West Seattle restaurant notes: Marination ma kai goes 7 days a week; Fresh Bistro goes retro; Admiral mystery; more

West Seattle restaurant updates to share tonight:

MARINATION MA KAI’S SUMMER SCHEDULE: Starting tomorrow, Marination ma kai (1660 Harbor Ave. SW; WSB sponsor) will be open seven days a week for summer. GM Shawn Findley says that comes along with expanded summer hours – 9 am-9 pm Sundays-Thursdays, 9 am-10 pm Fridays and Saturdays – and the new patio bar is open throughout the holiday weekend. If you’re free for lunch on Wednesday, a TV crew will be there, and Marination is offering an extra treat with all purchases – details in this tweet.

FRESH BISTRO’S ANNIVERSARY MENU: Fresh Bistro (4725 42nd SW) just returned to the WSB sponsor team to help get the word out about its 5th-anniversary celebration, including a special menu with some of the favorites from its early days.

The special anniversary menu is available through June 5th, with dishes including pan-fried garlic-chive cakes, Ahi Tuna Avocado Mango, Kalbi-Marinated Grilled Wagyu Flank Steak for shared plates, Cedar Seared Wild King Salmon, Fennel-Crusted Halibut (photo above), and Kurabuta Pork New York for entrées, plus a special dessert treat – see the anniversary menu here, and other menus here. Fresh Bistro is open for dinner Mondays-Saturdays, 5 pm-10 pm, and for brunch Saturdays and Sundays, 10 am-3 pm; you can book a reservation online by going here.

ROYAL INDIA GRILL MYSTERY: We’re trying to find out the status of Royal India Grill in The Admiral District, after John tipped us that the space appeared vacant – we’ve gone by twice in three days and as of the second look today, the dining area is indeed empty, no furniture, no signs, nobody there, no information on whether it’s a closure or possibly something else like an impending remodel, nobody answers the phone, no hints on website or Facebook page. The restaurant changed hands in early 2013. Any info, please e-mail us!

HOLIDAY CLOSURES: Per social-media announcements, Zippy’s Giant Burgers will be closed Monday for the Memorial Day holiday; Mashiko in The Junction will be closed Monday through Wednesday.

UPDATING THE WSB RESTAURANT GUIDE: We’re in the process of checking with local restaurants to see if any information has changed since last time we updated the WSB West Seattle Restaurant Guide. (Restaurants are also welcome to contact us any time with updates.)

David May 25, 2014 (11:53 pm)

Sorry to see Royal India go…kinda liked them. But we tried to go there about 2 weeks ago. They “seemed” open (door unlocked, lights on) but we just went in and stood there for like 5 minutes, no one seemed to be in the place, no one eating there. Too bad. On the up side we finally went to the joint in the junction (Maharaja) and had a very good meal, so forced to try someplace new isn’t always bad.

onion May 26, 2014 (7:34 am)

Royal India is/was a restaurant that it was too easy to forget about…. or barely notice in the first place. Their food was fine, the ambiance decent, but when I did think of them it has been a perpetual “oh yeah, ought to check them out again some time.” They really needed to promote themselves more, such as participating in the Taste of West Seattle.
As for Marination, glad they are doing well enough to support extended hours. But I still don’t understand why they don’t do ready-made breakfasts and have them available for the prime morning water taxi hours starting at 7:00 a.m. or so.

Yayano May 26, 2014 (10:46 am)

Marination needs to hire some faster bar staff and leave that bar open later. 9pm is too early to be kicking people out. 10:00 or 11:00 would be a lot better. And that bar staff is way too slow. 20 minutes in line to get a drink is unacceptable.

Sue May 26, 2014 (4:24 pm)

Very sorry to hear about Royal India. It’s one of my favorite restaurants, and even though I live 2 blocks from Maharaja, I definitely preferred Royal India and would go there instead. I thought the food was better with the old owners, but still really good. I did always wonder how they stayed in business with how few people were in there.

