Baking pastries at Yesenia’s in Hillsboro. See video below.
There’s something wonderful about the aroma of bread baking. Even Franz with its Wonder-soft loaves smells good when the ovens are on. But Mexican bakeries—panaderias—are a whole other world. They use cinnamon, anise and orange in their fragrant pastries, called pan de dulce or pan dulce, filling them with guava, pineapple, coconut and vanilla cream. Savory breads are often stuffed with ham. Cookies even come in the shape of a pig. While every Mexican market in PDX carries these kind of goods, a smaller number make their own breads and pastries. Of these, two are a step above the rest: Yesenia’s and La Espiga Dorada. Don’t be shy. Just follow the grandmother with toddlers in tow, or the day laborer picking up some quick fuel, or the professional getting a box of sweets for the office. Grab a tray and some tongs and load up from the bakery case or the racks. (Hint: Items from the rack are fresher.)
A Trio of Salads from Eastmoreland Market
In the wake of IACP, Eat Mobile, and Taste of the Nation, all within a week of each other, I almost missed the publication of Devour, Willamette Week’s annual shopping guide for foodies. Glad I didn’t.
This year’s Devour has to be the most comprehensive guide to markets, bakeries, coffee roasters, kitchen supply stores, and the like ever printed in Portland. And it’s broken down by dozens of categories from “Open Sunday” to “Meat Market” to “Japanese”. And it’s not just a directory; each store gets a small review with recommendations. And it’s free.
There are some places missing here and there (one of which is included below), but I plan to keep it in my car at all times, a cheat sheet to exploring places I haven’t been or finding hard-to-find foods wherever I am. However, I suspect a lot of people will just use it for the markets and shops closest to their homes or offices. Following are 5 reasons to do a little exploring of your own.
Grinder
Ed Levine, perhaps the foremost authority on pizza in the United States, likes to point out that pizza is really just bread, so you can’t have good pizza without good bread. The same certainly should be the case for sandwiches, which are just meat and cheese stuffed into bread. Thus, in looking for a good sandwich in Portland, the artisan bakeries deserve special focus.
In tasting sandwiches at all of Portland’s best bakeries, none better shines a light on the importance of good bread and the way that bread can give character to a sandwich than Little T. The fillings are fine, but the breads are the star of each sandwich.
I suspect bagels made their way up the left coast to Oregon from L.A., like my parents, rather than across the continental divide. The Jewish branches of my family tree may have stopped budding when my great grandfather married a Hollywood shiksa goddess, but I can’t ever remember a time without bagels. Growing up, I associated them more with hippy culture than Jewish culture. The same people who ate bagels ate granola, wore Birkenstocks, and listened to the Grateful Dead — people like my mom.
But more puzzling than how bagels got here is the question of when a bagel became a soulless roll with a hole. Talking to New Yorkers, they just assume that the doughnut shaped Wonder Bread we call bagels are endemic to the west. I won’t argue that our average bagels were ever as good as New York’s, but I definitely remember bagels being chewier when I was a kid in the ’70s and ’80s.
The bellow of the bad bagel is a constant refrain on foodie message boards. I assumed that among the many commercial bagels for sale, many from places specializing in the Jewish bread, that at least a couple offerings would be decent. I didn’t hold out hope for any truly good bagels, the kind that would make a transplant from the lower east side weep, but I never would have guessed the truth: all bagels in Portland suck. That’s not entirely true. If you read on you’ll see there are some caveats, but for the most part it is.
Version 2.0 of Extramsg.com’s dining guide and tip sheet for the Portland metro area is finally finished. You can visit it here or by clicking the link at the left under Portland Food News.
The tip sheet has been greatly overhauled. Categories, such as Indian and Sushi/Japanese have been added, but also many of the entries in each category have been updated or completely changed. There’s also a new listing of “Quick Picks” by neighborhood in descending order by price.
Hopefully this tip sheet will help visitors and new residents of Portland — or those looking to expand their culinary horizons. If you would like to criticize or comment on the tip sheet, please follow the link in the dining guide itself.
Bakery Bar’s Citrus Poppyseed Cake
My mom loves holidays. Especially religious holidays. Even moreso if gift-giving is involved. So, despite being a single parent living day-to-day on waitressing tips, every Easter she made sure that I would wake to a brightly-colored basket overflowing with gifts, chocolate, and candy sitting in a bed of plastic grass.
The love I felt from my mom makes me want to be able to share that same feeling with others. I spent the last couple days exploring the offerings in Portland, finding foodie-level Easter sweets to give that would far exceed the Peeps and Cadbury Eggs of my youth. Although they could never exceed the love behind those simpler gifts.
Here are some especially tempting Easter treats from six of my favorite Portland shops: Bakery Bar, Di Prima Dolci, Ken’s Artisan Bakery, Pix Patisserie, Sahagun Chocolate Shop, and Saint Cupcake.
Radishes from Groundworks
Despite a chilly April Fool’s Day teasing with sun, but threatening with rain, this year’s Portland Farmers Market opener was packed with people as if it were July. There were so many market-goers vying for a taste of cheese, a loaf of bread, or a bag full of mushrooms, it made it darn near impossible to take a decent picture. (How dare they!)
While there weren’t many new vendors, there was a good range of products….
Baker & Spice’s Yule Log
Portland has a wonderful community of bakeries and pastry shops. Christmas and the holiday season affords these carb pushers a chance to make more complicated desserts and play with traditional winter flavors. From decorated cookies to seasonal tarts to made-to-order cakes, Portland’s bakers use Christmas to show off — or at least have a little fun.
The following are nine holiday menus from some of my favorite sources for pastries around town. Even this long list isn’t close to comprehensive. I didn’t have a chance to visit Blue Gardenia, a relatively new bakery on Mississippi that generally has tasty homestyle treats at the farmer’s market. I didn’t check to see what could be ordered from Portland Farmer’s Market regular Monica’s. I haven’t been to some of the newest spots in Portland, such as Saint Cupcake. I didn’t even go by my favorite spot in Portland for breads, Pearl Bakery.
But these nine — Baker & Spice, Criollo, Di Prima Dolci, Grand Central, Ken’s Artisan Bakery, Papa Haydn, Pix, La Provence, and St. Honore — provide a good range of options whether you need to order something for your Christmas dinner, New Year’s eve party, or just want to satisfy your seasonal sweet tooth.
Pearl Bakery still sets the standard for great breads in Portland.
I love the Portland Farmer’s Market. Not only is it the biggest farmer’s market in the area, but it has the best combination of quality, quantity, and diversity of vendors and products. It also has some wonderful special events, of which, my favorites are the summer loaf and the berry festival. I visited both this year and took pictures.
Clockwise from top left: Desserts at Pix; Margherita from Apizza Scholls; Cherries and blackberries from the Portland Farmer’s Market; Burger and fries from Cafe Castagna.
Version 1.0 of Extramsg.com’s dining guide and tip sheet for the Portland metro area is finally finished. You can visit it here or in the future by clicking the link at the left under Portland Food News.
The tip sheet suggests quality restaurants in a variety of categories and cuisines, plus places to shop for food. Following these recommendations are a list of dining options on Sundays and Mondays, links to online discussions of Portland eateries, and other dining guides. Finally, there is a list of over-rated restaurants to avoid.
Hopefully this tip sheet will help visitors and new residents of Portland — or those looking to expand their culinary horizons. If you would like to criticize or comment on the tip sheet, please follow the link in the dining guide itself.
