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Seattle's better half
Submitted by Michael Fielding on Sun, 02/08/2009 - 1:03pm.
April 20, 2008
On what felt like an unusually long evening flight from O’Hare to Portland, I met a soft-spoken massage therapist/life coach named Sarah. Originally from Kansas, she’s been living in Portland for most of the last eight years. Not one for small talk on a plane (seriously, I have little interest in gabbing with a stranger whose elbows I’ve been jockeying with for the tiny arm rest on a four-hour cross-country flight), I tried to ignore her. But it’s hard to do when the person is outgoing and all smiles. Just like my dad says, you can’t be mean to someone’s who’s smiling back at you.
Anyway, she got me talking, and I asked about what to do in Portland. She recommended the Eastbank, a few meditation gardens (although she brushed them off when she sensed it’s not my thing), a few restaurants and a downtown park. She offered to take me show me around herself and blamed recent colder-than-normal winters on global warming. When I asked her what Portlanders like to do, she told me they eat and drink beer and wine. That’s what Portlanders do, she said as she pulled a few spiced sausages and wasabi peas from her carry-on bag. She told me she planned to take up surfing in Australia or New Zealand or South America. Um, OK.
I stayed at the Hotel Monaco, located in a century-old building downtown. Despite more than 200 guest rooms, the place feels quaint and cozy. Each floor of the luxury hotel features portions of its private art collection from local Northwest artists. It’s been names as one of the top 500 hotels in the world by Travel & Leisure and Conde Nast.
The last time I was in Portland was 11 years ago, but little has changed: A mid-sized pedestrian city, it’s easily accessible with a top-rate public transport system. Located throughout a portion of downtown is a 22-block transit mall. The sidewalks are broad and made of red brick; flower planters, trees and fountains line walkways; streets run one-way; the tram runs through the heart of the area, and fountains, parks and statues decorate it, too, making downtown Portland peaceful and livable.
* * * * *
The Saturday Market – the oldest continuously run open-air market in the country – occupies a stretch of land beneath the west end of the Burnside Bridge between First and Front Avenues in the southwest quadrant of the city. Hundreds of people pack into the marketplace to browse for local crafts (by potters, woodcarvers and candle makers), locally grown produce and live entertainment – from tap dancers to country rock bands. I love markets like that; they’re relaxed and relaxing. And fun to spend some time at, peeking into the stalls to see how ingenious someone can be.
Across the Willamette River – traversed by half a dozen steel bridges – is the Hawthorne district. A sort of tamer cousin of San Francisco’s Haight district, the Hawthorne area is located with cafes and bookstores. Hairy-legged ladies and long-haired men walk the streets and work in the little eateries where hippie culture has melded easily with contemporary hipster culture. They’re places that serve a sort of healthy-food-for-the-young-and-introverted set. Ah life in Portland.
Anyway, there’s a little brew-and-view in Hawthorne called the Bagdad Theater, which screens movies for a few bucks and you can drink as much locally crafted brew as you like. I recall downing a pitcher and a half of a local wheat microbrew last time during a screening of “Slingblade.” Drunk and sad, I cried. Good movie, though, even without the beer.
I skipped out on Nob Hill this time around, though. Locals call the area Northwest or – more appropriately – “Trendyfirst and Trendy-third” after the streets that bound the neighborhood, whose sister neighborhood is the original Nob Hill in San Francisco: Streets are lined with turn-of-the-century Victorian houses, some of which are home to boutiques and book stores.
Although it’s also home to dozens of cafes (as is Hawthorne), it’s much more upscale, with several home furnishing stores for the well-to-do crowd. I’ve enjoyed poking around the stores and browsing pat alabaster lamps, colorful glassware and really expensive kites. Last time I was in the neighborhood I stopped at a café for a “mocha mindfreezer” and ate at a place called Seafood Mama, where all the waiters were flamboyantly gay and the filet of Oregon salmon was pretty ****** good.
* * * * *
Portland, Oregon
April 21, 2008
Breakfast at the Bijou Café consisted of oyster hash (fresh oysters in cornmeal flour and sautéed with onions, potatoes and parsley). The classic hash taste is definitely updated by the lightly fried oysters. The concierge at Hotel Monaco said it’s his favorite place to eat downtown. Soft yellows, light wood trim and white exposed brick give this place a casual elegance, and simple blue-and-white gingham table cloths and hardwood floors add to the French country atmosphere without injecting any pretension.
For supper I stopped at the popular Jake’s, where 19th-century oil paintings, deep green French curtains and dark wood paneled walls serve as the backdrop to a carnival of sounds: lively conversation, the tinkling of glasses and plates, and music – all of which continues a tradition that began in 1892 when Jake Frieman opened a seafood restaurant to showcase regional fish specialties, especially the crawfish.
In keeping with that tradition, I ordered half a dozen Netarts Bay oysters, Jake’s crawfish boil (Oregon-raised crawfish) and a glass of Cloudline pinot gris from the Willamette Valley. I don’t know why anyone eats crawfish. They’re the slugs of the sea – full of crap and short on meat. Still, I can sort of understand what made Jake’s famous. You can break a sweat working on those little things, but when you do grab a chunk of meat, odds are it’s some of the sweetest you’ve had. The oysters were meaty, although a bit on the fishy side. Considering that’s how oysters taste and that they are fresh, I’m pretty forgiving. The wine was crisp and fruity, dry enough to enjoy with the seafood.
