Spokane, WA

Autumn and I had been busy with grad school, work, company from out of town, and foster parenting for the past few weekends, so we decided that a date would be a great use of our Saturday night. We don’t have much money, but we do have generous friends and family who had recently given us a gift certificate to Mizuna, and movie tickets to AMC. So, without much cost to us, we could have a great night in downtown Spokane.

We arrived at Mizuna (214 N Howard) and were greeted by a friendly hostess. We’d been there before, and the service is always top notch. It seems that the staff enjoys working at Mizuna, and they certainly enjoy eating there. Whenever we ask about the menu items, our server raves about the best meal they have tried recently, and gives great advice about the kitchen staff’s best new creations.

We sat down in the patio section and were offered a choice between a traditional menu and a full vegetarian menu, which Mizuna is famous for. A vegetarian meal in Spokane is sometimes hard to come by, without picking meat out of something or being confined to a salad. Mizuna is setting a high bar for vegetarian food in Spokane, and they do it with an incredible amount of flavor.

Autumn got the green curry with tofu, and I ordered the succotash with braised wheat gluten, the special of the night. Though the name reminded me of Looney Tunes (“sufferin’ succotash”), the food was no joke. We ended up sharing both meals because they were too good to keep to ourselves. The evening was gorgeous, and the patio section between the historic brick buildings on Howard is lined with romantic white Christmas lights.

Our movie wouldn’t start for another hour when we finished eating, so we lingered at Mizuna, enjoying a quiet conversation about our plans, our work, and the kids we’ve enjoyed foster parenting recently. Finally, we walked up Wall Street to Rite Aid, and being the hardened criminals that we are, we bought some candy to sneak into the movie theater.

We took our time walking toward the AMC Theater at River Park Square. We visited my sister, Erin, who works at the Rock City Grill, and then made our way up the escalator to our movie in the sky, looking down at the gilded outlines of the lakes of the Inland Northwest.