Showing Off My Take on Portland's Food Scene

Where would you take a well-known food writer who asked you to show her your favorite Portland haunts? That happened to me last week when Leslie Kelly, Seattle food and wine writer and staff writer for the Dish section of Allrecipes.com, asked if I'd be interested in meeting up and showing her a few of my go-to spots.

She made it easy when she asked to start a few blocks from our house at Muscadine, the tiny outpost of genuine Southern American cooking owned by chef Laura Rhoman. During our sumptuous order of fried chicken, sea island red peas, collard greens, biscuits, oxtail ragu, cheesy grits and eggs arrived—did I mention we're both passionate eaters?—she did a short video of the meal while we plotted a few stops in the 'hood.

Since, like me, Leslie's a committed carnivore, I wanted her to meet my favorite vegan-turned-whole animal-butcher Ben Meyer (left). Handily for us he was right next door at Grain & Gristle for the day, so we marched in and promptly ordered G&G's signature and justly lauded burger along with a tap cocktail, a house-made hibiscus gin fizz that was an ideal counterpoint to the richness of the juicy pasture-raised beef in the burger.

Leslie managed to moan over the burger while at the same time talking cuts of beef with Ben. With second lunch literally under our belts, we drove up the street to tour the newly burgeoning businesses on 42nd Avenue. We stopped in so I could buy a chuck roast from Old Salt Marketplace's butcher case (right), and as it was being wrapped I gave Leslie a tour of the meat aging gracefully in the walk-in, then showed off the dry goods and value-added pickles and preserves that Ben has begun producing out of the space.

Across the street was Tommy Habetz's new Pizza Jerk, so we popped in for a slice of cheese pizza (left). (If you're keeping count we're now at third lunch…) Part of my not-so-hidden agenda was to drag my guest away from restaurants and shift the conversation to ingredients. Knowing that the Cully neighborhood is home to two urban farms, we drove a few blocks down NE 42nd to Simpson Street Farm, Rex Rolle's nearly 1-acre plot that supplies vegetables to farmers' markets and local restaurants.

A little further up the street is The Side Yard Farm (top photo), one of the small-acreage urban plots that is also a farm-to-plate catering service and supper club, the brainchild of chef and farmer Stacey Givens. As we stood surveying the orderly planted beds, Stacey herself emerged from one of the outbuildings and gave us the background on the project, along with farm schwag of mugs and a shopping bag. Do I need to mention that Leslie was totally impressed with the scale and ambitiousness of our urban agriculture scene as embodied by these two places?

My guest was needing to get back for her next appointment, but I prevailed upon her to make one more stop at Providore Fine Foods (right) the new location for the patres familias of the city's provisioners, Peter de Garmo and Don Oman, who opened their legendary Pastaworks shop on Hawthorne 25 years ago. This new incarnation is now owned by de Garmo's son Kevin and his wife, Kaie Wellman, who converted (in an oh-so-Portland move) a former car dealership on what is a still-developing stretch of lower Sandy Boulevard.

After chatting about kalettes and sea beans with Ken Fisher, wet rack wunderkind and body man to Rubinette Produce owner Josh Alsberg, exchanging fish stories with Flying Fish's Lyf Gildersleeve, then oohing and aahing over the fresh-baked focaccia, cheese-and-charcuterie counter and pasta display, I almost had Leslie packed in the car when she saw the Pie Spot (left). Part of the Ocean micro-restaurant hub that backs up to Providore, she had to run in and grab a few samples of the mini-pies on display and try to recruit them to open a branch in Seattle.

I'm guessing that means she was happy with our three-hour tour.

Read more about Providore Fine Foods and its purveyors.

All photos by Leslie Kelly.

Livin' in the Blurbs: Moving Our Food System Forward

Like the pairings of Astaire and Rogers; Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young; and Key and Peele, there's a beautiful affinity that happens when farmers and chefs get together. On Monday, March 3, the Farmer-Chef Connection will be holding an all-day conference to further the conversation between food buyers and growers in the Northwest. This year the day is organized around five-minute, TED-style talks called  "FED" talks (get it?), featuring some of the area's best known food movers and shakers:

• Gabe Rosen and Kina Voelz, Biwa: “Health Insurance and Wages in a Small Restaurant”
• Frank Morton, Wild Garden Seed: “Plant Patents on Common Vegetables”
• Samantha Bakall, Oregonian Food & Dining Reporter: “Waste Not, Want Yes: Beyond Farm-to-Table in the City Where the Dream of the ‘90s is Still Alive”
• Alice Busch, Emergency Management Coordinator at Multnomah County Department of Human Services: “Dining Through Disaster”
• Cory Carman, Carman Ranch: “The Steakholders in Sustainable Beef”
• Dayna McErlean, DOC, Yakuza, and Nonna: “Successfully Broke”
• Lyf Gildersleeve, Flying Fish Company: “Traceable Trash Fish”

Details: Farmer-Chef Connection. Mon., Mar. 3, 8:30 am-5 pm; $39 with preregistration online. Event at Western Forestry Center, 4033 SW Canyon Rd.

