Honeys Heart:
Gin & Tonic at Freeland Spirits
Seriously, what is not to love about this women-owned and run distillery? The design in on-point, the cocktails are tasty and they're now serving food. We've liked all the cocktails we've tried here, but our vote goes to their classic Gin & Tonic.
Everything at Eem
Like pretty much everyone in Portland, we are obsessed with Eem and it's commitment to "smoked meats and vacation drinks". Our favorite dishes so far are the White Curry with Brisket Burnt-Ends, the rice-filled sausage (apparently no longer on the menu?), and the Chopped BBQ Fried Rice. We'll also take any one of those cocktails. Pro tip: if you want your cocktail served in the puffer fish glass, all you have to do is ask.
A good Saturday happy hour is hard to find so Kel and I were happy to stumble across Rosa Rosa's on our way to a dance show downtown. Served from 3-6pm and 10pm-close daily, the happy hour menu at this Vitaly Paley spot features well-priced small plates including kebabs, hummus and pita chips, and meatball sliders plus $4 beers and $6-8 wine and cocktails.
This quirky little Japanese deli is housed inside Cargo in SE. We were partial to the Katsu and Egg Salad Sandwich and Salmon Onigiri, but we need to go back and check out the bento boxes since they were mostly sold out when we arrived for a late lunch on a Sunday.
Yeah, We'll Pass:
The Vibe at Montesacro
Ugh this place. The same Saturday we hit up Rosa Rosa, we also swung by Montesacro to check out their Saturday happy hour. We were a little confused since their website lists happy hour as 4-6pm but Google Maps alerted us that the restaurant doesn't actually open until 5pm. We called ahead to check and received confirmation that happy hour was being served, so imagine our surprise when we walked in on what was clearly a pre-service staff meeting in a totally empty restaurant. Everyone scattered awkwardly to their stations and our bartender made no attempt to hide his annoyance that we were encroaching on his set-up time. Sorry, dude - it's not our fault we came to a restaurant we were told would be open! On top of the iffy service, the margarita "pinsa" was just mediocre, so we will not be back.