“Listen, Sister,” the Squeeze said to me, waggling a piece of spice-crusted beef in creamy fenugreek sauce on his fork, “I’m not saying I don’t wish this was A-1.” My face must have fallen, just a little (but what did I expect, really?). He continued, smiling, “But it’s good.” Ah,I thought, thank goodness for that.

We’d already enjoyed our poppadoms (those most-delicious spiced and crispy wafers that often appear before a meal at an Indian restaurant) and our pakoras (vegetable fritters with coriander chutney)—both served with perfect accompaniments, full of flavor and not too, too spicy and The Squeeze appeared content as he tucked into his tandoor culotte steak. Across the table, I was a happy little clam. Though we were seated in the middle of the restaurant and right next to the kitchen, I didn’t feel crowded by other customers or by the stream of [friendly without being obnoxious] servers that moved past our table. Even the table right next to us, sharing the same bench on one side, was positioned at a respectable, breathable distance. You can’t enjoy your Carlton Farms pork vindahlo if you’re feeling hemmed in, you know.

And I did enjoy it. The portion size was rather massive, but the dish was quite well executed and flavorful. Even the rice—for which I had no expectations—held its own on the plate. It was light and mild and studded with crunchy (not soggy!) pistachio nuts. I definitely, definitely had my fix.

While I am sure that I enjoyed our meal more than the Squeeze did (I even loved his cauliflower puree, which he had a hard time getting excited about), I believe we both pushed back from the table satisfied, no need to swing by Burgerville on the way home. And though I consider Vindahlo—and the satisfying of my desperate craving for Indian food—a success, I don’t think I’ve exactly converted anyone.

It wasn’t any shortcoming of the restaurant’s, though. It’s just that some of us appreciate fine foods more than others.

Vindahlo
2038 SE Clinton Street
Portland, Oregon 97202
503-467-4550

Whenever I go to Nicholas, which is not nearly often enough, I have a spinach pie (from the pizza menu) and a bowl of lentil soup. In the past, I’ve experimented with various kabobs and mezza platters (you can have vegan, vegetarian, or meaty) and they’ve all been great, but now I’ve settled on the tangy spinach pie (filled with chopped spinach, onions, pinenuts, and sumac) and the subtle lentil soup (great for dunking all that warm, fluffy pita in). Go early in the day or expect to wait; this little spot in SE Grand is always busy.

Four: Miss Delta

The last time I suggested Mississippi Avenue’s Miss Delta to a friend, I was asked if the food was “South Carolina-Southern” or “Cajun-Southern” and I was rather at a loss to answer. I thought of the blackened cajun snapper and red beans over rice, and then of the crispy herbed fried chicken and vegan collard greens. I still don’t know how to classify the food at this fantastic little place, and I don’t particularly care. From the buttered brussels sprouts to the personal-sized pies to the 40-ounce PBR served over ice in a paint can, I love Miss Delta and I’ll call it whatever you want, so long as you go there.

Six: Nostrana

I had the margherita pizza with housemade mozzarella when I ate at Nostrana. I asked for fresh arugula on it too, applied right when the pizza came out of the wood-burning oven so the greens wilted just a little under the drizzle of olive oil. The sweet basil, creamy cheese and tangy rocket sang glorious notes atop perfect tomato sauce and a bubbly, crispy crust. Pizza will never be the same again. The meal was capped by Cathy’s four-ingredient gelato: the pistachio flavor tasted more like toasted pistachios than the nut itself. I don’t know how she does it but, oh my, she does it well.

Perhaps it is redundant to note that as we entered the building, still adjusting to East Coast daylight and the unrelenting crush of bodies – that essential quality of New York City that we delight in then try to escape from – I felt acutely out of place. I’m from Portland, right? Where I go out to eat, they only ask that patrons be dressed, not that we dress in a particular fashion. Honestly, I don’t know what Asiate’s “Smart Business” is even supposed to mean.

Asiate, and what I saw of the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in which it is housed, is beautiful. Their interiors are modern and clean and made me feel sort of special just because I was inside, enjoying the view and using the fancy soaps in the luxurious restrooms. The massive glass wall of wine bottles at the entry to the restaurant welcomes guests with a not-so-subtle insistence: drink our wine. And then, from the thirty-fifth floor, with floor-to-ceiling windows on two sides of the space, the views of Central Park and downtown are even more impressive. We would have liked to sit next to a window, but the hostess evidently didn’t think we warranted a view. I do not wish to sound whiny here — in her place, I wouldn’t have given our bunch the greatest table either.

Our server, a woman who achieved a demeanor at once stern and cheery, was about forty and spoke with a nondescript European accent. She appeared not long after we were seated and offered to help me choose a glass of wine. I told her I that like dry reds and she steered me towards a St. Julien wine from the Bordeaux region in France. I heard her say the word “figs” in describing the nose or the aroma or something — then I stopped listening. I figured that, compared to the five-to-ten dollar-per-bottle brews I usually drink, anything she’d serve me would taste pretty great. Also, I do not have a firm command of wine-speak and I’d rather not bother trying to sound like I know what I am talking about when I am perfectly comfortable admitting that I do not. Having lunch out at a fancy restaurant is not about working hard.

I regret not paying more attention to the wine list, but I was counting on finding it on their website. Whatever it was that I had was delicious – more than delicious. It tasted of dried figs and was so subtly sweet. I’d tell you more about it, but I’ve already said that I don’t know what I am talking about. Suffice it to say that whatever was in my glass sort of rocked my world. I would have liked to track down a bottle for a special occasion, but, alas, neither the menu nor the wine list are published in the Interwebs.

