Two great things are going on today: I realized a back-end feature that was missing in WordPress is now back and functional (I’m using it in this post, in fact). And the news that My-O-My, the new bar on NE Sandy and 86th Avenue in the Sumner neighborhood, is opening this Friday, January 6! It’s a soft opening—MonsterSmash will be smashing burgers, drinks will be flowing at the bar, there’s pinball, a fireplace, and I know there are a lot of locals in the Sumner, Cully, and Madison South neighborhoods (and beyond) that are pretty excited about it all.
My-O-My will be soft opening Friday and Saturday, 5pm to around midnight. Check it out!
It’s 2023! And though we are in a new year, I’m looking back at the top 10 posts of 2022. I realize that the last time I did this was … 2017.
It was, as usual, interesting to see what got the most traffic in 2022—meaning, what readers were particularly drawn to. It’s no surprise that restaurant news was the main driver, and summer seems to be a bit of a theme.
Over 55,000 visits were recorded, and almost 35,000 of those visits were new to the site. Not bad for this modest operation.
Last year I remember coming across something called the “Portland Strawberry Museum” and wondering, “what the heck was that?” I mean, what a great name! Is there some kind of museum dedicated to strawberries in Portland? Turns out it was a month of Saturdays in June of celebrating the strawberry, from Brittany Sigal’s Zuckercreme (then a popup). It is back this year for the entire month of June at her space in Montavilla.
Last year around this time I wrote about the Galette des Rois, the traditional French king cake to honor Epiphany aka Three Kings Day (January 6), and where it was available in Portland. In 2022, accessing this delicious cake—sweetened almond cream surrounded by buttery puff pastry—was limited. Happily, there are addition options this year, which I want to highlight.
In the “I’m Late to the Party” category, I only recently learned this weekend that Nectar Cafe has closed—at least the cafe as it has been. I was over in the Hollywood District yesterday and saw the signs up. They closed their doors on December 18, 2022 (one day before they planned to).
As I write this, it’s almost the end of 2022. And while I say it every year, I’ll say it again—I can hardly believe the year is over! It seemed to rush by, but at the same time January 2022 seems ages away. Personally, I’m looking forward to 2023, not because 2022 was so terrible, but more or less because I’m ready for a new year and that feeling of a “new start” it seems to bring.
As I think about the blog this year, I’m proud to say that this is the first time since I started this small outpost in the Portland food media world a handful of years ago, that I’ve written it for the entirety of a calendar year. There was something published every month. I’m really proud of that. The years that proceeded were full of interruptions: starting the blog halfway through 2017; breast cancer in 2018; recovering in 2019 from my mother’s death and finishing up her estate, plus a big move across town; overall weirdness in 2020 with COVID and its perpetual mutations; anemia and side effects associated with my cancer drugs in 2021, plus more COVID.
I got noticeably better, health-wise, in 2022, plus an increase in my work as an editor. It really was a better year.
I have plans to continue writing here in 2023, and look forward to it. Hoping to bring back Salad Week! And I have a few other ideas. I’ll do a roundup of 2022’s top posts and such at the start of the new year.
Many, many thanks to all of you for visiting and reading Bridgetown Bites. I’m grateful to each and every one of you! Happy New Year!
