And We Now Know Why It's Called The Rose City

(August 11th, 2013) I've long known that Portland was affectionately referred to as the Rose City, but even after having run past their rose garden on my first visit, I never really understood why until now. On our last day in Portland, Kim and I took in a few more sites, chief among them, the international rose test garden. Forget everything that you think you know about rose gardens, Portland's redefines all expectations. The garden itself is the size of four football fields, or so, and is filled with hundreds and hundreds of varieties of roses, a few of which are below.

Just running past the rose garden early that morning, my senses were overcome by the bouquet of roses that filled the air; and I'm not well known for my sense of smell. It's pretty gosh darn impressive in other words.

I'll admit that part of this tour of roses felt a bit like the madness of Dumas' Black Tulip had spilled out of the pages and into the very earth of this corner of Portland as rose after rose seemed to be an afront to all of the flowers that came before it. And, true to the spirit of Dumas' little known masterpiece, there was even a black rose or two.

Apart from the spectacles of the rose garden, Kim and I also made our way over to the Lan Su Chinese Garden. Nestled into the middle of the Pearl District, this garden offered a serene retreat from the hustle and bustle that flowed past just outside of its walls. Kim and I visited it on a dreary day, which seemed to only add to the peacefulness and calm.

Last, but far from least, Powell's. A trip to Powell's is a bit like a trip to Costco: you go in expecting to spend no more than $X, and by the end of your trip you've bought $10*X worth of books. Frankly, I'm amazed every time I'm able to leave the store without having bought over $100 worth of books. To put things in perspective, it's a fantastic, local bookstore that takes up an entire city block and is about 4 stories tall. And that's not enough, they've expanded to the the block across the street to have an entire annex dedicated to more technical subjects. No trip to Portland is complete without a trip to Powell's and a sufficiently satisfying consumption of local beer.  More on that in the next post.

Multnomah Falls

(August 10th, 2013) With Kim in town and no work to do, we were free to enjoy the sights of Portland and the surroundings. Just outside of the city is the famous Multnomah Falls. A definite must see if you have a car and a morning (or afternoon) to spend hiking and taking in the site. Granted, you could do it in much less time, but the hike up the falls to the West then back down the Multnomah Falls is worth it. But just once. The number of people around the Multnomah Falls was staggering...too many for me, but for the other trails in the area, there was hardly anyone and well worth a return visit.

Most of what follows will just be photos, so enjoy!

Wahkeena Falls. One of the first you come to (note the paved trail still) when you go up the trails West of Multnomah Falls.

Angel Falls. A bit higher up now.

After climbing to the top of the plateau, you can start down the more Eastern trail towards Multnomah Falls (though there're dozens of other trails that you can explore too). This way tends to be a bit more big falls into pools than just falls down the side of the rock face...

All this greenery is almost a sensory overload for us that live in the desert!

Part of the top half of Multnomah Falls...

And more of the falls with the classic picture including the bridge of people looking at the top half. You can also hike out to the point at the very top overlooking where the falls drop off, but it's difficult to get a good shot straight down...

Next up, some more food, and then some more sights!

Matt's Portland Food Blog...

(August 9th, 2013) Five posts in to my trip to Portland, and I think I might barely be past the halfway mark. With all of the site seeing that we were able to do during our weekend in Portland, I'm almost hesitant to spend time on something other than jumping straight into it, but the food that we took in on our first day in Portland warrants a good post, and so here I go...

We woke up, and after another run around the Willamette River we headed to Mother's Bistro for brunch. The line for Mother's was incredibly long for a Friday morning, so we bided our time with a trip around the corner to Stumptown Coffee to further help Kim wake up.

Once seated, we started with a blackberry, goat cheese, and hazelnut salad that was fantastically fresh with all of the ingredients complimenting each other well. Unfortunately, it was all downhill from there...Kim ordered a salmon hash that had pretty good flavor but was a bit oily with slightly rubbery potatoes. The salmon was good, but otherwise this dish wasn't really recommended by her. And for me, a pulled pork sandwich. Don't look for one of these outside of the South as disappointment is sure to follow. The meat was very tender, but the lack of a sauce left it dry with the flavor dominated by cheese and oily onions.

