Table & Travel

Port­land is a food town! Vicki and I trav­elled to this Ore­gon city in Jan­u­ary where I was the meet­ing of the Col­lege Book Art Asso­ci­a­tion. We arrived on Thurs­day, Jan­u­ary 7, and began a string of fab­u­lous meals in this town filled with out­stand­ing restaurants.

On Thurs­day evening we found a lit­tle Ital­ian trat­to­ria called Ris­torante Roma, it’s located in a rather non­de­script build­ing on a busy Port­land street, but the small restau­rant is filled with art­work and has lovely lit­tle tables with white table cloths and red accents. We had an excel­lent meal, which took us back to Rome; Vicki had Pap­pardelle Funghi e Sal­ci­c­cia, pasta with mush­rooms and sausage; I dined on Ravi­oli all’Astiche; crab and arti­choke ravi­oli with a lob­ster cream sauce—divine!

 

The fol­low­ing morn­ing we headed out to find a place for break­fast, but were stopped in our tracks by the falling rain. We had, of course, left the umbrel­las in our room. So we dove into the Drag­on­fish Asian Café, the restau­rant in our hotel build­ing, where I had an tasty and well-presented Shoyu omelet filled with tomato, aspara­gus, shi­itake mush­rooms, scal­lions, bell pep­per and mon­terey jack cheese.

Later that day I had a lunch meet­ing with two col­leagues at Sandoval’s Café and Can­tina, near the Ore­gon Col­lege of Art & Craft cam­pus. I was warned that it wasn’t the best Mex­i­can food in Port­land, but hey, it isn’t the worst either. I had a veg­gie tostada and it was great, loaded with good, fresh ingredients.

 

On Fri­day evening we had a real din­ing expe­ri­ence. A mem­ber of our steer­ing com­mit­tee had dined with writer Barry Lopez and his wife the pre­vi­ous evening and Barry had rec­om­mended Sim­pat­ica, in Portland’s east side. On Fri­day and Sat­ur­day evenings at din­ers arrive at Simpatica’s din­ing hall, walk­ing down to a win­dowed base­ment room where they seated at a long wooden table that holds about twenty-four peo­ple. At seven-thirty, they are wel­comed by the owner/chef, who explains what the prix fixe din­ner will be. Our four-course menu that night con­sisted of a starter of grilled cala­mari with roasted cau­li­flower, capers lemon and pars­ley; a salad of win­ter endive pear salad with warm pancetta dress­ing; a main course of braised pork shoul­der with fen­nel and tomato brood over savory grilled polenta; and a dessert of olive oil cake with orange mar­malade and Chan­tilly cream. Each course was accom­pa­nied by a wine cho­sen to match the food. Whew! The din­ner was superb, unques­tion­ably  the best we had in Portland.

 

While I was at the con­fer­ence, Vicki was explor­ing down­town Port­land, going to art stores and of course, Powell’s Books. All that walk­ing gave her a good appetite, so on Thurs­day, she had lunch at Clyde Com­mon, a “Euro­pean Style Tav­ern” located in the Ace Hotel. She had a lovely salad with farro, cau­li­flower, pome­gran­ate, wal­nut, herbs, and radic­chio. The next day she took her mid­day meal at the Port­land insti­tu­tion, Jake’s Grill, where she had an excel­lent pan-seared rex sole with bay shrimp.

 

The main part of the con­fer­ence ended on Sat­ur­day, so that evening a dozen of us headed to Jake’s Famous Craw­fish, for an evening of drinks, wine, and seafood. Vicki and I started with a half-dozen lus­cious Quilcene oys­ters, which were briny, with a nice salty tang. Vicki’s main course was one of her favorites, Petrale Sole Parme­san, pan-seared, with lemon, but­ter, and capers. I had Colum­bia River stur­geon, a fla­vor­ful and moist piece of grilled fish, served with a Dijon black pep­per­corn, basil butter—wonderful!

 

I had a board meet­ing on Sun­day morn­ing, then met Vicki at the hotel. Our plan was to hop-in-the-car and get out-of-town, but, what the heck, we decided to have one more meal before we left Port­land. We decided to head over a cou­ple blocks to the Heath­man Hotel, where we’d had an out­stand­ing brunch a cou­ple of years ago. The Heath­man was built in 1927 and is on the National Reg­is­ter. The kitchen and inno­v­a­tive menu, which fea­tures sea­sonal North­west ingre­di­ents, is over­seen by Exec­u­tive Chef Philippe Boulot, win­ner of the 2001 James Beard Award for Excellence—best Chef of the Pacific North­west. Even though we’d be dri­ving soon, we decided to share Bloody Heath­man, a tasty and spicy ver­sion of the Bloody Mary. We started our brunch with Roasted Pear and Cabecou  Feuille —warm pep­pered goat cheese grilled in a chest­nut leaf arugula and pome­gran­ate reduc­tion, toasted almonds. The tex­tures were won­der­ful, and the grilled goat cheese divine. Vicki decided to have the Smoked Salmon Hash, which had a crispy crust and was topped with two per­fectly poached eggs. I hadn’t had enough seafood yet either, so decided on the Hang­town Fry. The egg and veg­etable wrapped oys­ters were fried per­fectly, with a crisp outer-coating and a creamy cen­ter, yum! It was served with excel­lent fried pota­toes. This was an out­stand­ing way to end our visit to Port­land, one of the great food cities of the West.

Click here to view a Google Map show­ing all the restau­rants men­tioned above.

Ris­torante Roma
622 SW 12th Ave.
Port­land, OR 97205
503.241.2692
www.ristoranteromaportland.com

Drag­on­fish Asian Café
909 SW Park Avenue
Port­land, OR
(In the Para­mount Hotel)
503.243.5991
www.dragonfishcafe.com

Sandoval’s Café and Can­tina
460 SW Miller Road
Port­land, OR 97225
503–292-2128
 http://www.sandovalspdx.com/

Sim­pat­ica Din­ing Hall
828 SE Ash Street
Port­land, OR 97214
503.235‑1600
http://simpaticacatering.com

Clyde Com­mon
1014 SW Stark Street
Port­land, OR 97205
(In the Ace Hotel build­ing)
503.228.3333
www.clydecommon.com

Jake’s Grill
611 SW Tenth Avenue
Port­land, OR 97205
503.220.1850
http://www.mccormickandschmicks.com/locations/portland-oregon/portland-oregon/swtenthave.aspx

Jake’s Famous Craw­fish
401 SW 12th Ave.
SW Stark (cross street)
Port­land, OR 97205
503.226.1419
http://www.mccormickandschmicks.com/Locations/portland-oregon/portland-oregon/SW12thAve.aspx

The Heath­man Restau­rant and Bar
1001 SW Broad­way
Port­land, OR 97205
503.790.7752
www.heathmanrestaurantandbar.com

Tags: 2010, Oregon, Portland, restaurants

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