March M arch ’11 11 1 Portland’s Porttlands Magazine Magazine of F Food ood + Drink k
Barrel aging gives spirits a lift Sancerres of spring Charms of NW 21st Seven great beers you’ve overlooked
INTO THE WILD
Bitters and tonics plucked from the desert / p20 High-concept cuisine with native flavor / p26 A get-started guide to foraging / p35
MARCH 2011
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errie is one of the most attentive and detail oriented agents out there! She not only understands what you want as a client, but she ts your personality to your house. We have never felt pressured or rushed in our decision making process. Terrie is always PATIENT and willing to envision the possibilities based on her clients’ style and wants. She goes above and beyond to nd you a home... not a house, but a home. You have to be honest with what you want, what you can afford and she will make the match. Terrie is HONEST, up front and genuine. She adores her clients, respects the homeowners and the buying process. She is truly a professional and the best at what she does!! Without hesitation, we would recommend Terrie to our family and friends. She is not only our real estate agent, but she has become a close friend to our family.– Neil and Amy
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editor’s note If I have my way, this is the last time you’ll see my face. I actually enjoy toiling away in anonymity. The less people see me, the less likely it is I’ll be recognized at Trader Joe’s, my cart filled with packages of frozen dumplings, meatballs and cans of broth (and lots of little chocolate-covered things, too). Don’t get me wrong. Dinner at my house isn’t always hot out of the microwave. I love cooking and pretty much live in my kitchen. My next-door neighbor, who enjoys a lovely view into the heart of the mess, once asked me with palpable concern in her voice: “Don’t you ever leave?� Yes, I eventually do — more than I used to, in fact. There was a time, pre-kids, when I relished not only cooking, but cooking projects. Recipes
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4
like real cassoulet that require rendering duck fat for confit and take a week to execute. I still relish such things, though out of necessity I enjoy them more in theory than in practice. I’ve got hungry kids to force-feed, laundry to wash and not fold, and, now, a magazine to put out. Which is why I am in utter awe, and a little jealous, too, of the foragers we’ve spotlighted in this issue. Not only are they cooking amazing things and mixing amazing drinks, but they’re also hiking through the wilderness to pluck their ingredients right from the source. They give whole new meaning to the phrase “from scratch.� So does another awe-inspiring person: founding editor Martha Holmberg, who created this
magazine — from scratch — just over three years ago. She’s a visionary, and visionaries rarely sit still for long. So, with MIX running smoothly and a few new projects beckoning, she decided it was time to hand it off so she could focus her considerable talents on something new. This is MIX’s first issue without Martha at the helm, but her smart, forward-thinking and offbeat touch is all over it. As I move forward, I’ll be filling her brilliant template with my own similar brand of food-and-drink obsession. I may not be starting from scratch, but I promise each issue is going to be delicious. � �
Danielle Centoni, editor dcentoni@oregonian.com PHOTOGRAPH BY BeTH NAkAMuRA
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MARCH ’11 20 untAMed libAtiOns: Columbine Quillen’s cocktails are born in the wild.
26 nAtuRAl
stAte: Castagna’s chef steps out of the kitchen to forage for native flavors.
35 sO yOu WAnt
tO gO FORAging, tOO? Good. Our field guide will get you started.
in eveRy issue 11 stARteRs: Cocktails with a country twang, finger-lickin’ chicken.
41 WAlkAbOut: Rediscovering the charms of Northwest 21st.
17 MixMAsteR: Barrel aging goes behind the bar.
Seven great bottled beers you’ve probably overlooked.
45 PubCRAWl:
49 seleCts: We spell spring S-a-n-c-e-r-r-e.
On line extRAs At mixpdx:com:
• Keep track of what’s in season with our year-round foraging calendar
• Check out bonus recipes from this issue: Spicy Nutz; Stir-fried dandelion Greens With duck Fat and Garlic, and Leeks vinaigrette With Eggs Mimosa, Capers and Black olives • Go behind the scenes at Cascade Brewing • Find out where to buy our Sancerre picks
53 eAt HeRe: Eugene — it’s not all pizza and tofu 56 sCene: Slurpy noodles and bang-up bakeries to fill your belly. 60 HigH Five: Seasonal pies to put on your calendar.
ABovE: Spiney, briney and plucked by divers working off the Pacific coast, this sea urchin met its fate at Castagna. oN thE CovER: Bend mixologist Columbine Quillen breathes in the scent of juniper in the Painted hills
where to find the recipeS in thiS iSSUe: dRiNKS: Food: • Ned Ludd’s Charred Bruss, p12 • the Porter Wagoner cocktail, p11 • tonic Syrup With Juniper • New harvest Potatoes With Essence, p25 Warm Nettle dressing, Wild • Rose Petal and Mint herbs and Flowers, p34 Extract, p25 • Spring Fry: Fritto Misto of Fiddle• the Conestoga cocktail, p25 heads, Ramps and Asparagus • Painted hills Bitters, p25 With Meyer Lemon Aioli, p36 • Malheur Forest vermouth, p25
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Longtime local writer Audrey Van Buskirk always finds serving roast chicken daunting. “My lack of carving skills make my cooking skills look like Julia Child’s,” she laughs. “The platter tends to look like a battlefield.” So she was thrilled to discover the weekly chicken night at Tastebud, which has the additional advantage of pizza — perennially popular with her three young boys. She writes about food, family, sports and more from Southeast Portland. Page 14.
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Photographer Beth Nakamura has been taking pictures for MIX from the very start and is one of the main reasons the magazine is known for its gorgeous photography. For this issue she joined Matt Lightner on one of his foraging excursions — and got a little nostalgic along the way. “When I was little — we’re talking 5 or 6 years old — my mother used to send me out in the backyard to hunt for four-leaf clovers. No doubt this was mother code for, ‘Scram, kid,’ but I was happy to oblige. I loved being outside, hunting through the grass and nibbling on the clover. I don’t remember ever discovering anything bearing the luck of the Irish, but I can still remember, as if it were yesterday, what that clover tasted like. Walking down those paths with Matt felt a little like walking through time.” Page 26.
Tramping around Sauvie Island with chef Matt Lightner seemed like an easy assignment for writer Leslie Cole until the chef started diving into the bushes and muttering botanical names rapid-fire. From then on, it was a matter of keeping up with his enthusiasm for wild green things and capturing how he transformed roots, leaves and stems into stunningly beautiful plates of food. When she’s not trailing chefs in Gore-Tex and boots, Cole is a staff writer for The Oregonian’s FOODday section. Page 26.
A fourth-generation Oregonian, Kathleen Bauer loves the state’s lush western valley as well as its barren high plateaus. So when she heard about a bartender who foraged for cocktail ingredients in the sage and juniper of central Oregon, she had to go check it out. “There’s nothing I love more than talking to people about their passions,” Bauer says. “Especially where it intersects with Oregon’s unique food culture.” That same curiosity infuses her blog, Good Stuff NW (goodstuffnw.blogspot. com), and has won her accolades, including an award from the prestigious Greenbrier Symposium for Professional Food Writers. Page 20.
OTHER CONTRIBUTING WRITERS GrANt ButLer, KAtheriNe CoLe, AshLey GArtLANd, JohN FoystoN OTHER CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS/ILLUSTRATORS thomAs Boyd, FAith CAthCArt, JAmie FrANCis, ross wiLLiAm hAmiLtoN, motoyA NAKAmurA, rANdy L. rAsmusseN
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stArtErs Page 12: cheater’s wood-fired sprouts, a brilliant British book Page 14: Fiery chicken, good ‘bucha Page 16: smart box
try this
A countrified cocktail party Decked out with bordello- The Landmark Saloon 4847 S.E. Division St. worthy Victorian chintz 503-894-8132 wallpaper, bourbonthelandmarksaloon.com barrel tables, a burgundy velvet fainting couch and classic Pendleton blankets, The Landmark Saloon has a Wild West-meets-indie-cool vibe. As the weather warms up, Richmond residents pull on their cowboy boots and mosey down to the beer garden to fill up on bourbon and bluegrass. Eager to achieve some Landmark-ish cred at home, we asked co-owners Marc Curtis (far right), Erica Nukaya and Tim Hawk (right) to share some tips for creating our own country-cool cocktail party. Erstwhile musicians Hawk and Nukaya (we loved their now-defunct band Nordic) start by setting us up with a soundtrack. It’s gotta be “Back to the Barrooms,” they say. The classic Merle Haggard album is always in rotation at the saloon. Next, mix up their spiced nuts, a recent addition to the menu thanks to a recipe from their friend Kir Jensen of The Sugar Cube food cart. Mixologist Marc Curtis pairs this sweet-salty-spicy snack with the Porter Wagoner, an homage to the elder statesman of the Grand Ole Opry (who was as known for his blond pompadour and rhinestone-studded Nudie’s suits as he was for his old-school sound. Wagoner was a musical, though not sartorial, inspiration for Haggard, says Hawk). As brilliant as the cocktail sounds — fruit and citrus for contrast, sweet-and-spicy Bénédictine to complement — it seems a little fancy-pants. And port? Really? Actually, that’s a nod to “Porter,” explains Curtis. “Porter Wagoner was a dressy guy. This drink is more glam country than cowboy.” — KATHERINE COLE
11
Porter Wagoner MAKES 1 SERVING
1½ ounces golden rum ½ ounce port ¾ ounce Bénédictine ½ ounce fresh lemon juice 2 dashes Peychaud’s bitters Ice Garnish: lemon twist PHOTGRAPHy By MOTOyA NAKAMuRA
Combine all ingredients in a cocktail shaker and shake well. Strain into a cocktail glass and garnish. Note: Marc Curtis recommends Mt. Gay Eclipse rum and Barnard Griffin Syrah Port, although any golden rum and any port — tawny or ruby — will do. — From Marc Curtis, The Landmark Saloon, Portland
ON-LiNE EXtrA: Get the spicy Nutz recipe at miXPdX.cOm
stArtErscONt.
to do March
March 6
A night of classic wines Whether you’re a seasoned collector or a newly minted wine enthusiast, the annual Classic Wines auction is the place to score something unique for the cellar, as well as help local charities like Metropolitan Family Service and New Avenues for youth. classicwinesauction.com
March 11-13
Let’s make some noise!
12 12
It’s time to pump up the volume. First up, it’s the graffiti artists of sound from the theater spectacle “Stomp,” in which street musicians find ways to make music using push brooms and trash can lids. Keep the sound at high decibels afterward with drinks and a late-night bite at Clyde Common, a dining room/bar that’s unapologetic in its embrace of noise. portlandopera.org/broadway clydecommon.com
March 11-13
Destination: McMinnville This is the weekend for making a day trip to nearby McMinnville. On the menu: the 18th annual McMinnville Wine & Food Classic, featuring 160 of Oregon’s best wineries and live music. While there, grab dinner at one of downtown McMinnville’s hot restaurants such as the eclectic Thistle, or the Spanish La Rambla. sipclassic.org thistlerestaurant.com laramblaonthird.com
March 13-15
Don’t forget the aspirin We can’t all jet off to New Orleans for Tales of the Cocktail each summer. Luckily, they’re taking the show on the road, hitting Vancouver, B.C., for a mini-version of the bacchanalian spirits-fest. The three-day event features cocktail seminars from some of the best mixologists in the country, with plenty of tastings and samples to keep you lit all day long.
mOrE tO dO
cOOK this
Brussels sprouts get some respect
Brussels sprouts used to get no respect. Home cooks would steam or boil them into mushy orbs, and a generation of kids would move them around on the plate, hoping mom wouldn’t notice that they weren’t being eaten. But in the hands of someone like chef Jason French of Ned Ludd restaurant, they turn into sweet, charred beauties that diners gobble up like candy. “Growing up in a house where ‘bruss’ were bastardized, any recipe that elevates them to their rightful place is worth making,” French says. While the secret to Ned Ludd’s sprouts is the restaurant’s wood-fired oven, French says the dish can be re-created under the broiler using a searingly hot cast-iron skillet. And this time, no mush. — GRANT BuTLER
Ned Ludd’s charred Bruss MAKES 6 SERVINGS
1 pound brussels sprouts 1 tablespoon olive oil, plus more for finishing Pinch of coarse sea salt ½ teaspoon red chile flakes Juice from ½ lemon
PHOTOGRAPHS By MOTOyA NAKAMuRA
Preheat broiler to high. Place cast-iron skillet on the middle rack of the oven to preheat. Remove the loose outer leaves of the brussels sprouts and trim the stems. Cut sprouts in half. In a large bowl, toss the sprouts with olive oil, salt and chile flakes. When the skillet begins smoking add the sprouts and broil, stirring once or twice, until charred and soft but not burnt, about 10 to 12 minutes. The amount of time wil l depend on the sprouts themselves, as they change throughout the season. Toss cooked sprouts in a bowl with lemon juice, more olive oil and a pinch of sea salt. Serve immediately. — From Jason French, Ned Ludd restaurant
rEAd this NOW / “A yEAr iN my KitchEN” Award-winning British chef Skye Gyngell’s latest cookbook has us wishing, once again, we could cross the pond and visit London’s Petersham Nurseries Cafe to sample course after course of her elegant cuisine. We’re quickly learning, however, that the next best thing is to page through “A year in My Kitchen” (Ten Speed Press, $24) and start re-creating her culinary artistry at home. In the follow-up to her celebrated “My Favorite Ingredients” (Ten Speed Press, $24), Gyngell maintains the same sensual language and focus on inspired pairings of seasonal ingredients that made her previous work such a success. This time, however, she organizes her
rustic-yet-imaginative recipes around the seasons. Winter brings a pan-fried veal chop with an aioli blended with almonds and rosemary. Summer brings a salad of roasted chicken and red onions, toasted bread and dried sour cherries. We’re already making plans to get her leeks vinaigrette with eggs mimosa on the table this spring. The beautifully photographed book also includes Gyngell’s “toolbox” of most-used components — things like basil oil, flavored yogurts, relishes and jams — that can be made ahead and used to take simple roasted meats or salads into deliciously uncharted territory. — ASHLEy GARTLAND
ONLiNE EXtrA: Get skye Gyngell’s recipe for Leeks Vinaigrette at miXPdX.cOm
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stArtErscONt. mOrE WOOd-FirEd BLiss
tO dO cONt.
