Triple D Farms

We drove out to Wasilla today to visit Triple D Farms. Triple D is a small family run poultry farm that raises a range of poultry, selling chicks, whole birds, and poultry products. The 'farm' is in the suburbs of Wasilla (a bit of an oxymoron as Wasilla is all suburb) and it wasn't nearly as agricultural as I expected. There was a pen of turkeys near the front of the compound (with a few guniea hens thrown in) awaiting their Thanksgiving Day fate and a flock of ducks waddling around the back. It's a large lot with a small house, a few pens, some open pecking space, and an abbatoir.

Here's their website with all their prices:

For sale, they had half turkeys, smoked turkey parts, whole chickens, and fresh eggs. If you catch them at the right time of year they will also have several types of fresh ducks, smoked ducks, duck and goose eggs, whole geese, guniea hens, pheasant, quail, and more. Triple D Farms also sells Matanuska Creamery ice cream (we bought chocolate and blueberry, $4/pint, $8/half gallon). Triple D Farms also carries Van Wyke pork by the quarter, half, full, and whole (a couple sizes) pig. (Van Wyke is the pork farmer out in Kenny Lake I wrote about last February.)


The birds you buy experience all stages of their life in the uncrowded, clean setting of the owners' property and the folks themselves have the right attitude for this sort of thing. Currently, you have to drive out to Wasilla to buy their stuff. I asked if there was any chance of New Sagaya's or another local food place carrying their birds, but she said no.

The reason is they would have to become certified by the USDA as a processing facility, an ordeal that would cost at least a million bucks. This is one of the ways large ag corporations are able to keep small, local producers out of the market, by pressuring the USDA to require somebody like Triple D to have an office and cleaning station for their own USDA inspector. I'd like to see this get challenged in court. Is there a bored lawyer in the house?


Triple D Farms is also known as the place where Sarah Palin was interviewed while the owner slaughtered turkeys in the background.

You can't make this shit up.

Pinnacle Mountain Lodge

We were driving back to Anchorage on the Glenn Highway after a sunny weekend of not catching fish on the Klutina River when we decided to stop and walk Goatboy for a bit. We were in a caravan with my mom's RV so we needed to find a place that is relatively easy to pull on and off of but that would still be interesting. We pulled into the Pinnacle Mountain Lodge mostly because they had a long, linear driveway and a collection of what I guess might be called tractor art.


The lodge is located about 20 miles east of Palmer, in a townsite called Chickaloon. Once part of the Mat-Su agricultural region, not much happens in Chickaloon nowadays and that is sort of the case with this lodge. It's quiet, out of the way, and easily overlooked but I think the owners prefer that.


Besides the tractor art, there was also all sorts of animals walking around: goats, alpacas, llamas, ducks, and geese. Inside, on the specials board, was an announcement that today one of the specials was a goat burger. Goat is a common meat in most parts of the world, but I rarely see it outside of some specific neighborhoods in Honolulu and the Southwest. I asked the lodge owner where her goat was from and she pointed out the window. It turns out this lodge produces much of the food they sell, including the goat, pork and bacon, poultry, and eggs. They also buy all their seasonal produce from people who live up the road from the lodge.


The burger was really good, and the bacon was definitly not mass-produced. They also bake excellent pies (we tried the key lime), and if you get there early they sell both chicken and duck eggs by the dozen, but they sell out quick. Everything far exceeded my expectations and I always like to frequent local food sources, and these folks seemed well connected and deliberate about what they are doing.


If you are heading out the Glenn Highway be sure to stop here. Next time I'm going to order breakfast; their biggest sellers is a hashbrown scramble called "The Valley Trash".

Thai Village

For some reason (I have my theories) Fairbanks has a disproportionate number of Thai restaurants for its size, and they are by and large good places to eat. Thai food is one of the areas in which Anchorage falls short.

We've been to several Thai places and all have their relative strengths and weaknesses. This past week we dined at a Thai restaurant in the the low rent neighborhood of Muldoon.


Housed, like so many ethnic restaurants in Alaska, in a former fastfood restaurant (likely a Pizza Hut in the pipeline days), Thai Village does a couple things really well, and some others just acceptably.


The service was great in the way a true family run restaurant can be; multi-generational, joking, and very slow. I like that, though.


The larb (beef salad) was average. It had a tang to it and crisp lettuce to wrap it with, but it wasn't dusted with rice flour the way I like. I would order it again, though. The pad thai was hot, which was a first in Anchorage, but it was also too sweet for my preferences. Where Thai Village scored was with the panang curry. It was the best I've had in a while, and makes Thai Village worth a stop if you want Thai food on the east side of town.

Downtown Weekend Market

I love street food and think it is the best way to experience a culture's food. Unfortunately, like most US cities, the street food scene in Anchorage is sparse. Besides some reindeer dog carts in downtown and the various coffee 'huts' along the commuter routes there really isn't much to sample around the city.