Luckily for us, the rest of the day was not put off by this meal. After a morning of wandering around the city and shopping (tax free in Oregon after all!), we stopped at Oregon Wines on Broadway where we were pleasantly surprised by a few white wines.

The real highlight of the day, and someplace that I had been hoping to visit since before my first visit to Portland even, was our trip to Little Bird that night. Oh, what a treat!

The meal started tamely enough with a dozen oysters...

Before moving on to snails. The snails were topped with ox that was smooth, almost like a brisket, and marrow bread crumbs that added the perfect crunch to go with the almost al dente pasta and subtly flavored snails.

Next, bone marrow served with pickled peppers, squid ink flat bread (oh so terribly delicious), squid, and seasoned marrow. Decadent, but delicious. As much as we love marrow, by itself it's usually underwhelming. Complimented by the saltiness of the chorizo and the tartness of the peppers plus the squid ink bread: c'est magnifique!

The last course for us was a pork chop served with green beans, heirloom tomatoes, goat cheese, hazelnut, and fried prosciutto. The pork had been milk brined and barely cooked, and was a ten ounce behemoth with a perfect amount of fat and a garlic oil/vinegar emulsion with parsley. Absolutely fantastic! By far this was the best pork chop that we had ever had!

For dessert, a blackberry fig sorbet

And peaches accentuated with cracked black pepper and served with a vanilla bean tart. 

Everything was exquisite for this evening. The Little Bird truly is a gem of a restaurant that we'll seek out the next time we're in Portland with something to celebrate.

Oh, and did I mention macaroons?

What evening in Portland is complete without a trip to the neighborhood bar? After my last trip to Portland, I strategically chose a hotel that was just a few blocks from Bailey's Tap Room. During our stay, we did our best to sample as many of the ever changing beers on tap at Bailey's.

Next up, a post without food pictures...

Portland, After Work

(August 8th, 2013) The conference ended. My colleagues flew away. And I was left with a day in Portland before Kim was able to come out for the weekend. So, I decided to meet up with some of my good friends from Albuquerque that were visiting family in Oregon that week. Up until this point, all of Portland, and Oregon really, that I had been exposed to was fueled by internet searches and recommendations. Having two good friends act as tour guides for the day promised to show me a new side of the city. But, all of that would have to wait until after a run and lunch.

Lunch was at one of my favorite restaurants from my last visit, which Chris and TJ had never been to before and were curious to try. Pok Pok lived up to all of my memories and the expectations that I had built for it. I don't have notes or a receipt from it, but I can relive the meal as if it was yesterday:

To start, a drinking vinegar and the green papaya salad. As I raved last time, the drinking vinegars are just superb here. A little tart, a little sweet, and a little fizzy. It seems that every time I go back the variety of flavors just explodes. This time I went with a tamarind flavored drinking vinegar.  And the green papaya salad...before I ever went to Pok Pok for the first time, I would've been like...'green papaya?' so what? Well, I've since learned the error in my thinking. Green papaya has a wonderful spiciness to it that, when put in the above salad with sweet tomatoes and crunchy tamarind, mixed with long beans, Thai chili, lime juice, dried shrimp, peanuts, and so many other wonderful touches, is just heavenly in my mouth.

My main course was the Kaeng Hang Leh, a Northern Thai sweet pork belly curry. I love pork belly, and I love curry, and this Thai combination of the two was just phenomenal, making me momentarily forget how wonderful the green papaya salad was. Once again, Pok Pok proved that it more than deserves its James Beard Award!

Following lunch, Chris and TJ took me to McMenamin's Kennedy School. This uniquely Oregonian institution is really like nothing I've ever been to before. The company, McMenamin's, takes dilapidated or otherwise unused buildings, such as schools, mental institutes, movie theaters, etc., and turns them into giant brewery/pub/restaurant/place to hang out, etc. The Kennedy School, in my brief introduction to it, had multiple bars, a gift shop, movie theater, and even lodging for those that don't want to have to drive home after last call. And inside, instead of the sterile academic atmosphere that once filled the halls of the Kennedy School, an eclectic mix of art and steam punk trappings was woven through the fabric of the building.

