Portland Restaurant: PaaDee

The November issue of Portland Monthly Best Restaurants 2012 came out recently and of course it made me want to try a new restaurant, or ten. I finally picked PaaDee to be my first PM recommendation, figuring a restaurant that's name literally means "to bring good things" can't be bad for a Friday date night. Also, it's the same people behind Kinara, which I like, and Mee Sen, which I've been meaning to try.

Working with a tight budget, I am only commission after all, we decided to keep our date night affordable. Luckily one of our favorite theaters, Laurelhurst Theater on Burnside, only charges $4 for tickets and $16 for a bottle of wine, which of course I only get when I'm sharing. We decided to see Safety Not Guaranteed and follow that with PaaDee's 9pm happy hour. 

What: PaaDee
Where: 6 SE 28th Ave
When: 5 - 6:30pm and Last Hour

We ended up arriving early, but that was okay since there were many items on the regular menu I was happy to try. We (really just me) didn't want to wait for happy hour to order a drink, so I went ahead and chose A Taste of 27 ($9) with Oregon vodka, guava, Luxardo Maraschino, lemon, rock candy syrup, plum bitters and soda. It was really a well balanced cocktail. A little sweeter than what I might typically order, but I still enjoyed it.

Off the regular menu we ordered the Gra prao muu grob ($12) which was a super tasty combination of pork belly, basil, chili, and green beans that we added the fried farm egg ($1) to. The pork belly was crispy and the green beans had crunch. I really liked this dish and would definitely order it again.

Once the clock struck nine Adam selected a happy hour Sunrose Derby ($6) with Four Roses bourbon, Dolin Rouge, triple sec, lime, rock candy syrup and mint leaf. He was impressed, and even I was happy with a sip or two of this bourbon delight.

Even though our main dish was a great size and we probably could have called it good, we had to order off the happy hour menu. I mean, it's what we came for, right?

We chose the Tom Yum Goong ($5) and the Squid Skewers ($2). The hot and sour soup with prawns and mushrooms was excellent and on a cold fall night, which this was, I would highly recommend this. The Squid Skewers ($2) were okay. They had a spicy sauce on them, but were just slightly more chewy than I had hoped for.

Finally, we went with the Pak Kee Mao Pak ($5) with sauteed rice noodles and veggies. This noodle dish was a great deal and the portion was generous. Don't forget to squeeze the lime on top!

Overall the night was a success! We even ended this night with leftovers, which was nice since  most of our meal was happy hour prices and portions. From Adam's seat he spotted a fellow diners ramen dish and couldn't stop staring. It was slightly embarrassing, but I would have to agree that it looked AMAZING. I'm already planning our next movie/dining date night.

Beer Tour in Fort Collins: New Belgium, Big Beaver, Odell, Funkwerks, and Mayor of Old Town

A few weekends ago, Doug and I flew to Denver to visit Leslie and Ian in Fort Collins. Originally, we had planned to attend the Great American Beer Festival with them in Denver, but when tickets sold out within a matter of minutes, we had to let go of that part of the plan. It actually turned just fine in the end because during our two days in Fort Collins and two days in Denver, we somehow managed to sample 76 different beers between the four of us. Yeah. That's a lot beer.

Let's recap Fort Collins. Denver to follow!  

Day 1 in Fort Collins: 

1) Hike Horsetooth Mountain

2) Beer Tour at New Belgium Brewing

Doug and I agreed that this is one of the best beer tours we've ever been on. The tour was free, our tour guide was incredibly entertaining and knowledgeable (Warm your sour glass with your hands before drinking! Beer should be aerated too- enjoy that foam!), and we got to sample five different beers over the course of the tour, including the rare La Folie, a sour brown ale.


Favorite Beers:  La Folie, Cocoa Mole Ale, Tart Lychee, and Shift. 

3) Burgers and beers for dinner at Choice City. 

This deli/restaurant had a great selection of local beers and their hamburgers were really tasty. Doug's Choice City burger was the clear winner. Its made with a patty of bacon, irish chedder and buffalo all ground together and then topped with grilled balsamic onions and red pepper aoili. So good! 

Day 2 in Fort Collins:

1) Brunch at Snooze

Let's be clear: Ft. Collins and Denver are not foodie-friendly cities. I have never seen so many chain restaurants in one place in my life. Even Snooze is a local chain. But it was pretty good so Doug and I decided to be ok with that.

2) Beer Tasting at Big Beaver Brewing Co.

Big Beaver is obviously aiming to scandalize with their beer names (Black Curly's- really?) and their beer widely varied in terms of quality, but we certainly appreciated their generosity. Free samplers for CU students, Free Pint Fridays, and $1 pint specials. Definitely down for that. 

Favorite Beers: Whiskey Dick Stout and Bust-A-Nut Brown
Avoid!:  Sweet-n-Sour Booty and Wonder Wiener Wheat

3) Beer Tasting at Odell Brewing Company

Every single beer we tried at Odell was good, if not excellent. No joke. This is Doug's new Official Favorite Brewery, so that's a pretty big deal. The only sad thing is that Odell is not yet available in Oregon. Boo. Hoping it gets here soon!