A bright spot is the Weekend Market held during the summer here in Anchorage. Each Saturday and Sunday the market emerges on a large parking lot that overlooks Ship Creek. The market is mostly for tourists with trinket sellers galore, but there are also some food sellers (local vegetables and seafood) and most importantly with the dozens of vendor trucks, trailors, and carts, this market is the nadir for Anchorage street food.


Some of the highlights are the relatively affordable Alaskan seafood served dozens of ways, good ethnic food such as Hawaiian and Russian, and traditional carnival food in all it's fried and sugar coated glory.

Road Trip: Kodiak and Mill Bay Coffee Roasters

We went to Kodiak for the King Crab Festival a couple weeks ago. The festival itself was a bit underwhelming but Kodiak is an interesting and beautiful place.


There is a coffee shop on the road north out of town called Mill Bay Coffee Roasters. It's in a nondescript strip mall and we actually missed it on our drive out.


The owner is a master pastry chef from France who was the pastry chef for the French president early in his career. He later moved to the US and worked on the East Coast and at this point he began to visit Kodiak regularly to hunt and fish. He fell in love with the place and decided to retire there. Mill Bay is that retirement.


We ate there a couple times and everything was outstanding. There is a limited breakfast and lunch menu (crepes, eggs, waffles, quiches) that is very reasonable priced, especially for Kodiak. Pictured above is the king crab quiche and the seafood pie. The real draw here, though, is the baked goods. They include things like croissants, cinnamon rolls, tarts, eclairs, and a slew of cakes and pies. The pastries at Mill Bay beats the pants off of anything I've come across in recent memory, and it is a true gem on those cold, rainy mornings when you are touring about Kodiak.

Yamaya's Seafood

This is the best Japanese food I've had in a long time. It is very simple, but it is always excellent. The family who own this place are nice people too, and don't be surprised if they bring random stuff out for you to try. This is a favorite spot for the international air crews, so it's not unusual to have the place filled with native Japanese speakers.


The restaurant is in an old house off 6th Ave. in downtown Anchorage. It is very informal and the menus are written on the walls, so be sure and look around everywhere before you order. The prices are good, too, especially considering their focus on fresh seafood.

We had:

shrimp tempura udon soup
fish cake
grilled whole squid
gyoza
fried idiot fish

and some dried king salmon fin sake...

...which was as nasty as it sounds.

Big Al's Wings and Wings

The best hot wings in town aren't found at the locally renowned Wings and Things, but at a little dumpy place located on Spenard Avenue.


Big Al's Wings and Wings uses a chili powder heavy rub on their wings which is hot and flavorful. Their wings are a bit small but the skin is crispy, and the motif of the restaurant (Al Pacino's Scarface seems to be the primary theme) makes for an interesting experience.

Most Anchorage residents will tell you to go to the reopened Wings and Things, but they use nutmeg and some other seasonings that I don't care for on hot wings, and they are extremely greasy with the wings resting in deep pools of oil in each order. W&T is almost Caribbean in taste, whereas Big Al's is Mexican influenced. Also, the 2 hour wait for Wings and Things is a bit much.


So, go to Big Al's instead for the ghetto-chic atmosphere and fast, spicy hot wings.

Live King Crab at New Sagaya's

New Sagaya's, a specialty food market with two locations, has live golden king crab for $8.99/pound this week. I prefer red king crab to golden, but the goldens are a bit smaller and easier to transport.


Supposedly the ones with barnacles on them taste better. It may have something to do with molting cycles or it could just be superstition.


Our crab weighed about 5 pounds and we ended up with about 3 pounds of meat.


Although it is cheaper to buy frozen king crab, fresh is much better. When the crab is fresh, stuff like butter or lemon detract from its flavor.

Marx Brothers' Cafe

Located in an old house on Third Ave, this is, in my opinion, the best restaurant in Alaska. Everything is inventive and correctly prepared. They use excellent ingredients. The menu changes daily. Pretty much everything is prepared in house from scratch (you'd be surprised how much frozen/packaged stuff is used in even the better restaurants around town). The wine and beer list is good, too.


Marx Bros. blows places like Orso and Simon and Seafort's out of the water.

We had:

caesar salad, prepared tableside
wild boar baby back ribs
rabbit rangoons
celeriac soup with tea smoked duck and marscapone
pan roasted breast of pheasant
seared Kodiak scallops and grilled prawns

and for dessert:

blueberry sorbet
creme brulee (best I've had in memory)
chocolate mousse (unbelievably good)

Simon and Seafort's

Simon and Seafort's is located at the western edge of downtown Anchorage, overlooking Bootlegger Cove and Knik Arm. It's a long-established 'fine dining' venue in Anchorage and is the sort of place the extended family goes to when they are in town for little Johnny's graduation.