Soon after we were served our wine and had placed our orders, there were little gruyere-filled herbed pâte à choux puffs. Then prawn goyza and panko-crusted salt cod fritters (served with spicy watercress and a rather bland sauce), then demitasses of red bell pepper soup. A waiter wandered the dining room carrying a wooden box of baguette pieces, brioche rolls, and focaccia squares. He served each customer individually, using a pair of spoons like tongs to place bread on square glass plates. At one o’clock the dining room was nearly full. Four Blackberry-toting young businessmen were seated at the table next to ours. They joked in French while their phones flashed on the tablecloth next to their soup bowls.

For our main courses, the Squeeze and I ordered wild salmon and duck wontons, respectively. The piece of salmon that came on his plate couldn’t have weighed less than eight ounces, the tapered ends of the filet flopping over the rim of the plate before him. It was glazed in a too-sweet honey sauce and cooked in such a way that it became utterly mushy. Underneath the sauce the fish itself tasted good, despite the distracting texture. Perhaps this is salmon cookery en vogue, but I could not help but wonder if this particular fish had been on it’s way to spawn when it was plucked from the ocean and made into lunch. The duck filling in my wantons was, as far as I could judge, unseasoned. The wontons sat in a shallow bowl of rich herbed coconut broth, along with carrots chunks and quartered pattypan squashes. The vegetables were perfectly al dente. I appreciated that.

Both the restaurant and the food we ate were very pretty. The staff was well turned out, the dining room tastefully and attractively appointed — it’s a nice place to be. But my only conclusion after having lunch there is that I am certainly not the sort of person that the restaurant exists for. I would have been much happier to pay the same amount of money for food that was more delicious and less handled. I’ve realized, too, that a place like Asiate is not a restaurant where one goes for top-of-the-line cuisine. There are other places in New York City for that, places like Thomas Keller’s Per Se, just a few doors down. A gal would go see Keller if she wanted to have a gastronomic experience. She goes to Asiate for the view of the City and the Park, for the totally adorable (and perfectly fine) demis of bell pepper soup, for the roaming waiter with his shiny spoons and box of brioche. And, compared to Keller’s prix-fixe prices, Asiate’s a bargain.

Asiate Restaurant
80 Columbus Circle at 60th Street
New York, New York 10023
212 805 8800

When I am halfway through the door, he asks me if I am the stage (nearly rhymes with “podge”). A little flicker of recognition tickles my brain – I know that word. I knew that word when I was working for the Brilliant French Baker, but I cannot recall quickly enough what it means. The stage, the stage…I realize I am waiting too long to speak and by now he must have figured out that I am not the stage, else I am a very poor stage, unaware of what or who I even am. Then I worry if maybe I am the stage, even though by now I think I remember that a stage is some kind of kitchen intern.

So I say, “I might be. What’s a stage?” I had decided yesterday that I was not going to try to affect coolness this morning as I usually find such endeavors rather futile and exhausting. Besides, by now I am sort of amused by our scene and I imagine that whenever the real stage arrives – probably heavily tattooed nineteen-year-old who has been working in kitchens since before he was born – we will all have a good chuckle.

“A person who works for free,” he tells me. I pause and then reply, “That sounds familiar, but today I’m a writer,” which I see immediately does not illuminate for him why I am knocking at Le Pigeon’s door at ten in the morning.

It’s a whole different kind of expectation when gearing up to go to a restaurant that you’ve heard nothing about. When some wingnut with her own food ‘blog writes a rave about the taco cart on Lombard, everyone falls all over themselves in a rush for the famed carnitas, right? The eager gastrophiles cram in line and take turns reciting their favorite lines from the wingnut’s review. They know what to expect, so there’s no use waiting. It lacks suspense. But when the only notions you have of a place are of your making entirely, it’s a whole different show. The story is yours to write and until you’ve walked into the restaurant for the first time, nothing will contradict you.

So it was with the Thai Laundromat. I imagined the two businesses might be joined on the inside as well, giving diners a view of their tumbling whites while enjoying a plate of salad rolls and peanut sauce. I smelled dryer sheets and stain remover mingling above my head with the aromas of garlic, ginger and coconut milk wafting up from the meal. While I was eager to perhaps add a new eatery to my list, this game of make-believe was a guaranteed good time, and I wasn’t up for disappointment should the place turn out to be a dive. Frankly, I was prepared to be pleased if the food turned out to be just a notch above edible.

And then on one otherwise unremarkable day, I decided to quit dreaming and taste the stuff.

That was months ago, and now I regard the Thai Laundromat as my place, the food I am always in the mood for, the restaurant to which I take all new friends and out-of-town visitors. I’ll admit to being somewhat fanatical here, but for me the Thai Laundromat is all that I love of my neighborhood, poured into vinyl booths and large, ornate wooden carvings, into steamed white rice, green curry, and fresh salad rolls.

You would never know that the restaurant has a self-serve laundromat for a conjoined twin. Their skins may look similar, but entering the restaurant renders unsustainable all thoughts of bleach and dryer sheets and change machines. You might admire the lovely glass light fixtures hanging over the tables and booths, or the display case of teeny figurines just inside the street entrance. You may even notice that there are other people present, but soon your world narrows to the menu, to your company at the table, and to the fantastically good food.

