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.

That Weed In Your Yard? It's the New Superfood.

For years I'd been battling the red-stemmed, succulent-like weed with the fat, oval leaves, wondering what in the heck kind of invader it was. It wasn't particularly hard to pull out, but it was pretty darn persistent, coming back every year like those door-to-door fundraising dudes with their clipboards. I'd seen it in other people's yards, too, even growing out of the most inhospitable cracks in the sidewalk.

Purslane in a grain salad.

Then, out at Ayers Creek Farm one day, I saw its familiar shape and made some kind of smart remark to Anthony Boutard about needing to do a better job weeding his rows. First, never mention weeds to an organic farmer…the plant you're pointing at might be a valuable nitrogen-fixing cover crop for soil improvement or be providing shade for a sprout that's just peeking out of the soil. He informed me that the "weed" I was disparaging was purslane, one of the bonus crops he sells at the farmers' market, along with other field greens like chickweed, lamb's quarters and more.

Purslane in buttermilk soup.

In Theo's, a Greek restaurant in the town of Penticton in British Columbia's Okanagan wine region, I saw purslane offered as a salad on the menu and pointed it out to Dave. The owner overheard us, and came over to tell the remarkable story of how his mother, Mary Theodosakis, was walking through a farmer's field and saw it growing under a plant in one of his rows. Having grown up foraging the plant called glistritha in her native Crete, she asked the surprised farmer if she could take some to serve at her restaurant. Long story short, the farmer started growing it just for her and then, when her customers began asking where they could buy some, he began growing it as a cash crop. (Full story here.)

Crunchy when fresh, with a mild, lemony flavor, it's most often used in salads, either as the main ingredient or combined with other greens and grains—try this terrific main dish recipe for tuna, grain and purslane salad. My friend Linda Colwell follows Deborah Madison's lead and includes it in a buttermilk and frikeh soup. Anthony likes to do a quick and easy pickled purslane (recipe below) that keeps in the fridge and can be featured on an antipasto platter or as an accompaniment to grilled meats.

Incredibly high in omega-3 fatty acids—more than any other vegetable—it's also a great source of beta-Carotene, with five times the vitamin E of spinach, according to an article by my friend Leslie Kelly. No wonder it's starting to get some buzz as the new Superfood.

Pickled Purslane
From Anthony Boutard at Ayers Creek Farm

Our staff keeps a nice kitchen garden outside of their front doors. For them, the plants they call verdolagas are an essential green. They are delicious boiled, sautéed, pickled or as a salad. The Lebanese serve them with yoghurt. The French salt purslane overnight before adding it to a salad. Boiled, it can be dressed with a bit of olive oil and ground pepper. Or mix the wilted leaves into a potato salad.

For us, purslane is an essential pickle. Many books suggest pickling just the stem. We prefer to pickle the whole shoot—leaves and stem together. This recipe works for two or three bags of purslane:

We heat and add a tablespoon of salt to 1-1/2 cups of water, then mix in an equal amount of white wine vinegar.  Add a few cloves of garlic, quartered, a tablespoon of peppercorns and a dried pepper.  Drop the purslane into the heated vinegar mixture and let it wilt for a bit.  Pack the purslane and vinegar mix in a mason jar. If you need to, top off with vinegar and water in equal proportions. Store in the refrigerator. We start using them about an hour later, but they will keep for several months.  Some recipes call for full strength vinegar, but we much prefer it diluted.