Portland Dining Month Giveaway

Irma is the lucky winner with comment #5! Congratulations Irma!

March is Travel Portland's annual Portland Dining Month with $33 unique 3-course meals offered nightly at 100-plus participating Portland restaurants. Travel Portland started Portland Dining Month in 2009 as a way to promote overnight travel to our fair city. Some of the many Portland restaurants that I love that are participating this year include Andina, Autentica, Biwa, Davenport, Departure, Kachka, Ken's Artisan Pizza, Little Bird, Ned Ludd, Olympia Oyster Bar, Radar, Trifecta, Xico and so many more.

New this year, Feastly Portland has joined Travel Portland’s lineup. The pop-up dining experience will feature 21 top chefs from around the world in to-be-released locations around the city. The focus this year is on ethnic cuisine including Ethiopian, Pilipino, Turkish, Puerto Rican and Nigerian dishes. Find out more at eatfeastly.com.

I have two gift cards -- one for Ataula and 1 for Ray -- that each entitle the bearer to a 3-course Portland Dining month dinner this March. All you need to do to be entered for this drawing to win BOTH cards is leave a comment here about some sort of food or drink (or food adventure) that you've had in another city in the US or abroad that you'd love to see in Portland. OR you can comment about something like this that you've never experienced firsthand but have dreamed of and would like to see here. I'm writing down a number now and will snap a photo of it. That numbered commenter will be announced at the end of next week and then I'll mail out the cards.

Whether you win or not I highly encourage you to make your reservations for Portland Dining Month via portlanddiningmonth.com. Travel Portland has partnered up with OpenTable and a donation will be made to Oregon Food Bank's hunger-relief efforts for every reservation booked through the website. Please share this any way you can/want. Thank you!

Eighth Annual Portland Fermentation Festival -- TICKETS ON SALE!

The Portland Fermentation Festival aka Stinkfest is less than a month away! I'm pasting the press release that I just sent out here below. Please have a gander and save the date! Want to participate as an exhibitor or do a demo this year?! Info. on how to do so below.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Eighth Annual Portland Fermentation Festival Thursday, October 26th 6-9:30pm Ecotrust’s Billy Frank Jr. Conference Center Rooftop food and drink sales and music 721 NW 9th Ave. Portland, OR All ages, open to the public, $10 advance, $12 cash at door Children 12 and younger attend for free www.portlandfermentationfestival.comTickets on sale! We are now less than a month away from the EIGHTH annual Portland Fermentation Festival! Please join us on the evening of Thursday, October 26th at Ecotrust for Portland's annual, open-to-the-public, all-ages celebration of fermented food and drink lovingly referred to as Stinkfest. Bring kimchi, try kimchi. Bring miso, try miso. Come out for Portland's fermented food and drink skill sharing, recipe sharing and tasting event of the year. Taste and share live, fermented food and drinks made by professionals and home fermentation enthusiasts at the annual event that brought out more than 400 attendees in 2016.

Talk to fellow fermenters, exchange cultures and recipes, get advice from local food fermentation enthusiasts, attend fermentation demo's and sample everything from sour pickles, miso and natto, to cheeses, hard cider and kombucha.

2017 highlights:

Nat West of Reverend Nat's Hard Cider will be making and sampling Hawaiian okolehao at this year's festival! For festivals past Nat has made chicha, kumiss, Angel of Death (LAMB-steeped cider!) and other gutsy ferments. We always really, really look forward to the wild (in more ways than one) ferments that Nat experiments with and brings to the festival. Love it.

Imperfect Produce recently launched in Portland and they'll be joining the Stinkfest festivities this year in order to talk up what they're doing, hand out some of their Imperfect Produce and give fest attendees recipes to ferment their produce with.

Some of the fermented treats already on the roster to be sampled in the main festival hall from amateur and professional fermenters include Korean makgeolli, fermented mustards and ketchups, adaptogenic herbal kimchi, Wanpaku Natto from Heidi Nestler, Soma Kombucha and Elixirs, Eva's Herbucha, Squirrel and Crow Tempeh, Claudia Lucero of Urban Cheesecraft's vegan fermented cheeses and much, much more.

On the beautiful Ecotrust rooftop (with its lovely open hearth to cozy up to and pretty strung lights) we'll have food and drink for sale. Reverend Nat's Hard Cider will be pouring delicious hard cider and Cinder BBQ (at Bushwhacker Cider every Thursday) will serve tasty sandwiches. DJ Jimbo will make his annual pickled playlist for the fest so you can sip on cider, eat a 'cue sandwich and listen to sweet and salty Jimbo tunes under the stars. We have surprisingly *never* had a rainy Portland Fermentation Festival. Strange but true.