After another expensive trip to the Meadow (my favorite shop in all of the Pacific Northwest), Chris and TJ bid me adieu and left me on my own for the evening. Dinner found me wandering through the Pearl district to Andina, which, despite how fancy it is, is a Peruvian restaurant. The expectations that I had for Peruvian cuisine, owing to the few home cooked Peruvian dishes that I had during my time in Pittsburgh, left me ill prepared for the feast that I sat down to that night.

Unfortunately, not a single picture that I took was in focus, so please squint at the following:

The special of the day was "Russian Roulette Peppers" as one in twelve of the peppers is very hot. These had been prepared like shishitos: slightly fried. Having been fresh off my visit to The Meadow, I was disappointed that neither Bamboo Salt or Pyrimades Flake was used to accentuate the flavor, but otherwise they were very good as fried shishitos is one of my favorite dishes. Top left of the above photo is a causa, a traditional timbale of lime-scented potato purée, layered with assorted fillings, served chilled with avocado. This particular causa is the mixta nikkei, which has Yukon gold potatoes, with crab and spicy tuna sashimi on top. Nice flavors and very creative, certainly nothing that I've ever tried before. On the top right in the above photo is the piquille relleno. Instead of the traditional chile rellenos that we have in the southwest that are made with massive poblano peppers, these were made out of large strawberry sized piquille peppers that were fire roasted until the skins came off. Inside was a delicious mixture of quinoa, cheese, ham, some carrots, onions, etc., with cilantro around the base. Simply fantastic, even better than the Russian Roulette Peppers! As I was finishing all of that, the chef sent out a small tasting of grilled salmon, topped with fresh blossoms and a tomato-pepper sauce. I'm perplexed that that dish isn't on the menu yet as it was simple yet well rounded and delectable.

For dessert, I finished the meal with alfajores, which is a small cookie stuffed with dulce de leche. Very light and pleasant. After leaving the restaurant, I slowly made my way back to the trolley to head to the airport where I picked up Kim for a weekend of excitement in the Rose City. It was about time that I did more in a city other than work and eat!
 

Portland Observations

(August 5th-7th, 2013) Once the conference got underway, my trips out to restaurants became fewer and farther between.  As we often only had a brief amount of time to grab food for lunch, my colleague Mike and I headed out to the famous food trucks of Portland to get a quick meal a few times. As many breweries as there are in Portland, there are easily twice as many food trucks (on the order of hundreds) spread across the downtown. It's a Portland thing, and it's fantastic. Many of them are listed on Yelp too as they tend to be semi-permanent installations, so check them out if you get the chance. Below Mike is visiting DC Vegetarian, one of the higher rated food trucks in the city. It unquestionably lived up to its reputation!

After grabbing our food, we enjoyed it while sitting on the waterfront. Passing time, we started to observe all of the runners and joggers (and there were hundreds of them on this beautiful August day). We came up with a hypothesis: In Portland, there is a strong correlation between wearing Nike products and running with an IPod. There's no way for me to not sound like a snob with the next two sentences, so I'm going to say that I'm a running snob and move on. In general, runners that are more serious about training for races (as opposed to running just for health reasons, which is probably a more sane approach to running mind you) tend to askew IPods or other music devices as they distract from the joys of running and what's going on in your environment (i.e. the honking car that's trying not to run you over or the rattlesnake warning you to back off). At the same time, with a few exceptions, Nike trainers (i.e. running shoes that aren't specially designed for speed work, etc.) tend to be frowned upon as well as they're perceived to be a more casual product with a marked up price due to the brand name. Granted, with Portland being so close to the Nike headquarters, it's not unsurprising that so many people wear Nikes, but it's nonetheless usually indicative of casual runners.

