While preparing for my recent trip to Seattle, I started having "fish fantasies". There I'd be, in a yellow rain slicker, steaming cup of coffee in hand, hanging with the Pike Place fishmongers at 5am.

Needless to say, my co-travelers weren't having this. But I did motivate them to head to market around 8:30, on a surprisingly sunny day, with the promise of coffee in their near future.

For all my fantasizing, I really didn't know what to expect. I knew they might throw fish, a quirky gimmick I'd witnessed in the opener for Seattle's Real World. Given the market's tv-ready renown, I assumed I was walking into a relatively delicious tourist trap.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3vcGax9ojE

First, let me attest that throwing fish is a pretty efficient way to move the product. When we arrived, there were very few other onlookers, so we got to chat a bit with the 'mongers about their fish flinging style. They also let us taste their smoked salmon (I hate this "word", but mouthgasm seems an appropriate descriptor), and sold us a bit of salmon jerky for the road, while I wantingly eyed the king crab legs.

As impressive as the fish was, the biggest surprises at Pike's were the flowers and fruit. Generously bursting bouquets of cabbage flowers sold for the New York price of a bad bunch of dyed carnations. The range of local, vividly-hued produce was also impressive, especially the iconic-ly tart local citrus: satsumas. We were also seduced by one vendor's chili-spiced spin on huckleberry jam. In short, the whole market was a series of sensory revelations.

If I did have one critique of the market, it would be this: when the other tourists did arrive, few of them seriously shopped. It's hard to support a market on tourism alone, and you could hear it in the mongers' banter. "Step right up, anyone with money." "Someone here who actually wants to shop?"

It killed me not to have a kitchen. Next time I go to Seattle, I'm cooking for myself.