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.

Clockwise: garlic spears, strawberries and tomatoes, spring veggies, cherries

The Beaverton Farmers Market is clearly one of the largest in the area, on most days the largest. Only during a festival does the Portland Farmers Market challenge Beaverton’s on size. And it’s still a very good market. While the percentage of produce vendors may be lower than some markets, there are no craft booths like in Vancouver, Gresham or Eugene. It’s truly a farmer’s market.

I rushed out on Saturday about a month ago before heading to judge a BBQ competition in Aloha. I was hoping to taste bagels from a fellow PortlandFood.org member, “Krunchky”, but he was at a wedding. It was drizzly which made for fewer market-goers, easier photos, and an opportunity to talk with a few of the vendors.

Boones Ferry Berries

Was driving through Westmoreland after an unsuccessful attempt to visit Curds & Whey one afternoon just over a month ago and I happened upon the Moreland Farmers Market. I’d never been, so I stopped. It’s at the corner of 14th & Bybee, just west of Milwaukie, a short walk from Adobe Rose, Oaks Bottom, Caprial’s, and so on. It’s a small market, but diverse enough to make a quality neighborhood farmers market, especially for only being in its second year.

DISCUSS MORELAND FARMERS MARKET ON PORTLANDFOOD.ORG

Mini Tarts from Little Pots and Pans

The Hillsdale Farmers Market, one of the few in Portland Metro to run year round, is a great farmers market. Sure, it’s smaller than Portland Farmers Market, Beaverton Farmers Market, and possibly a couple others. But it has its own character and several terrific vendors that you can only find there or who only provide a certain product at the HFM. It’s also on Sundays, a bonus to me since I’ve been doing the deli on Saturdays.

Two weekends ago, I rushed to the market just as it was opening to snap some photos and buy some treats before a noon flight to Chicago. Good thing for my pocketbook I had that flight to keep me from over-buying.

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.

Portland Dining Guide and Tip Sheet

With only one week left until Christmas, I thought there might be a few of you that would want to make one last push for a gift. (Okay, okay, truly I am hoping that my wife will read it. But play along.)

Half the battle can be getting the gift-giver to the right store. Not only do the items you want have to be available, but someone with the knowledge to guide the shopper has to be available, too. Hopefully this report will help. I’ve surveyed six stores: Bed, Bath, & Beyond, In Good Taste, Kitchen Kaboodle, Linens n Things, Sur La Table, and Williams-Sonoma.

Cheeses from Foster & Dobbs

I was brainwashed. Behold the power of advertising, or rather, public service announcements. To this day, when my “get up and go has gone up and went, I hanker for a hunk of cheese (yahoo!).”

That hankerin’ has got a whole lot easier to indulge lately. In the last couple weeks, two new cheese shops, Steve’s Cheese and Foster & Dobbs have opened. Add to that this summer’s opening of Curds & Whey. Suddenly we have three new cheese-focused shops in a town that previously had none. That means Portlanders are now infinitely better off than before.

Well, that’s not totally true. Portland has had several gourmet/organic markets with laudable cheese selections. New Seasons, Wild Oats, Whole Foods, Pastaworks, Elephant’s Deli — all have extensive selections. Even lesser places from Zupan’s to Fred Meyer’s carry gourmet cheeses. And Trader Joe’s stocks a small number of cheeses, but prices them significantly lower than any of their competitors. Their Irish cheddars — cheeses I find superior to domestic favorites like aged Tillamook, Grafton, and Cabot — are fantastic values at less than $4/lb.

But Zupan’s, Fred Meyer’s, and Trader Joe’s do not have knowledgable cheese mongers to guide you in your selections. Nor can you taste cheeses before you buy. Therefore, I’ve limited this survey to eight markets: Curds & Whey, Elephant’s Deli, Foster & Dobbs, New Seasons, Pastaworks, Steve’s Cheese, Whole Foods, and Wild Oats. Update: I’ve now also added Market of Choice.

Each mini-review that follows contains a semi-random list of their cheeses with pricing. However, I’m starting this report with a price comparison of some popular cheeses along with a rough count of their stock.

(Note that I round up or down on prices. Anything above seventy-five cents gets rounded to the whole dollar and anything below twenty-five cents gets rounded to the whole dollar. Also, note that I did not make a serious effort — but there was some effort — to ensure that producers were the same for the same type of cheese in the lists. Therefore, one gruyere may be from a more respected cheese maker than another. I’ve tried to indicate a few obvious differences.)

KEY: CW = Curds & Whey, ED = Elephant’s Deli, FD = Foster & Dobbs, MC = Market of Choice, NS = New Seasons, PW = Pastaworks, SC = Steve’s Cheese, WF = Whole Foods, WO = Wild Oats
* The Parmeggiano from CW was a 3 year and the one from ED was a 5 year.
** Only an 8 month while others were a year or more.
+ 7 Corners NS was surveyed; Hawthorne PW was surveyed; Vancouver WO was surveyed.
^ I consider commercial cheeses those that are pre-cut and sold in commercial packaging. This includes everything from Tillamook to pre-packaged Cabot to slices to Denmark’s Finest to Kraft. At minimum, a gourmet cheese should be sold whole to the shop and in most cases be able to be tasted. There’s not a perfect division, but I think most people could distinguish the two in the store.
N/A Some places noted that they will be rotating in cheeses that I’ve listed as not available.

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.

Portland Dining Guide and Tip Sheet

Yes, all these people are in line for sausage.

The Beaverton Farmers Market claims to be the largest in the Northwest. It’s probably true. There seem to be slightly more vendors than at the Portland Farmers Market. But as McDonald’s proves every day, quantity does not imply quality.

Like the suburb it inhabits, the Beaverton Farmers Market suffers (slightly) from chains, of a sort. Most of the produce vendors — Deep Roots, Spring Hill, Rossi Farms, etc — can be found at the other Portland area farmers markets. However, they do have a couple unique seafood vendors, several interesting and exclusive prepared foods vendors, and the largest selection of nurseries.

Following are some of the highlights from the opening day.

Spring defined: flowers from Rick Steffen Farms.

As if Mother Nature herself was blessing an early start this year, the Portland Farmer’s Market enjoyed a beautiful beginning to its season: sun, pleasant spring breezes, blossoming flowers, and crowds lingering and spending money. Portlanders must have felt like the kids in All Summer in a Day, clamoring to the market to get a taste of the warm weather to come.

I got there a little after 9:00 am and it was already packed. Taking pictures was much more difficult than I had hoped. I was repeatedly bumped from behind just as I was snapping a photo and I nearly got caught up in two dogfights. Yet I still managed over two hundred images.

Following is a summary along with some of the highlights from the market opening, along with links to the 150+ images I uploaded.