Long Awaited Update
Posted by: Laile at breakfast time.
So as you can see the Snow City blog has not been updated in quite some time. Many changes have occured, but we’re still that comfy downtown breakfast spot you love. Summer has come and gone, the tourists with it. A bittersweet goodbye, as that means it is now quite dark outside when we open, but we can get back to doing what we do best, taking care of our loyal locals. Thank you all for voting us Best Breakfast in both The Press and The Anchorage Daily News. Speaking of local, our Head Chef and resident “Hellcat!” Natalie is making continuous strides to keep our menu as local and fresh as possible. So why look to the approaching winter with dread? Get your sunshine on at Snow City. Linnaea makes a killer cup o’ joe, Chrystal gives you service with a winning smile and lots of chatter, Say, “Peace out” to Tucker before he leaves us for exotic travels abroad, and get a Kodiak Benedict. See you here. - Snow City Ezra
April
Posted by: tasia at lunch time.
Welcome to Breakup! Maybe things aren’t as green or springy as they are in the lower 48 but that’s what makes us special, right? That’s what I keep telling myself anyway.
We have a few things that may be of interest to you and I’ve collected them and summed them up in this nifty little email newsletter. We wanted to tell you about our efforts at to make Snow City greener, our escapades in the virtual world (twitter, facebook, myspace), gift options for administrative professionals week, and this month’s artist Lance Lekander. There’s also a bio of one of our servers, Ezra.
Thanks for supporting us through this winter of, ahem, “interesting” economics. We’re so thankful that we’ve been able to keep our doors open when so many small businesses are calling it quits. It’s because of you all that we’re still flipping eggs and pulling espresso shots. We’re proud to be the place you choose to spend your time and money, and we’re so deeply grateful for your business and friendship.
Tasia Jelatis-Hoke
Front of House Manager
We just keep getting Greener!
Local produce, and compostable/recycled to-go stuff
We’re greener than ever! We’ve made the switch from plastic and styrofoam to sugar cane boxes and corn based plastic bags and cutlery. It’s kinda pricey but we think it’s worth it. We hope you think so too! We’re also working with “Alaska Root Cellars” (formerly Alaska People’s Market) to make sure we’re gettiing all the local produce we can. We’re looking forward to summer when we’ll have all the bounty the Matanuska
valley has to offer! Soon you will be able to check out our website for more information on our hopes, dreams, and accomplishments where local and green ethics are concerned.
Social Networking
Twitter, Facebook, Myspace
Well folks, we’ve done it. We can now be found online in three different social networking programs. Facebook has proven a great way to connect with many of you. We have a few fan photos up on the site and we’d love to see more. You can also
find reviews here. If you’re more A.D.D. there’s Twitter on which we broadcast small blips of info throughout the day. And, if all that’s not enough, you should check us out on myspace where our top friends are also our staff.
Featured Employee:
Ezra, Server
This poet with a penchant for pancakes hails from the very unpretentious Turnersville, NJ. He’s no stranger to Anchorage though, having been serving within the Anchorage area for the last 8 years. Ezra enjoys bamboo, karate movies and phillips head screwdrivers. When asked what he likes to bring to every table he wittily replied, “milkshakes.” He dislikes napping. Next time you’re here make sure to check out Ezra’s colorful shoes and pen bandolier.
Celebrate Administrative Professionals!
Administrate professionals week is April 20th through 24th. Snow City Gift Cards make awesome gifts and keep your friends caffeinated. Buy at $25 coffee card for only $20. It’s a great deal. Add a coffee mug for only $6 and you have a great eco friendly gift! Stop by to check out our other merchandise or click on the merchandise link to visit our online store.
Love is in the air…
Posted by: tasia at after hours.
It’s been a weird week at Snow City. As you’ve probably noticed we were closed this week so that we could have a new floor installed in the kitchen. It’s going to be non-sliptastic! We’re planning a quite commemorative ceremony where we’ll sit on the new floor and eat take-out Chinese food. Because when else will we get to feel good about eating on the floor of a restaurant kitchen?
As some of us manager types were not as needed at the restaurant we’ve been giving a little extra loving to Laile and company’s new project, the Spenard Roadhouse. It looks amazing in there and they can’t wait to open their doors for all of you on February 16th! I’m looking forward to lounging around and sipping bourbon, personally.
Your friendly tech-responsible manager (yours truly) has been busy sitting in front of computers (mainly her own--yay!) and getting some things updated/rolling. (Sorry about the amount of punctuation in that last sentence--I sometimes go a little crazy with the parentheses.) So, we’re still on Twitter and holding strong with 85 lucky followers. Twitter’s pretty cool, especially now when we can get Mt. Redoubt updates via Twitter! I was kind of addicted to checking on Redoubt, though, in my defense, I believe the obsession began when I thought it was going to blow a couple of weeks ago while I was responsible for Snow City.