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Portland is a place where more and more people are starting to ask the question "Where does my food come from?" And, no, I'm not talking about that episode of Portlandia where the chicken being served in a restaurant is named Colin. It has more to do with a desire to eat healthy, local food and avoid pesticides, GMOs and big carbon footprints, to support accessibility, community and quality in our food choices. Perhaps no one exemplifies that ethos on the purveyor side than Ben Meyer of Grain and Gristle and Old Salt Marketplace. In a recent article in Forbes magazine on Portland's leading food entrepreneurs, Meyer discusses his strategies for selling the highest quality, sustainably produced meat and produce for an affordable price, plus providing all of his employees with a living wage and health care. His restaurants are places where not just his neighbors, but the farmers and ranchers he works with, can afford to eat in his restaurants. His new project is The Descendants Dinner Series, bringing together pioneering chefs of the Northwest's farm-to-table movement with outstanding area farmers and some lucky young chefs in what are sure to make delicious, as well as stimulating, evenings.

Details: The Descendants Dinner Series. Beginning Mon., Mar. 10, 6:30 pm; $100 includes beverage pairings. Reservations required. Old Salt Marketplace, 5027 NE 42nd Ave. 971-255-0167.

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Like so many modern conveniences like the internet, e-mail and artisan cheeses, it's funny how you don't realize what you've been missing until one day it comes into your life and you're, like, "Wow, how did I ever get along without it?" Until Friends of Family Farmers (FoFF) was organized to foster family farmers whose approach agriculture respected the land, treated animals humanely and sustained local communities, small farmers had very little support in advancing issues that affected them or a way to network with other farmers who shared their concerns. In addition to promoting legislation that helped ease restrictions on farm-direct sales and marketing, FoFF has been involved in efforts to ban growing canola in the Willamette Valley, started public education evenings called "InFARMation (and Beer)" to bring the public into the discussion about the direction of the state's agriculture and been involved in a myriad of other efforts. They're currently in the middle of a series of 20 Listening Sessions around the state designed to bring together farmers and ranchers to talk about the great parts of, as well as the barriers to, farming successfully in Oregon, where they can brainstorm solutions and help define the future of agricultural policy in Oregon. Upcoming sessions in the metro area are:

• Thurs., Mar. 6, Redland Grange, 18131 S Fischers Mill Road, Oregon City, 7-9pm. Please RSVP here.
• Mon., Mar. 10, Kennedy School, 5736 NE 33rd Avenue, Portland, 7-9pm. Please RSVP here.

Details: Listening Sessions with Friend of Family Farmers. Full statewide schedule here.

Top photo from New Seasons Market. Bottom photo from Friends of Family Farmers.

Livin' in the Blurbs: Oregon's Uniqueness Exemplified

Health care is a big topic these days in many sectors, not just in Congress, and many Portland restaurateurs are taking the unusual step of providing health care their employees, including servers, kitchen staff and dishwashers. Businesses of 50 or fewer employees are not required to do so by the Affordable Health Care Act, so providing this vital access costs small employers a great deal. Local restaurant owners Gabe Rosen and Kina Voelz of Biwa have debuted the innovative practice of adding a 5% "Health and Wellness" service charge on guests' checks, with a card accompanying it explaining that the money goes into a fund to pay for health insurance for all of the staff, as well as bonuses for the cooks and dishwashers. The response from customers has been universally positive, as has been the response from staff, some of whom have never been able to afford health care before or have put off surgeries due to the expense. Happy and healthy employees committed to a place that cares about them—now that's a good business model.

Details: Biwa, 215 SE 9th Ave.. on the corner of SE 9th and Ash. 503-239-8830.

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Draft horses, working breeds almost lost to the mechanization of farming, are experiencing a resurgence of interest, not just from preservationists and horse breeders, but from young farmers who are integrating them back onto the land. Seen as less expensive and easier on the land than trucks and tractors, they're also used as part of a rotational system of fertilizing and renewing pastures. Oregon is a hotbed of the return of plowing with teams of horses, and you can see these gorgeous creatures doing the work they were bred to do at Heiser Farms' Draft Horse and Mule Plowing Demonstration on Sat., Oct. 26. Some of the best teams in the area will be making an appearance and the farm store and farm activities will be running, so it should be a great day to get out in the country.

Details: Heiser Farms' Draft Horse and Mule Plowing Demonstration. Sat., Oct. 26, 10 am-2 pm; free. Heiser Farms, 21425 SE Grand Island Loop, Dayton. Map.

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When Ben Meyer first started his restaurant-cum-beer parlor Grain & Gristle on NE Prescott, he wanted the menu and pricing to be modest and accessible to we average Joes and Janes. That ethic of accessibility has gone several steps further with his new establishment, Old Salt Marketplace, a combination restaurant, bar and butcher shop. Designed to serve the diverse communities and incomes of its neighborhood, think of it as Laurelhurst Market for the rest of us. Imagine delicious food, simple wood beam construction and affordable prices, and you've got the vibe. Along with its own farmers' market set up on Thursday evenings in the parking lot, it also boasts a cooking school, Good Keuken, owned by Blake van Roekel, formerly of Robert Reynolds' Chef Studio. Offering classes on a wide range of topics from urban foraging to butchering to baking holiday cookies, she's about to debut an innovative series of classes with top Portland chefs, all priced to sell.

Details: Good Keuken, 5031 NE 42nd Ave. 503-753-1655.