I need you to appreciate the gravity of the following sentence: I could eat the Thai Laundromat’s Pumpkin Curry every day for a month and not tire of it. A surprise to some of the folks I’ve eaten with there, the pumpkin curry isn’t made with the jack-o-lantern type pumpkins most familiar to the western palate. Rather, it features the kabocha squash, which you may have seen before in Japanese cooking, perhaps on a plate of tempura veggies. The kabocha is a squat winter squash with rough-looking (though edible) dark green skin. It is egg yolk yellow on the inside, and the texture of the flesh falls somewhere between silky and crumbly. I’ve never met a kabocha that I didn’t love. It is sweet and earthy. It is just the thing to add to the Thai Laundromat’s spicy sweet coconut-and-basil curry sauce.

I’ve tried to work my way through the menu. About sixty percent of the time, I manage to order something other than the Pumpkin Curry. Usually, this is only possible because I’ve talked someone else into getting it and sharing with me. The Pineapple Fried Rice is always a winner, and features a ton of the largest cashew nuts I have seen anywhere. Drunken Noodles make me wiggly. The Peanut Curry, not printed on the regular menu (it was a special once, and I’ve just kept on ordering it), is one of the best things I have ever tasted anywhere. Rather than itemize my delights, which will only keep you here longer when you should be putting on your coat to go find this place, I’ll instead share my only two disappointments. I’ve had two stir-fries that were merely good, not great. The Garlic and Pepper and the Cashew Nut dishes just don’t live up to the (very high) standards that this place has set for itself. I finished them both of course, scraping the bowl with the plastic spatula I’ve taken to carrying in my purse when I eat there, but the high wasn’t as euphoric as I’ve come to expect of the place.

I have one other complaint about the Thai Laundromat: it’s getting crowded in there. Every time I go in for a meal it feels busier, like someone’s let the secret out. In the beginning of my relationship with the restaurant, back when I was only a causal user, some days my friends and I were one of only a few groups for lunch or dinner. These days, most of the tables are filled and there is a regular flow of folks who stop in for take out orders.

It’s hard to know just what to do when a gal finds a really great restaurant like this. Selfishly, I am tempted to want to suspend it in time. I want there always to be an open table for me. I want the food to be as good tomorrow as it was today. In fact, I don’t think I could handle it being any better. A diet of little more than coconut milk, basil, and kabocha squash probably lacks some necessary nutrient or vitamin or something. I hope they never reupholster the booths or repaint the neon green bathroom, and I hope they never have to hire a new cook or server. One in six visits, the place really does smell a bit like laundry detergent, and I like that too. But it’s unreasonable and unhealthy to resist the sort of inevitable change that marks the growth and maturing of a good restaurant. As the neighborhood changes, the Thai Laundromat will have to change a little bit with it, and I really ought to celebrate their success, not mourn it.

I love watching the slow grins bloom across the faces of my more skeptical friends when they take their first bite of green curry or spring roll. You said it’d be good, they tell me, but I didn’t think it was gonna be that good. It seems that now my desire to go public with this pleasant surprise is larger than my wish to keep the Thai Laundromat all for myself, as if that were even possible. I have heard other happy patrons chatting about the upswing in business, and I am ready to make peace with having to share my find with the rest of the city. So, dear readers, go there. Go if you love Thai food, because you won’t be disappointed. Go if you’ve never had Thai food and you want to try it. Go even if you think you hate Thai food, because I am confident that this place will change your mind. Go, and then tell your friends, your mom and your colleagues about it. If it’s going to get crowded in there, at least we can try to fill it with people who have good taste in little known food ‘blogs.

Monsoon Thai Cuisine
4236 N Mississippi (at Skidmore)
503.280.7087

- – -
My mom drives to Monterey to Sea Harvest or Wharf Number Two and buys cooked, cracked, whole crabs. The dismembered Dungeness beasts are dumped out into the utility sink, washed, and returned to the fridge until dinner. When I set the dinner table around four-thirty, I place a nutcracker and a pick along the top of the place setting, centered between the spoons on the right and the forks on the left. The crab is served cold in big earthenware casserole dishes. Mom’s whole wheat crescent rolls arrive at the table warmed and nestled between cloth napkins in a woven basket. We heap salad onto our plates and use the pick to tease crabmeat out onto the bed of lettuce and veggies.

Until my mid-twenties, I was too repulsed by my abstract, untested notion of crab to eat any myself, though the entire table moaned at its lusciousness. Some other runner-up meal was prepared for me and any other non-crab eaters present, but instead of jumping right in and finishing before everyone else, I moved around the table, helping crack and pick crab for the rest of the family. There was great disappointment when I finally clued in that Dungeness crab is one of the most delicious things a gal can have for dinner.

- – -

At the end of the meal, we were well sated declined the offer of a dessert menu. Our server, in kind, careful English, offered that the house dessert was included in the meal and asked if we would like to try it. Reasoning that it would be rude to refuse, we assented. We didn’t know what the dessert was – I had only understood, or thought I had understood, “water chestnut,” and when it arrived, the dish was a bit of a surprise.

The dessert was a soup, I guess, in a small bowl – the same that held the white rice during our supper – with a saucer. It’s a clear liquid, slightly sweet and hot, in which floats a crinkly matter, not unlike rice noodles but firmer and in short, koosh-ball-esque shapes. And three lychee nuts. Or, they’re berries, right? The lychees were pitted, but still sheathed their rough red skins.

I took up the large ceramic spoon, awkward to my american table habits, and slurped, first the liquid, then with the crinkly bits. I discovered the water chestnut – if that is really what it was – a few bites in, cut up small and sunk to the bottom of the tiny bowl.

The lychee was delicious, and I especially enjoyed breaking the tension of the skin with my teeth to release the soft, sweet flesh inside. The physical sensation of its mastication was as enjoyable, if not more so, than its flavor.

