North City Bistro & Wine Shop

North City Bistro & Wine Shop
1520 NE 177th ST
Shoreline, WA 98155
206.365.4447

By Tara Dezao

The façade of the North City Bistro and Wine Shop looks like a throwback to a retro dinner, but don’t be fooled. Once inside, you are transported to a cozy cellar with handmade marble counter tops, wood fixtures and hand-stained floors. North City Bistro is a wine shop featuring over 600 wine selections by day. At night, the second half of the venue opens into a bistro where Chef Justine Palmer whips up a menu of Mediterranean-infused small plates and full entrées.

Aside from the transformative appearance, North City Wine Bistro has even more surprises up its sleeve. If you ask to see a wine list, owners Larry and Pat will suggest that you walk over to the wine shop to pick out a bottle—the shop is their wine list! Unlike your run-of-the-mill restaurant that at times charges double the retail price, at North City you only pay the price of the bottle plus a $10 corkage fee. The wines hail from more than twelve regions including the great Northwest, which occupies the entire back wall of the shop. If a bottle is not what you had in mind, the shop has an extensive and reasonable by-the-glass list that changes every week with prices ranging from $4 to $8. The food is also very affordable; small plates run between $6 and $9. One of my favorite features of North City Bistro is that for around $15, you can go home with your very own fresh baked homemade pie from the Bistro kitchen’s in-house pie-maker, Deborah Kerns of Deborah’s homemade pies.

There is something for everyone in this eclectic venue. In addition to a growing selection of hand crafted bottled beer, by the end of October, Larry and Pat expect to feature craft beers like Blue Moon and Manny’s on tap. Last but not least, North City Bistro and Wine Shop provides live jazz music on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday nights. Check out the jazz calendar at their website: northcitybistro.com.