Right, so the new techy development…are you ready for it?..it’s the goliath of all online social networking…We’re on Facebook! Snow City on FacebookIt was time. Just as I was designing the page a customer was suggesting to one of our servers that we should have one. He had the great idea of inviting people to post retrospective photographs of the cafe. So if you have any old photos scan em in, find us on Facebook and load em up. I’m especially curious because I’ve only been in Anchorage for two years (anniversary is Valentine’s day btw).
I think that’s about it. We’ll be open this Saturday for my anniversary of moving to Anchorage, and the less widely celebrated holiday of Valentine’s day. Take care all!!!
Tasia
Happy New Year!
Posted by: tasia at after hours.
Well, it’s a New Year. And I’m pretty sure we’re all ready for it. A lot has happened in our sweet little Anchorage restaurant in the last few months. We have re-affirmed our commitment to the environment by switching to eco-friendly to-go-ware. We have some great new products from the wonderful Deborah O’Leary and Greenware Alaska. Our to go boxes are made out of sugar cane so when you’re done with your left-overs you can chow down on the box (provided you need a little extra fiber in your diet).
We’re getting real techno savvy around here (or trying). We’ve got our fashion forward merchandise online now! Whoo hoo! You can now purchase your very own Snow City t-shirt, travel mug, or GIFT CARD from the comfort of your own home--or send one to a friend. We’ve ordered a lot of new stuff so check in the cafe or online in the next few weeks to see what’s new (think knit caps with brims, long sleeved hoodies...).
In other internet news, Snow City Cafe is now on Twitter (www.twitter.com) For all of you 20th century folks, Twitter is a “microblog” meaning a blog consisting of 150 characters or less. So, check it out, follow us, and get all the latest and greatest insider tips on your very favorite Anchorage restaurant. Here’s one little tidbit for you now--this weeks Winter Wednesday Special is a super tasty soprassetta salami sandwich on rye with a feta spread. Sooo goood. And every other Wednesday this winter we’ll have something new. It’s always served with a drink and a dessert bite for $9.95. Yay!
Well folks, I think that’s all I’ve got. Looking forward to longer brighter and (fingers crossed) warmer days,
Tasia
Goodbye Summer Hello Fall
Posted by: tasia at breakfast time.
While we may not be relishing the cooler temps, we’re all enjoying breathing a little easier as the usual summer madness lets up. The cruise ships are gone and our regulars who’ve stayed away for the summer are coming back to us! Shout out to Candy and co. We missed you!
Incoming: As the title of this blog indicates, our lovely chef, Natalie Janicka is back from a summer off. This means we’ve got some new weekly specials and y’all should come on in and try them. (This weeks quiche is YUMMY! I looove tarragon!) We’ve got a few new faces around the place and we’re looking for a few more (see employment section of this website).
Outgoing: Sadly for all of us, our baker has developed a serious allergy to...wait for it...wheat. She’s gonna take a break from baking which means we’ll be welcoming a new baker in a week or two. We will all miss Stacie’s mellow presence, sweat treats, and sweeter notes.
That’s about all from this neck of the woods. Be sure to come in on Halloween to see us all in our spookiest/goofiest finery.
Tasia
What I did this Summer, by Snow City Cafe
Posted by: tasia at lunch time.
Filed under: general
It’s been an exciting summer in Snow City land! We’ve had record sales and would like to thank all of you for hanging in there as the weekend waits reached an hour and a half. We are so honored and overwhelmed by the positive feedback we’ve received from you week after week. Here are a couple highlights of our summer:
A New Restaurant
Rumors were flying as Spring turned into Summer (or breakup turned to rain) about a new restaurant. A Snow City Midtown? Something about Hogg Brother’s Café? The truth is out—Laile, JoAnn from Sack’s and a group of investors have purchased what was Hogg Brother’s Café on Northern Lights and Spenard. In November it will reopen as the Spenard Roadhouse—a lunch and dinner spot with a full bar, great burgers and pizzas along with grilled Alaskan fish and roasted veggies from the Mat-Su Valley. We hope you’re looking forward to this place as much as we are. Finally, a new place to eat when Snow City closes its doors in the afternoons! Drinks anyone?
Block Party
This year’s neighborhood block party and ACVB Evening Exchange was a blast with awesome live music by Nervis Rex, dancing, a margarita tent (courtesy of Simon and Seaforts), burgers and hot dogs, and face painting and crazy hair styling for the kids. And most excitingly…it didn’t rain! The clouds parted for a few hours (in the midst of rainy weeks) and we saw blue sky and danced under the sun. Our 6th Annual West End Block Party was sponsored by Snow City Café, Simon & Seafort’s, The Hotel Captain Cook, and PangoMedia.
