More beer! Korean Fried Chicken, and Vegetarian Stuffed Portobellos at a hotel bar?

Renton's got a new brewery. It's Bickerson's Brewhouse, (4710 NE 4th St.), in the eastern Renton Highlands, in the complex where the QFC is. Renton now has three breweries. I went to check out Bickerson's on Thursday. A while back I checked out Dubtown Brewing, the next newest kid on the brewery block (201 Main Ave S), and at four years old, Four Generals Brewing( 229 Wells Ave S.) is the senior citizen of Renton breweries, and  is a place I continue to return to.
Anyway, the beer pictured is Bickerson's Five Blind Mice, an IPA. It was delicious.
What astounds me is that the last few times I have gone to each of these breweries, they were full of people drinking beer.  As Martha Stewart said " It's a good thing."
Just a few years prior to Four Generals opening, there were a couple of Renton breweries, operated out of the owner's garages. Herbert B. Friendly was only open one afternoon a week. They were in South Renton, and it was the garage and back deck of the guy's house. The owner was friendly, and the space was cool. The beer, unfortunately, wasn't great. But they did have a beer dedicated to Star Trek's Jean Luc Picard, made with Earl Grey tea.
Strongarm Brewing was located around Fairwood/Lake Youngs. I never went to the facility, but one of their beers. Cincinnatus Brown Ale was carried by a couple of Renton taverns, and it was good.

As some of you know, my diet is almost exclusively vegetarian, occassionally pescetarian. However, if the only food that I wrote about was vegetarian, this writing could get boring pretty quickly. How often could one write  about  tofu and kale?  There's good vegetarian food out there, but I'm a vegetarian for health reasons, not because I don't think BBQ ribs are delicious. Therefore, if I'm going to be writing about a place where it wouldn't be fair to the reader to only try their vegetarian selections, I'm going to stray and eat what the place ought to be good at.  Besides which, I'd been craving fried chicken, something I hadn't eaten in years. And Korean fried chicken is "in" right now, and in Renton, so I had to try it.  The photo on the left is from Yummy Kitchen, (1250 SW 43rd St) in the IKEA neighborhood. It's a Hawaiian/Korean restaurant. I like both Hawaiian food and Korean food so it seemed like a promising place to try. It's a former teriyaki joint, and not a place you'd seek out for ambience. But the Korean fried chicken plate, which was very good,  came with macaroni salad, japchae noodles( made from yams!), rice,  and in house made daikon kimchi.
Lots of food, good prices, and very tasty. They also have poke, so when I go back next, that's probably what I'll have, since I've eaten my fried chicken quota for a while.

The ownership of the Yankee Grill ( 1 South Grady Way ,within the Red Lion Hotel), recently changed hands.  Prior to this ownership change, the Yankee had evidently been going downhill. Which was too bad, because not too long before that that, it was one of Renton's better happy hour places,  especially value wise. But it was not the kind of place that would blow you over with food quality. It was pretty good. I liked the happy hour fish tacos a lot. They had discontinued happy hour during the summer, prior to the ownership change , but now it's back. They don't have a huge beer selection, and nothing local, but Elysian Space Dust is still a good beer, even though Elysian is now part of the evil Budweiser empire. And it's half price at happy hour. They are planning on  coming up with a happy hour food menu, but it's not there yet. The afternoon I was there, they did have a special, of a vegetarian, quinoa stuffed Portobello mushroom. What kind of hotel bars cater to vegetarians? Not too many. I ordered it and it was spectacularly delicious! Quinoa, roasted peppers, spinach, cheese, roasted cherry tomatoes, a balsamic reduction sauce.. Just great! I hope it remains a special, or becomes a regular menu item, or even better: Put in on the happy hour menu!

Last but not least, a seemingly cool business is coming to Renton. 50th St. Studios is opening in downtown Renton at 814 S. 3rd St., in the former Garland's Jewelers space. They are a non profit video production studio, and advocacy organization for artists and creators. Maybe they will have some involvement in the film version of the novel I have not completed. A boy can dream. They will have weekend bazaars, and will be hosting a free Friday evening public domain film festival. But wait, Mr. Freakazoid! I thought this was a food blog! Are you straying into other things? Will you be discussing politics, or music, or what that loud noise was?
Nope. It's a food blog.  Therefore, I must point out the fact that during the free showings of films at their Public Domain Film Festival, there will be popcorn. That's food, isn't it? For the record, I am not a fan of popcorn. When I go to these movies, it won't be because of the popcorn.