My dining companion looked on in mock – or true – horror. She slurped a little of the liquid, might have tried the crinkly things, broke apart one of the lychees with er spoon, and then set her bowl aside to watch me.

I suggested she try a lychee, making a show of enjoying mine in the exact manner that my father used with trying to convince Baby J9 to eat steamed zucchini slices. Mmmm, just like candy, he’d say. This tactic never worked on me; I don’t know why I was surprised that it didn’t get the lychees eaten either.

When I finished and pushed the bowl away, she made a joke, likening our dessert to gorilla testicle soup.
“I am sure gorillas have much larger testicles than a lychee nut,” I volleyed, determined not to let an allusion to primate genitalia affect my digestion.
“Well, I would have said ‘monkey,’ but I didn’t want to be culturally insensitive.”

- – -

Three years ago I was at the Portland Nursery with my friend Julia. We had gone on a specific errand, but as often happens, we allowed ourselves a stroll through the greenhouses and were unable to resist one or two particularly beautiful, or interesting, or just plain green plants. I spotted a cluster of coffea arabica: coffee. I let out a small, quick noise that betrayed my delighted surprise. Coffee? I asked, for Julia is one of my favorite resources for all matters relating to both fauna and flora. She responded in the affirmative. Yes, that really is coffee and yes, it can grow in the Pacific Northwest. Like citrus, coffee is potted instead of planted so that it can be brought inside in the winter. It took no more assurance or encouragement: I took home eight three-inch tall coffee trees.

The little trees are now three years old and have lived with me in four different houses. Each summer when the temperature is reliably above 60º most of the time, I take them outside and try to tuck them in shady, warm corners of my yard. Coffee plants prefer to live in the shade. Too much sun and their leaves will burn, making photosynthesis impossible. Too few months later when the temperature drops back down, I bring the pots back inside, trying to find places they may be protected from the cats.

Julia’s house is always stuffed with plants and living things, sometimes so much so that it resembles a nursery more than a place where one might settle down in the evening with a book. When she housesits for me in the winter, she brings some of her houseplants with her, hanging the orchids from the baker’s rack in my kitchen and setting pots down on the floor of my living room. When she leaves, my place looks a little empty and I wonder how I survive with so few houseplants.

- – -

Sometimes a girl can walk by a restaurant and just *know* that it’s a winner. I’d like to tell you that I can always pick the great ones, that I am a human dowsing rod for good eats, and I’d like that to be an accurate assessment of my divination prowess. But the truth is, I’ve picked some real losers in this town, and often I don’t see the gems coming until the meal arrives in front of me.

Last week, however, I called it – called it good. A friend of mine has just moved to town and, having neither a proper job nor a full course load to monopolize the hours of my day, I have taken to exploring the City with her. It’s nice to see good ol’ Portland through fresher eyes. We had enjoyed a lunch at the Bridgeport Ale House and were walking up SE Hawthorne Boulevard just to walk up it. Construction compelled us to cross the street six blocks above 39th Avenue, routing our stroll by the Hawthorne Fish House. A sandwich board sign on the sidewalk forced us to walk single-file past the modest-looking door, just outside of which was mounted a translucent plastic menu caddy. As I moved past I reached for one, saying “Gosh, I bet this place is good,” while folding the menu into my bag. I don’t remember why I thought so, or if I could have justified the assessment at the time. Back home, the menu lay folded on my desk for days before I bothered to look at it again.

The Hawthorne Fish House (henceforth, HFH) menu is nearly perfect. Though they do offer one or two items to appease the non-pescaphile (a burger, chicken strips), the majority of their food is fish, fish, or fish. Or clams.

It is, I believe, a profoundly wise restauranteur who can resist needless innovation and clutter on her menu. So it is at the HFH. Make no mistake, I am not herein supporting the hum-drum or the uninspired. No, I am not. I am, however, saying just this: When you figure out how to make what are very possibly the best fish’n'chips this gal has ever had the rapturous pleasure to chew and swallow, it’s best for everyone if you don’t screw with them too much.

- – -

The last time I watched and enjoyed a cooking show was during my grammar school years. I would have been home with a flu or something, watching Jeff Smith and Martin Yan on KQED between episodes of the Woodwright Shop and This Old House.

Cooking shows were different then. Jeff Smith opened his show with a stroll through an outdoor market. Martin Yan made vocal sound effects while chopping vegetables with his imposing, well-honed clever. These guys could cook, too. They didn’t need a pretense – no friends were on their way over expecting an array of munchies to to enjoy while watching the Big Game. Meals didn’t have to be prepared in under thirty minutes, or in only five steps, or with some obscure ingredient that nobody’d want to eat anyway. Jeff and Martin cooked because they were good at it, and I watched them because they were clever are rarely obnoxious. These days the Food Channel makes me cringe, as I do when someone asks if I’ve seen the newest Nigella Lawson cookbook, and when celebrity “chefs” appear on my darned cracker box. Leave my crackers alone, or bring back the Frugal Gourmet.

     The thing I like so much about this coffee shop is that it’s a very focused place. It is sparsely decorated, but not remotely sterile. There are comfortable places to sit, there is a counter at which to order your drink, and they even offer a couple of pastries if you are feeling nibblish. They know how to make a drink there, which is evident not only in the quality of their product, but in the barista award plaques displayed on the walls and counter. There isn’t a forest of syrup bottles. They don’t make smoothies or frappies or squishies. They make coffee and espresso and some loose teas. And it’s good.