Staff picnic/kickball
To celebrate all of our hard work (pat on the back) we met in Valley of the Moon park for a game of Kick Ball with family and friends and a lot of good grub. Trust the Snow City crew to come up with some tasty food (and to know how to eat too!). Natalie, our head chef showed up with her new baby girl, Jillian, and Allison, four years. We took a picture of the whole crew to send back with a dishwasher from Russia who’s been working here this summer. I think the adults enjoyed the kick ball as much as the kids (probably more) though the competition was fierce.
Snow City 5K
The excitement continued into August with the Big Wild Run. This year Snow City hosted the 5K. We cheered our runners (and all the others) on as they bolted past Snow City and on to glory. And we felt just a little guilty for eating a Heart Attack on a Plate as we cheered—but not guilty enough to stop eating.
The latest news is that, once again, Snow City has won the coveted title of Anchorage Daily News Best Brunch! Thanks to all of our loyal fans for voting for us. We await the Press Picks results with anticipation.
Well, as my dad would say, “That’s the news from Lake Woebegone” (which makes significantly more sense if you’re from MN and/or a fan of Garrison Keillor’s A Prairie Home Companion Show). So be well, do good work, and keep in touch,
Tasia Jelatis-Hoke
p.s. pictures of the aforementioned joys of summer to come…
Valentine’s Day Menu
Posted by: snowcitycafe at lunch time.
Filed under: special events
Dinner
Appetizer choices
• Roasted Red Pepper, Garlic and Chevre on Baguette
• Rustic Squash Tarts
• Wild Mushroom Risotto with Seared Scallops
Salad/Soup choices
• Spinach Salad with bleu cheese crumbles, almonds, dried cranberries, and raspberry vinaigrette
• Mixed Organic Greens tossed with grape tomatoes, foccacia croutons and balsamic vinaigrette
• Seafood Chowder
Entrée choices
• Polenta with Roasted Winter Vegetables and Jus
• Ciopinno with prawns, scallops, crab, cod, and clams in tomato, basil, and pepper broth and a polenta crouton.
• Roasted Chicken Breast with Leek and Fresh Herb Stuffing served with au gratin potatoes and roasted asparagus
• Pork Loin Medallions topped with greens and crispy shallots in a whole grain mustard sauce served with au gratin potatoes and roasted asparagus
Dessert
Three choices to be determined
Kids’ Menu
Appetizer choices
• Homemade Soup
• Cold Veggie Platter
Entrée choices
• Grilled Cheese Sandwich
• Homemade Crispy Chicken Strips
• Macaroni & Cheese
Dessert
Valentine’s Day Benefit Dinner
Posted by: Laile at breakfast time.
Hey Friends & Lovers!
In response to the random shootings that happened last December, Snow City Cafe is hosting a benefit dinner on Thursday, February 14, Valentine’s Day. All proceeds will be donated to Elizabeth Rumsey, Tamas Deak and the Jason Wenger Memorial Writing Award. Our staff is also donating their time and tips.
There will be two seatings – 5:30 PM and 7 PM. $40 for adults, $10 for kids. Very kid-friendly, family event.
The special 4-course menu will be announced on our website on January 31.
Make your reservations by calling 272-3239 or e-mail Melissa@snowcitycafe.com. We have 100 spots to fill for each seating.
Wednesday Nights
Posted by: Laile at lunch time.
Snow City Cafe has decided to discontinue providing a venue for Irish Music night every Wednesday. Our last traditional Irish Music session was 11/21/07. The event seems to have run its course here especially now that there are more options for everyone to go to. We’ve enjoyed the music, the dancing and especially the people. We’ll be very sad when it ends because it’s the end of an era at Snow City. It’s been really fun for our staff and we’ve been happy and proud to be a part of such a joyous event.
Reduce, Reuse and Recycle!
Posted by: snowcitycafe at lunch time.
Filed under: general
5th Annual West End Block Party!
Posted by: Laile at brunch time.
Snow City Cafe, along with Simon & Seafort’s, The Coordinators and PangoMedia, are hosting the 5th Annual West End Block Party on Thursday, August 2, 2007, 4:30 - 8:30 PM. This block party includes live music, food and Simon’s famous Margarita Garden! Everyone is invited!
We close off the block between 4th Avenue and L Street—you’ll see the tents, stage and balloons! Hector and El Combo Tropicale Latino will be playing. Free parking in the Captain Cook Parking Garage.
