8

Rally Pizza’s Midsummer Local Harvest Dinner, Vancouver, WA

Rally Pizza, Midsummer Harvest Quarterly Dinner Series, Vancouver, WashingtonThis post is in collaboration with Rally Pizza.

Located in Vancouver, Washington, Rally Pizza is a family-friendly neighborhood pizzeria specializing in Neapolitan style pizza. They’re owned and operated by husband and wife team Alan Maniscalco and Shan Wickham, with Alan serving as Rally Pizza’s Executive Chef and Shan serving as the General Manager and Pastry Chef. They offer an ingredient-driven menu of classic and seasonal pizzas, small plates, and salads.

Every quarter, Rally Pizza hosts multi-course Sunday Dinner with a different theme. I’ve seen the menus for past dinners and have always been curious to see Rally Pizza do a veg-friendly version. It finally happened! This past Sunday was their Midsummer Local Harvest dinner with a vegetable focused menu with produce exclusively from two Washington based family farms: Red Truck Farm and Wobbly Cart Farm. Every item on the menu is vegetarian, and there is a vegan option for each course.

I was invited to join Rally Pizza for their Midsummer Local Harvest Sunday Dinner. It happened to be one of the hottest days (ugh) we’ve had in the PNW this summer, but this 5-course dinner was worth venturing out in the heat for. Here are all the vegan offerings from July 15th’s Sunday Dinner menu:

Pakoras, Rally Pizza, Midsummer Harvest Quarterly Dinner SeriesI didn’t expect to see pakoras on the menu at a pizzeria, but these Sunday Dinners are an opportunity for the kitchen to have a lil fun. These are made of fennel, onions, kohlrabi, and cilantro with fried in a chickpea flour batter and served with a cilantro dipping sauce. Nice, light batter and that sauce was really delicious.

Can’t have a local harvest dinner without a good salad, right? Fresh greens with snow peas, radishes, red cabbage, pea shoots, pickled beets, red carrots, and fennel tossed in a citrus vinaigrette. I like to defy the vegan just eat salads stereotype, but this is a salad I would happily eat everyday.

Summer Salad, Rally Pizza, Midsummer Harvest Quarterly Dinner SeriesFor the pasta course, the vegan option was house made semolina spaghetti with fried zucchini, sungold tomato passata, new crop garlic, basil, and chile. When I saw the description on the menu, I knew I going to love this dish. I was right. Perfectly bouncy, twirlable pasta. And the toasted breadcrumbs add a fun crunch. This was my favorite of the savory dishes.

Spaghetti, Rally Pizza, Midsummer Harvest Quarterly Dinner SeriesBoth entree options were vegan. One of them was this gratin of summer squash, eggplant, carrots, new potatoes, green beans, and onions, cooked with saffon and preserved lemon. Great flavors from the summer produce, but it’s a little difficult to get super enthused about a tagine stew on a hot day. I’d love to see Rally Pizza do a fall/winter tagine during the cooler months.

Tagine, Rally Pizza, Midsummer Harvest Quarterly Dinner SeriesRally Pizza’s Sunday Dinner menu wouldn’t be complete without pizza, especially as Alan got his start at the famed Ken’s Artisan Bakery as a bread baker before quickly moving on up. This pizza is the ultimate summertime pie with gorgeous crust, squash blossoms, baby zucchini, roasted torpedo onions, fresh basil, and cashew cream sauce. What a beauty!

Squash Blossom Pizza, Rally Pizza, Midsummer Harvest Quarterly Dinner SeriesWhen Alan brought out the dessert, he mentioned that this trio of sorbetti was his favorite of the five courses. Wild black cherry meets yellow cherry meets baby green apple sorbetti, plus a little wild rosebud-rose granita. Seriously heavenly.

Trio of Sorbetti, Rally Pizza, Midsummer Harvest Quarterly Dinner SeriesNote: This post is in collaboration with Rally Pizza. I was invited as a guest to this establishment and received a complimentary meal. This was not in exchange for a positive review and all opinions expressed here are my own.

You Might Also Like

8 Comments

  • Reply
    Erin @ Platings and Pairings
    at

    I keep meaning to make it in to Rally Pizza – Everything on their menu sounds absolutely amazing!

    • Reply
      wazwu
      at

      You should! Vancouver’s not too far, but I wish they were right here in Portland.

  • Reply
    Pech
    at

    The pasta and pizza sound so good!

  • Reply
    Catherine @ To & Fro Fam
    at

    Mm, these look delicious! The next time I’m in Vancouver I’m headed here. Sometimes the heat takes away my appetite, but a super-hot day is a great opportunity to get out of the house—and let someone else do the cooking!

    • Reply
      wazwu
      at

      If you do make a trip there, you definitely need to order dessert too! Such a treat!

  • Reply
    Rachael Stinson
    at

    I LOVE rally! I love to get their roasted veg platter (ask for it vegan) and the polenta (vegan, add mushrooms and sweet & sour onions). I think they are getting close to having a housemade vegan mozzarella too, can’t wait!

    • Reply
      wazwu
      at

      Ooh, that polenta sounds delicious! I didn’t know that they’ve got a house made vegan mozz on the way. That’s exciting!

    Leave a Reply

    This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.