Visiting Portland

[duckduck]

I don't know that I've ever seen dogs downtown, peppyre. At the farmer's market but not much of anywhere else downtown. I know off in some of the neighborhoods, places are very dogs friendly. Alameda brew pub even has a water bowl out on a regular basis. Veritable Quandry has outside tables that might be a possibility but their food is inconsistant. Jake's Crawfish might be a possibility. They have outside tables although no "patio".

[malachi]

(all personal opinions)

the Ripe empire (aka Family Supper, clarklewis, Gotham Tavern) -- severely hyped, but the food is really very good indeed. while clarklewis is more consistent, the food at Gotham Tavern, when on, is the best of them. in general, these tend to be liked by folks who tend to be cool with a more "urban" hipster experience, and less enjoyed by people who want something a bit more sedate, comfortable and traditional. if you go to clarklewis i'd suggest skipping the menu and getting the tasting menu instead.

Hurley's -- has been the best in PDX for a while. has also seen some turnover in the last year. has some restaurants nipping at its heels now. if you want the sedate, comfortable and traditional - this is the place to go.

Paley's Place -- consistently over-rated and disappointing. i've given it "a second chance" time and time again and am now just over it.

Taqueria Nueve -- great cocktails and somewhat predictable but enjoyable "nuevo" mexican. nothing like what you'd get in LA or Miami, but not bad. skip DF (their Pearl District restaurant) as it's an over-priced inferior version of the original.

Navarre - loved by some, hated by many. if you want "inventive" food and prefer amped up "flavours on steroids" you will not be happy here. if, instead, you want simple and unpretentious food that is perfectly balanced and actually tastes good - and especially if you love wine - this might be perfect for you. best Thurs-Sun.

Pho Van Empire (Beaverton, Pearl and SE locations) -- ranges from decent to very good. i find the Pearl location to be the weakest and the SE location to be the strongest. the latter is probably my favorite Vietnamese place in town and has my third favorite Pho in town. their whole baked catfish is a must.

APizza Scholls -- the best pizza in town by a huge margin. in fact, saying so diminishs the acomplishment. may well be the best pizza on the west coast (there is a contender in Seattle and one in San Francisco). this is true, real pizza. personally, it's one of my favorite places in town. love it.

Bewon -- quite good Korean. good Korean is hard to find and the difference between good and average is enormous. i love their salt crusted mackeral as well as all the standards.

Park Kitchen -- good breakfast, very good lunch. i've actually been thoroughly underwhelmed by their dinners, which i find to be unbalanced and overly complicated and not well thought out.

[stevea]

And, since we are now going down for 3 days, we are taking our dogs with us.  Any restaurants downtown with a patio that is casual enough the dogs can sit tied up outside with us?

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You should be OK at restaurants with sidewalk seating (assuming it's not raining, which it's never safe to assume). Southpark comes to mind, and it's close. I'm not sure about Wildwood's patio though.

Of course, if you hop across the river to SE Hawthorne, there's always the Lucky Labrador brewpub, probably the most friendly dog establishment in the city. You can sit on the picnic table patio, get a bowl of water for your dog, and someone will probably come by with a dog buiscuit or two. Food is pub grub, but beer is made on premises.

[Mooshmouse]

I'll give a nod to Adelsheim Vineyards.

[peppyre]

Well, reservations have been made and of course we changed our minds yet again. My mom had to replace the tires on her car this week, so decided we would spend a little less on our hotel room than we intitially planned. So, now we are staying at the Washington Park Inn, it looks like a great place to be with the dogs. What is there in that area? It looks like it's a bit of a suburb with a park but I can't find much info online. Anyone know the area well?

[stevea]

I hadn't heard of the hotel before, but if it's the one I can find online, with an address of 820 SW King Ave, that's close to PGE park (the baseball stadium), which is downtown. It's at about 20th, so that's about a 13 block walk to places such as Southpark, Higgins, Heathman. It's a bit closer to Pearl district places such as Andina, Bluehour, Geogios. Depending on how you feel about walking, it's convenient to a lot of good restaurants.

[peppyre]

that would be the one. i'll definetely be up for walking. thanks for the info.

[joiei]

Just got home from my fast trip to Portland and environs. Too tired right now to go into details, but a fast down and dirty, Timberline Lodge, over rated, inadequate service, food quality spotty. Wildwood - great lunch, i have pictures, and the weather was nice enough to sit outside. Paley's Place, Great meal. I will go back there, best food of the trip. Jakes, good as I remembered from 20 years ago. Keith's in NW excellent savory croissant and tart normande, coffee I have had better. Criollo's out on Fremont, just excellent. Much better than I had anticipated. And the coffee next door was also excellent.

I will talk in more detail later. But IT was an excellent journey. The hotel was way cool, great location, free parking!!!!!! and the street car stopped right out front.

And the burger at Jet Burger in Camas was interesting to say the least.