Good Eats in Portland

Portland is known for its food- its markets, restaurants, food carts, coffeehouses and breweries. We explored a number of the city’s culinary offerings while we were there.

The first stop on our gastronomic adventure was to visit Portland’s famous food carts.  There are so many food carts in and around Portland that you could eat at a Portland food cart every night for two years before you would be forced to eat at the same one twice! We made our way to a place in downtown Portland where there must have been over 50 food carts.  These food carts are permanently located around this particular city block. There were all kinds of food from Thai cuisine to hamburgers. There were also a lot of people there.  Ashley took us to her favorite food cart called “Whole Bowl.” The bowl was filled with rice, beans, guacamole, avocado, salsa, cheese, cilantro and special sauce. All of the ingredients were very fresh and very tasty. After ordering, we went to a nearby park where we enjoyed both the delicious food and the beautiful weather.

One of 700 Food Carts

Homage to “Street Food”

One of the other famous establishments in Portland is Voodoo Doughnut.  This doughnut shop is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and has 6 locations throughout the city.  They offer many unusual flavors of doughnuts and unique toppings. Every time we passed by the store or went to it, there was a long line to get in. We had to wait for over 30 minutes when we went. They put their doughnuts in bright pink boxes. We saw lots of pink boxes floating around Portland. In addition to selling doughnuts, Voodoo Doughnut offers legal marriage ceremonies. Can you guess what you’d serve at the wedding reception?

Other days, we sampled food at other wonderful Portland restaurants. We dined at a great Mexican restaurant called ¿Por qué no? and a great Thai restaurant, too.  Almost every day we stopped and had coffee at a coffeehouse.  One of my favorites in the city is called “Revolución.” We also found a new gluten-free bakeries – Petunia’s and New Cascadia – and had to sample some of their wares. On my birthday, we had brunch at Cheryl’s on 12^th and topped off the day at my favorite restaurant for dessert, Papa Hayden’s.  I think that they have the best desserts in Portland.  Going to Papa Hayden’s was a real treat and was a wonderful way to celebrate my special day. Thank you Ashley and David for making it such a great birthday!

On Saturday mornings, there is a large Farmers Market in a park near Portland State University.  The park has large shade trees that provide an excellent place to shop and stroll.  We were impressed by the quality and the quantity of fresh, organic produce and the number of specialty foods.  There were vendors offering different types of hummus, nut butters, honey, herbs, cheeses, breads, gluten-free treats, Kombucha and much more.  Food vendors also offered samples and sold good eats to the shoppers.  One food vendor was even making fresh tortillas on a huge comal – a large griddle used in Mexico and Central America for making tortillas. We bought a few items. We both loved the market. If we lived in Portland, this would be a place that we would definitely frequent.

Tortillas on a comal

A huge wonderful market

Beautiful campus of PSU

It’s a good thing that we walked so much while we were in Portland because Portland is definitely a place where you can find many gastronomic delights.