Festival demo's will take place throughout the night. Please check our social media closer to the date for details.

Admission for the 6pm or 7:30pm Thursday festival tastings and fermentation demos is $10.

Online tickets are on sale! A limited number of tickets will be available at the door the night of the festival and will be $12/cash only.

If you or your business has a ferment that you'd like to sample and/or demo at this year's festival please visit our website for info. on how to apply to be a part.

Festival coverage:

KGW

Photos from last year's festival Food Lover's Guide to Portland

Cooking Up a Story

KBOO Food Show

Portland Monthly

Willamette Week

Portland Mercury

OPB

Facebook Portland Fermentation Festival Twitter @PDXFermentFest Website www.portlandfermentationfestival.com

Mark Bittman at the James Beard Public Market Fundraiser in Portland January 22, 2015

I'm a very lucky lady. I got to be Mark Bittman's date when he was in town for the James Beard Public Market fundraiser dinner at Leftbank Annex last night. Greg Higgins of Higgins Restaurant put together an incredible Pacific Northwest bounty meal comprised of recipes inspired by Mr. B's latest book How to Cook Everything Fast which Higgins joked in his intro. to the event was probably "the longest book on fast cooking." It's a whopping 4+ pounds after all. (My favorite dishes that I've cooked from the book so far: miso glazed catfish with mushrooms, caramelized cod and Vietnamese-style fish sauce brussels. Mmmmm!)

The James Beard Public Market has been in the works now for nearly 15 years and it looks like we'll finally have a market sooner than later. There have been all sorts of recent developments including the securing of the space at the west end of the Morrison bridge from the county for development, the partnership with the Norwegian design firm Snohetta to design it, the partnership with Bon Appetit Management Company to develop the teaching and demo. kitchens and on and on. In other words, things are moving right along now and gaining momentum. There are so many great local food folks involved including board secretary Janie Hibler, outreach and operations director Ann Forsthoefel, board members Lisa Sedlar and Greg Higgins and many, many more.

The dinner met the night's fundraising goals and the highlight was Mr. Bittman's inspiring speech which you can listen to here if you weren't able to attend:

The sound is pretty crappy but if you crank it up you can get most of it. There were a lot of bodies in the room and a lot of wine glasses if you know what I mean.

I'm really looking forward to one fine day when we have a large urban, indoor/outdoor year-round public market. I grew up in Cincinnati with Findlay Market and I really get how important these hubs can be to local culture. I want it! I want it now! Patience. It will soon be. Help make the James Beard Public Market dream a reality. Let's do this thing.

Leftbank Annex all pretty for the event. Three Leg Torso playing on the stage just out of view of the photo to the right.

Mark and Bon Appetit Management Co. CEO and co-founder Fedele Bauccio before the dinner.

Super tasty menu from Greg Higgins.

EVERYONE left with a copy of Mark's How to Cook Everything Fast.

Mark giving his inspiring speech. Link to the audio is above.

Greg Higgins' yummy dessert.

Mark and James Beard Public Market executive director Ron Paul at the end of the night.

The happiest and luckiest person I know at the end of the night. Yep.

Learn more about the James Beard Public Market at www.jamesbeardmarket.com

Toro Bravo Cookbook Events

It's real! I got my first advanced copy of Toro Bravo: Stories. Recipes. No Bull and I couldn't be happier about it. Two and a half years in the making and it's finally here! The launch date is October 15th but you can pre-order copies from Powell's, McSweeney's and Amazon now.

We're going to seven cities so far for the book tour this fall -- New York, D.C., Baltimore, San Francisco, Boise, Seattle and Eugene. Below are events that we've already slated in Portland and beyond including the book launch party on Wednesday, October 15th at Toro. I'll keep updating with posts here as we add new events. If you're interested in having us visit for a book event or any sort of media please contact McSweeney's director of publicity Isaac Fitzgerald. You'll like him. He's really nice.

New York City James Beard House dinner + Toro Bravo cookbook previewEssence of Spain: Tapas to Sherry Thursday, Sept. 19th 7pm $130 for members, $170 otherwise Call 212.627.2308 to reserve a seat

Portland Powell's City of Books reading and signing Saturday, Sept. 21st 4pm

Portland Wordstock panel -- On and Off the Menu: PDX Chefs Sunday, October 6th noon John Gorham, Liz Crain, Gabriel Rucker & Meredith Erickson for the Toro Bravo and Le Pigeon cookbooks Moderated by Karen Brooks Wordstock event description: "Two famed Portland chefs. Two books hot off the cutting board! What does it take to convert perfect food from restaurant plate to cookbook page. These panelists are shaken not stirred."