For our research study, we observed approximately 150 individuals that were jogging or running and made coarse estimates as to their speed/fitness in addition to noting their running gear. From our study we were able to conclude that, with a 95% confidence interval, if a runner/jogger was wearing an IPod, then that runner/jogger would also be wearing Nike gear. As for other hypotheses that might be formulated, more research will be necessary to draw any definitive conclusions...

Aside from our lunches by the river, I had time for one more nice dinner out during the conference. Due to my reputation as someone that is able to find great restaurants in a new city, my colleagues have started to put me in charge of organizing the dinner activities for us when we need to have a meal out together on an otherwise light night. So, that's how I found myself marshaling a group of twelve colleagues to Southpark Seafood.

At Southpark, we all had large, decadent meals - though relatively light due to it being seafood. To start, what I always must have when traveling to the Pacific Northwest - Oysters. This time I had Shigoku and Kusshi oysters, both of which were sweet and smooth. I'm always glad the Kusshi oysters are so widely available on the West coast as they're becoming typical of my favorite type of oyster. There're a few varieties that I like better, but the names of those I can never remember...as long as I can remember to ask for something like a Kusshi, though, I'll be set. My main course, above, was a trout wrapped in prosciutto, with potatoes, green beans, and mustard sauce, topped with fried artichokes and accompanied with a barigoule puree. All of the varied, complex flavors complimented each other very well - Crispy, salty, savory, smokey.

Accompanying dinner was my first (and later second) taste of an Oregonian wine, Pinot Noirs. Both were good...the first, Soter, was a bit fruity while the second, Roucas, was a more Earthy and very robust wine.

For dessert, the chocolate bonet, served with chocolate creme caramel, an almond croquante (the long stick in the photo), and assorted cookies that came in a hazelnut chocolate basket. The almond croquante was a honey almond mixture that paired really well with the chocolate bonet (like a mousse). The cookies were pignoli, pistachio, biscotti, almond toffee, and shortbread. Those of you that have seen me catching a smell of an Italian bakery know that I absolutely adore pignolis (Italian for pine nut cookies), especially when they're fresh and soft still.  Mmmmm, pignolis.

Next up: some time to myself in Portland...

Portland + Germans = Beer Hall Festivities

(August 4th, 2013) The hypothesized equation of

Portland + German Colleagues = Beer Hall Festivities

was evaluated to the best of my abilities after my meetings let out for the day. I had a number of German acquaintances in town for the conference as well, including Pascal and Bernhard whom you might remember from previous posts.

We started off the evening at the Hair of the Dog Brewing Company, where we imbibed all of the samples that we could until the place closed (it was a Sunday evening after all). I couldn't tell you what I had to drink, but it was good. In addition to their own beers on tap, they also reserve some for barrel aging. The results of which - phenomenal.  I'll have to stop by again if I'm in the neighborhood, though with the 50 some breweries in Portland that I still haven't tried, it might take a while before I make it back there!

  

After visiting a few other bars, I convinced my German colleagues that what they really needed to do was to go out to VooDoo Doughnuts for a late night treat (as it was getting close to midnight at this point since we closed down two other bars on our way over). After a long night of drinking and walking all over Portland, this is definitely a must-do event!

Tons of inventive varieties of doughnuts...just look at the surrounding pictures for a taste of them

For the curious among you, I recommend clicking the above picture to be able to read all of the amazing varieties.

This visit, I ended up getting just four doughnuts to tied me over for breakfast for the rest of the week. Clockwise from the upper left: Diablos Rex, Mexican Hot Hot Hot Chocolate, the No Name Doughnut, and Portland Cream. All fantastic in their own rights.

Just remember that if you go there, bring cash. They do have an ATM inside, but it seems like a better idea to have cash on hand when you frequent the establishment.

Next up: less drinking and more eating.

The Rose City

(August 3rd-4th, 2013) Portland is quickly becoming one of my favorite cities. After just three visits there now, the quirkiness, localness (of food and place), and, dare I say, hipness have just won me over as a huge Portland fan. I only lament that they have no major research university within an hour's drive.