     So I get off the bus in the rain and go inside. It’s seven and pouring and really dark outside. The interior of the shop immediately provides relief from the bus and the rain and the tired ache that’s been creeping up my neck. The deep, rich coffee smell hooks me by my nostrils and draws me towards the counter. On my way I noticed that there are pretty people at all of the tables. They all have Apple laptops and are browsing Craigslist, writing their brilliant Master’s theses, or designing wrapping paper patterns for the holiday season already upon us. I think I see Hillary Clinton in someone’s Skype conference, but as I get close enough to tell for sure, he hurriedly folds his computer closed and gives me the Stink Eye.

     Brown bags of preportioned coffee beans are piled around the cash register, stacked three or four high. I survey my immediate options, then the bean menu written on the chalkboard on the wall. Having given up premium beans in favor of a more economical brew some years ago, nothing leaps out as a clear choice, and I decide to ask the guy behind the counter for his opinion.

     The barista has one black eye and elaborately styled Emo hair. He is wearing tight black jeans and a new-but-old-looking t-shirt with something spray-painted off-center on the front. He politely asks what I am looking for, and I tell him that I am interested in his take on the beans.

     I do this a lot. When spending fourteen or twenty dollars for one pound of coffee, I am much more willing – if not eager – to shelve my characteristic shyness towards strangers and dive into long chats (if that’s what it takes) on the relative acidity of the Sumatran versus the Rwandan beans. It usually goes like this:

• ME: I am looking for some beans.
• THEM: What kind of beans do you like?
• ME: I tend towards medium-dark roasts – something with a little less caffeine and a little more flavor.
• THEM: Our peaberry is really good right now. It’s really floral and vanilla-y.
• ME: How about something bigger? I’ve really enjoyed some of your African beans. And a few months ago I had a little of the Nicaragua Los Delirios that I thought was pretty rockin’.
• THEM: Okay, I think I know what you are looking for. Why don’t you try the Costa Rican – it’s a lot like the Nicaraguan you liked.

     And then I pay and leave happy.

     But the black-eyed barista is evidently incapable of engaging in such an exchange. I say I am looking for a darker roast. He says, Do you mean bitter? ‘Cause that’s what I think of when someone says “dark.” I scrunch up my face a little. What kind of a nutter asks for bitter coffee?

     I try to be clearer with my request. No, I don’t mean bitter, I say, wondering if someone also knocked his brains loose when they gave him that shiner. I mean roasted dark. Most beans used for espresso are dark roasts. The classic French roast is dark. And, while it is generally accepted that dark roasts don’t make for as complex or subtle a cup as do lighter roasts, to my knowledge asking for a well roasted pound of beans isn’t as criminal as, say, asking for a well done entrecote.

     We don’t have any dark roasts. They are all Full City, he tells me, sounding annoyed, as if I should have known, as if I must not understand where I am or with whom I am speaking. He asks if there is any Guatemalan stacked on the counter. That’s what I tell people to get when they come in asking for dark roasts, he says, passing a cup of tea to his previous customer and returning to the counter in front of me. I don’t see any Guatemalan and by now I just want to leave. I want to buy whatever beans lay closest to my left hand. I want to reach out and grab them, throw a wad of cash onto the counter and stomp out towards anywhere else. He asks me to clarify what I really mean when I say “dark.” It’s almost like he wants to help me, but this question is so nonsensical that I can’t think of how to begin my next sentence. I hesitate, agape.

     Chewy, I attempt, which I can see in retrospect probably isn’t the most precise adjective I might have picked. I want to say that I think a lot of light roasts turn out too thin in body and too fruity in flavor. I want to tell him that I like darker coffee because it has less caffeine than lighter roasts and because I do, in fact, enjoy a bit of acidity in my morning cup. None of this is coming out, though, and now he has come around the counter, presumably to look at the beans with me. He picks up a bag from the bottom of the pile and passes it to me. See? I knew we had some. The Guatemalan’s right here. He doesn’t say it like he’s happy for me that we’ve found the beans I want. He says it like I should have seen them and now he thinks that in addition to having bad taste in coffee, I am also a moron.

     I ask to see and smell the beans, which have come prepackaged from Stumptown Coffee Roasters. A minute ago, I wanted to leave, but now I want to make him work for the sale. No, no, no, I can’t open the package, even though it’s not sealed. But I am in luck – he has some brewed. He presses two tablespoons of coffee into a demitasse and hands it to me to taste. I take a sip, not paying any attention to the coffee in my mouth, and swallow. It’s fine, I say, I’ll take it.

     Fine? The black-eyed barista is not moving any closer to the cash register. He is standing only halfway behind the bar with one hand on his hip, his mouth making incredulous smirk. I echo; it is fine. As in, it will do. As in, I want to go home now. I don’t think it’s fine, he continues, and then with the chipperness of a middle school cheerleader, I think it’s great. I stare blankly; but he is obviously waiting for my riposte. It’s kind of sweet, I sigh, and thin. I am starting to think about leaving again, only in this version of my fantasy, I throw the beans overhand, like a football, and nail him in his non-bruised eye.

     But then he says something that frees me: Well, he begins, now exasperated, surely thinking that I will never, ever learn, and that now he’ll have to sanitize the counter where I’ve touched it and apologize to his other customers for subjecting them to such a blasphemous conversation, it tastes like coffee.

     I don’t remember exactly how I got out of the coffee shop. All I know is that I did, because I am home now and because I made some coffee this morning. The Guatemalan beans that I bought were, as expected, much too light for my taste. I had to use more beans than usual and it still tasted watery. I do not wish to suggest that the coffee I bought is of poor quality. It’s great coffee, in fact: subtle, nuanced, complex. And light. Good, but not what I wanted and not what I asked for.