Chugach Celebrates 100th Birthday at Snow City Cafe!
Posted by: Laile at breakfast time.
The Chugach National Forest turns 100 on Monday, July 23! To celebrate, the Alaska Center for the Enviroment is hosting a dinner at Snow City Cafe. The Wild Chugach Centennial Dinner will be a four course meal featuring Copper River Sockeye salmon and locally grown produce. Tickets are only $35 and includes wine and specially brewed for this evening, Moose’s Tooth special Centennial ale. For tickets and information, valerie@akcenter.org or 274-3662.
Are You Ready for the Summer?
Posted by: snowcitycafe at after hours.
We’re ready! Last year, we were just finishing up our remodel construction and not ready for the crowds, which came in record numbers. But this year, we are staffed up and ready to go. We’re going to start off with a bang—the International Whaling Commission is taking over the Captain Cook Hotel for the month of May. This a huge deal for Anchorage—most of the downtown hotels are sold out. K Street will be closed the last week of May to handle media tents and conference overflow. Greenpeace will be here. They’re having a family oriented parade on Sunday, 5/27—walking twice around the Captain Cook Hotel and then heading to the Park Strip to form a whale by all holding hands. Anyway, we hope to be busy this May. But don’t worry, we always have room for you!
Great weekend!
Posted by: Laile at lunch time.
Ever since I had kids, I usually work Mon - Fri, but once a month I work a weekend and this was it. I really enjoy the energy of the weekend; it’s very different than the rest of the week. We were very busy—it almost felt like summer busy. Lots of great compliments on our staff which is really nice. I always get a little anxious when I hear that someone wants to talk to a manager, but this weekend I had a number of people pull me aside to say what a great server they had or how the host really helped them out. Also, I had a server say that he’s worked at probably 13 restaurants and he thinks our food expediters are the best. Yay Lisa and Jackie!! (The food expediter is the person who gets the food that the kitchen is putting out all organized and ready for the server. She makes sure that the toast is ready, the soup is on the right plate and all food modifications are done to order. She is the liaison between the servers and the kitchen. It can be a very high pressure job!)
Our Call Ahead Wait List system seems to be working but it still causes aggravation for some people. This is how it works—you call ahead and we put you on our waiting list. We try and give you an estimate for how long it’s taking for people to be seated so that you know when to come in. Once you come in, you check in with the hostess and we’ll give you a pager. If we’ve estimated correctly and you’ve shown up when we told you, you will most likely be seated within 10 - 15 minutes. Sometimes our estimates are wrong (people are sitting longer than we anticipated or we got a sudden surge of people come in) and sometimes people show up earlier than we estimated. So it’s not an exact science but it does work most of the time. Try it next weekend! (Call 272-3233 instead of 272-2489 if you want to avoid the long automated voice message.) It’s usually not necessary to call ahead during the week, only weekends, but starting in May it will probably be busy enough, so call ahead Mon - Fri too. Waits for a table were about 45 minutes this weekend. Worth the wait, I promise!
Well it’s 7:11 PM. Time to head home. Fun while it lasted but I’m ready to go back to Mon - Fri for awhile. —Laile
New website!
Posted by: Laile at breakfast time.
Today is the big day for our new website! It’s been fun working with Taughnee Stone at Endeavor Creative to make this happen. I don’t think we changed the content on our old website for three years and now we’ll be changing it weekly. Obviously our weekly specials will be updated but we’ll also have this blog available to tell you about the latest happenings at Snow City. We’ll also post employee and customer photos and hope you will feel free to post your comments and photos of you wearing Snow City gear.
So here’s what’s happening this week...this Friday, 4/6, is the Art Gallery Walk. We’ll be featuring the work of Julie Bourbeau. She does some really cool mixed media, which includes painted aluminum, to make brightly colored fish wall hangings. The show is 5:30 - 8 PM and we’ll have appetizers so come on out. Also, every Wednesday night, the Irish musicians and dancers come to the cafe for Traditional Irish Music Sessions. We had some great posters made by MadDog Graphx to start promoting this event again. We haven’t done any advertising in years and the usuals that come every Wednesday want to see some new faces so come on down!
Next Sunday is Easter. This is a great day to come to the cafe because we are typically not very busy. Everybody likes to go to the big fancy champagne brunches and we end up kind of slow. The servers are planning on wearing flowery dresses and bonnets just for fun (they like to dress up every so often—last time was Pajama Day). I think we’re having some Easter specials, I’ll know for sure later today, and we have a new champagne drink that the staff loves—the Snow City Royale—Odwalla Pomogranite Juice, champagne and raspberry crumbles. Yum City!
Well, I’ve got to get back to work. This is my first blog ever. Be kind. —Laile