March 15-16
Can I get a witness? “Dinner and a show” is almost a religion unto itself, so do it up right. Start with a meal at one of the theater district’s newer places to eat (such as the new sushi spot Shigezo), then hit the Schnitz for the awe-inspiring alvin ailey american Dance Theater, performing an array of works plus the legendary, Gospel-inspired “Revelations.” shigezo-pdx.com whitebird.org
March 17
Do you feel lucky? St. Patrick’s Day is a big
14 celebration for the city’s Irish and
Irish-wannabes. Hit one of the big celebrations, like the annual fetes thrown by Kells Irish Restaurant & Pub, which run March 16-19 and feature plenty of live music and food. Not your style? Create your own bash at home by making corned beef with top-grade brisket from Chop Butchery. kellsirish.com/portland chopbutchery.com
March 21
Will we be snubbed yet again? Portland chefs have had plenty of James Beard Foundation awards nominations in recent years, but it’s been a long time since the Best Chef Northwest honors went to anyone working outside Seattle. The nominations announced today will start the latest round of kvetching. Could this be the big year for someone like Castagna’s Matt Lightner or Nostrana’s Cathy Whims?
mOrE tO dO
Wednesday night chicken dinners at Tastebud There’s an oft-repeated trope that restaurant critics should order roast chicken whenever possible, since no other dish offers such an elemental test of the kitchen’s skill. Keeping the breasts and thighs juicy while crisping the skin to crackling perfection flummoxes many a cook, but not those at Tastebud. Since January, the cozy Brooklyn pizza restaurant has devoted Wednesday nights to the quest for the ideal bird, making room in its wood-fired oven for succulent chicken ($12 for a half bird) made in one of three styles: peppery alla diavola, sweet barbecue or winter herb with parsley, rosemary and thyme. Settle in at one of the communal tables topped with flickering candles and mismatched dinnerware, listen as an old turntable spins retro LPs, then tuck into poultry perfection. Veg out the meal with a couple of $5 sides (including a winter cabbage and celeriac slaw, roasted potatoes and leeks, or iceberg wedge with blue cheese). If you insist, try one of Tastebud’s acclaimed pizzas, too, but certainly don’t skip the fruit crisp a la mode. It may not require as much skill to execute, but it still scores a perfect 10. — AuDREy VAN BuSKIRK Tastebud Farm 3220 S.E. Milwaukie Ave. 503-234-0330; tastebudfarm.com
PHOTOGRAPH By ROSS WILLIAM HAMILTON
driNK this / BEt yOU’LL WANt this ‘BUchA Some people swear by the curative properties of antioxidant- and probiotic-rich kombucha. Others can’t get past the fermented tea’s stinky smell and vinegary flavor. Enter Eva’s Herbucha. While most American kombuchas are made with black or green tea (often spiked with fruit juice to make them palatable), Eva Sippl makes four of hers from an herbal tea base, as is the custom in her native Germany. The result is a lighter, more delicate drink. From her rented kitchen space on Southeast Division Street, Sippl brews her Detox, uplifting, Immune Support and Relax blends PHOTOGRAPH By TOPAZ DESIGN
from curative herbs such as passionflower, dandelion root and stinging nettle. Her Comforting, Traditional and Jump Start are oolong tea-based kombuchas subtly flavored with ginger juice, ginseng, cayenne pepper or mulling spices. Medicine never tasted so good. — KATHERINE COLE
Eva’s Herbucha ($3 a bottle) is delivered by bike to Portland area co-ops. (For a full list of stores visit the website). It’s also served on tap at the Red and Black Cafe and Portobello Vegan Trattoria. herbucha.com £
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stArtErscONt. GENiUs / GO BOX
Your kitchen can be more than just a natural place to gather.
Allow us to throw some cold water on the Portland food cart love fest by bringing up a wee fact: Our beloved carts produce some 60,000 disposable containers, most of which are diverted to a landfill, every month. So kudos to Laura Weiss, an environmental policy wonk with a food service background, who dreamed up the GO Box — a sturdy, reusable take-out container made of No. 5 polypropylene plastic — and a plan to make it easy for people to use it. Weiss’s idea, which should roll out at downtown food cart pods within weeks, won’t have you toting soiled clamshells to and fro. Instead, you buy a GO Box at a participating food cart for a one-time fee of $8.50. When
you’re finished with your meal, you toss the box in a special drop box, which spits out a token. The next time you visit a participating cart to get another meal, you exchange the token for another GO Box. So goes the cycle, in which the food containers are picked up daily by bicycle, washed in a commercial kitchen and returned to participating carts. The only thing you have to lug around is a small token. Part of the fee goes to the food cart owner, who also saves 15 cents every time he or she doesn’t have to serve your lunch in a throwaway container. To which we can only say, why didn’t we think of that? — LESLIE COLE
www.goboxpdx.com
tO dO cONt. 16
March 25-26
Best of the best
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Many food and wine events focus solely on local talent, but the new “NORTH meets SOUTH” Food & Drink Jubilee offers a weekend of tastings from 100 topnotch wine producers from Canada to Mexico, as well as live music and plenty of tasty bites. Proceeds help the annual Salud Wine Auction. northmeetssouthjubilee.com
March 25-27
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you’ve got reusable grocery bags, and you’re diligent about recycling, but there’s plenty more you can be doing. The Better Living Show is the place to discover all sorts of little changes that can help save the planet. The stages feature green cooking demos and an ecofriendly fashion show, and
exhibitors display Earthfriendly products. betterlivingshow.org
March 25-May 1
Break out your wooden shoes Get your first official taste of spring with the 26th annual Tulip Fest at Woodburn’s Wooden Shoe Bulb Company. you can walk through fields of brilliantly colored tulips, figuring out which ones will complete your garden makeover. Then pick up bouquets of freshly-cut stems to brighten up your kitchen or dining room table. woodenshoe.com £
mixmaster [ Experiments in barrel alchemy ]
By Ashley GArtlAnd / photoGrAphy By thomAs Boyd
For centuries distillers have used wooden casks to age such spirits as brandy, whiskey and rum, giving them a darker color and, more importantly, complex flavor and finesse. But a few inventive locals got curious about these barrelaging benefits and have begun experimenting with the method, playing not only with different types of barrels but also the liquids used to fill them.
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mixmaster cont.
Portland Spirit Events Portland Spirit Presents Ken Davenport’s
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Consider house spirits’ Krogstad Aquavit, a spirit so nuanced and sublime it has earned a cult following. But as successful as it is, the inventive distillers still couldn’t resist the urge to experiment with it. so they decided to try aging it, as the norwegians do, in an oak barrel. But not just any oak barrel — one previously used to age pinot noir at Andrew rich. “We figured that we’d get some color and a little flavor from the red wine barrel,” says co-founder lee medoff (who left the distillery late last year). they also hoped time in the barrel would polish the base spirit and give it notes of coffee or caramel from the oak, as well as a fruity quality from the pinot noir-soaked wood. the
challenge would be keeping those notes from masking the flavors of caraway and star anise in the distillate itself. “We left it for about 10 months and kept tasting it over time,” says medoff. the experiment was both successful and surprising, as the aged aquavit turned out delicious but didn’t taste fruity at all. While house spirits’ unaged aquavit is clear, precise and herbal, its aged aquavit was softer and earthier and had an unexpected “honeyed richness.” It works especially well in savory or alcohol-forward cocktails, such as a twist on an old-Fashioned, but it’s also excellent sipped on its own. the distillery released its aged Gammal Krogstad aquavit under its limited edition Apothecary line. the spirit has since
It may seem counterintuitive to take a freshly made drink and age it (after all, who — other than the very desperate — would want an old cocktail?), but Clyde Common bartender Jeffrey morganthaler is proving age can be a beautiful thing. When made in large batches and poured into small oak barrels, classics like the manhattan, negroni and el presidente take on a rounded, complex flavor from the wood.
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“The wood can help you shift around some of the flavor profiles.” — Daniel Shoemaker sold out, but the distillers will release new batches of aquavits aged in different types of barrels, from whiskey to rum, later this year. As distillers prove barrel aging can be applied in nontraditional ways, the practice is trickling down the cocktail trade to bartenders, too. Behind the sleek pearl district bar at teardrop lounge, bartender daniel shoemaker gives some of his more aggressive housemade bitters a timeout in small, one-gallon oak barrels, transforming a harsh mixture into a well-balanced ingredient. Barrel-aging, shoemaker says, rounds out the rough edges of bitters that are too heady, too strong or too spiritpresent without diminishing their essential character. With his oregon truffle bitters, for example, the truffle flavor was too mild to stand up to the rye whiskey he used as the base. then he put the mixture in a barrel. “the truffle (flavor) became more dominant and moved to the front and the rye whiskey became more muted,” he says. “the wood can help you shift around some of the flavor profiles.” the bar staff at teardrop ages about half a dozen bitters as well as other cocktail ingredients, such as dry vermouth, an herbed Barolo chinato digestif, and a blood orange “shrub,” a vinegar-based fruit syrup. to make the shrub, shoemaker steeps herbs and spices such as licorice root and cardamom in a mixture of fresh blood orange juice and reduced balsamic vinegar for a month, then removes the spices and puts the liquid, along with highproof rum, in a barrel to age for nine months. the resulting syrup serves as an important
highlight in cocktails such as the African swallow, a gin, lillet and chartreuse elixir. over at Clyde Common, head bartender Jeffrey morgenthaler takes the concept of aging even further: he ages the actual cocktail. morgenthaler got the idea after trying an aged manhattan at tony Conigliaro’s unnamed london bar. When he arrived back at Clyde Common, he mixed up a gallon of manhattans, poured it into a madeira cask and let the wood do the work of putting a soft wine finish on the drink. “I didn’t want to age a manhattan in a whiskey barrel because it would just make a manhattan taste like whiskey, which it already does,” he says. “I wanted to juxtapose the flavors a little bit.” A month later, he put his madeira cask-finished manhattan on the menu and it sold out within two days. since then, morgenthaler hasn’t looked back. he’s already perfected a negroni — traditionally made of gin and Campari — aged in whiskey casks to give it a woody, whiskey finish, and has worked his way through batches of aged el presidentes and tridents. And after blogging about his experiments, he’s been credited with inspiring bartenders in cities like new york and Chicago to start aging cocktails as well. home bartenders could certainly join the trend and age their drinks and spirits at home, though morgenthaler cautions that these experiments can tie up hundreds of dollars of booze — not to mention storage space. An easier route? pull up a stool and enjoy the fruits of someone else’s labor. £
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BEND’S MASTER MIXOLOGIST COLUMBINE QUILLEN SCOURS THE HIGH DESERT FOR NEW INGREDIENTS By kATHLEEN BAUER pHOTOGRApHy By THOMAS BOyD
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SHE’S A WILLOWy STRAWBERRy BLONDE, WITH A NAME SO pOETIC IT COULD’vE BEEN LIFTED FROM A ROMANCE NOvEL.
