We arrived home late Sunday night, and I am just now slowly emerging from my food coma brought on by all of the good things to eat in Portland!

Portland is quite famous for at least a couple of renowned restaurants like Pok Pok and Ken’s Artisan Pizza, as well as the uber-popular coffee shop, Stumptown. It’s also the home of an almost obscene amount of food trucks—several hundred according to the Travel Portland website.

We indulged in brunch two mornings in a row, based partly on the fact that every single restaurant seemed to serve brunch from early in the morning through til mid-afternoon.

First up was Mother’s Bistro and Bar, a gigantic restaurant downtown that at my count had three separate dining rooms. We arrived around 11:00 on Friday morning, and it was a mad house! Every room was packed, and several diners were ahead of us waiting for a table. Service moved quickly though as we were seated within 15 minutes without a reservation.

As might be expected from such a large restaurant, the menu was also extensive. Everything looked good but we eventually settled on two very good dishes.

 

The next morning we headed over to Tasty ‘N Alder, also located downtown. This was a total gamble, because we knew from a light internet search that the place was often insanely busy, and did not take reservations. We also stupidly arrived close to noon, possibly the busiest time for brunch service. Every seat was packed when we arrived, and several people were milling about the entrance. The hostess very cheerfully told us she’d be happy to take our name and cell number, and that she’d phone us when our table was ready….in 60-90 minutes.

Now, normally I’d be totally disinclined to wait 90 minutes for a table anywhere (especially when they don’t take reservations), but we did fly all the way to the PNW, and this brunch at this restaurant was on my list, and it was raining so hard AGAIN that we needed cheering up, so, I am ashamed to admit, we did it. We fell for the madness of the brunch stampede. We caved in to the hype and hoopla. We drank the “we take no reservations and everyone wants to eat here” Kool-Aid.

We set off into the rain yet again, with me harassing D every 10 minutes to make sure his cell volume was cranked all the way up so we didn’t miss the call. We killed an hour browsing at some neighbouring shops, including Whole Foods, before I finally found myself dangerously close to a hangry meltdown, so we returned to Tasty n Alder where we waited another 30 minutes for a table.

And oh, but how the crazy wait was worth it!

 

Not pictured (because I was so engrossed in shoveling it in my mouth by giant forkfuls that I forgot to take a picture) was a generous slice of Hungarian coffee cake that we also ordered. You are warned as you are seated at Tasty n Alder that “we serve family style, so everything comes out one at a time and is meant to be shared”. This sounds charming in theory, but in reality I had a strong opinion of what “family style” meant and why it was necessary there. But I will save that rant for inside my own head.

We had drinks prior to dinner one night at a bar in the basement of the Ace Hotel, called Pepe le Moko. I didn’t think I’d enjoy this place because it was just so hip and cool that I thought it would be gimmicky. I was wrong.

Pepe le Moko was certainly way too cool for me, but the drinks were so good! It was practically the entertainment of the evening to watch the bartender mix drinks in small glass beakers, using house made mixers and bitters as needed, tasting each one using a small straw as a pipette before pouring the drinks out into chilled glasses. Something about the way the bartender moved and was able to carry on conversations with the patrons seated at the bar reflected real métier—you could tell he wasn’t exactly new to the game. D and I were quite impressed.

 

Right around the corner from Pepe le Moko is Clyde Common, a large restaurant that was also very young and hip, and yes, I felt very old there. Unlike Tasty n Alder, Clyde Common does accept reservations for parties of two for dinner, so we arrived a couple of minutes late but were seated immediately in the loft area upstairs.

The menu is varied but manageable. We tried a few things before the three Negronis that I downed at Pepe le Moko finally caught up with me and the room started to spin!

 

Finally, on our last night in Portland, D was attending a Dandy Warhols concert without me. I saw this as the perfect opportunity to try one of the hundreds of food carts in the city!

 

The most famous Portland food cart is arguably Nong’s Khao Man Gai, but it was closed the couple of times I walked by, and not open at all on the weekends, so I missed out. Instead, I tried out Anna Thai Basil on SW Alder, mainly because Anna behind the counter was so friendly and kind.

 

 

And that was our Portland food adventure.