Slabtown Ribs and Barbeque
2606 NW Vaughn Street
Portland, OR
Let me ask you this: whenever you see smoke coming out from a restaurant (hopefully, from the exhaust), what comes to your mind? Good food, doesn’t it? So how about when it comes from a smoker? Or how about it coming from a smoker on the street at 7:00 a.m.??? Yup, that’s what happened when I passed by Slabtown Ribs and Barbeque during my stay in Portland. Every morning I passed by, I could see that smoker parked in front of the restaurant (which, otherwise, I would have passed by without noticing!) and wondered myself: “wow, that’s starting early!” And, of course, given you see actual smoke rather than the pressure cook/boil the meat, grill it, toss it with sauce and serve it (like, say, Montana’s Cookhouse), that was incentive enough to try to have some (real) BBQ goodness…
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Tagged as:
BBQ,
Beef,
Portland
Pambiche
2811 NE Glisan Street
Portland, OR
I don’t recall/remember/know how or when this began but, somehow, I have been deemed to be the subject-matter expert when it comes to Latin American food. Don’t get me wrong, I do really appreciate people think that is the case; however, I am not sure to what extent my expertise goes, as Latin America cuisine goes in almost all directions: from meat in Argentina, to seafood in Peru, to spices in the West Indies. The list goes on and on. But, rather than taking it for granted, I take it as a challenge. So why bring this? Since our showing of Latin food in Vancouver is heavily skewed towards Mexican, other Latin cuisines have been extremely shadowed by it. The only growing sprouts of other Latin cuisine have been Peruvian (El Inka Deli and Mochikas, which I still have to go) and Salvadorean (Rinconcito Salvadoreño) but even then, they are “forced” to serve Mexican dishes because the public “demands” it. But, given I was in the US, with a heavier Latin, non-Mexican influx, I thought I should give these other places a try. And the place is one of the top rated restaurants in Portland and which Sherman heavily recommended me give it a try: Pambiche.
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Tagged as:
Latin America,
Pork,
Portland
Stepping Stone Cafe
2390 NW Quimby Street
Portland, OR
Hello from Portland!
Yes, finally, after been grounded at work for several months, I am finally travelling again. OK, OK, I was in both Tacoma and Tukwila but, you know what, that does not really count as it can be done as a day trip. However, Portland, while is driving distance as well, is slightly different. By the time you get here, chances are you might want to stay at least a couple of nights.
So, unlike certain other border crossings, this time it went relatively smooth and managed to drive from Downtown Vancouver to my hotel (in Uptown Portland) in about 8 or so hours (with a couple of stops in between – without the stops, it would have been ~6.5 hours), which meant I arrived early enough… To go to an open restaurant!!! Which then again begs the usual question… Which one?
I ended up going to Stepping Stone Cafe for one reason: it is a diner. Granted, there are a lot other restaurants in the area (think a combination of Kits and Commercial Drive) but, at the same time, it has that odd forced “fakeness” to it. So, rather to go to some of the these more “posh” places, I chose to go to what might be the lowest common denominator – but, then again, my reputation for selecting this type of restaurants is quite well know…
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Tagged as:
Diner,
Portland
