Portland food news and views
I ate this pinsa soon after they opened in 2019.
I learned over the weekend that Montesacro, an Italian restaurant in the Pearl that served pinsa, a “precursor to the pizza,” has closed. They opened in late 2018. A note about the closing was spotted on the restaurant’s front door on Friday, March 25:
Continue reading “Montesacro Has Closed”Din Tai Fung is coming to Pioneer Place. I first caught wind of this yesterday from the Portland Business Journal and yesterday morning The Oregonian confirmed it. A second Portland Biz Journal article confirmed it, too: “A representative for Brookfield Properties and Pioneer Place confirmed Thursday that a world renowned Taiwanese restaurant is coming to Pioneer Place shopping center.” This is a win for soup dumpling lovers in Portland. Look for a 2023 opening. 700 SW 5th Avenue, Portland
Two 82nd Ave wings recommendations. This week I picked up on two solid recommendations of places to get tasty quality wings in Portland—Utopia Lounge and Mekong Bistro. Utopia Lounge is in the northern section of Montavilla, and according to Yelp they’ve done some recent renovation inside (there’s karaoke, too). Their fish sauce wings (these are the style of wings made famous at Pok Pok) with a cold beer is the perfect pairing; pepper salted squid and shaking beef also come recommended. Then there’s the “Crazy Wings” at Mekong Bistro in Madison South, a Cambodian restaurant. A “thick fish garlic sauce” enrobes the wings, accompanied by crispy onions. 1125 NE 82nd Avenue and 8200 NE Siskiyou Street, Portland
Food Fight! vegan grocery has new owners. Beth and Adam are the new owners of Food Fight! and posted about it over on the FF! Facebook page. They wrote, “We are best friends that have been married 25 years. Some of you may already know Beth from the store, she’s been working here the last few months. Adam is a Master Mechanic who loves to share his knowledge with anyone that needs help. Portland has been our home for a few years now and we love this vegan paradise.” Read more over on the post. 11155 NE Halsey Street, Portland
Flour Market cafe featured on GoodStuffNW. Kathleen Bauer, who writes the excellent blog GoodStuffNW, stopped in at Flour Market, a bakery/cafe that opened up recently on 30th Avenue and Killingsworth and wrote about her time there. I liked this part especially:
“I myself am particularly fond of the pastelitos, squared layers of shatteringly crisp, flaked croissant dough that Matt, the croissant savant at the market’s production bakery, whose family has roots in Puerto Rico, made and filled with cream cheese and a guava paste that an aunt sent in a care package.”
Guava and cheese, one of my favorite combinations. I look forward to stopping in soon. 5507 NE 30th Avenue, Portland
Bird’s eye view of the location of a potential food cart complex on N Hayden Meadows Drive. Photo credit: Portland Maps
Last month I came across a city permit indicating a new food cart complex could come to the Delta Park area on Hayden Meadows Drive. The permit had to do with arranging a “Pre-Application Conference”—this is “a meeting that the Bureau of Development Services has with a person who is interested in doing a development project in the City of Portland.” Interestingly enough this conference took place this morning. Outcome is unknown to me, but the whole thing is intriguing.
Continue reading “Possibilities Near Delta Park: a New Food Cart Complex?”
Now that’s it’s officially spring, I thought I’d bring you up to speed on something that I learned about this past January. On a very chilly winter day, I stopped in at Sebastiano’s in Montavilla to chat with Dan and Elise about their exciting upcoming olive oil import project. Bottles will have their private label and should be on the shelves by summer 2022.
Continue reading “Olive Oil From Sebastiano’s Is Coming in 2022”
Photo credit: Another Believer via a Creative Commons license
As someone who loves cocktails but doesn’t drink alcohol, zero proof drinks/dry cocktails/mocktails are pretty exciting. And I’m glad to see them getting more attention—most notably in this area of drinking is the fully dry cocktail bar Suckerpunch that recently opened in Portland. So you can imagine how happy I was to see that this weekend Montavilla’s Zuckercreme is hosting an event featuring mocktails made with Wilderton spirits—locally-made and alcohol-free.
Continue reading “Zero Proof Tasting and Mocktails With Wilderton at Zuckercreme on Saturday”