I’m in Portland, the microbrew capital of the world, so it would have been just plain wrong to go without visiting a local brew house. Over at Bridgeport Brewery, I slurped an Old Knucklehead, a hoppy, potent classic barley wine served in the mezzanine of the bar attached to the brewery. It’s Oregon’s oldest craft brewery.
The bar is where I-beams, twinkling votives and exposed brick intersect, a place that encapsulates modern Portland, Seattle’s better half: a booming population of young, semi-professional singles who have converged on the city as a segue into the rest of their lives, where delaying marriage and family is the norm, and sushi and a hearty beer are what fill the stomachs of this unique population. Which brings up my new acquaintance, Sarah: Nowhere else is the marriage of granola and tattoos more sacred than Portland, although Sarah had no interest in either, from what I could tell.
Back to the Old Knucklehead. The beer is actually aged in American oak bourbon barrels, giving it notes of vanilla, toffee and sherry. Three gulps left and I wasn’t even sober any more. At 20 proof, though, what can you expect? I had to try the E.S.B., but since I hadn’t had a bitter (English-style ale) in almost 15 years, I had no idea what I was in for. The flavor is mellow but still weighty. It’s slightly more than 12 proof, which helps give it that assertive body. Considering that bitters are the only ales – only beers, actually – that give me a headache immediately upon consumption, I was taking a gamble (largely because I hadn’t consumed that style of beer since college and since my mid-30s body has been quick to hangover with everything from gin to absinthe Well, with the absinthe I think it was more withdrawal after a day of full alcohol consumption, but no matter.
* * * * *
Portland, Oregon
April 22, 2008
There are people who like the Bijou and there are people who like Mothers – both fantastic breakfast joints. Mother’s, where I spent this morning, is a great place. It’s bright, airy, with blonde wood floors and sheer white curtains that are draped from the high ceiling. Chandeliers and gilded mirrors complement the rustic wood cabinets and wainscoting painted in soft green and yellow pastels. It’s elevated comfort food, and any place that warns you that the breakfast dishes are cooked with pure butter is good with me. So I ordered the buttermilk biscuit breakfast with pork apple sausage on side.
Sarah was right: When in Portland, do as Portlanders do. Drink. Eat. Repeat.
I was told not to miss out on lunch at Huber’s, where the perfect young tom turkey has made a name for this dark, cozy spot. It’s a hearty serving of turkey, moist and tender, with two full cups of cranberry sauce and stuffing that melts in your mouth. It was accompanied by a Spanish coffee (Kailua, Bacardi 151, triple sec and coffee topped w/fresh whipped cream nutmeg & flamed tableside by the mustachioed bartender decked out in red tie, black vest and arm bands). Black-and-white photos of the original proprietors from the (shanghaied) Louie family hung above my booth, and above that an American flag below the life-size oil portrait of young Louie himself wielding a carving knife over a plump bird.
“Enjoy our fair city,” the bartender told me. “We’re known for roses, microbreweries and gentlemen’s clubs. Oh yeah, we have more gentlemen’s clubs than anywhere else in the nation. If you want the oldest (and the skankiest), there’s Dream On Saloon.” He actually began to list half a dozen of the city’s more colorful clubs. “There’s also Sassy’s downtown, but the one everyone knows about is the Acropolis.”
“I leave tomorrow though,” I told him, not to offend him.
“Well, maybe tonight then,” he said encouragingly as the Chinese waitress shuffled by.
* * * * *
It was in Old Town where scores of early Portland architecture still remains. Most of the buildings date to the mid-1800s and are simple, multi-storeyed buildings of heavy red and white stone. Yet a major contrast to the hearty survival of the buildings in Old Town, officially called Skidmore, bums fill the streets, X-rated adult movie houses and boarded-up buildings occupy the same area as the impressive 19th-century buildings.
Located in what used to be called the city’s Old North End, Old Town Pizza (where I spent the evening) sits in the original lobby of the former Merchant Motel, built in 1880 by two lumber barons. The place oozes charm: The lobby's original decorative cast-iron beam posts flank the former reception desk where patrons now place their orders. Underneath the floorboards below are the Shanghai Tunnels that were used to nab unsuspecting sailors before transporting them to ships docked on the river. The area of the city was once a popular place for brothels, and one working gal named Nina found herself thrown down the elevator shaft ... and is reported to have never left the building.
There’s a peculiar live-and-let-live spirit among Portlanders that I haven’t yet quite grasped. Maybe it’s the city’s fairly insulated location from the contemporary moral culture of the rest of the nation. Or it could just be in their blood: The city was one big notorious red light district a century ago, when sailors, miners and loggers transited through Portland, stopping along the way, no doubt, at the many saloons for liquor and gambling on the first floor and trollops upstairs, so maybe its people haven’t quite shaken that characteristic. Maybe they don’t want to. After all the city is home to about 50 strip clubs, arguably more per capita than any other city in the world.
Come for the gentlemen's clubs, some might say, but stay for the food and the beer. I'm buying it ... although I never made it to Eastbank.
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