JTB May 26, 2014 (4:52 pm)

West Seattle needs a good Indian restaurant. Based on comments here, I’ll try Maharaja again after disappointment several years ago. Quality at RI declined toward the end of the previous ownership and deteriorated terribly with the new owners. Not surprising they’ve closed shop.

timh2o May 26, 2014 (6:04 pm)

I’ve never had a bad meal at Maharaja’s. Good vegetarian selection too. I would most likely weigh a few pounds less if I skipped the buffet. The Admiral place never gave me much happiness.

Cynthia Fields May 26, 2014 (7:14 pm)

What happened to Red Star Pizza?!

WSB May 26, 2014 (7:25 pm)

We’ve heard they’re hard to reach lately but I haven’t heard that they closed – we ran a story a few weeks ago about them getting kicked out by year’s end because of a project on the property:

Cynthia Fields May 26, 2014 (7:50 pm)

Yelp has reported they are closed. Phone calls over the past several weeks go to a full VM box. An outgoing message would have been a nice gesture to loyal customers. Bummer – it was our fave.

WSB May 26, 2014 (8:02 pm)

Don’t take Y#lp as gospel (I’ve seen erroneous “closed” descriptions and also have personal reason for distrust, given that they have yet to take down a photo stolen from our site two years ago). Red Star tweeted yesterday that they were open: https://twitter.com/RedStarPizza/status/470643922868260864 – if you haven’t tried in the past few days, try again. That follows another tweet from a couple days earlier saying they were back:
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https://twitter.com/RedStarPizza/status/469247490705719296

DH May 27, 2014 (7:37 am)

I wish Fresh Bistro would stop serving Food Gras (a cruelly produced food). I would be up for checking out their vegetarian friendly items. They have some good food but once I realized they served Food Gras I just can’t bring myself to go there.

WSB May 27, 2014 (7:50 am)

Where on their menus are you seeing that? I just looked at all of them and don’t see it. The menus are all linked here: http://www.freshbistroseattle.com/menus

Huindekmi May 27, 2014 (10:04 am)

I see some Foie Gras aioli on the bahn mi sandwiches, but that’s all I could find. Just a little bit of flavoring in the mayo on one dish.

NeoYogi May 27, 2014 (10:17 am)

I think this is what DH is speaking of…

Braised Pork Belly Banh Mi Sliders
Foie Gras Aioli, Traditional Accompaniments, Serrano Chili, 5 Spice Frites

It’s on the dinner menu.

sam-c May 27, 2014 (3:30 pm)

re: Marination: I don’t ever find that I have to wait long to order a drink at the bar, but do find it kinda annoying to order fish n chips at one spot and then have to go around and order the beer to go with it at another spot.

Ugh May 27, 2014 (5:30 pm)

Royal India sucks. Maharaja sucks. Both have terrible food/service/atmosphere. There are not only no good Indian restaurants in West Seattle, there are no good Indian restaurants in Seattle anywhere that I’m aware of.

Dana Greenlee May 27, 2014 (5:32 pm)

A possible clue on what might come next for Royal India. My husband and I make the drive to Southcenter every weekend to Indian Curry Palace (17155 Southcenter Pkwy, Tukwila) even though we enjoyed Royal India. About 4 weeks ago, when we told the owner of Indian Curry Palace that we drive from West Seattle to eat there, he said that soon we can come to their second location on Admiral. He said he was taking over the space where Royal India is. Then, a few weeks ago, we asked him when the opening would be and he said they’ve been rethinking the move. Hearing now that RI is closed, perhaps the move is back on. It may be worth a call to Indian Curry Palace to check.

WSB May 27, 2014 (5:33 pm)

Thanks for another potential clue!

JTB May 28, 2014 (9:19 am)

Ugh: You might try Taste of India on Roosevelt. I think Saffron is less interesting than TOI, but it’s still quite decent. I haven’t tried Sanik yet but intend to soon.

Sue May 28, 2014 (9:48 am)

JTB, have you tried India Bistro on 64th/Roosevelt? I haven’t been to Taste of India, but I’ve been to India Bistro a few times and really liked it. I believe they have another one in Ballard, but I haven’t been to that one.