Tag: Hit the Spot

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Four Things I Learned This Week (August 26)

hit the spot! opens their first brick & mortar next week. Very happy for hit the spot!, a popular burger cart known for burgers with many patties, as well as their charitable interests, that made it to their first restaurant space. Their grand opening is going to be Wednesday, August 31 at 11am. “Enjoy the cheeseburger you’ve loved along with fried chicken sandwiches, cheese fries, milkshakes and brews.” 676 SE Morrison, Portland

Sayler’s gets some Feast love. Although Feast is known for its spendy festival and obsession with personalities of the Portland restaurant world, I was happy to see them give some love to Sayler’s Old Country Kitchen in east Portland. It’s been around for decades, is a shining example of the best of “old Portland,” and has a diehard fan base. From Feast:

“From the hottest new opening in the city, we turn our attention to what is among the city’s most venerable dining institutions: Sayler’s Old Country Kitchen. Opened in 1946 by brothers Art and Dick Sayler, the restaurant was founded around the maxim of offering a “quality steak dinner at prices that even the common man could afford.” Today, the restaurant is still owned and operated by the Sayler family, overseen in this, its 76th year in business, by third generation proprietors Bryan and David Sayler.”

Read more here. 10519 SE Stark Street, Portland

Lovely’s Fifty Fifty is coming to Netflix. The news has been spreading around Portland food media but I want to take some space and time to congratulate Sarah Minnick, the force behind Lovely’s Fifty Fifty, for being featured on “Chef’s Table: Pizza” on Netflix. I consider Lovely’s Fifty Fifty to be the best representative of a “Portland-style” pizza. I love her use of seasonal ingredients and lots of vegetables. The pizzas are delicious. You can watch “Chef’s Table: Pizza” on September 7, 2022 on Netflix. 4039 N Mississippi Avenue, Portland

Poor Richard’s in the news (so random). Willamette Week ran a story last week about the Poor Richard’s space, which closed in 2011. In 2019 I noticed activity inside, and had great hopes for a reopening of something great, but learned that it was going to be used for a Bank of America expansion (administrative needs, not customer space). A lot of Portland old-timers lament the shuttering of PR’s and remember the twofer fondly—two-for-one dinners featuring the iconic American dinner plate of steak, baked potato, onion rings, and salad.

As for what’s more current, it looks like they wanted to put up a new BofA sign (permit is still listed as Pending). Portland maps indicates it will be, “59.9 square feet with the following dimensions: 18′-11″ wide by 3′-2″ tall.” 3907 NE Broadway

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Four Things I Learned This Week (April 22)

Happy Earth Day! 🌎

Hit the Spot will move on from their burger cart and open a restaurant in SE Portland. They posted on their social media this week: “We got some big news y’all! Just signed the lease and got the keys for our new restaurant. It is located at 676 SE Morrison St. It was most recently BrunchBox! It’s only 5 minutes from our current location. We’ll be open early summer!” They are also selling their cart for $50K. I’ll be sorry to see them leave their location on NE Sandy Blvd, but the restaurant sounds like progress. 676 SE Morrison Street, Portland

Jollibee is coming. Willamette Week first reported on this—they spotted a listing for the Filipino fast food giant in the mall directory of the Tanasbourne Village mall in Hillsboro. This is a big deal; Jollibee is a big deal. Yes, the chicken is a huge draw but the sweet Jolly Spaghetti with hot dogs is truly legendary; be sure to try the halo halo, too. I love the big red bee mascot. Now if only Red Ribbon Bakery would open a location in our area. NW 185th Avenue & NW Evergreen Pkwy, Hillsboro

Division Midway Alliance features Sunbela. The March DMA newsletter has a great blurb on Sunbela, the excellent Iraqi bakery and restaurant on Division near SE 125th. I stopped by recently and let me tell you, this place is terrific. I love this quote from Faten, Sunbela’s owner: “I opened this restaurant so that our community feels a sense of belonging in the new country. Food brings people together and it’s a way to celebrate life and culture. I am happy when community members tell me how much they like the food.” Definitely check it out. 12503 SE Division Street D, Portland

The Record Pub will open in Sellwood. While I was meeting a friend for breakfast at Bastion this week, I noticed a sign up in a nearby storefront for The Record Pub. I know very little about them, aside from their offerings of “Records. Tapes. Beer. Gear. Experience.” I’m definitely curious about the beer (their liquor license application doesn’t mention anything about food). It could be a pretty awesome spot to meet up for some pints and tunes. I’ll see what else I can find out (and if you know anything, send me a tip). 6034 SE Milwaukie Avenue, Portland

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Four Things I Learned This Week (August 27)

Brokedown Palace burger pop-up at Bar Norman on Saturday. You can look forward to burgers and market vegetables from Brokedown Palace tomorrow, Saturday August 28, at Bar Norman. “They’ll be popping up at the bar with delicious food and fun vibes (think street DJ, skate videos, and lots of chilled red wines)…the perfect way to say byyyyyyeeee to August.” The fun goes from 6pm to 9pm or until sold out. You can still hang out after that, though.

Hit the Spot to Open a Restaurant in Vancouver. Hit the Spot, the popular burger cart that sits in the Human Bean coffee shop parking lot on Sandy Blvd, will open a future restaurant at 2420 Main Street in Vancouver, Wa. “We’ve worked so hard to get to this point. Can’t tell you how great it feels to start with a pop up tent and a bbq in 2014 at the farmers market on the weekends, to going full time late 2018 in a food cart, to finally achieving a restaurant space in 2021.” From what I can tell, this means the cart will close eventually. CORRECTION: They are not closing the cart! The Columbian also reports on their dreams of further expansion. “The goal is to open hit the spot! restaurants in other parts of Vancouver, as well as suburbs such as Gresham and Beaverton.”

Asian vegetables grown in Gresham. Loved this PoMo article on Catherine Nguyen, who started Mora Mora Farm, where she grows bok choy, mizuna,  yu choy, and kabu turnips, among other things. She has an annual CSA (currently there’s wait list) and she provides the veg for Cully’s Matta food cart. Personally, I love farms that grow produce common to diverse cultures, but I’m also the person that was drawn to the mysterious-to-me veg in the unmarked box at Berkeley’s Monterey Market years ago.

Join Wellspent Market’s olive oil CSA. Have you heard of this? It’s really a variant on the CSA model, but beneficial nontheless. Here’s how they describe the olive oil CSA as their way of helping to support their small farm partners:  “It works like this: Early in the year you buy a CSA share for $100. We use the cash to pay the farmers, and when the season’s olive oil arrives here, that share is worth $120. It’s good for anything we sell at Wellspent Market, not just olive oil. Money well spent indeed!”