Portland Farmers Market Cookbook Fest PSU Farmers market Sat., Oct. 12th, 9am-1pm

Portland Toro Bravo book launch party at Toro Music. Food. Drinks. Books. Partaaay! Tuesday, Oct. 15th, 5-10pm

San Francisco Omnivore Books on Food Toro Bravo dinner at Contigo + book signing Wednesday, Oct. 23rd Fixed price TBD

Brooklyn Powerhouse Arena book event Tuesday, Nov. 19th 7pm

Mario Batali thinks you should PRE-ORDER THE BOOK!

Toro Bravo according to him:

"These guys make Portland one of the most exciting restaurant cities in the world today." -Mario Batali

One of David L. Reamer's many amazing photographs in Toro Bravo: Stories. Recipes. No Bull.

Back of the book with all of the fantastic blurbs from Mario Batali, Cheryl Strayed, Gus Van Sant, Carrie Brownstein, Paul Bertolli and Karen Brooks.

And the beautiful spine. Love!

Taste of the Nation Portland 2013

This year's 26th anniversary Portland Taste of the Nation at McMenamins Crystal Ballroom was incredible as always and rather than type up all of the reasons why I'm going to lay it all out in photos for you. This was the first year Taste was held at the Crystal Ballroom and it's a great venue although next year they should consider cranking up the air. It got a little toasty. If you weren't able to make it please consider attending next year. It costs a pretty penny but 100% of proceeds go toward hunger relief in Oregon. Without further ado...

Biwa's soy cured escolar with shaved beets.

Lardo's beautiful porchetta.

Boke Bowl sui mai action

Craggan hydrating and about to eat a Boke Bowl pork and shrimp sui mai.

Racion's chicharrons topped with tuna? Ahhh, took too long to post this and can't remember exactly but DO remember they were super tasty.

View from the balcony an hour or so into this year's Taste of the Nation.

Our plates of Trigger hot wings and other tasty things with Captured by Porches kolsch.

Anthem Cider's organic hops cider.

Departure's grilled scallop hand roll with coconut miso.

St. Jack's not so pretty but delicious chicken liver mousse with port poached prunes.

Laurelhurst Market's corned beef tongue reubens with a smoky bourbon cocktail. One of my favorites of the night.

And for dessert, 50 Licks soft serve churros and chocolate ice cream.

Stay tuned for next year's Taste of the Nation! Always delicious and always 100 percent to a great cause. www.portlandtaste.org

Winner of Taste of the Nation Portland 2013 Tickets!

You know who you are lucky #4 commenter. You've won yourself two VIP tickets to this year's Taste of the Nation on Tuesday, May 7th at McMenamins Crystal Hotel & Ballroom! Drop me a line at info at lizcrain dot com with your name and contact info. and I'll pass that along to the organizers who are donating the tickets. Your pair of VIP tickets will be available the night of the event at will call.

Thanks everyone for all of your tasty comments. I hope that some of these businesses come to fruition. As for me, I want a soft pretzel cart in my North Portland neighborhood, near my house, or fuck it, in my driveway with all sorts of homemade mustards and sauces.

For those of you who didn't win tickets there are still tickets available for this year's 26th anniversary Taste of the Nation. It's one of the best food events in town and I highly recommend it. In addition to it being delicious and super fun 100% of proceeds go toward ending local child hunger.

Thanks everyone!

Share Our Strength's Taste of the Nation Tuesday, May 7th, 2013 6:30-9pm McMenamins Crystal Hotel & Ballroom 1332 W Burnside Portland, OR 97205 Tickets $85 and up (order by phone 877.26TASTE or online) www.strength.org/portland

Taste of the Nation Portland 2013 -- Ticket Giveaway!

Share Our Strength's 26th annual Taste of the Nation on Tuesday, May 7th at McMenamins Crystal Hotel and Ballroom is less than a week away and in an effort to help generate last minute ticket sales I'm offering a ticket giveaway here. The bighearted, hardworking folks at Taste of the Nation Portland have donated a pair of VIP tickets ($150 dollars EACH, gen. admission is $85) to me for this year's event. (Actually, two pairs. I get to go as well.) VIP ticket holders head in to Taste of the Nation and sample select food and drink an hour before everyone else and they also get complimentary valet parking.