But if you look closer you’ll notice that Columbine Quillen’s sunny good looks are belied by a steely determination in her eyes and a set to her jaw that speak to her upbringing in the mountains of Colorado — one that included racing pack burros, no less. “It’s a funny sport where you run over a mountaintop with a donkey,” Quillen says. “The donkey has to carry a pack saddle with a gold pan, a pick and a shovel in it and the pack has to weigh 33 pounds.” The race can cover anywhere from three to 30 miles of rough terrain, and the racer has to run alongside the donkey — riding it is grounds for disqualification. It’s a sport that’s difficult and unconventional, two traits that suit Quillen just fine. With that in mind, it’s not really surprising to learn the intrepid mixologist and bar manager at Bend’s 10 Below Restaurant and Lounge not only makes her own syrups, bitters, tinctures and infusions, but she also hikes central Oregon’s painted Hills to pluck the ingredients from the source. On a recent foraging trip, she hopped out of her truck and took off into the juniper and sage. For a visitor accompanying her through the brush, the beauty of the high desert is incredibly distracting, but Quillen was like a hawk, scanning the dry ground for the small flowers and succulents that she’d take back to her bar-cum-laboratory. When she spotted a small, low-growing cactus half-hidden beneath some sagebrush, she got down to business. The spiky knob she snipped off with her scissors was a beautiful thing, small and green, segmented and sporting half-inch-long spines that could draw blood from a less-careful forager. She did the same thing with a small stand of yellow flowers poking out of the dirt, taking just a few samples and leaving the rest to go to seed and provide more flowers for next year. And if she’s not sure of a plant’s provenance? “I just take it and I go home and find out what it is,” she says with a shrug. “But I’m not afraid to put anything into my mouth. My sister once asked if I was afraid of poisoning myself, which I’m not. I once put pine tar in my mouth to see if you could make it into a drink. And you could, but only if you like a terribly bitter drink with an abhorrent wax that envelops your teeth, tongue and tonsils for approximately four hours.” More snips of juniper, both greens and berries, as well as a few wands of sagebrush went into her brightly colored shopping bag, an incongruous element in the landscape of muted colors around her. As we head back to town, with the plants in the bag on the floor perfuming the cab of the truck as it bounced along the dirt road, Quillen describes the difference, as she sees it, between a bartender and a mixologist. “A bartender is someone who tends bar and makes things like vodka
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tonics. A mixologist is a bar chef, someone who’s always seeking out new ingredients and is creatively putting those ingredients together.” The project that piqued her inner mixologist and launched her foraging expeditions began a little over a year ago, when she was looking for cocktails to celebrate Repeal Day — December 5, 1933, when prohibition was repealed. She pulled out a copy of one of the first cocktail books published in the United States: “Jerry Thomas’ Bar-Tenders Guide Containing Receipts for Mixing,” written by the father of American bartending, Jerry Thomas, and printed in 1887. She thought using the book would be a snap. After all, she had access to a fully stocked bar and the liberty to order whatever she needed. Instead, she found that in the 100-plus years since Thomas wrote his guide, many of the special bitters and tinctures he used were lost to history. Re-creating his cocktails became an obsession, and she embarked on a quest to make all of the cocktails in the guide — a process she dubbed the Jerry Thomas project. At first she thought it might take a couple of months to complete, but it’s only now — more than a year later — that she’s beginning to see the light at the bottom of the cocktail glass. The reason? Making the vintage recipes required her to go to great lengths to search out the unusual ingredients Thomas used, or find adequate substitutions.
Wandering through a stand of trees, Columbine Quillen keeps her eyes on the ground, scanning the scraggy turf for ingredients like wild thistles and sage — ingredients she’ll use to make complex bitters and extracts for her signature cocktails at 10 Below Restaurant and Lounge in Bend. In a field dominated by men, the mixologist has been earning accolades for her creativity and inventiveness.
Is it a bar or a perfumery? It’s not that easy to tell when Bend mixologist Columbine Quillen sets to work, mixing up tonics and tinctures using high-proof spirits and flowers and herbs she’s gathered from Oregon’s painted Hills. The plants growing wild in the picturesque high desert are perfect, says Quillen, for making bitters.
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The recipes called for things like cochineal, quassia, catechu, calamus or capillaire (a syrup made from maidenhair fern) not to mention the jellyfish skin that was used as a thickener — all things commonly used in Thomas’ day but now difficult to find or considered no longer suitable for consumption. Then there were the bitters and tinctures he used, which often originated as herbal medications. One in particular was called Boker’s Bitters, one of the most popular cocktail bitters at the turn of the century. Unfortunately for modern mixologists, prohibition ensured that almost all the companies that made bitters went out of business. The lack of this ingredient almost stymied her project, but Quillen’s determined research paid off when she found a long-buried recipe for re-creating the forgotten formula (which has recently been revived by a Scottish company). “I had made bitters before, but this was the first time I made a really complex bitters,” Quillen recalls. “After I made the Boker’s Bitters, I started making a lot
of different bitters, which eventually led me to see that all around me are plants that are perfect for making bitters.” This is where the foraged bits in the shopping bag come into play. Once Quillen identifies an herb or wild berry, she places it in a small lidded jar, fills it with a neutral spirit and sets it aside to steep on a shelf for weeks or even months. After tasting it along the way to check its flavor profile, she strains the liquid through cheesecloth several times, then bottles it for use. Her little brown bottles of bitters are each labeled with a piece of tape with a number on it. Number 19 is made from wormwood, angelica root and cherry bark, while number 20 is a concoction of white willow, jasmine and elderberry. Number 21, a favorite of Quillen’s, has lemon peel, elderflower, schizandra berry, eucalyptus and hyssop. The bitters find their way into both new creations and classic cocktails. For example, her Manhattan Flight offers three “baby” Manhattans, each made with a different version of her bitters. She also has a collection of infused spirits, including a maple-infused vodka she combines with ancho chiles, fresh lime and epazote (a Mexican herb that thrives in Bend’s long, hot summers) in a drink called the vulcan. Her postmodern pimm’s Cup is a visual stunner, its green glow coming from gin infused with lemon-mint, which is then combined with St. Germain (a liqueur made from elderflowers), pimm’s, cucumber and house-made lime sour mix.
WITH BOTTLES OF THE MySTERIOUS LOOkING BITTERS SITTING ALONGSIDE LARGE ApOTHECARy JARS FILLED WITH FLOATING HERBS, THE BACk BAR AT 10 BELOW LOOkS LIkE SOMETHING OF A MAD SCIENTIST’S LABORATORy.
“It’s become a conversation starter,” says Quillen. “Someone will ask what’s in the jars. Then somebody next to them will say, ‘I was wondering that myself.’ And that gets them talking.” Her use of indigenous plants in her cocktails got the attention of Nightclub and Bar magazine, which named her one of the four top bartenders in the country. She’s won accolades in Bend as the most popular bartender for the past four years running, and Travel Oregon included her as one of the top-10 artisans in their Oregon Bounty campaign last fall. Though awards are a wonderful acknowledgement of her work, and the Jerry Thomas project has been an education in the evolution of cocktail culture, she finds the real thrill has been watching across the bar as her guests’ eyes widen when they take that first sip. “One of the things I love about what I’m doing is getting people to think outside the box about what can be put inside a glass,” she says. “Really, there’s almost no ingredient that we’re not able to somehow incorporate into a cocktail, and it’s fun to challenge people and get them to try something new.”
ROSE pETAL AND MINT EXTRACT
THE CONESTOGA
MAkES 4 CUpS
Columbine Quillen developed this recipe, made from ingredients that grow in eastern Oregon, for the Oregon Bounty Wanderfest. To give it true Oregon flavor, use a locally made whiskey.
This flavorful extract is a great addition to cocktails and lemonade. you can even use it in Middle Eastern dishes. ¼ cup rose petals ⁄8 cup fresh mint
1
4 cups high-proof spirit (such as vodka, rum or whiskey)
MAkES 1 SERvING
2 ounces whiskey ¼ ounce Malheur Forest vermouth (recipe follows) 3 dashes painted Hills Bitters (recipe follows) Ice
Combine ingredients in a large glass jar. Allow to steep, refrigerated, for one week before straining out the solids. Store the extract in the refrigerator in an airtight container. It will keep indefinitely.
Combine ingredients in a mixing glass and stir well. Strain into a cocktail glass and garnish with your favorite garden flower.
MALHEUR FOREST vERMOUTH MAkES ABOUT ½ CUp
TONIC SyRUp WITH JUNIpER ESSENCE
2 ounces whiskey (or any high-proof spirit)
MAkES ABOUT 2 CUpS
15 huckleberries
This concentrated syrup will make 6 cups of tonic water — and the best gin and tonics.
2 teaspoons honey
1 cup granulated sugar 2 cups water 1 grapefruit, sliced (with rind) 1 tablespoon allspice berries 1 tablespoon juniper berries 1 tablespoon quinine powder (see note) Combine ingredients in a saucepan and set over medium-high heat. Bring to a boil, stirring. Remove from heat and strain out the solids. Let cool before transferring to an airtight container and refrigerating until cold. To turn the syrup into tonic water, combine one part syrup to three parts water. Note: you can buy quinine powder through online retailers.
RECIpES By COLUMBINE QUILLEN
1 to 5 strawberries (see note)
2 ounces white wine Combine whiskey, strawberries and huckleberries in an airtight container and allow to steep, refrigerated, for three days. Strain out the solids, then stir in the honey and white wine.
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you can store it in an airtight container in the refrigerator for several weeks. Note: If you use mountain strawberries, they are small and you will need three to five. If you are using store-bought strawberries, one or two should do the trick.
pAINTED HILLS BITTERS MAkES ABOUT ½ CUp
4 ounces whiskey (or any high-proof spirit) 10 juniper berries 25 juniper needles 1 teaspoon minced sage leaves The white fluff from inside one purple thistle Combine ingredients. Allow to steep for three weeks (you do not have to refrigerate) before straining. £
CACTUS pHOTOGRApH By kATHLEEN BAUER
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wild things
Castagna chef Matt lightner forages the northwest landscape for native flavors By LESLIE COLE / Photography by BETH NAKAMURA
Out in the woods after a strong spring rain,
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This isn’t the farmers market. Out in the woods, armed with little more than a reusable shopping bag and a warm coat, chef Matt Lightner has to look long and hard for herbs and greens to take back to the kitchen at Castagna. Wild yellow violets top his list, if he can find them, but wood sorrel, licorice ferns and miner’s lettuce also will find a place in his bag and on his menu.
ReCiPe: lightner’s recipe for new harvest Potatoes with warm nettle dressing on PAge 34
Matt lightner looks like just another guy in skater shoes and baggy jeans — except for his habit of constantly wandering off the trail. Focused and businesslike, the 30-year-old chef barely notices the puddles, the birdsong and the blackberry brambles; he’s busy scanning the undergrowth for ingredients. then he wades into the weeds to get them. today he’s hoping for wild yellow violets, a surprise discovery on a recent trip to his favorite foraging grounds on sauvie island. “they’re sweet, acidic, a little floral, but very mild. Really pretty. Bright, bright yellow,” he says. For the time being, he settles for a patch of wood sorrel, which he calls by its latin name, Oxalis. dropping to his knees, he pulls out tiny shears, snips a dozen stems that look like perfect clovers and tucks them away in a small plastic tub. the bright green sprigs will be part of a first course tonight, artfully arranged on a plate with buffalo carpaccio and pickled white strawberries, then showered with a dusting of malt powder. that we’re in the woods with three friends for an hour on a tuesday morning is not a stunt, or a survivalist’s vision quest. it’s an expression of lightner’s philosophy about food. “People come to your restaurant to eat the area, to get a sense of your culture. we’re only as unique as this,” he says, arms stretching wide to take in the forest around him. the restaurant he’s referring to, of course, is Castagna, which under lightner’s watch has become one of Portland’s most exciting kitchens. his food is stunningly beautiful, layered and surprising, expressing the seasons and earth and place. You might encounter a lightly poached duck egg and a single fat morel in a pool of stinging nettle purée, cloaked with wisps of chickweed and crisp-dried nettle leaves. it’s composed like a still life, and served on a slab of polished walnut. Bay scallops, a spring special, are cured in sake lees and served with young almonds that burst in your mouth like fat cucumber seeds, plus pickled chicory stems and tender sprigs of sweet woodruff and lovage, all in a pool of rhubarb juice. “the bay scallops are gummy, the other elements are acidic, sweet, bitter, herbaceous,” lightner says. “it’s really just an explosion.”
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lightner plays with foams, pulps and other feats of molecular gastronomy, but his food, which springs from the mossy forests and meadows of the maritime northwest, belongs here and only here. lightner came to Castagna in late 2009 with an impressive résumé. he worked for more than a year at the acclaimed Mugaritz in spain, followed by a monthlong stage at denmark’s noma, where vaunted nordic chef René Redzepi combines the likes of sea urchins, hay ash, foraged beach mustard and juniper branches into dazzling edible compositions. so, yes, lightner plays with foams, pulps and other feats of molecular gastronomy, but his food, which springs from the mossy forests and meadows of the maritime northwest, belongs here and only here. Foraging, whether it’s for wild saffron on a scrubby slope in Basque country or yellow violets in a damp Oregon forest, is about ongoing learning, says lightner. You see something new, pick it and do the research, then experiment in the kitchen. “Right now we’re trying to work on a dish of spring onions. You roast them in hay — it’s kind of a way to bridge that gap between being in the city in a restaurant, and being out in the country.” not everyone will love lightner’s food, or even get it. “it’s not a hamburger,” says Robert Reynolds, instructor/owner of Chefs studio and formerly chef-owner of the French-inspired le trou in san Francisco. “You’re not going to ‘get it’ before your teeth even break through the bun. it has refinement. it’s well-thought-out and exquisitely done.” But critics so far are sold, and lightner’s star is rising on the national scene. last year, just months into the job, lightner was named a James Beard Award nominee and one of Food & wine’s 10 Best new Chefs. Although Castagna was always a respected Portland kitchen, lightner’s cooking earned it the Oregonian’s 2010 Restaurant of the Year. Plenty of chefs throughout the northwest plate up dishes featuring wild morels, fiddleheads and other forest edibles. But only a few forage for the ingredients themselves, week in and week out. “if you want the quality, you pretty much have to go get it yourself,” lightner says. Plus you can take only what you need — just the delicate tops or the buds of miner’s lettuce, for instance — and cut it exactly how you want it. in spain, lightner gathered chestnuts and tender greens. in Copenhagen he harvested wild moss, which he says tastes almost like a noodle if you lightly blanch and toss it in butter. Oregon, with its many
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Although he’s been known to forage for his own sea urchins, chef Matt Lightner got this prickly specimen from a purveyor who sources them from a group of divers working off the coast of southern Oregon and Northern California. Here he cuts out the edible middle, which he might cook with grilled spaghetti squash and chili oil, serve with caramelized beets and coastal herbs, or add to a gelled broth of toasted shrimp and geranium.