In August, I found myself returning to Portland for a conference. Sometimes conferences are in quite unpleasant locations (Orlando comes to mind due to the constant mugginess and commercialization/Disneyification), but every once in a while you luck out with a conference in a city that you genuinely want to spend time in.

The first half of my trip there was all business...catching up with colleagues, meetings, and a few presentations. But, since it was a large enough conference that was spread out over a week, there was plenty of time between meetings and presentations to enjoy some good food (surprise surprise!).

My first night in Portland was no exception as I met up with one of my British colleagues and we headed out for a night on the town. Dan, despite being from a land of bitter beers, ales, and Scotch (or maybe because of it), insisted on going for a drink of American liquor, namely his beloved Jack Daniels. A strange concept for me to fathom, but that's what he was craving. Portland, though, is known for their insanely large microbrewing scene, with over 50 microbreweries in the city, and about 100 in the county. So, it wasn't too much of a surprise as bar after bar that we entered informed us that they only served beer.  Eventually we made our way into the Pearl district to a very...colorful...bar that we were able to fulfill Dan's drink request at. What Dan didn't realize at the time, though, was that it was a gay bar that we proceeded to plop down at and catch up. Normally, this wouldn't give me a second thought, but after having a few people come up behind me and put their hand on my back while complimenting me or Dan on something just indicated that maybe it was time to move on to something else, especially since Dan has a reputation as a lady's man that wouldn't be well served in this particular bar.

So, next we set out for food, and ended up at Ristorante Roma. Normally I askew Italian restaurants, I generally like my own pasta sauce (and pasta when Kim and I are feeling industrious) better than anything that I can get at an American restaurant. Roma, though, was the exception. The ravioli filled with lobster and artichoke was a masterpiece of subtlety and harmony. The light tomato cream sauce on top tied the meal together, which I savored bite by bite between sips of a Barbera. At least, that's what I wrote at the time, so no telling how much I had had to drink at that point.

The aforementioned lobster and artichoke stuffed ravioli in a tomato cream sauce, and tartufo for dessert:

After Roma we set off to the Teardrop Lounge, where astute readers may recall that I visited on my last trip to Portland since the owner is the brother of my sister's colleague from her time at Tulane. At this point, the evening transitioned into watching Dan shamelessly flirt with women; always a fun activity until you start doing some math about relative ages in your head...From there we frequented a few more bars, the highlight of which was a Habanero infused Margarita at the Vault Martini Lounge. Don't ask me to recall the rest of the night as it was more of the same. In either case, sleeping in the next morning (a Sunday) was fantastic.

After my long run Sunday morning along the Willamette River, I set off for the Veritable Quandary for brunch.

This restaurant left me in a veritable quandry trying to find the right superlatives to describe my meal. Perhaps it was the hunger unique to having just finished a long run, but I don't think that that was the case...

The blackened catfish had the right mix of Cajun spices to remind me of the South without being the typical "blackened" meal with only char. The local squash and tomatoes that it was served with were slightly grilled and fantastic! The Hollandaise sauce, house made, had a savory twang to it that complimented the Aardvark Habanero hot sauce perfectly. (Ken, I know you're reading this, so that last link is for you). All of this was served on a bed of home fried potatoes, which soaked up the poached eggs, and spinach that had been slightly stewed to almost, almost, resemble collards. So, even though I was exploring the Pacific Northwest, this quandary took me back home to the Carolinas.

After brunch, it was time to head off to meetings (I had arrived on a Saturday to make sure that I'd be on time for my meetings on Sunday), but on the way I stopped at the weekend street market on Ankeny St. The coming week was the Oregon Beer Festival (not sure on the exact wording, but you get the idea), so the normally full market was overflowing with tons of extra vendors lining the waterfront.

The other things that I truly enjoy about Portland is that, at least if you're staying downtown, how close and accessible everything is. Up until the second weekend of my visit, I was able to get by with walking and an occasional trolly ride if I was with others or in a rush. Also, the Willamette River. Downtown there's a nice, 2 mile loop that you can do without having to deal with roads. Alternatively, you can just head South for dozens of miles if you want to change things up. 

Next up: taking the Germans out for a night on the town...