I love Taste of the Nation because 100% of ticket sales go toward working to end child hunger via Oregon Food Bank, Klamath-Lake Counties Food Bank, St. Vincent de Paul Food Recovery Program and Partners for a Hunger-Free Oregon. Read about last year's Taste of the Nation here.

This year's TOTN will showcase food and drink from 30-plus restaurants, 17 wineries, 7 distilleries and 7 breweries. The list is growing daily.

So it's a VERY worthwhile cause that I highly recommend buying tickets for. You can also try your luck for a pair of VIP tickets here on my blog. I've got a number in mind and I've written it down and taken a photo of it as proof. That numbered person to comment takes the cake -- you get me your name and contact info. Please help me to spread the word about this ticket giveaway and Taste of the Nation on Twitter, Facebook etc. so that we can all help promote and support the event and generate ticket sales. I'm foodloverPDX on Twitter.

So what to comment about? Let me know what sort of food/drink business you'd love to see launch in Portland. It could be a food or drink product, a market, a non-profit, coffeeshop, brewery. It could be something that already exists and you'd like to see replicated in another neighborhood or it could be a business you've just always wished existed here that you've never seen. Leave a comment and let me know -- I'm curious.

I'll announce the lucky winner this weekend or early next week!

Share Our Strength's Taste of the Nation Tuesday, May 7th, 2013 6:30-9pm McMenamins Crystal Hotel & Ballroom 1332 W Burnside Portland, OR 97205 Tickets $85 and up (order by phone 877.26TASTE or online) www.strength.org/portland

Portland Zagat Guide Giveaway

This summer and fall I was lucky enough to get to work on Portland's first very own Zagat Guide. A few weeks ago I came home to a box of them hot off the presses on my front porch. Have you seen it yet? What do you think? I'm sharing most of my copies with friends and family but I'm also giving one away here to a lucky commenter. I've written down a number as usual and that numbered commenter will get a copy of the guide. And just so you know this is how you pronounce Zagat. I've botched the pronunciation for years.

What I'd like to know is this -- what are some of your favorite brunch spots in Portland? I've been going to brunch more these days and it's always nice to know of new spots. Some brunches that I've really been digging lately -- Kenton Club (pop-up brunch every Saturday and Sunday), EaT Oyster Bar and Interurban. I live in North Portland and tend to stay up in the hinterland for brunch but suggestions throughout Portland are welcome.

Check out this recent Oregonian interview with Nina Zagat.

Portland Zagat Guide 2013 $14.95 www.zagat.com

Cocotte Contest

Have you checked out this year's Willamette Week Restaurant Guide that came out last week? I look forward to it every year. Partly, because I always get to review restaurants for it but also because it's a great compass for Portland dining and always makes me hungry to try more places.

This year I wrote three reviews for the guide -- Ocean City, Bamboo Sushi and Cocotte. I'd never been to Cocotte and loved it and think you might too. Here's a bit of what I wrote:

"For all of the complaints that Portland doesn’t do seafood right beyond a few sushi spots, let’s have a drum roll for Cocotte. This pretty little corner bistro on Northeast 30th Avenue’s restaurant row (neighbored by Beast, Yakuza, Autentica and DOC) is all about small plates and entrees from le mer. The smoked salmon salad over a fallen potato soufflé with tarragon aioli is topped with farm-fresh greens, moist and not too smoky salmon, and slivers of radish in a lemony shallot vinaigrette. It’s perfect..."

Read the full review

Cocotte's co-chef/owner, Kat LeSueur, sent me two $25 gift certificates for a blog contest so I've chosen a lucky number and that numbered commenter gets both gift certificates. This is what I'd like you to comment about here -- what's one of your favorite dishes to prepare solo at home when the days get shorter? When the weather gets cold a lot of times we tend to want to make big pots of stews and soups and braises -- enough to feed a small army. What's a smaller dish -- just for you -- that you love cook in the fall and winter?

Cocotte 2930 NE Killingsworth Street Portland, Oregon 97211 503.227.2669 www.cocottepdx.com

For Your Viewing Pleasure Pt. 5

Things have been crazy around here in more ways than one so rather than writing much this week I'm putting up a snapshot from recipe testing for the Toro Bravo Cookbook: The Making, Breaking and Riding of a Bull (McSweeney's fall 2013). We're quickly approaching our deadline and making so much headway. And in three weeks we head to Madrid for it! Hope you're doing well and spending as much time outside as you can.

www.torobravopdx.comFor Your Viewing Pleasure Pt. 4For Your Viewing Pleasure Pt. 3For Your Viewing Pleasure Pt. 2For Your Viewing Pleasure Pt. 1