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microclimates and mild seasons, has an enormous range of wild edibles. spring is prime time for succulent greens, but lightner goes out to the woods year-round, sometimes to the Coast Range, or around his sister’s farm in washougal, wash., where he finds ferns, salmonberries and other wild fruit. Back on sauvie island, thorny vines claw at lightner’s feet as he makes his way to a mossy tree, rakes the trunk with his fingers and pulls out a fern clinging by its roots. he brushes the dirt off the root and holds it to his nose, breathing in the anise scent. it’s the gnarled base of a licorice fern, a root used by native Americans to sweeten teas, and pungent enough to flavor lamb or steep in bourbon and pair with salsify in a yet-to-be named dish. By midmorning, lightner has filled his bag with treasures: licorice fern root, sweet woodruff and the tender, nutty tips of fern fronds, in all their lilliputian perfection. Miner’s lettuce, which tastes a lot like pea pods, to pair with fish or morels. Bright green fir tips, the sweet new growth that he’ll use to flavor ice cream, or a sauce. And an armful of nettles from a patch he and chef Jason Byl found last week; some of these he’ll sandwich between silicone baking mats and stick into a food dehydrator for feather-light “chips.” he’s found wood sorrel, and what he thinks are the last of the yellow violets this season. it’s time to go. heading back to the car, lightner’s quick steps rustle the grass. he suddenly stops, picks what looks like a weed, crushes a leaf and holds it to his nose. “hey, this is garlic! let’s get some of this.”
Matt Lightner’s food is so artfully and carefully composed — using tweezers, no less — it’s almost hard to imagine that much of it begins in the wild abandon of the woods. The springy dish above features a pool of rhubarb juice, into which Lightner sets bay scallops, immature green almonds, pickled chicory and sprigs of sweet woodruff and lovage. One of his favorite foraging haunts is on Sauvie Island, where he’s often joined by friends and colleagues who welcome the chance to get their hands — and boots — dirty for the sake of haute cuisine.
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NIELSEN’S Jewelers Since 1892
Recipe new harvest Potatoes with warm nettle dressing, wild herbs and Flowers MAkeS 6 TO 8 ServINgS
Rich and herbaceous, this combination of potatoes, nettles and wild herbs makes a beautiful salad. 2 pounds new potatoes, the smallest you can find sea salt ½ pound stinging nettles (handle with gloves) 1 cup fresh spinach leaves ¼ cup minced green onion 1 tablespoon olive oil 2 tablespoons minced shallots 1 tablespoon minced garlic Pinch chile flakes
503 234 1614 825 NE Multnomah, Suite 280
Freshly ground black pepper
Lloyd Center Tower building
Juice of one lemon
across skybridge from Nordstrom
For serving: mixed wild herbs or flowers
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SIMPLY ELEGANT Hand Dyed Silk
Place potatoes in a large saucepan, cover with water and add 2 tablespoons salt. Bring to a boil over high heat, then reduce to a low simmer. Cook until tender, drain and reserve in warm, dry place. Fill the pot with fresh water and add a heavy amount of salt, until it tastes like the sea. Bring to a boil over high heat. Place nettles in boiling water for approximately 30 seconds to one minute, until wilted but still vivid green. Remove with a slotted spoon and transfer to a large bowl of ice water. Repeat with the spinach. Reserve one cup blanching liquid from the stockpot and chill. when greens are cool, drain in a colander and gently press out the excess water.
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in a blender, purée blanched greens, green onion and the reserved blanching water until very smooth.
heat olive oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add shallots, garlic and chile flakes and sauté briefly, until garlic is fragrant and shallots start to soften. stir in nettle purée and bring to a rapid boil. Add salt and pepper to taste. Carefully break the potatoes open to reveal the fluffy interiors and place on a serving platter (reheat potatoes in the oven if they’ve become cold).
drizzle warm nettle dressing over potatoes. squeeze the lemon juice on top. garnish with wild harvested herbs and flowers, such as oxalis or wood sorrel, chickweed, field balm, violets, mustard flowers, wild carrot tips, miner’s lettuce, wild lemon balm or yarrow. — From Matt Lightner, Castagna, Portland £
FIELD GUIDE TO FORAGING
Admit it. You want to be a forager, too. Well, join the club, because who wouldn’t want to go for a nature walk and load up a basketful of tasty, free food? Chanterelles, morels, fiddleheads — all for the price of a leisurely walk in the woods. Sounds pretty sweet, right? Before you head out, though, you need to do a little research. Otherwise your foraging foray could lead to some rather unpleasant, or even dire, results. There are lots of toxic look-alikes in the world, and they’re not only limited to mushrooms and the Olsen twins. Luckily Oregon is as rich in foraging resources as it is in wild edibles. There are classes, workshops, treks and clubs to join, plus, dozens of great books and websites to help you dig even deeper. To get you started, we put together this mini field guide —some food for thought. So, take a read before you take a hike. There’s a lot of food out there waiting to be found. — DANIELLE CENTONI
Book tells you what to do with what you picked Ask any forager why they scour the wilderness for food and the answer will invariably have something to do with the pleasure of communing with nature, living off the land and satisfying that innate hunter-gatherer impulse modern life has yet to bludgeon out of us. But some foragers have managed to parlay that passion into a full-fledged business, finding a healthy market for their wild ingredients among chefs hungry to harness the taste of something untamed. Connie Green was one of the first people to turn foraging into a topshelf culinary business in this country. For three decades the Napa Valley resident has been supplying acclaimed chefs like Thomas Keller with wild foods through her business Wine Forest Wild Mushrooms. After so many years of living around and working with culinary greats, not to mention cooking with what she finds, Green has amassed encyclopedic knowledge photograph by sara remington
photograph by beth nakamura
of how best to prepare some of the most sought-after wild ingredients, from sea beans to dandelion greens. Recently she partnered with chef Sarah Scott to come up with recipes that put her knowledge to delicious use in their book, “The Wild Table” (Viking Studio, October 2010, $40, 368 pages). Unlike field guides, which focus mainly on identification, Green and Scott’s book focuses on what to do with the ingredients once you get them home. “It’s a hybrid between a cookbook and a true reference book for some of these wild ingredients,” says Green.
“It has practical instructions for things as basic as cleaning the things you find, from washing mushrooms to cleaning the fur off fiddleheads. This is what people are ignorant about. It keeps people from using them because they don’t know what to do.” Even chefs, she says, struggle with how to handle wild ingredients. “A lot of chefs don’t understand the flavors of some of these things. And after selling mushrooms for over 30 years, I still go to restaurants and bite into a mushroom dish and get grit in my teeth.” So, along with recipes for things like Elderflower Panna Cotta, there are tips such as: “You can make a lobster mushroom eject its spores by placing it upside down in the sun.” Every wild ingredient gets paired with pointers on cleaning and prep, ideal cooking methods, storage and how to select. And most of the ingredients are found all over the country. “Even in New Jersey or the suburbs of Los Angeles you’ll find some of these things,” says Green. Though it’s hard for her to pick just one favorite ingredient, morels definitely top the list. “I like finding
them, I like cooking them, I like eating them. I love stuffing them,” she says. “The recipes in the book for stuffed morels — we could have had 30 of them. I have a party every year when chefs come. They’re required to bring one stuffing, and we just stuff and eat and drink the entire day. It’s an incredible scam on my part — they do all the cooking!” Here in Portland, we can purchase many of the wild edibles featured in the book at farmers markets and even supermarkets. Still, if you want to find them yourself, Green has a few words of advice: Join a mushroom society, learn from experienced foragers, get a guidebook for wild food as well as one for wild mushrooms, and go out in the morning. “I think it’s wisest to do anything when the fewest people are out, and some things are just dramatically better harvested in the morning. Besides, you may want to eat it that night. And this gives you a chance to go out and have a lovely adventure first.” Get Connie Green and Sarah Scott’s recipe for a spring fry-up
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FORAGING FIELD GUIDE / CONT.
CHRISTOPHER M
THE ART OF
Fritto Misto of Fiddleheads, Ramps and Asparagus With Meyer Lemon Aioli makes 4 to 6 servings
Almost any vegetable can be substituted in this recipe. Cut them into sizes that will allow them to fry at the same rate. Meyer Lemon Aioli: 1 large or 2 small garlic cloves 1 teaspoon kosher salt 1 large egg 1 large egg yolk 1 cup extra-virgin olive oil Finely grated zest of 1 Meyer lemon 2 tablespoons fresh Meyer lemon juice Fritto Misto:
3 0 8 S W F i r s t Av e n u e Portland, Oregon 877-844-3447 www.ShafferFineArt.com
4 quarts peanut or vegetable oil 3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour 1 cup cake flour 1 large egg 2 cups buttermilk ½ teaspoon kosher salt, plus more to taste ¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
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Date Night by Candlelight at the Grape Vine
ITALIAN, GREEK AND AMERICAN CUISINE
FAMILY DINING & LOUNGE
1½ to 2 pounds mixed fiddleheads, ramps (or green onions) and asparagus, cleaned and patted dry To make the aioli: Place the garlic and salt in the bowl of a food processor. Process until garlic is finely minced and beginning to liquefy. Add the whole egg and egg yolk. Process for 30 seconds. With the machine running, slowly begin to drizzle in the oil. As the mixture thickens, the oil can be added a little more quickly. Add the lemon zest and lemon juice and process briefly to mix in. Taste and adjust seasonings as needed. If the aioli seems too stiff, add water in ½ teaspoon increments to thin it. To make the fritto misto: Place the oil in a 6- to 8-quart pot and heat it to 375 degrees. Sift together the all-purpose and cake flours and place them in a
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wide bowl or on a platter. Whisk together the egg, buttermilk, salt and pepper in a large bowl. While the oil is heating, prepare the vegetables, making sure that they are dry before coating. To avoid gluey fingers, use one had for wet dipping and the other for dry. Working with a few pieces of the vegetables at a time, dip them into the buttermilk mixture, coating them well. Lift them out, letting the excess buttermilk drip off, then drop them into the flour mixture, working quickly to coat them evenly with flour. Shake off any excess flour and lay the vegetables in a single layer on a large parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Continue until all the vegetables are coated (you can do this up to 25 minutes ahead).
When the oil is hot, carefully add the vegetables to the pot but do not overcrowd. Fry until golden brown, 2 to 3 minutes. Give the vegetables a stir as they fry, turning any that are browning unevenly. Using a slotted spoon or flat strainer, remove the vegetables and place on a paper towel-lined baking sheet. Sprinkle with salt. Hold in a warm place while frying the rest of the vegetables. Be sure to bring the oil back up to temperature before adding the next batch. Serve warm with the aioli. — From “The Wild Table” by Connie Green and Sarah Scott
ON-LINE EXTRA: Hungry for more? Get a recipe for Stir-fried Dandelion Greens With Duck Fat and Garlic at mIXpDX.cOm
photograph by sara remington
What’s in season now: We’re surrounded by moist, shady forests — prime real estate for much of the wild edibles that emerge each spring. Here’s a taste of what you can find growing around here this time of year:
4 DAnDeLions: No introduc-
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5 nettLes: The leaves have notoriously painful stinging needles that are neutralized by cooking or drying. They’re very nutritious with a rich, full flavor. Look for them growing in moist areas.
1 Doug Fir tips: The bright,
light-green new growth on the tips of conifer branches is tender and fragrant. Use it to infuse spirits, simple syrup or cream, or grind and blend with salt. 2 MoreLs: These meaty
mushrooms thrive in chaos, growing best in forests where the ground has been disturbed — think fires, selective logging and campsites. Don’t eat raw.
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3 FiDDLeheADs: The tightly
furled new growth of wild ferns have an asparagus-like flavor and texture. They grow best in shady, moist areas.
tion needed, just a word of caution: Unless you like extremely bitter greens, pick the leaves before the flowers form.
6 eLDerFLowers: The blue elderberry tree sends out plumes of sweet-smelling flowers from spring into early summer. Just harvest the petals — shake the branch over a paper bag to collect them — then use to infuse cream, syrups and spirits with their floral, honeyed sweetness. The pollinated calyxes that stay behind will grow into delicious cassis-like berries you can harvest in fall. 37
On the web: Join the cLub
Oregon Mycological Society (wildmushrooms.org) FinD A cLAss
Wild Food Adventures (wildfoodadventures.com)
Before you hit the trail, hit the books:
Trackers Northwest (trackersnw.com)
Kitschy but gooD:
get An App
Download “Foraging for Edible and Medicinal Wild Plants” — the new interactive app from “Wildman” Steve Brill due out this month (wildmanstevebrill.com)
“All That the Rain Promises and More,” by David Arora (Ten Speed Press, $17.99)
the toMe:
For LocALs:
the cLAssic:
“Identifying and Harvesting Edible and Medicinal Plants,” by Steve Brill with Evelyn Dean (Harper Paperbacks, $21.99)
“Edible Wild Plants: Wild Foods From Dirt to Plate,” by John Kallas, Ph.D. (Gibbs Smith, $24.99)
“Stalking the Wild Asparagus,” by Euell Gibbons (Hood, Alan C. & Co., $17.50)
pretty pictures:
For the cooK:
“Nature’s Garden,” by Samuel Thayer (Forager’s Harvest Press, $24.95)
“The Wild Table,” by Connie Green and Sarah Scott (Viking Studio, $40)
FORAGING FIELD GUIDE / CONT.
