The author, Simona Trakiyska, right, poses with Mercedes Zaragoza, who heads La Tarasca. This family-run restaurant is well worth planning for on a return trip from Portland to Seattle. (Photo courtesy of Simona Trakiyska)

Sara McCaslin is an editor and visual journalist for The Seattle Globalist. She worked for several daily midwest newspapers including The Flint Journal, The Columbia Missourian and The Boone County Journal before moving to Seattle. Sara trains the next generation of journalists through the Globalist Apprenticeship Program and is a graduate of the Journalism School at the University of Missouri.