Over all, the menu is made up of seafood and steaks, and the quality of the ingredients is high and the preparations well executed. They usually serve things like spot shrimp and halibut cheeks, both good signs.

The trick here is to get into the saloon during their happy hour (4-6pm) for the half priced appetizers. This is one of the best deals in town.

They have kobe beef sliders, king crab cakes, king crab dip, salmon wrapped scallops, and more. All of it is excellent, and as it's half-price, they cost just a bit more than a Happy Meal.


The setting is brilliant, with sweeping views of the ocean, mountains, trains, planes, and ships all coming and going. It's a great spot for a slow afternoon out eating and drinking with friends.

Hula Hands

Hula Hands is a small Hawaii style restaurant located in the Mountain View neighborhood. The menu is Local all the way and they do a good job of keeping it authentic by offering things like mix-plates, loco mocos, spam, poke, lau lau, and even turkey tails, all with two scoop rice, one scoop mac!


It's a diner, so what you get is good value for big portions of relatively simple food Everything I've had there is delicious and would stand up against the typical Local joint in Hawaii. They do a good job. There are loads of Hawaii expats here in Anchorage so they have a very loyal following and I think that is well deserved.

I ordered the kalbi plate.

Copper Center Roadhouse

I had to travel to Copper Center for work a couple of weeks ago. The rural road system in Alaska is pretty horrendous, food-wise, so I was pleasantly surprised by the Copper Center Roadhouse.

The lodge has been open for close to 100 years, and it offers the best food choices (by far) in the Glennallen-Copper Center-Tazlina area.

I ate three of my meals there, two dinners and a breakfast, and I would highly recommend it to anyone traveling through the area. Breakfast in particular was outstanding. I ordered cajun chicken fetticuini one evening and it was prepared exactly how I had hoped (I cooked this dish alot when I worked at the Pumphouse in Fairbanks).

Breakfast is where the Copper Center Roadhouse really shined. The breakfasts are huge. The sourdough pancakes are made with 100 year old starter. The bacon and sausage are locally sourced and excellent quality.

I ordered a ‘mini’ Sourdough Breakfast that came with two sourdough pancakes, each the size of a pizza. It came with bacon, eggs, and coffee. Three people could easily split this breakfast. It was a perfect Road breakfast.

I strongly recommend the Copper Center Roadhouse to anybody traveling through the Copper Center area, especially if they are there before 11am.

While the pancakes were worth noting, more significant was the corner convenience mart which also sold pigs by the half, in addition to cheetos and boxes of white zin..

The nearby community of Kenny Lake is the site of one of Alaska’s most established small farm pork producers, and the corner store in Copper Center has the meat available for $3.95/pound when you buy it by the half. It was a bit of an unorthodox souvenir, but I had to buy one and try it out. I was told that the meat from this farm is sometimes available at a game processor located in Palmer, and that they are working on marketing the pork into the mainstream consumer circles in the Anchorage bowl.

The first test was some pork chops which proved to be excellent, and next will be a baked pork leg (the ham before it is ‘hammed’).

Charlie's Bakery

Charlie's Bakery is a small, family owned bakery and Chinese restaurant located in a strip mall in midtown. Both aspects of the location are pluses because if a place can stay busy for years and is able to do so without a high profile or shi-shi ambiance, the food is probably good.

We hit Charlie's about once per month for their Saturday dim sum. The dim sum set up at Charlie's is a not like the dim sum halls I've seen in NYC, San Francisco, Honolulu, or Tucson where waiters push around steamer carts and you pick your items as you go. I really like that style of dim sum, but at Charlie's you go to the counter and order your food and then they bring it to your table. Again, part of what I like about saturday morning dim sum is the carts and kettles of tea and general buzzing about on a busy weekend. However, Charlie's food more than makes up for any loss of sense of fun.

I would rank the food served for Saturday dim sum to be above avaerage when compared to the other places I have eaten. I have had better at a couple places in NYC's Chinatown and at one place in Honolulu, but it beats the rest.

The options are quite varied, flavorful, and well-prepared. As far as I can tell, the majority of the menu items are prepared in house and from scratch. There is a great variety and the prices are good. Two people can have a good meal for $20, and they can get fat for $30.


The baked good are above average, and the breads in particular are good. I haven't tried the filled rolls, but I've been told they are a tasty, cheap breakfast when you are on your way to the Kenai to go fishing.

It is a family business with a half dozen different people from several generations all pitching in, which is something I personally like to see. Also, the kitchen is very open and is well laid out and is spotless.

The Chinese entrees are typically excellent, the best I've seen in Anchorage, and comparable to what I was used to at the better places I frequented in Honolulu.

It may seem counter-intuitive to go to a bakery for the best Chinese food in the city, but there you have it.