Awe have fewno shortage words from the wise In a city as unconventional as Portland, of local foraging experts who make a living venturing off the beaten path. We asked three of them to share some of their best — and worst — moments in the wild.
THE EDUCATORS:
John Kallas, Ph.D. the director of Wild Food adventures (wildfoodadventures.com) is one of the foremost authorities on wild foods and has been teaching hands-on classes about them since 1978. his book “edible Wild plants: Wild Foods From Dirt to plate” (gibbs smith, $24.99, 416 pages) was released this fall. Biggest foraging mistake being so focused on gathering the ostrich fern (edible fiddleheads) that i did not notice they were growing in a patch of poison ivy. 38
Best foraging find back in the late ’70s i was making a cross-country trip using u.s. route 2 in michigan’s upper peninsula. at some point along the route, there was a huge cattail marsh to the north of the road. it was almost continuous for about a three-hour (or more) drive. it is a good guess that the marsh was 200 miles long. that’s a lot of food. Favorite foraging moment i was at michigan state university when i discovered wild spinach (also known as lambsquarters). it was a major epiphany that grew in importance the more i used the plant. here was a wild food anyone would love: it produces in quantity, is widespread all over north america, tastes wonderful raw and cooked, is easy to gather, easy to prepare and is one of the most nutritious greens ever analyzed. Favorite thing to make with a foraged ingredient i love wild huckleberry and wild mallow meringue pie. With mallow alone i can make gumbo, mallow cream, s’mores and meringue, among other things. The moment that inspired you to become a forager there was no moment, i was born this way.
Emily Porter the blogger behind trackerofplants. com leads edible and medicinal plant walks with rebecca Lerner, has worked as an educator with trackersnW, and is planning foraging classes with rewild portland. Biggest foraging mistake i got really drunk at a leek festival in Western pennsylvania and dug up iris roots (which are poisonous) that i thought were cattails. i knew something was off right away because when i bit into one it was too hard and tasted bad. moral of the story: Don’t drink and dig. Favorite foraging moment it was a sleety day in november and i was wearing only a plaid skirt, wool sweater and rain boots. my friend harry and i decided to have a race through a cranberry bog. i tripped and fell in face first, getting totally and completely drenched. The moment that inspired you to become a forager i was always interested in foraging. my dad taught us about a few plants like sorrel, sassafras, indian cucumber and sumac growing up. in eighth grade i even did a report on wild edibles. a college class in ethnobotany further stoked the fires. (Funny thing is, i didn’t receive an a for the report or the class!)
Rebecca Lerner the blogger behind firstways.com writes about foraging for wild edible and medicinal plants in portland. she also leads introductory urban foraging walks through the alberta arts neighborhood in the warmer months. Biggest foraging mistake as a survival experiment, i attempted to spend the last week of may 2009 foraging portland’s wild edible plants and eating nothing else — no gleaning, no Dumpster diving, no salt, nothing. i thought i could just walk around and find weeds to eat. but after five days of walking for miles and finding little more than some stinging nettle for broth, and some burdock root and chickweed, i nearly blacked out. scarcity is such a big challenge in the city. the next time i did it, i spent months storing wild fruits, acorns and chestnuts. nature is not like the grocery store: if you want to eat wild, you have to respect the seasons. Best foraging find Discovering tasty Arbutus berries at alberta park was a score. and i was really excited to find cleavers growing in the alleyway behind my house when i was sick last year — a cold tea of that plant cured me in a day. Favorite thing to make i like curry stir-fries with dandelion leaves, dandelion root coffee and sumac tea. For smoking, i like to mix dried lemon balm (a calming mint that grows like a weed all over town), mullein leaf and russian sage, an ornamental plant that contains thujone, the intoxicating agent in absinthe. Favorite foraged ingredient black walnuts, because they taste like they have maple syrup inside them. Why did you become a forager Foraging is a profound experience, a great way to experience yourself as a part of nature.
G R E A T
Escapes THE VENDOR:
Steamboat Inn Lars Norgren The purveyor of Peak Forest Fruit sells his wild mushrooms, greens and huckleberries year-round to Portland restaurants and Kruger’s Farm Market on Hawthorne, as well as through his booth at the Hollywood and McMinnville farmers markets. He says his biggest foraging mistake is one he actually avoided making: “almost 15 years ago, when wild foods were a gleam in no one’s eyes, a storied French chef called me looking for licorice fern root. he was going to serve 300 people at a special dinner in manhattan, so he needed 300 2-inch sections of licorice fern, each with two small fronds. it was midsummer, and forest mushrooms, almost my exclusive income in those days, were at their hiatus. it was a hard order to turn down, even though i knew exactly what i was getting into. “as far as i know, licorice fern grows only on trees. the ‘root’ for which it is prized is really a rhizome, or underground stem. but on the trunk or limbs of a big-leaf maple, the licorice fern uses the layer of moss as its substrate. gathering that many pieces of rhizome, picked to florists’ specifications, would require scaling a good many maples. i didn’t own an extension ladder, not even an orchard ladder. “besides, i had my suspicions. had this chef ever tasted a licorice fern? i had been in boy scouts, troop one to be exact, in the early ’70s, when euell gibbons was doing his grape-nuts tour on tv. We were eager to live off the land on our monthly campouts, but options were limited on the winter banks of the alsea or south santiam rivers. Licorice fern was the only thing edible, and boiling it up for tea was the only type of preparation appropriate to our talent level. sipping our licorice-infused alsea river water was tolerable because we were just killing time until the two-layer chocolate cake came out of the Dutch oven. the stuff tasted like dirt, not candy. “so i snagged a piece of licorice fern rhizome replete with tender green fronds from the big-leaf maple near our mailbox. that day the chef was in portland, not new york, so i took him the sample alive and kicking. he left his command position in the basement prep-kitchen with uncharacteristic alacrity and began peeling the bark from the roots. in no time the cream colored, snakelike rhizomes were chopped and in his mouth. then, in the most stereotypical French accent he announced, ‘it was a cute idea, but it’s all messed up!’ ” £
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Nob Hill neighborhood
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2281 NW Hoyt St Portland, OR 97210 (corner of 23rd and Hoyt) 503-222-5463
NW Glisan St
NW 22nd Place
NW Everett St
Our unique shop offers the finest hand-painted European stoneware from Ceramika Artystyczna that is microwave, dishwasher and ovensafe. We also carry linens, antiques and gifts. We welcome your visit and are open everyday between 11am6pm. www.polishpotteryplace.com
3 NW Northrup St
NW 23rd Ave
NW Pettygrove St
Hand Crafted Stoneware
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Salt, Fire & Time Salt, Fire & Time is a Community Supported Kitchen that organizes a weekly pick up of prepared foods sourced locally. We also offer cooking classes and Friday night dinners open to the public. We focus exclusively on nutrient dense, organic foods that help restore your health and our own northwest food heritage. Also available for private parties and catering. Mention MIX and get a free fermented soda! 1902 NW 24th Ave Portland OR 503-208-2758 www.saltfireandtime.com
Thinking about changing food for your pet? We carry a large selection of Natural foods for Dogs and Cats. Come and check out our selection of Raw Food such as Nature’s Variety, NW Natural, Primal, Stella & Chewy’s. Here at Nature’s Pet we foster cats from the Columbia Humane Society and try and find homes for them. Free underground parking. Open M-F 10 to 7, Saturday 10-6 and Sunday 11 to 5. Stop by and mention this ad for 10% of your entire purchase. 111 NW 21st Ave Portland, OR 503.360.1244 www.naturespetmarket.com
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To set an appointment please call 503.228.8363 Mention this ad and receive 10% off your service before April 2011. 1211 NW 23rd Ave Portland, OR www.ausalon.com
Serratto
Celebrate Spring! The Insect Lore Live Butterfly Garden is just one of thousands of extraordinary toys on our shelves. We can help you find the perfect present for a child of any age. Find us on Facebook by searching “Child’s Play Toy Store”!
Celebrate the Holidays with us! Gift Certificates available. Lunch, Dinner & Happy Hour Seven days a week. Parking in our lot on NW Johnson St.
2305 NW Kearney St Portland, OR 503.224.5586 www.childsplayportland.com
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Au Salon Au Salon is a full-service Bumble and Bumble hair salon. We have been providing customized hair care in the Nob Hill neighborhood since 1996. We pride ourselves in educating our clients and providing a comfortable family atmosphere. We are now open 7 days a week!
Child’s Play
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Food Front • Fine bourbon • Classic cocktails • Southern Cuisine 2075 NW Glisan Street Portland, OR (near the corner of NW 21st and Glisan) 503.222.1056 www.popehouselounge.com
Nob Hill Marketplace
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Food Front is NW Portland’s freshest source for local and natural foods including organic produce; fine wines; artisan breads & cheeses; fresh, local meats; and fair trade coffee and chocolate. Whether you’re looking for daily essentials or delightful indulgences, you’ll find it at Food Front, naturally. Open 8am-9pm Daily
Urban Fondue Serving a unique dining experience featuring scratch recipe fondues made with local ingredients. Open 7 nights a week 2114 NW Glisan St (next to Bartini) Portland, OR Reservations: 503-242-1400 or www.urbanfondue.com
2375 NW Thurman St. Portland, OR 503.222.5658 www.foodfront.coop
To advertise in Marketplace contact Lindsay Grant at 503.221.8352 or lindsayg@sales.oregonian.com
walkabout / 21st ave.
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[ Ten blocks and 40 ways to while away the day ] little more than two decades ago, Northwest 21st Avenue was largely a workingman’s land, with lots of bars catering to the blue collar workers who would stop by after clocking out from the nearby industrial area. Then in 1990, the acclaimed Mediterranean restaurant Zefiro opened at the corner of 21st and Glisan Street, with big names like Wildwood, Paley’s Place and Caffe Mingo following in quick succession. Soon Northwest 21st became the epicenter of the city’s fine-dining scene.
BY GRANT BUTLER / PHOTOGRAPHY BY BETH NAKAMURA
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But people are fickle and trends change. When Zefiro closed in 2000, it marked an unofficial shift as the heat moved first to the Pearl District, then to the east side. Still, Paley’s, Mingo and Ken’s Artisan Bakery remain draws for people throughout the metro area, and the rest of the avenue’s food-focused spots thrive on local traffic from the area’s residents. And boy, how they thrive. Between Northwest Everett and Pettygrove streets, there are nearly 40 places to grab a bite, coffee or a cocktail along 21st Avenue or within a few steps of it. They may not be on everyone’s lips, but they’re the backbone of this quintessentially Portland neighborhood. Take 1 anna Bananas (1214 N.W. 21st Ave.; 503-274-2559), a quaint yet frumpy coffeehouse in a refurbished Old Portland home. This is the kind of place where everyone feels welcome, with older women at their midmorning coffee klatch sipping artfully poured lattes amid threadbare chairs and hipsters sporting
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colorful hair and facial piercings. Besides toasty bagels, however, most of the treats are depressingly wrapped in cellophane on a table next to the counter. Better to save your calories for 2 Finales Desserts (901 N.W. 21st Ave.; 503-241-5012; finalesdesserts.com), a
wholesale and wedding cake baking operation that grew into its own storefront last year. The display cases, not surprisingly, emphasize cakes with flavors like banana-chiffon and chocolate Grand Marnier, but there’s more nibbleoriented fare, too, like peanut butter cookies and lavender shortbread. In between bites you can browse through premium art galleries, bike shops and the hilarious 3 stellas on 21st (1108 N.W. 21st Ave.; 503-295-5930; stellason21st.com), where you’ll find food-focused gifts with a dash of whimsy. Know any lapsed Catholics? They’re sure to enjoy the irreverence of Jesus and Virgin Mary salt and pepper grinders. For the nature lover, try a can opener shaped like the bill of a toucan or a sleek martini shaker etched with zebra stripes.
