when…

“Arriving at my massage office on Hanford St. and Beacon Ave. early last Sunday morning to find that the ubiquitous litter in the parking strip has changed from 40-ouncers to Kombucha bottles and PCC to-go containers.”

Seattle Mag loves Beacon Hill

Seattle Magazine has given Beacon Hill some extra love recently, with a neighborhood feature and a review of the new Indian restaurant Travelers Thali House in the current issue. Last month they reviewed Bar del Corso and profiled local bicycle activist Dylan Ahearn.

Beacon Hill was featured in an “Urban Safari” by Patrick Hutchison, which mentioned a collection of Beacon businesses, including Kusina Filipina, El Quetzal, Despi Delite Bakery, The Station, Victrola, NEPO House and Jefferson Park:

“Long treasured for its diversity, Beacon Hill is amassing a trove of new tastes, out-of-the-box art and community music spaces—not to mention the new light rail station that provides quick and easy access for residents and day-trippers alike.”

The review of Travelers Thali House, by Allison Austin Scheff, is pretty darned positive: “For years, there have been complaints about the lack of (and lacking) Indian food options in Seattle. I’m here to tell you: Travelers is the answer to your prayers.” Is it going to become as hard to get a table there as at Bar del Corso?

Not yet, says Scheff in “Rooting for the Underdog, Restaurant Version“: “It’s a bittersweet review for me because the restaurant is so good, so welcoming, and the food is lovely in so many ways. But where is everyone? Travelers was virtually empty on each of my three visits.”

Speaking of Bar del Corso, last month Scheff had more superlatives about that restaurant: “First things first: This place makes the best margherita pizza in Seattle.”

Restaurants are not the only Beacon Hill fixtures that the magazine has drawn folks’ attention to lately. Last month, Dylan Ahearn, chairperson of Beacon BIKES (and BHB contributor), was included in a profile of 5 volunteers who are contributing to positive change in their neighborhoods.

Travelers Tea Co. asks for your support tonight

Travelers Tea Company has added bright new color to the purple house on Beacon Avenue. Photo by Wendi.
The new Travelers restaurant at 2524 Beacon Ave. S. has been open for a month or so now, serving Indian food and also selling Indian cooking supplies from a tiny store in the restaurant. However, opening the new restaurant along with their existing Capitol Hill location has apparently put the business into a financial crunch. Here’s a message posted today on their Facebook page:

Dear Fellow Travelers,

We’ve always been open with our customers, our community, when we’ve needed your help, and you have always come through for us. Thank you for your continuing support that has allowed us to survive 13 years, including some very hard times. Travelers is again at a difficult point, our survival depends upon your support.

We have been really excited about our new restaurant, and we were slammed with customers when we opened the doors. We hired more people, “real servers,” more kitchen support, a Nepali farm woman (seriously!). All great folks. But business has dropped off, and the bills kept coming. Payday is coming, and we need your help.

Here’s what we are doing to make us easy to support

Payroll Party! Thursday night September 22nd, come help us harvest enough bounty to compensate our wonderful staff and get us through our big crunch. To make it a real party we are offering a couple of super deals

Get an extra 20% with any $100 gift certificate
Take 20% off any sale totaling $100 or more

You can add up lots of little stuff and still get the 20% discount. With the certificates, the extra 20% can be a separate $20 certificate if you prefer. We’ll be open at both locations with tasty food and beverages. We have wine and beer too at the Beacon location (try a Taj from India, or a Kingfisher), delicious with pakoras.

Though we don’t like reviewing restaurants until they’ve been open for a few months, we’ve been to Travelers several times already and found the food to be tasty and inexpensive. We like it, and hope they will stay around.

See also this story at the Capitol Hill Seattle Blog.