     I think I know what the black-eyed barista was trying to do when I asked for dark roasted beans. He is a proud member of the Portland Bean Scene. He is probably better educated about coffee than I’ll ever care to be. It’s his thing and he clearly has strong opinions about it. Moreover, he works at a coffee shop with a reputation for serving excellent drinks. He took my reasoned preference as misguided ignorance and he thought he’d educate me, maybe change my mind about things, maybe give me my first “real” taste of coffee.

     I can relate, to a point. I was a barista once upon a time, kind of. I was a baker and a bookseller and a deli counter gal who spent a lot of time behind the nearest coffee bar. I know the basics about growing and harvesting and roasting, and am familiar with the profiles of the world’s growing regions. I’ve been to “cuppings,” events hosted by roasters who brew half a dozen pots and then talk participants through a tasting not unlike those for wine. I know what a real macchiato is, and I can make a mean one.

     I got my introduction to the mighty bean in a coffee shop not unlike The Albina Press, in fact. It was a serious coffee joint where we did coffee, tea and espresso correctly and traditionally for it’s own sake, out of respect for the bean and the leaf. And while a lot of our customers could tell the difference between a poorly made drink and a good one, there were many who could not be convinced that we knew what they wanted better than they did. Starbucks regulars, for example, have a habit of ordering The Bucks’ proprietary drinks where ever they go, even if those beverages aren’t on the menu. And while it’s not fun to make a drink that you think is a hideous offense to your glorious beans, you still make it. You just overcharge for it.

     It’s frustrating to see something that you care about destroyed by what you perceive as a third party’s terrible taste. For cooks, it’s ketchup on prime rib. For bakers, whipping cream in the eclair. And for baristas these days, it seems to be dark roasted coffee beans.

     But my understanding of the black-eyed barista’s exasperation towards me isn’t enough to excuse his unprofessional manner. I have never lived so close to a coffee shop as I do to The Albina Press. It is walkable in any weather and they make a really tasty cup. I have long fantasized about walking to my local java joint first thing in the morning for a cup and a browse of the morning’s news – and it’s in my reach, right over there at The Press. But I’m not going there, not any more. I prefer to my caffeine fix without having elbow past the combative hipster barista to get it.

     When I saw the black-eyed barista, I felt a little sorry for him that he’d been roughed up. I wondered if he’d been hassled at the bar the previous night (maybe about his silly hairdo), or if he lives with a woman who perhaps doesn’t know how to express her anger in any other way. But walking out of the shop, I didn’t wonder at all about his black eye. I figure it must have been the last person who tried to talk to him about coffee beans.

The night before our most recent meal at Passionfish, I had a couple of glasses of wine, and wondered out loud and at length at the strategy I should take upon my return to the scene of this great letdown. I had over eleven months to think about it, yet had not come to a decision. The crux of the problem was this: If the same menu item that was a disaster last December was offered to me again, should I take it, thus giving the kitchen an opportunity to atone for past wrongs, or should I choose something else, perhaps safer, thereby increasing the likelihood of having a satisfying experience and mending my strained relationship with a favorite restaurant?

It was clear on the ride over that my family didn’t quite grasp the full extent of my (admittedly slightly dramatic) quandary. I can’t believe you’re so worked up over one meal, Mom puzzled; and then Dad asked with genuine worry in his voice, Are you going to say something that gets us thrown out of the restaurant? I told them that I am the nicest critic I know, that I have only ever written two mean things about anyone, and that of course I would behave myself in public. None of these assurances had any visible effect on my parents.

Our meal at Passionfish, I am delighted to report, was positively fantastic and I feel completely at peace with them once again.

We had a crab cake over lime relish to start, and barbecued shrimp with lemongrass slaw and spicy Vietnamese sauce. The crab cake was just like it ought to be – mostly crab, fried crisp, and carefully seasoned. I didn’t taste the shrimp, but their accompaniment was without question the best thing on the table that night. The slaw tasted like daikon with pea shoots and the Vietnamese sauce was so flavorful and spicysweet without being too much of either. Together they gave me pause – the crunch and tang of the slaw, the spice of the dark sauce drizzled over… As soon as I finish this piece, in fact, I am going to draft a letter to Chef Ted, in which I will beg with as much dignity as I can muster for the recipe.

For our entrees we chose – and I snagged a menu so I could get it all accurate here, mind you – Mahi with a black pepper-rum sauce, cucumber salad and green onion rice, Alaskan sablefish crusted with pepper in a wasabi slaw, and ginger vinaigrette, Maine scallops with a tomato-truffle butter and a thyme risotto custard, Tilapia with thyme mashed potatoes and garlic-balsamic vinegar butter, and Duck confit with a honey reduction, chile gratin potatoes, and braised fennel.

My plate was the tilapia, but I tasted it all, swooning ever more with each bite. While it is true that some dishes (the scallops, the tilapia) were more fantastic than others (the sablefish, the mahi), it is wholly unfair to say that anything was rotten. To my mind, the latter two were under-seasoned and therefore underwhelming in the flavor department. It’s also darned near impossible to seriously compete with well-prepared scallops (in tomato-truffle butter, for heaven’s sake!). Everything on the table was extremely well-executed. The fish on my plate was cooked to a medium doneness, which makes for a moister, more flavorful piece of fish. The garlic-balsamic butter, which I was half-expecting to think was objectionable, was absolutely delicious, and mixed so well with the herbalicious spuds and the tender (but not overcooked) snap peas. I forced myself to eat slowly and savor; it wasn’t easy. I can’t think of how they might have improved the plate, in fact.