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With over three dozen places to eat and drink, plus a healthy concentration of young apartment-dwellers nearby, the avenue really comes into its own at happy hour. One of the best options is 4 serratto restaurant and Bar (2112 N.W. Kearney St.; 503-221-1195; serratto.com). The Italian kitchen opened near the end of the avenue’s dining boom and has had enough chef changes over the years to give diners the impression it’s uneven. But current chef Tony Meyers has a sure hand with pasta, and at happy hour you can get a plate of homemade rigatoni with spicy sausage, tomato, fresh mozzarella and basil for just $6. For sharing, there’s a massive cone of twicefried french fries with garlic aioli for $4. For sipping, opt for a $12 flight of wine that includes three 3-ounce pours of anything on
the by-the-glass menu. For something more exotic, visit 5 Indish (305 N.W. 21st Ave.; 503-546-4900; indishrestaurant.com). It had one of the most low-key openings a few years ago — it was months before the cold-looking dining room was made more inviting with art and drapery — but has since emerged as one of 21st’s
most-interesting ethnic kitchens. Its happy hour features an intriguing combination of Indian flavors with American Southern cuisine, like a Punjabi saag paired with a hunk of cornbread ($4), an Indian-spiced take on barbecued spareribs ($6), or chicken korma with a flaky biscuit ($5). Once properly fueled, it’s showtime. On Thursdays, Gypsy Restaurant & Velvet Lounge packs in the crowds for its rock-band karaoke, where you can sing while backed by a live band. But nearby 6 voicebox (2112 N.W. Hoyt St.; 503-3038220; voiceboxpdx.com) lets you work your inner Katy Perry in a less-intimidating setting. The private karaoke rooms, which fit 10 people, came down in price in January, and now rent for $40 an hour except Friday and Saturday evenings. Using your own smart phone, you become the karaoke DJ, programming your playlist from more than 12,000 songs. After purring out your spot-on interpretation of Vanessa Williams’ “Save the Best for Last,” reward yourself with a glass of sake and an order of Malaysian potato-curry dumplings. Then sit back and try not to cringe as your friends butcher Kesha’s “Tik Tok.” £
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LAKE OSWEGO: Downtown
LAKE OSWEGO: Kruse Way area
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pubcrawl
[ Hidden in plain sight: Seven great beers flying under our radar ]
w
hen you think of “Oregon beer,” certain bottles immediately come to mind. Deschutes Black Butte Porter, Widmer Hefeweizen, Ninkasi Total Domination — beers with wideranging distribution and legions of far-flung fans. But because so many brewers now bottle their beers (thanks in part to mobile bottling operations such as Green Bottling), there are many other Oregon beers to bring home and try, beers that add to the conversation about the state’s vibrant beer culture. These are some — a small fraction — of those beers. This list doesn’t pretend to be exhaustive, nor is it a best-of list, though these beers eminently qualify. They aren’t necessarily the biggest, baddest, hoppiest, most sour, longest aged or any of that. They’re just great Oregon beers that remind us how lucky we are to be citizens of Beervana. To help me evaluate these stalwarts, I corralled four beer-savvy folks from the coming generation of Portland publicans, brewers and bloggers. We sat down recently at Beermongers (thanks for the space and the tasting glasses, gents) to taste, talk and explore the virtues of these magnificent seven.
By JOHN FOysTON PHOTOGraPHy By mOTOya Nakamura
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17th Annual
SPRING BEER & WINE FEST and Tour de Cheese
pubcrawl cont. THE PaNEL: Yetta Vorobik: Owner of The Hop & Vine, a great North killingsworth bottle shop/ wine-and-beer bar/ cocktail place with an excellent menu. Angelo DeIeso: The peripatetic beer blogger of Brewpublic.com, angelo is everywhere, all the time. He knows his beer, and he knows Oregon’s beer culture.
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Sean Campbell: Co-owner with Craig a friendly little southeast bottle shop/pub that’s become one of my favorite places. Campbell knows his beer and is a great publican: He still works at mcmenamins Fulton Pub and made his bones working in English pubs, and it shows. Ben Edmunds: He’s a professional brewer at Breakside Brewing and a beer educator, teaching classes through Oregon Beer Odyssey. He went to yale, the siebel Institute, america’s oldest brewing school, and he studied brewing in Belgium and Germany. He knows his beer and is an articulate and thoughtful taster. John Foyston: I’m the oldest of this lot by two or three decades, but I’ve been writing about Oregon beer since before most of the panel could legally drink it. still, I was glad of their expert help and predict a fine future for Oregon’s beer culture under their guidance.
the redeemer Heater-allen Pils
the Farmhand upright Five
a beautiful golden lager with a Northwest twist. Lagers are the most popular — and most degraded — beer style in the world. They were a sensation when the first golden beer was introduced in Plzen, in what is now the Czech republic, in 1843. But, like collies in the era of Lassie, they became too popular for their own good and industrial brewers turned them into the yellow fizzy water that most people think is beer. Heaterallen is one of the few craft breweries reminding us that a real lager is a wonderful beer. It’s also the only Oregon brewery that makes only lagers. “Thank God we have rick allen devoting himself to Germanstyle lagers,” says Edmunds, “styles that virtually no one else is making in Oregon.” “It’s hard for a small brewery to make lagers,” says DeIeso, “often because of a lack of fermenter space. ale yeast works at 70 degrees or so, which means a brewery can ferment an ale in 10 days at room temperature and have a beer ready to drink. But a lager can take three or four times as long and must be fermented at near-freezing because of the properties of bottom-fermenting lager yeasts.” as for the taste? “It’s light-bodied with notes of biscuit, white pepper, lemon peel and grapefruit,” says Vorobik. Edmunds notes “it has a full, floral flavor that dominates the early palate.” Campbell says the lager finishes with a noticeable hop tang. He says that when customers ask for a lager,“I always suggest this Pilsner because it’s traditional in style but hoppy enough to qualify as a Northwest take.”
alex Ganum’s brewery near the Broadway Bridge is relatively new and esteemed beyond its years for its unique, flavorful beers based on French and Belgian farmhouse styles — beers that were originally part of the room and board for European farmworkers. upright Brewing uses the classic yeast strains and incorporates a full dose of Northwest inventiveness. Five is the hoppiest beer among the other year-round beers (named Four, six and seven; special beers such as Billy the mountain and Oyster stout get more elaborate names), but with a further tweak. “I’m impressed by how (Ganum) uses unpopular hops — Willamette, Liberty and Perle — instead of Cascade or other standard Northwest hops, so he gets no citrus or piney flavors, says Edmunds (though as a part-time upright brewer, he admits he’s biased). “Instead he gets this whole new range of earthy, woodsy hop flavors.” “The aroma is a nice amalgamation of floral with a bit of cheese,” DeIeso says, “and I love that musty, earthy hop character, especially as a contrast to the citrusy grapefruit notes of the typical Northwest aroma hops.” Vorobik says upright’s inventiveness with yeast strains has brought a whole new facet to Portland beer, and Campbell agrees. “alex and Garrett (Ganum’s assistant brewer) are really nudging Oregon brewing into some new and exciting places.”
the new reliable Laurelwood Free range red Head brewer Chad kennedy — inventor of Workhorse IPa and many others — and crew have proved equal to the task of maintaining Laurelwood as one of Or-
egon’s best breweries, and their Free range red is the top of the pops on draft and in bottle. “This beer smells like grapefruit,” says Campbell, “and the taste is balanced with a bitter citrus finish — it’s very hoppy for a red ale, and the overall impression is grapefruit with subtle malt flavors.” Edmunds calls it a classic and discerns a bit more malt backbone but agreed about the citrus hop flavors. “This exemplifies the Northwest session beer to me,” he says, “balanced, easy drinking and bitter.”
the Fine and Fitting tribute Hair of the Dog Fred It would be impossible to write about Portland beer without including Hair of the Dog, whose beers are celebrated and cherished far beyond the state line. This was one of the favorite breweries in the world for the late, great Brit beer writer, michael Jackson. Fittingly, Fred is named for another trailblazing beer writer, Portlander Fred Eckhardt, who is still active and still writing — and still teaching kids to swim! — as he approaches his 85th year. I love and respect the man, and this golden strong ale made with five hop varieties and five different malts is the perfect way to honor a great soul. “Brewer alan sprints’ style of brewing has inspired new standards for the beer community, including barrel aging,” says Vorobik. “The nose is strong with yeast, fruit and a bit of molasses upfront. The body is heavy with alcohol and a candy sweetness with a vibrant hop finish that lingers nicely.” Edmunds finds a touch of oxidation in the aroma that puts him in mind of the classic Fullers Vintage ale. It would be a defect in a lesser beer, but beers such as Fred or adam (Hair of the Dog’s first beer) are big enough at around 10 percent alcohol that they can age well for years. I have a bottle of the first adam that’s nearly 15 years old, and have no qualms about drinking it except that I won’t be able to replace it. “Hair of the Dog changes in
the bottle,” says Campbell. “The young beer is strong, sweet and hoppy, but it mellows nicely with age as the hops round out and the malt steps forward.”
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the contradiction Barley Brown’s Turmoil This was a treat from DeIeso and came in a growler, so it’s not strictly within the guidelines of the tasting, but it’s a brilliant Oregon beer from Baker City and it has a good story, so we’re bending the rules. Turmoil is of the up-and-coming beer style that tastes like an India pale ale but is as black as a porter or stout. In our part of the world, we want to call the style a Cascadian Dark ale or CDa, instead of the contradictory Black India Pale ale or something similar. Organizers of the Great american Beer Festival called them american-style India black ales when they made a first-ever class for the style last year, and Barley Brown’s Turmoil won the first gold medal in that class. “Big, burly and unapologetic,” says DeIeso. “This beer is what stone Brewing (in san Diego) wishes they were brewing — it floods your palate with succeeding waves of sappy hops and roasty grain.” “This beer is a surprise,” says Campbell, “so dark that you can hardly see through it, but the nose is very, very hoppy — piney and almost skunky.” Other panelists agree that there’s more than a hint of Humboldt County’s biggest cash crop in the nose — not a surprise as hops are kissing cousins with marijuana. “The flavor of pine sap melts slowly in your mouth,” says Vorobik, “almost as if you were sucking on a caramel.” “Hop-soaked espresso in the nose,” says Edmunds, “and the hop flavors are out of control: dark, piney, sticky, but by some miracle, brewer shawn kelso gets some balance of chocolate and coffee without a hint of roast. There’s no doubt in my mind that this is the best Oregon CDa and it deserved to win gold.”
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pubcrawl cont. the new wine 2009 Cascade apricot ale This is the beer I bring to Thanksgiving dinner for the edification of wine drinkers who are convinced they don’t like beer. Cascade is an absolutely unique brewery and their new Barrel House on southeast Belmont is likely the only pub in the country to age, blend and serve such a wide array of tart, sour and barrel-aged ales. These are not beers for everybody, but — like the Belgian and Flemish sour ales they emulate — they are beers that your palate grows to appreciate with experience. apricot ale pours effervescent and cloudy gold and has a wonderful, vibrant tang to it — a perfect accompaniment to a rich meal such as turkey and trimmings. “The apricot, kriek (sour cherry-based) and the Vine are definitely fruit-forward,” says Edmunds, “and they’re also the most accessible of Cascade’s beers.” Vorobik noted the winelike qualities: “It’s slightly to medium sour,” she says, “and there are lots of stone fruits in the body: apricot, peach and unripened nectarine with almost an almond oil in the finish, a silky residue.”
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the perFect Storm 2010 Pelican mother of all storms Brewer Darron Welch presides over the brewery at the Pelican Pub in Pacific City, and he’s bolstered the reputation of Oregon brewing by winning dozens of medals around the world for his fine beers. This is the pub’s English-style barley wine, stormwatcher’s Winterfest, but it’s been aged for months in kentucky bourbon barrels. I would’ve loved to have shared this with the panel, but due to a logistics glitch (Ok! I forgot the bottle at home) that didn’t happen, so I tasted it myself the next day. Just as well, probably, because my notes were getting pretty sketchy toward the end of the tasting. It pours a dark garnet, though not totally opaque, with a thin, tan head, as a good barley wine should. The aroma is full of raisins and plum pudding, malt and vanilla with a bit of oak. The flavor delivers on that promise, plus a bonus buzz of alcohol and some definite bourbon notes. The oak is present, but it doesn’t dominate as in some barrel-aged beers, which can leave you feeling as if you’ve been whacked upside the head with a stave. This is a brilliant sipping beer and, like Hair of the Dog’s Fred, it shouldn’t be served too cold or the complexities will be masked. shoot for 48 degrees or so, and notice how more layers of flavor open up as it warms in your glass.
WHErE TO FIND THE BOTTLEs The Beermongers, 1125 s.E. Division st. Belmont station, 4500 s.E. stark st. Bottles, 5015 N.E. Fremont st. Bridgetown Beerhouse, 915 N. shaver st. By the Bottle, 104 W. Evergreen Blvd., Vancouver Cork, 2901 N.E. alberta st. The Hop & Vine, 1914 N. killingsworth st. John’s market, 3535 s.W. multnomah Blvd. saraveza, 1004 N. killingsworth st. Woodstock Wine & Deli, 4030 s.E. Woodstock Blvd. also, this being Beervana means that your local grocery store — especially New seasons, Whole Foods and Fred meyer — is likely to have hundreds of craft beers on the shelf. as for beers from Barley Brown’s, they appear only sporadically in Portland due to limited production and the fact that Baker City is a fair bit down the road. Look for them on tap at good beer bars such as The Beermongers, Bailey’s Taproom, Belmont station and the Horse Brass. When you see one, order it, even if it isn’t Turmoil. Chances are you’ll like it just fine. £
online eXtra: go behind the scenes at cascade brewing at miXpdX.com
selects / sancerre [ Surrender to a spring fling ]
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By Katherine Cole / photography By Beth naKamura e always can tell what season it is by what we’re hungry for. this month, we’re salivating for flaky white fish and briny mussels steamed in herbaceous broth. We want crisp salads topped with warm goat cheese. and we’re thinking ahead to the ramps, fiddleheads and garlic scapes that soon will emerge from the chilled soil. We’ve got stinging-nettle pesto on the brain. Spring may not yet be in full swing, but the
foods we’re jonesing for are sending us a clear message: it’s time to chill a bottle of Sancerre. Sure, we can dig a zesty sauvignon blanc from new Zealand; we appreciate a crisp and inexpensive blanc from Chile. But Sancerre is sauv blanc at its most complete. it’s sunny with acidity and citrus, it’s grounded with flinty minerality, it’s green with aromas of nettles and freshmown grass. Drinking Sancerre in springtime can make you feel like a new leaf, unfurling in the cool breeze and photosynthesizing for the first time. it’s both bracing and energizing.
