A Day in PDX – Food Carts, South Park Blocks, and Veritable Quandary

While Tina contributed a lot of photos, today's post was written by Ed (from Yuma) about explorating parts of Portland with some old friends. Tomorrow's post will be from Kirk or Cathy. Now you know.

We were looking forward to a couple of days with Steve and Helen, friends who live in Monterey CA. They had been visiting Steve's sister in Vancouver WA, so we picked them up and descended on downtown Portland.

It was lunchtime, and we were looking for interesting and inexpensive food. The food carts around SW10th Ave and Alder fit the bill:

All kinds of choices:

Tina, Helen, and I decided on Eurodish – street cart Polish food:

The Polish sausage (on a bun) was grilled only after it was ordered, placed on a nice large bun, and (since Tina asked for everything on it) looked like this:

Seriously, there is a Polish sausage hiding under the profusion of condiments. Much yumminess. What a hot dog aspires to become when it grows up.

I chose combination #2, a cabbage roll and dumplings:

The dumplings had a soft chew and were cheesy, creamy, and pleasantly bland; the onion and red pepper slices a nice contrast. The cabbage roll was a pretty good rendition. The tomato sauce was pretty straightforward, but there was a nice picante touch. The beefy rice filling was flavorful, and I loved the triple layers of cabbage – the roll tasted like cabbage:
 

Steve, being a Philly boy, had to have a cheese steak which came with curly fries. He pronounced it very good, considering it was Portland Oregon and not South Philly:

One advantage/disadvantage of the carts is that there is no seating provided, so we and a lot of other folks found impromptu spots to set ourselves and eat around the fountains in Director Park at Ninth and Yamhill.

After lunch, we started strolling south by southwest through the South Park Blocks. This picture shows the basic layout – a small park area flanked by two city streets:

But that small park area extends for 14 blocks. It is a beautiful walk with a variety of people – tourists, students, and the homeless:

Canopies of leaves above people hurrying somewhere or just sitting on a bench and talking:

A guitar and accordion duet:

There is also some old-school statuary. A classical water bearer, probably a Naiad:

A pensive Abraham Lincoln:

In the distance, an equestrian statue of Theodore Roosevelt in the beautiful park setting:

And here is good ol’ Teddy, ready to charge up San Juan Hill:

The Portland Art Museum, adjacent to the park, has some public statuary of its own, such as this beautiful intertwined couple:

Or this striking female who perfectly matches her surroundings:

Most of the time we were walking slightly uphill as the Park comes closer to the hills that flank the west side of Portland:

The southwestern end of the linear park extends into Portland State University. In that area there is a nice rose garden:

So Tina stopped to photograph one of the roses:

Then the elongated park transforms into a campus:  A very pleasant walk, but we had to turn around and walk 14 blocks back in the direction of our car. As we approached the northeast end of the Park, we were all feeling a bit peckish, and I for one was looking for somewhere I could sit down for a while. I looked over my restaurant list to see if anything was nearby. I mentioned Veritable Quandary at 1220 SW 1st, and Steve said, "Oh, that's close – only eight or nine blocks away." So off we marched.

The exterior of Veritable Quandary is very attractive:

We sat down at the bar and each ordered a glass of wine. I had Elk Cove Pinot Gris, but I'm not sure about the others. We liked the atmosphere and the menu was sufficiently interesting, but when we asked about dinner, they told us that the dining room was booked up until 8:30 that night. By then, I would have starved, I'm afraid, or drunk myself to complete silliness. Fortunately our helpful server suggested that we eat in the bar area; in fact, she said, that she would put together two small tables at the window for us. Wow, sure, yeah, thanks!

While there was a television with some game on, no one would confuse this place with a sports bar:

Considering we were stuck at the end of the bar area, the service was outstanding throughout the meal, so here's a shout out for Sasha who was a perfect server (and she does not look this fuzzy in person):

The bread that was placed on the table was probably the most impressive I had on the trip. The dark rustic crust and the firm flavorful crumb reminded me of the breads of central Europe:

Sasha also helped us choose a wine, a reasonably priced Pinot Blanc from Elk Cove. Usually a glass of wine looks pretty much like any other glass, but for me, this glass weirdly reflects the ambience of the evening:

Or maybe it's just a bad photo.

We chose the rabbit pâté for our appetizer:

Fortunately Tina took a much better shot of the appetizer:

The pâté itself, wrapped in bacon, was smooth, savory, and rich. The brioche was light and crunchy, and we liked it so much that Sasha brought us extra.

While the two different mustards were nothing special, the prune jam was an unusual sweet complement, the watercress added a green and mildly bitter touch, and I nearly swooned over the pickled pear.

For their main courses, Steve and Helen decided to share, so Helen ordered the Caesar salad:

It certainly looked nice – an attractive pile of romaine lettuce fancied up with Parmesan cheese, black pepper, and a Caesar dressing.

Tina chose the house made brie ravioli:

The two giant pasta pouches lay atop wedges of roasted hubbard squash, the whole thing covered with grated cheese (Pecorino?) and fresh frisee. In a way, a really unusual pasta salad. The firm autumnal squash so different in texture and flavors to the richly melty cheesy ravioli and both set off by the crunchy lettuce and slightly tart, oil based dressing.

Steve and I had decided on the same thing, the fish special of the evening, something called Blackened Hawaiian Walu:

The large fish steaks that perched on roasted sweet potato wedges were accompanied by radicchio, micro greens, and a tangy sauce.

And the fish tasted very good. It was extremely rich and had a distinctive almost waxy texture. The blackening added a spicy note, and both Steve and I appreciated that the fish had not been over cooked:

Luckily, none of us had a bad digestive reaction to the fish, which we have since learned is more commonly called escolar and is banned in Japan, a country that happily devours fugu and chicken sashimi. It’s good to be lucky sometimes.

For dessert, we shared two items. First, a scoop of house made vanilla bean ice cream:

It was decent and the cookie added a contrastive crunch.

The chocolate soufflé was the highlight of the desserts:

Warm and puffy chocolate pillow with gooey chocolate sauce. More proof that the best thing you can eat with chocolate is more chocolate.

For the quality of the meal and service overall, the bill seemed reasonable:

As we walked another 10 blocks back to the car through the pleasantly cool evening, we all thought it'd been a pretty good day adventuring in Portland, though I'm sure Steve and Helen felt we hadn't walked quite enough.

Comments

[Joan Koblas]

Ed, this post perfectly captures what makes Portland, ah....well...Portland. You could spend a hundred days like this in all parts of the City and have a wonderful adventure and exquisite food choices. Thanks for sharing this with your readers!

[jack]

Great post Ed, thanks for sharing

[Christina C]

I'm a big fan of Veritable Quandary. We try to pop in whenever we are in town. I'm a big fan of their brunch as well. They make a great beet Bloody Mary.

[Ed (from Yuma)]

Thanks Joan and jack - I appreciate the nice words. I understand, Christina, the appeal of the place. I was surprised by how busy it was on a Thursday in October. My old buddy Greg says it was a favorite bar of his back in the 70s - not nearly as upscale back then.

[caninecologne]

Great post on PDX Ed. We were there in '09 and again in '12. We loved exploring the different neighborhoods (across the bridges) and the food pods. So much variety!