Portland Archives - A Side of Sweet

Weekend in Portland, Part 2

Heath and I started out our morning with brunch at Tasty and Sons. It was a-mazing. I had house made kimchi with stewed veggies over brown rice. Soo good! Heath had biscuits and gravy.

Weekend in Portland - Brunch at Tasty & Sons

We also had some beautifully-made drinks – a Bloody Mary for Health and something figgy and fizzy for myself.

To give me a peek at her background, my other host, Anesa, took me to try to Bosnian food. We went to Two Brothers to eat Chevapi (little sausages) and Serbian style flat bread called lepinja. The food was delicious and very hearty. The photo below on the right is a random sighting in Portland. Sweet ride!

We finished the night with a pint of local brew at the Green Dragon Bistro and Brewpub. You really can’t experience Portland without trying one of their hundreds of microbrews!

Weekend in Portland, Part I

Still on the interview trail, I headed to Portland to check out the program at OHSU. I also spent the weekend hitting up some local couch surfers for the local scoop on Portland! Voodoo Donuts Portland | Running Blonde

Heath and I went to the famous Voodoo Doughnuts. We snagged one of the uber-popular Maple Bacon Bars and also an oreo-topped one. So good! I am digging the sweet-salty of maple and bacon and have a couple of recipes that I want to try featuring the combo once life settles down a bit.

In order to take our love of coffee to the next level, we headed to the Stumptown Roasters Annex. They offer free tastings of their premium coffees at 11:00 and 2:00 every day.

The tasting process, also known as “cupping”, was pretty intense – some may say ridiculous. It was five steps and involved sniffing and swirling and slurping. Perhaps if you are a super taster, this process would have been more meaningful. It was funny to watch my fellow participants “ooh” and “aah” over the brews. One girl even used the word “purple” to describe the essence of the coffee she was tasting! Are-you-kidding-me?

Coffee Tasting Stumptown Portland | Running Blonde

There is something I like to call the “Garden State Effect”. Everyone raved about Garden State the movie. I watched it and thought it was strange and didn’t really make much sense. After discussing it with several people who “liked” it, and telling them how I felt, invariably they let out a sigh of relief and sheepishly admitted that they didn’t really get it either but were just going to about it to not seem like dummies!

The last stop was the Southeast Wine Collective. This brand new spot is an Urban Winery (only in Portland, right?) and was awesome! Also ladies, it was home to the cutest bartenders in Portland!

Portland Rose Garden + Bagel Co

Today we started out at the International Rose Garden. Portland is called the Rose City, and they prove it with this incredible free garden. The number of roses was almost overwhelming and I kept expecting to hear the “We’re painting the roses red” song from Alice and Wonderland!

There was also a Japanese Garden across the street, but we decided the $8 price tag was just a bit too much for out budget. Instead we did the “Google Tour”, which was still quite impressive.

After that we visited the “Alphabet District” on 23rd street, where the streets that cross is are named from A to Z. A bit of trivia, many of the characters from The Simpsons are named for these streets, including Ned Flanders, the bully Kearney, Reverend Lovejoy, Mayor Quimby, and Milhouse Van Houten. (Thanks to Wikipedia)

I forgot to pack a sweater, so I stopped in Brooklyn Industries and bought this awesome snap fleece:

We also stopped at the Portland Bagel Company and enjoyed their Bacon and Cheddar bagel, which was phenomenal. Lunch was a crepe at Vivace – brie and pear.

On the way out of town, we stopped at Widmer Brothers Brewery. We got a sample paddle and I finally found the amazing craft brews that I was expecting in Portland. Their beers were beyond delicious! My favorite was the Himbeer Gose. It was raspberry flavored and bright pink, much to the dismay of Pat. He found the Rotator IPA and the Nelson O’Ryely more enjoyable. We will definitely be looking to bring a case of their beer home!

That was the end of our time in Portland. Next stop – Oregon wine country.

Oregon Colombia River Highway

In the afternoon, we headed outside of Portland to see the historic Colombia River Highway. The highway is punctuated with waterfalls along the way and we stopped to see a few. The most impressive is Multnomah Falls, but this is also the most touristy (so much so it has a fudge stand at the bottom!). Our favorite was Bridal Veil.

On the way back home, we stopped at the very upscale Riverview Restaurant. The only reason this place fit into our budget is because they had a Groupon a few weeks ago! I had the best tuna steak I have ever had, and Pat had an amazing piece of salmon. We also topped it off with creme brulee, which was phenomenal. It was nice to sit on the deck outside, overlooking a river and a lot of green space. We highly recommend it!

Portland, OR

Portland was the first stop on the official 2011 “Residency Lifestyle Tour”. Pat and I both think that the west coast would be an ideal place for us to end up after our time in Madison is done.

We were lucky enough to find a place to stay with some locals, Daniel and Becky, on couchsurfing.com. They had a great place in north Portland, with easy access to the city via the metro. The first night, they took us to a local dive bar, something that Portland has on every block. It was the ultimate dive experience, with pool, video games, a big screen TV, shuffleboard, Poker from paybyphonecasino.uk, and a multitude of local beers on tap. We had an epic shuffleboard tournament, boys versus girls. Unfortunately, Becky and I were creamed by the boys, but we did put up a solid fight in the second game.

The next day, we hit up the Portland visitor’s center, where the people running the desk were SO helpful! I would highly recommemd making this your first stop if you are new to Portland.

Armed with maps, we set out to US Outdoors, a local sports shop, to find me a surfing wetsuit. I lucked out, and the first one I tried on was on sale AND fit perfectly. The guys working also told me I set a store record on fastest wetsuit on and off. Finally all those days as a triathlete pay off!

We stopped at one of the many food carts in Portland for some cheap thai food. If you are in Portland on a budget, food carts are the way to go! Lots of options and totally delicious!

In the afternoon, we hit up Mississippi Street, a place that reminds me a lot of State street. It’s lined with brew pubs, cute boutiques, and great restaurants. The smell of waffle cones drew us to Ruby Jewel Ice Cream. We chose the salted carmel and dark chocolate flavor. Their all natural, sustainable ice cream did not disappoint!

We also had a pint at Amnesia Brewing. Not the best beer I’ve ever had, but very satisfying given that we had one of the first sunny days that Portland had seen in weeks!

Sorry for the utter lack of photos for this post! We both left our cameras back at Daniel’s. 🙁