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selects / sancerre cont. Sancerre isn’t the only French sauvignon blanc; pouilly-Fumé, just across the river, produces a nearly identical aromatic white, and other regions, such as Bordeaux, produce fine examples as well. But Sancerre is what wine lovers thirst for when spring rolls around. as one of our tasting panelists, winemaker nicolas Quillé, notes with a sigh, “it’s like that first date you’ll never go on again; you keep looking to reproduce it.” THE PRICE OF NAME RECOGNITION
“Scarifying and powerful.” —The New York Times Feb. 22–March 20 Madeline Nelson & Jim Lafky
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paneliStS ivy manning Cookbook author, cooking instructor and food writer, ivymanning.com mimi martin Co-owner, the Wine & Spirit archive educational center, wineandspiritarchive.com nicolas Quillé Winemaker and general manager, pacific rim, rieslingrules.com
What makes Sancerre so special? the wine reference books tell us it’s grant Butler the pierre à fusil, or gunflint charCritic-at-large, the acter, that the flinty limestone soils oregonian and miX of the region impart to the wines. martha holmberg But we can’t discount the power of Founding editor, a good name. While pouilly-Fumé miX magazine brings to mind the “fumé blancs” made by Californians who thought Katherine Cole it a good idea to dump sauvignon Wine columnist, the blanc into oak barrels, Sancerre’s reputation remains unsullied. oregonian and miX alas, good Sancerre doesn’t come cheap. When we cased the city of portland for 15 examples of the 2008 and 2009 vintages to bag and taste blind, we couldn’t find anything for less than $20. and a total of six were priced at $26. Coincidence? or have importers and distributors found $26 to be the Sancerre sweet spot? they know we’ll splurge on a bottle every spring, and they’re right. We start hankering for Sancerre the moment the outdoor thermometer hits 65 degrees, even if it’s just for a day. We’re downright pavlovian, we wine drinkers. A PRETTY GOOD PROBLEM Blind-tasting can be a chore, no matter what the wines are. if they’re poorly made plonk, it’s difficult to subsume the urge to cry, or at least get up and walk away from the table. But if they’re pleasant, that can be challenge, as well: When every glass is filled with well-crafted work, it’s difficult to come to a decision. We had this problem with our flights of Sancerre. the wines were so across-the-board good that we had trouble identifying bottles to eliminate. as panelist and wine educator mimi martin put it, “everything is solid.” We finally selected an array of winning wines that best represented the variety of styles we seek in Sancerre: We chose an easy-drinking aperitif, a quirky conversation starter, a fresh spring sipper and a classic sauvignon blanc. usually, we pour all the wines down the drain when we’re done tasting, but we have to admit that we held on to a few of these. they continued to hum with vitality, even after sitting in the fridge. (one of my faves, Domaine Vacheron, was deemed too spendy to make the final cut at $33.50, but i snagged the half-empty bottle en route to the recycling bin and continued to enjoy it for three days after our tasting.) Bottom line: Sancerre won’t disappoint if you’re willing to spend at least 20 bucks. So the next time you’re preparing to sauté some fiddleheads, invest in Sancerre. especially if you’re cooking for a first date.
Rated “Clucktacular” —Grant Butler, A&E
CATERING ALL MARCH GAMES!
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2008 Patient Cottat Vieilles Vignes Sancerre Blanc
Be warned: the unattractive label (think powder-blue pleather) makes this wine a poor candidate for displaying on the dinner table. Better to pre-pour it and hand out glasses for sipping alongside hors d’oeuvres. But looks aside, it’s a very “quaffable, juicy” white, as martha holmberg put it, with “tingling acidity.” there’s something sultry about the aroma — nicolas Quillé thought it might be that musty tropical odor of acacia blossoms — which would match well with smoked trout on crackers, marcona almonds, goat cheese or lemonchicken skewers. Sourced from 30-plus-yearold vines, this bottle was the relative bargain of our tasting.
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Floral and herbaceous, this wine was all “green shoots and twigs,” as manning noted. minerality, the scent of lime peel and a refreshing spritz made grant Butler want to match it with raw oysters or simply prepared mussels; holmberg thought she “might drink several glasses of this while cooking.” manning wanted to pair this “most spring-y of the wines” with a “buttery, flaky tartlette of leeks and crème fraîche, spring peas or parmesan cheese straws.” We’ll drink to that.
teXtBooK SauV BlanC
2008 Lucien Crochet Sancerre Blanc
this one’s for all the sauvignon blanc freaks out there: it has notes of gooseberry and grass, citrus and bitters. it’s lean, clean and flinty, with white pepper on the finish. “it’s very varietally correct,” summed up Quillé. mimi martin called it “intense, crisp and mouthwatering.” manning suggested pairing it with creamy linguini and clams, or a triple-crème goat cheese such as le peilloute. is anyone else getting thirsty around here? and hungry? £
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eat here/eugene
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[ From rabbit rillettes to elk bolognese, there’s more to this college town than tofu ]
osteria Sfizio
STory By AShlEy GArTlAnd / PhoToGrAPhy By MoToyA nAKAMUrA
t’s easy to dismiss Eugene as another crunchy college town with a dining scene limited by students’ indiscriminate tastes, cash flow problems and alternative leanings. But the truth is it’s quite easy to find great places to eat. The difficulty lies in finding room in your stomach and time in your schedule to sample it all.
By the time you pull into town at midday, you’ll be hungry for lunch. Jump off the freeway and head to 5th Street Public Market, where you’ll find the lauded Marché (296 E. Fifth Ave.; 541-342-3612; marcherestaurant.com) and the restaurant’s charming epicurean store and marketplace, Marché Provisions (296 E. Fifth Ave.; 541-7430660; marcheprovisions.com). With its well-executed, French-inspired menu and white tablecloth ambience, Marché appeals to the sophisticated diner. But the farm-to-table veteran is also attracting a wider
audience with its affordable lunch menu of hors d’oeuvres such as pillowy gougères and spiced rabbit rillettes in the $5-a-plate range. Founding chef Stephanie Pearl Kimmel’s response to the tough economy is getting people in the door: The place is packed by midafternoon with folks tucking into the duck confit salad and grilled steak with golden pommes frites. Those seeking grab-and-go fare should swing by Marché Provisions, where you can shop for hard-to-find gourmet ingredients while dining on artisan sandwiches, thin-crust pizzas,
off the Waffle
Marché Provisions
54
seasonally influenced salads and ice cream in flavors both familiar and unexpected. no matter what, rain or shine, be sure to get a scoop of the olive oil ice cream. Post-lunch, walk off your feast with an excursion through the market shops and Eugene’s quaint downtown. If the weather cooperates, extend your walk a few more blocks and you’ll arrive on the University of oregon campus. By the time you return from exploring, it’ll be time to eat again — or at least time to start narrowing down your dinner picks, and for a college
town, Eugene boasts some serious contenders. If you can get into the intimate and rustic Belly (291 E. Fifth Ave.; 541-683-5896; eatbelly.com), snag a seat and settle in for chef Brendan Mahaney’s farmhouse cuisine. Mahaney’s talent for marrying strong European flavors with Pacific northwest ingredients is evident in every soulful dish, particularly the bacon-wrapped figs and house-made boudin blanc sausage. But if you only order one thing, make it the pork shoulder confit. Mahaney pairs the house specialty with polenta and tart seasonal fruit to create a deeply flavorful dish.
Eugene Essentials The University of Oregon: The university’s tree-lined campus offers wide sidewalks and plentiful pathways to wander. If rainy weather interrupts your campus exploration, duck into the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art or tour the ground floor of the architectural marvel known as the John E. Jaqua Academic Center for Student Athletes. Eugene Running Company: Track Town USA’s namesake running store offers more than a selection of sneakers. The store’s staff and website are hubs for local running information and advice. If you’re a frequent visitor, join the weekly running groups if you want to hit the trails with a local sweating it out by your side (eugenerunningcompany.com). Eugene Saturday Market: When the city’s outdoor market returns in April, it becomes an essential activity on any visitor’s itinerary. Fuel up with hideaway Bakery’s rustic baked goods, then browse the craft booths for souvenirs (perhaps tie-dyed T-shirts?) for your friends (www.eugenesaturdaymarket.org)
If the wait at Belly is too long, venture beyond downtown to the new Osteria Sfizio (105 oakway Center; 541-302-3000; sfizioeugene.com). With its high ceilings and decor that borders on splashy, the striking space offers a welcome change of pace. From his post in the open kitchen, chef rocky Maselli pays respect to Italy with a menu driven by plentiful antipasti and regional country cooking. A meal at Sfizio might unfold over an eyecatching beef carpaccio, brawny elk bolognese lasagna and a scoop of creamy gelato, served affogato if you wish.
ninkasi Brewery
Breakfast can take shape in many ways, from places like campus favorite Glenwood Cafe (1340 Alder St.; 541-687-0355; glenwoodrestaurants.com) to relative newcomers such as Off the Waffle (2540 Willamette St.; 541-515-6926; offthewaffle.com). The latter’s strip-mall setting and hodgepodge interior won’t win any design awards, but brothers omer and dave orian don’t need fancy digs to sell their liège waffles, which are made from a yeast-based dough wedded with pearl sugar that caramelizes as it cooks. The resulting waffles are tender, crisp and
Glenwood Cafe sweet, and are bolstered by inventive toppings that keep customer traffic at a constant flow. later, wander over to the Whiteaker neighborhood and you’ll find the immensely popular Ninkasi Brewing (272 Van Buren St.; 541-344-2739; ninkasibrewing.com) in an old retrofitted plumbing company. Since opening in 2006, the village brewer has been making what founding brewer Jamie Floyd calls “beer geek beer” with mass appeal. order a sampler tray that includes the brewery’s flagship Total
While pleasing your health consciousness! domination IPA and you’ll join the fan club, too. With one last meal to savor before you skip town, why not make it a quintessentially Eugene lunch? With its artsy vibe and menu of vegetarian and vegan pies, the Pizza Research Institute (530 Blair St.; 541-343-1307; pizzaresearchinstitute.com) offers thin-crust pizzas layered with inventive toppings such as Granny Smith apples, smoked Gouda and toasted walnuts. They’re so good you’ll never miss the meat. . £
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503.636.4025 www.vandenbur ghjeweler s.com PRECIOUS GEMS • DIAMONDS • PEARLS • EXPERT PLATINUMSMITHS
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scene Our picks for what to eat where CompileD by: Grant butler ConTribuTors: Kathy Hinson shawn levy bridget A. otto Alex pulaski David sarasohn s.j. sebellin-ross Jake Ten pas Amy Wang
Get mOre Of the POrtland scene, at mixPdx.cOm
Japanese flair Asian sensations, with dashes of comfort thrown in.
Biwa 215 S.E. Ninth Ave. 503-239-8830 biwarestaurant.com Hip, hormone-free and oh-so easy on the wallet, this izakaya (Japan’s twist on a tapas bar) bustles on weekends. Don’t look for sushi — it’s not here — but the maguro nutaae (chunks of raw yellowfin tuna lounging in a mustard miso sauce; $11) will satisfy your sashimi craving. The handmade gyoza’s ($7) delicate wrapper cradles satisfyingly seasoned pork filling. Then it’s on to skewers of beef, chicken, even mushroom (most are $3 and $4, seafood higher). For dessert, try the milk jelly (cream, milk and gelatin, topped with strawberries
Tanuki
pHoToGrApHy by rAnDy l. rAsmussen
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In vino veritas small plates to share. The waitress tending Tanuki’s 20or-so seat dining area will steer you through the plentiful sake choices (plus beer and wine). Then dive into the tradition of Japanese and Korean drinking food, choosing from the day’s offerings. The menu tries hard not to intimidate, with helpful clarifications such as “Kushiyaki — stuff on sticks!” There’s the offbeat (for us): broiled eel with a tangy-sweet kick from rice wine and soy sauce. or, you could stick with more-familiar items, such as edamame and the fabulously rich marinated hanger steak. prices on a recent menu stayed in the single digits, making it easy to follow the tradition of drinking a bit, ordering a bite, then drinking and eating some more.
and hazelnuts; $4). The drink selection is dizzying — including two-dozen-plus sakes, plum wine and shochu, a distilled spirit. Syun Izakaya 209 N.E. Lincoln St., Hillsboro 503-640-3131 Tucked anonymously into the corner of a stately old building in the heart of downtown Hillsboro, syun izakaya boasts a vast menu of homey Japanese dishes: sushi and sashimi, soups and salads, grilled and fried meats and vegetables, plus a sake selection nigh unequaled in the portland area. The servings are designed for sharing and to suit virtually every taste and level of adventurousness. you can gorge on raw fish, cozy up to a stir-fry, share tempura or fried chicken nuggets (excellent, truly) with the kids — what have you. if you live in portland, you may not appreciate the drive, but the food and atmosphere are superb. Tanuki 413 N.W. 21st Ave. 503-241-7667 tanukipdx.com Hard day at the office? on the way home, make like a Japanese salaryman and duck into your friendly izakaya for drinks and
Yakuza 5411 N.E. 30th Ave. 503-450-0893 yakuzalounge.com ever since micah Camden opened yakuza — it marked its fourth anniversary last fall — it has done Japanese food differently. it’s not an extensive menu, and it changes to include more cooked dishes in the winter. but in any season, it can surprise and impress with even relatively simple dishes, such as a fresh crab, avocado and crème fraîche roll that demonstrates what a California roll is supposed to be. scallop tempura is nothing like you’d imagine, each piece sweet and intact in a nest of crunchy deep-fried phyllo on a spicy sauce that sets off the sweetness. Kobe tartare is exquisite, with a pile of red richness enhanced by a poached egg robed in crispy bread crumbs oozing gently over toasted baguette slices. Yuzu 4130 S.W. 117th Ave., Beaverton 503-350-1801 This near-secret, tiny hot spot full of Asian diners, foreign tongues, friendly service and a loaded menu is generally at capacity. on a Tuesday night, the earliest open table was 8 p.m., and brisk business ensued. And if what’s coming out of the small, frenetic kitchen is any indication, most everyone is coming
[In wine is truth.] Plato
Uncorked a
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05•14•2011
A Sampling of Auction Lots “52 Bottles of French Wine” 2002 Moet Et Chandon Dom Perignon 92 pts 2004 Joseph Roty Charmes Chambertin Grand Cru 92pts 2003 Chateau Pontet Canet Pauillac 93 pts 2007 Domaine du Vieux Telegraphe CDP La Crau 96 pts NV Billecart Salmon Rose 94 pts Dom. Baumard Quarts de Chaume 98pts
“Beaux Freres Vertical” 1991 through 2009
“Mountain of Magnums” Ayoub, Ken Wright, Betz, Andrew Will, & more
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tickets available online www.uncorkedwineauction.org
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Sellwood neighborhood
3
6
SE 16th Ave
10 8 Blvd SE Bybee
7
Farmhouse Antiques
4 SE Rural St
Sellwood’s favorite mini-mall! - Vintage jewelry - Hats - Furniture - Cast Iron - Glassware - Pottery - Postcards - Holiday decor – And more! Always buying - 7 dealers. Open daily 11-5.
