Shrimp ceviche – citrus marinade, mango, cilantro, pine nuts, chipotle aioli, housemade chips, at Star
Ernie Enkhtaivan and family have launched Star Fusion and Bar, a restaurant with about as much fusion as you can pack from Asia — from sashimi to Mongolian beef stew — into the large restaurant space at the corner of Broadway and Mercer where Dilettante used to do its chocolatey thing.
CHS reported on Enkhtaivan’s plans for Star last month as the family of restaurant veterans with Bay Area and Mongolian roots came together with a plan to fill the 3,000-square-foot restaurant space.
In some places on earth, the restaurant’s footprint wouldn’t be such a challenge but, on Broadway, sky high rents already inspired one restaurateur to bail out and pass along his lease after only 18 months on the north end of Capitol Hill’s central business strip. “It’s large — which translates to expensive,” Edgar Pelayo of Añejo Restaurant and Tequila Bar said about the space.
Now it is Enkhtaivan’s to make work. His menu for Star — still a work in progress — is evidence the family members who have come together for the venture aren’t going to miss an opportunity. There is ramen and poke, miso pork or a NY steak, Mongolian noodles and calamari fries. You’ll also find a full bar. It’s a busy, hustling concept that even Yelp doesn’t know quite how to handle. The online service categorizes the restaurant as “Japanese.”
But you won’t find “Mongolian Grill.” “That’s not real Mongolian food,” Enkhtaivan told CHS in January.
Will Star be able to fly above the rent challenges and expensive business environment on Capitol Hill and across Seattle? They are just getting started but you might watch the space as a sign of whether effort alone can make your restaurant a true star on Broadway.
Star Fusion and Bar is open at 538 Broadway E. It is open daily starting at 11:30 AM through 10 PM and until midnight on Fridays and Saturdays. There is no website or social media. For now, the best place to learn more is on Star’s Yelp page.
PLEASE HELP KEEP CHS PAYWALL-FREE!
Subscribe to CHS to help us pay writers and photographers to cover the neighborhood. CHS is a pay what you can community news site with no required sign-in or paywall. Become a subscriber to help us cover the neighborhood for as little as $5 a month.
But you won’t find “Mongolian Grill.” “That’s not real Mongolian food,” Enkhtaivan told CHS
. . .as he serves shrimp ceviche. . .
Mongolia, Peru :)
This mish-mash isn’t even going to last longer than Mongolian Grill. People on Capitol Hill can say what they want about over-saturated mainstream Asian cuisines like Thai, Japanese, and Vietnamese but at least they have customers.
I have to agree. Don’t dump all over Mongolian grills as inauthentic and then open a Mongolian restaurant that, I assume, is trying to cater to everyone in the hopes of getting business through the door.
Time will tell but seems to me they’d have far better results if they just picked a single food focus.
I hope this is better than Dilettante.
What a ridiculously dated concept that could only have sprung from the mind of a tasteless middle aged white lady who, despite her tastelessness, thinks she is the arbiter of all taste the universe over.
The type of middle American, middle aged white lady who refers to everything as “fun.”
The type of middle American who thinks “pouring chocolate” is (1) an actual thing and (2) is cool.
The type of middle American, middle aged white lady who shops at those weird boutiques where all the clothing looks like it’s made from drapes taken out of homes in the 1980s and cut to hide the fact that those wearing the clothes are shaped like beach balls.
Ugh.
Good riddance to an awful business like Dilettante. Here’s hoping that the new place is a business someone other than middle aged white ladies with eating disorders would like to patronize….
And I was told you liberas weren’t sexist.
I guess there’s hope for you, yet.
Wow….what a confusing diatribe. You obviously have some issues.
Dilettante has been gone from the space for quite some time.
What a small minded and ill-spirited comment. PD managed to be racist, ageist and sexist coastal snob while also body-shaming… all in a single post!
Such irrational hatred for a long time Capitol Hill small business…. I wonder if there is a back story there.
Whoa. Your comment is hateful, inappropriate, irrelevant, and brings nothing of value to the discussion. And if you were trying to be funny, you missed the mark there as well.
You need a therapist.