Favorite Beers: St. Lupulin, IPA, Cutthroat Porter, and Isolation Ale

4) Beer Tasting at Funkwerks

Funkwerks is a saison-focused brewery, so not really my thing. Doug thought their beer was interesting, but was a bit average following the amazing beers we had at Odell. But Funkwerks did win Best Small Brewing Company and Best Saison at the Great American Beer Festival this year so maybe don't listen to us?

5) More Beer at Mayor of Old Town


Mayor of Old Town has over 100 local beers on tap. It was a great stop because we were able to sample some beers from local breweries that we weren't able to make it to like Longmont's Left Hand, Boulder's Avery, and Loveland's Grimm Brothers.

Our trip to Ft. Collins also included some quality time spent with this little lady:

June is such a cutie-pie!

Stay-tuned for a recap of the Denver leg of our trip including: Doug is too hungover to drink more beer, Leslie & Ian's first sake bombs, and "rocky mountain oyster" stout.

2012 Pumpkin Beer Tasting: Elysian's Blight for the Win

A few weekends ago, Doug and Joe decided to host a pumpkin beer tasting at our apartment. Being the over-achievers that they are, they managed to wrangle up 10 different pumpkin beers for us to try. Allie, Allison, and Anna chipped in too!

The six of us sampled the beers one-at-a-time, individually giving each a rating of 1 to 5 with 5 being "pumpkin deliciousness all over my mouth" and 1 being "I can't drink this even though I know it's alcohol".

From most delicious to least, here are our combined results!

#1 Elysian Blight Pumpkin Ale (Seattle) 

Part of Elysian's 12 Beers of the Apocalypse series, this pumpkin ale earned the top spot thanks to its flavor combination of pumpkin, brown sugar, and cinnamon. Would work all the way through the holiday season really.








#2 Elysian Great Pumpkin Ale (Seattle) 

More pumpkin forward than the Blight, Elysian's Great Pumpkin came in 2nd place. Elysian makes this ale by putting roasted pumpkin seeds in the mash and adding pumpkin to the mash, kettle, and fermenter. Think "pumpkin pie" and that's the flavor of this strong beer.








#3 Shipyard Pumpkinhead Ale (Maine) 

Pumpkin, nutmeg and cinnamon flavors abound in this very drinkable wheat ale. Yum!







#4 Shipyard Smashed Pumpkin (Maine) 

A special edition pumpkin ale from Shipyard that we didn't think was quite as good as the regular seasonal Pumpkinhead.









#5 Pike Harlot's Harvest Pumpkin Ale (Seattle) 

Organic pumpkin puree and brown sugar were used to create this dark ale. Plus, as Doug pointed out, the label is pretty entertaining.










#6 Epic Fermentation without Representation Imperial Pumpkin Porter (Salt Lake City) 

This beer was my favorite and Doug's second favorite so I'm sad to see it so far down on our group's list. It has chocolaty porterness with easily recognizable, but not overpowering, pumpkin flavors. A great balance of the two. Definitely recommend giving this one a shot! 








#7 Laurelwood Stingy Jack Pumpkin Ale (Portland)

Most of us were not huge fans of this amber ale, but I liked it. Made with a roasted whole pumpkin and pumpkin puree. Doug says he thought this was a little harsh but would likely age to be more mellow.








#8 Uinta Punk'n Harvest Ale (Salt Lake City) 

This beer got a collective "no thanks" from the group. Too sweet with its vanilla and honey overload. We still have 4 bottles of this in the fridge and Doug won't even touch it (which says a lot!).








#9 Oakshire Big Black Jack Imperial Chocolate Pumpkin Porter (Eugene) 

 Chocolate + stout = very little room for any pumpkin flavor. A good stout on its own but didn't pass the pumpkin beer test.









#10 Uinta Oak Jacked Imperial Pumpkin (Salt Lake City) 

The beer left over when all the others were gone? This one. Props to Uinta for being the only oak-aged pumpkin beer we found, but really, this stuff is no good.









Disagree with our results? Have a pumpkin beer that you love? Let us know in the comments!

Portland Happy Hour Update: The Bent Brick

Any new venture usually has trial periods and lessons learned of what does and doesn't work. That means that the happy hours we blog about change and evolve as the restaurant receives feedback and brainstorms new concepts. These can be changes we feel are good and bad. Luckily, the recent change at The Bent Brick is a good one! (We think).

Katie tried The Bent Brick in early August and wasn't impressed by their happy hour. You can read her full post here. We returned with their PR team and tried their regular menu which we both enjoyed, though that didn't change Katie's initial conclusion that their HH isn't that great and doesn't represent what their menu offers.

Thanks to Eat Beat's round up of top food news, we got an update that "The Bent Brick has launched a new happy hour chef's choice trio special every day from 5 to 6:30 pm. In addition to $5 glasses of wine, $3 beers, and $5 cocktails, the $25 chef's choice special will feature three modern small plates from chef Will Preisch. The happy hour menu is still home to several $3 bar snacks, like smoked salmon poofs and pickle or ham plates."

Here are some pictures from our last visit and with these changes we will likely give it another try!

 country ham, honey mustard ($5)

 cod poofs ($5)

 padron poppers ($5)

 green and romano bean salad ($10) liked the addition of plums!

 prosciutto wrapped romaine and fried pickles

 custard with crab

 pork belly and loin ($23)

 candies ($2.50 each)