The duck at Passionfish, I should say, is also the best duck I have ever had. It is a thing of dreams, the sort when you wake up and are depressed all day because what you dreamed was not real. Except this duck is real, it is just 700 miles away. It is a leg and thigh seared over high heat to caramelize the outside, and then slow-roasted for hours until it is tender and succulent and barely hanging on to the bone. It has never not been on the menu and I would order it every time I go, were it not for those gratin potatoes (I think cheese is icky) and the dazzling array of seafood offered with accompaniments that I actually want to eat. If you ever go to Passionfish with me, you will almost certainly be encouraged strongly and at length to order the duck so that I can have a bite without having to contend with those cheesey spuds.

If thoughtful, well-crafted and delicious food weren’t enough to make the trip to California especially for a meal at Passionfish, you should also know – and you might if you read Bon Appetit Magazine – that the Walters and Passionfish are advocates of sustainable seafood, dedicated to serving meals that are healthy for their customers and for the environment. Like Alice Waters of Chez Panisse, Cindy and Ted were doing this before it was cool, and now get serve as guides for newer chefs and restauranteurs who will undoubtedly hop on to this very important wagon. Indeed, the global community of cooks and eaters – not to mention all of the fishies in the sea – are lucky to have them aboard.

When I lived in Pacific Grove, this was the restaurant of choice for my gang of friends whenever we had any occasion to mark, and for when we just felt like celebrating our collective love of good food, wine, and each other. It is such a tremendous relief for me to have had another dinner at my beloved Passionfish, and for that dinner to have met their – and my – high standards. And though my parents clearly relished their meals, they were much more pleased that I was given no reason to utter remarks that would have gotten us thrown out of the restaurant.

Passionfish
701 Lighthouse Avenue
Pacific Grove, California 93950
831•655•3311

Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch

Though most mobile kitchens (which is what those trailers all over town are, regardless of their actual mobility) are little more than shacks, that aspect of their construction is not something I like to focus on when enjoying their fares. A shack sits on a mountain slope, possibly inhabited by a bearded and socially awkward recluse. A shack is a structure you can use as a painting studio in the summertime. Shacks are on beaches. They have sagging thatched roofs; they creak and bend perched on the constantly-shifting sand. Shacks hold rusty garden tools. Shacks are for ghosts and cobwebs.

Also, I am not an eater of ribs. At my childhood dinner table, ribs came from either a restaurant in Salinas called Smalley’s Roundup (fantastic steak fries, as I recall) or from Smokin’ Jim. Jim had a mobile home and a huge fire pit attached by a trailer hitch. The only place you could count on finding him was the County Fair in August. The rest of the year we could only wait to spot him in parking lot somewhere. In the late 90s we all got cell phones, thus enabling easy cancellation of dinner plans in favor of his delicious barbecue. Whenever dinner came from Jim or Smalley’s, I’d have a grilled chicken breast which, of course, they both wisely offered. I love the charcoal grill flavor, but have always preferred something easier to eat. All of that gnawing and the sauce, the extra napkins and dental floss – it didn’t seem worth it.

The only other thing that bothered me about Da Rib Shack was the only other thing I knew about it: the legitimization of non-standard English, Da. Of course, I see now that Da is part of the charm, that a place called The Rib Shack would fly crooked and feel inauthentic. After all of the jaw-flapping I’ve done about honest food, you would think I’d have understood this one right off.

Now that Da Rib Shack is open and I’ve tried it a few times, I love it. I love that it exists, and that I live in a neighborhood that can sustain it. I love that everyone I’ve met working or eating there has been warm and friendly. I love that their food tastes really good. I love the hand painted, graffiti-inspired sign. I love that they serve only vegetarian-fed, organic meats and that they support local agriculture. I love that their southern greens are vegan and that they offer sweet potato cheesecake for dessert.

But I am getting ahead of my own story.

* * *

A nice introduction, right? Maybe it ran a little long, but I liked it. But before I could proceed – you can see that I was just about the get to the good part – I wanted to have one more taste of that aromatic barbecue. I was going to tell you about the brisket sandwich that changed my mind about saucy meats. I was going to extol the vegan greens and rice and the friendly service and the cook who honestly cares that you are happy and satisfied and – - The plan was to compose a review that would, provided that Da Shack did not disappoint, propel all of my Portland readers to hop on TriMet’s Number Four, stomachs rumbling and pockets stuffed with with cash.
Also, I was hungry.
Alas, much longed-after meal could not be procured. I had the lunch special at the Mississippi Pizza Pub instead and then returned home, worried. After frumping about for a number of minutes, thinking of what I would do if I couldn’t get those black eyed peas anymore, I decided that it’s better to know than to wonder. If Da Rib Shack is really closed, I’d rather get the story straight so that I can grieve and cry and, someday, hopefully move on.

Their e-mail address was conveniently printed on the menu that I had grabbed as a souvenir of my first visit, so I wrote them:

Dear Missing Rib Merchants,

I have been craving a brisket sandwich for a week. On Sunday, my Squeeze and I walked down to your corner for lunch, salivating and quite eager to feast upon your delicious po’boys and delectable black-eyed peas. Indeed, we had been talking about it for days. When we arrived at Da Shack and saw that the awning was gone and the place closed up, we refused to consider that you might be gone. We reasoned that, it being a Sunday, it was not unlikely that you would be closed. But today when we made the walk again, the evidence could not be ignored. Is this true? Has Da Rib Shack left our dear Mississippi Avenue so soon?

