Everything on the table started in salt water this morning.
Selkie keeps no walk-in freezer. What arrives at the kitchen door before service — Hama Hama oysters off Hood Canal, Dungeness crab from the Strait, day-boat halibut out of Neah Bay — is what goes on the table that night. When the boats don’t run, the menu changes instead of the fish.
We built the dining room the way a tide table reads: something is always coming in, something is always going out. Ninety seats, a raw bar at the center of the room, and a service style borrowed from the water — unhurried, exact, and a little bit briny.
Selkie sits four blocks from Colman Dock, an easy walk from Pike Place Market. If this is your first plate of Pacific Northwest seafood: colder water grows firmer, sweeter shellfish than you’ll find further south — start at the raw bar and you’ll taste why.