SE Knapp St
e ES
S
Madison Park Antiques
SE Rex St
Well-chosen antiques, art and curiosities
SE Milwaukie Ave
SE 13th Ave
lvd dB
oo llw
SE Malden St SE Bidwell St
7805 SE 13th Avenue 503.233.3731
8028 SE 13th Avenue 503.232-6757 4
7
SE Lambert St
3
SE Lexington St
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CoCo Gets
▲ N
Dressed
SE Miller St
6 SE Spokane St
SE Tacoma St
SE 17th Ave
5 2 1 SE Harney St 1
“Fun and fine gifts for girls of all ages” Join us at our new location in Westmoreland right next door to our sister store “Coco Gets Dressed”. Still the same charming shop with many treasures straight from the streets of Paris. Candles, lotions, scents, stationary, ribbons and all things feminine. Come see us in our new fabulous home!
Come see what what’s new for Spring! The best from our designers including Cynthia Ashby, Cut Loose and Bryn Walker plus contemporary & trendy jewelry from local artist grayling. Always fashion forward, comfortable and easy care. The finest collection of HOBO handbags, wallets and clutches reside here too! We’re not teasing when we say, “CoCo Gets Dressed has clothing that tickles your soul.”
7011 SE Milwaukie Avenue 503.236.5999
7007 SE Milwaukie Avenue 503.236.7777
2
Corkscrew Wine Bar
Cravin’ Raven Enriching Sellwood’s status as a healthy-living hub is Cravin’ Raven Organic Bakery, the place that proves you don’t have to use white flour, white sugar, or butter to make delectable treats. Try our healthy and delicious assortment of muffins, cookies, cakes, and assorted treats, all organic and sweetened with agave nectar. Specializing in Gluten-free options. Catering Available. 8339 SE 13th Avenue 503-234-0603 www.cravinraven.com
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Justin & Burks Visit us at our new location just three doors down. Unique antiques, home decor, & custom lighting. Hours: Tue-Sat 11-5, Sun 12-4 8317 SE 13th Avenue 503.234.6414
Sellwood Marketplace
You’ll find something for everyone here! You’ll love our American-made solid wood furniture, upholstery, lighting, signs, weathervanes, rugs, candles and much more. Visit our 21 rooms on 2 floors full of great decorating ideas, many that you won’t find anywhere , but here. You’ll find something new each time you visit. 8203 SE 13th Avenue 503-235-5115 www.americanatheart.us
Corkscrew is a special place hidden just off the beaten path in the heart of Portland’s historic Westmoreland business district. We love featuring some of the best wines from our local region and other parts of the world complimented with unique artisan cheese & charcuterie plates. Welome and cheers! Tue-Thu, 5pm, Fri-Sat 4pm til closed 1665 SE Bybee 503.239.WINE corcscrewpdx@gmail.com
To advertise in Marketplace contact Jeff Brosy at 503.221.8320 or jeffb@sales.oregonian.com
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scene Finds Old & New Finds Old & New offers a charming blend of old, very old, and not so old, treasures. Specializing in: • Vintage & artisan jewelry • Asian antiques • Furniture • Unique & eclectic finds We buy and welcome consignments. Open Tuesday to Sunday 7907 SE 13th Avenue 503.235.0892
Ken’s Artisan bakery
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Moreland Vision Source Come check out our exclusive optical gallery featuring hand-painted stain glass eyewear from Studio3 Occhiali Eyewear imported from Italy. We also carry famous designer eyewear such as Gucci, Liz Claiborne, Silhouette, Prodesign, Lafont, Calvin Klien and Sean John, just to name a few. Stop by and check us out! Hours: Mon-Fri 8:30 - 5:30 6539 SE Milwaukie Avenue 503.236.6008 www.visionsource-moreland.com
for the large, steaming bowls of fresh ramen with perfectly chewy noodles steeped in silky broth. Although the ramen takes center stage, several starters and other small plates stand out at this izakaya. The tender, petite gyoza — six to an order — have just the proper bite and burst with spicy diced pork. The kakuni — a semithick, creamy stock laden with noodles and spiked with scallions and chunks of tender roast pork loin that falls apart with a poke — bursts with the richness of a holiday meal.
Bang-up bakeries
Where your daily bread is a masterpiece. Ken’s Artisan Bakery 338 N.W. 21st Ave. 503-248-2202 kensartisan.com The baguette ($2.75) here is all about texture, with its substantial crust and contrasting crumb. Though you would eat the little T baguette with a slather of sweet butter, Ken’s baguette demands to be dunked into, say, a cassoulet. The country blonde ($4.20), one of the most delicate of Ken’s breads, has a dark chewy crust veering toward the sweet and a light, moist interior leaning toward the sour. The walnut bread ($4.50), heavy with nuts, has a fragrant, subtly earthy flavor. Dense enough to give your jaw a workout, it was made to enjoy with a slice of sharp cheddar and hunk of chorizo or a smear of musky gorgonzola hidden underneath slices of juicy pear. pHoToGrApH by JAmie FrAnCis
Little T American Baker 2600 S.E. Division St. 503-238-3458 littletbaker.com baguettes consist of little more than flour, yeast and salt, which means they rely almost entirely on technique and are a superb indicator of a baker’s skill. Clearly baker Tim Helea has prodigious talent indeed: His baguettes ($2.75), with crispy crusts that crackle into fragile shards with every bite and a light and softly moist crumb, are the best in portland. First cousin to the focaccia, the hub slab ($3.75) is a large, nearly flat, misshapen golden brown bread topped with a slick of fruity olive oil and a sprinkling of salt. The inside is rich and soft. For a robust bread with a moist crumb, try the house loaf ($2.75), made with sourdough, whole wheat and rye. Lovejoy Bakers 939 N.W. 10th Ave. 503-208-3113 lovejoybakers.com With its noisily crisp and jaw-achingly chewy crust, the hearty baguette ($2.75) here has enough personality to stand up to any strong filling you might want to stuff it with — from meatballs and tomato sauce to deli meat and Dijon mustard. The rye with caraway seeds ($4) has a richer and more prominent sour tang than the sourdough baguette and a thin crust and dark, dense interior studded with tiny caraway seeds. stuffed with plump kalamata olives, the olive ciabatta ($5) has a delicate, barely crispy, thin crust with an airy, creamy white crumb. but, as good as that bread is, the kalamata olives steal the show. Juicy and fruity and added to the dough with a liberal hand, they are so tasty they elevate a good bread to great.
Pearl Bakery 102 N.W. Ninth Ave. 503-827-0910 pearlbakery.com With a moist, open crumb and a softly nutty aroma, pearl’s baguette ($2.75) is crisp and assertive. The olive ciabatta ($5) is heavy with black kalamatas and has a soft, moist interior and a chewy crust. The silky crumb of the golden paesano ($3.75), coupled with its lightly chewy crust, make this the ideal comfort bread — the one you want with a cup of hot tea on a miserable day or the one you would smear with peanut butter and jam on those nights you just can’t sleep. St. Honoré Boulangerie 315 First St., Lake Oswego 503-496-5596 2335 N.W. Thurman St. 503-445-4342 sainthonorebakery.com The crust on the baguette ($2.25) is explosively crisp while the inside is fairly dense, moist and chewy. not a baguette for the timid, this hearty bread can hold its own against stews heavy with vegetables and meat. large enough to wear as a puffy crown, the round couronne ($5.15) has a thin, crisp crust and a dense, serious crumb. This hearty bread is pretty enough to serve guests as part of a sunday brunch or sturdy enough to use for sandwiches. The richest bread is the incredibly buttery brioche ($5.95). baked in the classic fluted brioche shape with its ball of dough centered on top, it has a mere slip of a crust containing a rich interior that is surely the love child of a poundcake and a pullman loaf. When it is time to crack open your last jar of prized marionberry preserves, this is the bread to use.
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Beaverton Hillsdale Hwy
503.292.0119
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7763 SW Capitol Hwy ~ 503.244.1560
In the Heart of Multnomah Village
Scottish Public House • Portland’s largest selection of single malt whiskies • Traditional Scottish fare including unforgettable fish & chips • Meet friends for a pint in one of our cozy rooms 201 S. 2nd St. @ Hwy 99E,
Oregon City, OR 97045
503-723-6789 www.highlandstillhouse.com
Spice Road Mead
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Unlike anything else you’ve ever tasted.
YAMHILL
OREGON
503.730.7535 www.kookoolanfarms.com
random order Coffeehouse & bakery
hiGh five Perfect Pies Admit it. you can’t resist anything in a crust. still, there’s pie, and then there’s great pie — the kind that’s worth the drive across town, or the interminable wait until strawberry season arrives again. With their tender crusts and delicious fillings, these are favorites whenever they’re available.
— S.j. Sebellin-Ross
Chocolate cream pie at Random Order Coffeehouse & Bakery: This leaf-green corner shop invites your eyes to wander, from the painting of elvis as an astronaut to the statue of a goose with enviable eyelashes to the anatomically correct sock monkey. but don’t let those curiosities distract you from the main attraction: excellent pies. The chocolate cream ($4.25 a slice) offers a meltingly flaky crust filled with a pool of deep, dark pastry cream perfectly balanced with three kinds of chocolate. A puff of rich cream
pHoToGrApH by FAiTH CATHCArT
freckled with cocoa tops it all off. (1800 N.E. Alberta St.; 503-331-1420; randomordercoffee.com) Apple hand pie at Whiffies: The food cart pod on the corner of southeast 12th and Hawthorne is a favorite of the after-bar crowd, but you don’t have to be threesheets to get a craving for the hand pies ($3 each) at this cart. They’re roughly the size of Hostess pies, but so much better. The apple pie, a fan favorite, is stuffed with a sweet filling of diced apples. (Corner of Southeast 12th Avenue and Hawthorne Boulevard; 503-946-6544; whiffies.com) Rhubarb hand pie at Baker & Spice: To get to the counter at this Hillsdale bakery you might have to dodge dogs, baby carriages, toddlers and their accompanying entourage, but it’s well worth it. The rhubarb hand pie ($2.50 per pie) offers layers and layers of airy, light, gently sweet, exuberantly crispy crust folded in on itself. Take a bite and you’ll find a smattering of rhubarb jam tucked inside. it’s made with just enough sugar to balance rhubarb’s inherent pucker-factor, and provides a tart-sweet counterpoint to the rich pastry. (6330 S.W. Capitol
Highway; 503-244-7573; bakerandspicebakery.com) Dutch apple almond crunch pie at Helen Bernhard Bakery: opened in 1924 in the house of the original owner, Helen bernhard bakery looks like a cake shop from days gone by. The Dutch apple almond crunch pie ($10.85 per pie) brims with perfectly cooked apple slices — just firm enough to prove they started out the crispest of apples, yet silky, rich and tender. A generous shower of crunchy, sliced, toasted almonds adds another layer of texture and flavor. (1717 N.E. Broadway; 503-287-1251; helenbernhardbakery.com) Strawberry mini-pie at Immortal Pie and Larder: A pretty, airy shop stocked with French salted caramel sauce, chocolates and tins of spanish ortiz tuna, immortal pie and larder looks like a european import and has the prices to match. The crust of the 4-inch strawberry mini-pie ($6) is thick and tasty. but the filling — simply loaded with plump, sweet berries — is the best part. (8029 S.E. Stark St.; 971-255-1491; immortalpieandlarder.com) £
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