If this is so, I am disappointed not only on behalf of my taste buds, but also because I was looking forward to completing an article I had been writing about you, rhapsodizing over your tasty barbecue and singing the praises of your friendly service.

Perhaps you are merely taking a break? Vacation? Perhaps Da Rib Shack is already moving into more substantial digs or a more suitable location, though I cannot imagine a better corner.

Hopefully awaiting another brisket sandwich,

J9

* * *

This morning I received a bittersweet reply. Though it seems the Shack as I know it is closed, they are offering catering and holiday desserts, with delivery available from noon to six p.m. for orders of at least $35. I suppose I’ll just have to have a party.

And that is the end of my tale, though it didn’t shake out as happily as I’d like. I’m still hungry and I still want a darned brisket sandwich and some black eyed peas ‘n’ rice. Sure, there are plenty of other barbecue joints in the city and I am sure that at least one of them is almost as good. But I can’t imagine that any of them is as charming or as honest as da Shack.

We are not the sort of people who hang out at a brewery. We are, in fact, not the sort of people who “hang out” anywhere. In my case, I am not of that type anymore; I don’t know if he ever was but it is difficult to believe that one could have skipped that 24-hour-Pie House phase of adolescence. Last night, however, a number of things recommended the brewery as our most appealing option.

First, it is close to our house, a moment or two by bicycle or a seven-minute walk. Second, he had never been there. Third, the menu at the brewery is small, simple, and accessible. There aren’t so many items to bog down the mind of tired, hungry souls such as ourselves. Fourth, there would be beer, naturally; and standing in the tiny kitchen thinking about beer made me sort of happy.

The brewery is on the main street in our neighborhood, the nexus of the gentrification which I am counting on to raise my property value sufficiently so that we can afford to move before this place becomes unbearably hip. For now, the street is a pleasant mix of new boutiques and old, cruddy storefronts and warehouses. We have three coffee shops, all of them trendy but only one so much that it is alienating. An antique store went in last summer, which I kind of like, but the rapid multiplication of “size four stores” is a disappointment. What really kills me, though, is that the tiny produce market around the corner will close at the end of the month, citing “unforeseen economic conditions.” I haven’t asked what, exactly, is moving them out of my neighborhood and into an area not yet re-developed, but I suspect commercial rent has begun to increase here. Now, our only providers of fresh fruit and veg are the chain grocery stores and the overpriced community market about twenty blocks away. I would rather spend my money at the community joint – their window adverts suggest that they are supporters of the local, sustainable, and organic movements – but the thing I liked so much about my market, the one that is closing, is that they carried all of the same stuff, except no one hung around with flowers in their hair or a BMW parked at the curb.

The brewery, I suspect, was installed on the street before anyone was interested in living near it. I can remember downtown Portland when The Pearl was called The Brewery Blocks. Walking up West Burnside on the way to Powell’s Books or the 24-hour Zupan’s Market, the area smelled like old, stale, warm beer. That smell, I am sure, was the first thing to go.

The brewery in our neighborhood isn’t like the big beer company down the street, with tours and large windows looking on to the polished stainless steel vats and fancy German menus and a carpeted dining room and leather booths with brass trim. The “dining area” feels like an afterthought, as if one afternoon people showed up for pretzels and pints, needing somewhere to sit, and the management pulled some picnic tables out of the staff break room. There is some indoor seating and a proper bar, behind which four chalkboards and multiple handwritten signs on copy paper serve as the menu. No matter what you want or where you plan on sitting, your first stop is always there – the bartender is your host and order-taker.

The menu, I’ve said, is very small and simple. You can have bratwurst or burgers and everything comes on a bun with potato chips off of the charcoal grill situated outside at one corner of the “beer garden.” There are several different types of brat, and a burger is available made of cow or veggies, with or without cheese. There are also peanuts, pretzels, and goldfish crackers, on order of which comes in a pint glass and costs a dollar. As for drinks, there are the house-taps and guest draughts, wine by the bottle or glass, hard cider, and soft drinks. If you order something from the grill, the bartender will give you a neon pink card with a letter markered onto it to stand on your table. We ordered a meat burger, a veggie burger and two hard ciders, closed our tab, and plunked down at a picnic table in the garden, where we tugged on our delicious pear ciders and watched everyone else receive their food first.

Lately I have been thinking a lot of about honest food. Or, if you like, poser food. Or, authentic food, being exactly and unapologetically what it is. This is a tricky judgment, as contemporary American cuisine is reasonably fluid, in that a dish can be anything the chef says it is, leaving the customer only to gauge how successfully the meal is in satisfying her appetite. But I’ll just go ahead and say that I don’t think a hamburger can happily and honestly coexist with white linen napkins. And that there is definitely something wrong with offering beef at an Indian restaurant. And, certainly, a place called Da Rib Shack could never have table service. So maybe what I like so much about the brewery is that does not pretend to be anything that it isn’t and you can see, with great transparency, just exactly what it is. There is no bullshit, no “gourmet” items thrown onto the menu in an attempt to attract a different clientele. It is comfortable in there, easy to sit with a book or a trio of buddies.

You want a tasty porter and a hot, delicious veggie burger? You wanna watch the grill master take it out of the cooler and apply it to the barbecue? You wanna help yourself to a napkin from roll of paper towels sitting on the table next to yours? You wanna do all of this while watching the Mississippi Street foot traffic as the sun sets rather picturesquely behind the West Hills? Then, go – -
Amnesia Brewing
832 North Beech Street
Portland, Oregon 97227
503 281 7708