No Dishes to Wash

The more I blog, the more I realize a) how much I eat out (scary) and b) what nice places we have in P-town.  Laurelwood Brewing Company is a great home-town brewery that serves decent food.  I’ve only ever had the happy hour, and there are a few tips and tricks to that.  Nachos- great.  But they have a tendency to keep them under the heat lamp for a while until all your chips are brown.  Feel free to make them re-do them.  Garlic Fries - are weird IMO.  The garlic is funny tasting every time.  It’s like the crushed garlic out of a jar, and they put a LOT on with parsley… I think they may be trying to counteract the garlic breath with the parsley, not sure if it works though.  Pork sliders - don’t bother.  It’s dry pork smothered in BBQ sauce on a white bun.  Hummus plate - good.  Has marinated artichoke, eggplant, kalamata olives, tomatoes, cucumbers and pita bread.  Fish tacos - great.  Their beers are all hand crafted, I really enjoyed the seasonal they have right now called Imperial Hefeweizen.  Their most popular beer is their red ale called Free Range Red.  They also have won a few awards with a spinoff of that, called the Double Deranger.  All of the Laurelwood brewpubs are really kid friendly, which has made them really popular with our parent-friends.  On Monday nights, they have wings on special, and happy hour every night.  The original Laurelwood, at 40th and Sandy, is now a pizza joint…. have yet to try it.  Our server last time was Matt, and he was super friendly… even let me get a  kiddie fry instead of having to order the garlic fries.  I’ve had a few girls their, too, who are super sweet, always including the kids at our table.  Overall, this is a nice way to support local business without breaking the bank, because their prices are reasonable. The HH is $4 a pop… watch out, because as soon as you at meat to the nachos, they are $7.  Laurelwood also gives back to the community - for example, Sept 15th, 20% of all sales go to The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, a great cause.  So let’s all eat out Monday Sept 15th at Laurelwood!  Located at 5115 NE Sandy Blvd. Open M-F 11am-11pm, Sa-Su 9am-12am.  Brunch served weekends 9am-3pm, and HH 3pm-6pm and 9pm-cl every day.

I was blown away.  Quite literally.  The hand dryers at Hopworks Urban Brewery (HUB) are the loudest, noisiest, strongest and driest hand dryers around.  That’s the first thing you have to try out there.  The second is the hummus!  It rocks!  It’s way smooth, garlicky, and has roasted red bell peppers.  It’s on the appetizers list… called Humus among us.  (That’s just how they spell it.)  Our server ROCKED because he brought us another thing of hummus and bread for a dollar!  That’s the kind of service I’m talkin’ bout.  He was from Iran, his name was Farhad, and he was teasing us because none of us were drinking beer because we really don’t like it.  (Ok, I like it and Andrew likes it, but none of us wanted it that night.)  Turns out, after he was giving us all crap, he likes cider better anyway!  He made us shandy’s (at HUB they call them Radley’s. I think.  It was hard to hear him.)  Half lager and half lemonade.  (JUST IN CASE some of you didn’t know what a shandy was.)   We loved it.  We had a large 18″ pizza, the four of us (me, Caleb, MANdrew and Micah). We got a  D.N.F (never found out what it stood for, sad) but it had bacon, pepperoni, sausage, mushroom, olive, green and red bell pepper. I like their thin crust pizza, they also make a sicilian style, too, but their thin crust is just crisp on the bottom, not crunchy through the whole crust like some.  Hopworks is a little spendy… probably because you are paying for all the organic-ness.  This is the same guy that was the brewmaster at Laurelwood.  Except everything here is organic.  It’s pretty amazing, a whole restaurant and brewery that is completely organic and sustainable.  Very green. Parking for up to 50 bicycles.  Very Portland.  This is why I love living here.  Located at 2944 SE Powell Blvd, open Su-Th 11am-11pm, F-Sa 11am-12pm.  Happy Hour Su-Th 3pm-6pm and 9pm-close.  F-Sa 10pm-close.  Don’t forget the hand dryers!

I would much rather be telling you about some of the “cool” McMenamin’s around, like Kennedy School, Edgefield, or Baghdad, but tonight I happened to be at the Mall 205 McMenamin’s, so that will have to do.  These are local brewpubs that are only here in WA and OR, aren’t we special! (BTW, I just heard officially that Portland has more microbrews than anywhere in the world - it used to be anywhere outside of Germany.)  I had the Ruby, which is a light wheat beer with raspberries - very refreshing and light.  If you like something a little darker, there is Terminator Stout, or the Porter, which is slightly nuttier, and I prefer it, especially if they have it on nitro.  If you don’t like beer (shock and horror!!!)  you can go with Caleb’s choice, homemade hard cider, or they have fresh pressed apple cider for the kids.  They have a full bar as well, if you’d rather take the hard road.  Our server tonight was Danie, (such a doll, she was from Newcastle, England) and she was right on the money, at my elbow as soon as my pint was dry.  Our table was dirty when we sat down (that happens a lot here) but she was over to clean it in seconds.  I got my usual, the hummus plate sans pita, I just have them put extra cucumbers and tomatoes.  The hummus is not really anything to talk about, it tastes rather pasty in fact, could use a little more olive oil.  It tastes like it’s made from a powder mix.  So why do I keep getting it, you ask?  Because they serve it with large chunks of solid feta, olives and red onions marinated in red wine vinegar.  Yummy!  Caleb likes their spinach artichoke dip, it’s very cheesy, not so much runny like the Newport Grill counterpart next door.  I kind of feel about McMenamin’s that the food is kinda the second reason you would go, the first is if you like McMenamin’s beer.  You can buy it to go, bring your own LIDDED container and they will fill it for you! (Must be beverage style container, they don’t do just tupperware, guys.)  Located at 9710 SE Washington St, open M-Sa 11am-1am, Su 12pm-12am.  Happy Hour everyday.  Check out their Kennedy School (hotel, theater, restaurant and bar) at 33rd and Killingsworth, or Edgefield (a former poor farm and then nursing home, situated on 74 acres) where you can see a movie, concert (just recently went to Death Cab for Cutie there, best outdoor venue I’ve been to, which is another topic for another time), watch a glassblower, get a massage, or a myriad of other things.  McMenamin’s also makes their own wines, whisky, brandy and gin, and roasts their own coffees.  Or don’t pass up the Crystal Ballroom, where you can “dance on air” (the wooden floor is on springs!).  Anywhere you go, I’m sure you’ll love the drinks! 

Two places in one night, wow!  My brother in law and his wife invited us downtown to Descutes Brewery and Public House right after we had returned from dinner, and since beer is always a good thing…. we went!  Deschutes Brewery is well known in the Portland area, and the main brewery is located in Bend.  The building in the Pearl used to be Jim Stevens Auto Body… I still marvel that they got the smell of paint fumes out of the air!  We sat outside, but the inside seating looked cool too.  And then, instead of ordering beer, we ended up having wine. (Go figure.)  We shared a bottle of 2004 Kitara Syrah from the Willamette Valley. It had a heavy butterscotch taste, and I was thrilled, because it was the first time that I had really identified a “taste” in a wine before.  I was so excited, I had to tweet Garyvee right then and there!  The wine was great, and I loved the ahi tuna I ordered, it came with tapico caviar (yum!) and sesame-ginger marinated cucumber (also yum!)  But sadly, the rest of the team wasn’t so impressed.  My sister in law Charlotte’s veggie burger was too spicy, and Caleb’s ribs were stringy, no fall off the bone meat here.  Jacob (my brother in law) had mac and cheese with salmon (which I thought was a strange combination, but to each his own, right?) and he said it was just “OK.”  The Brewery was busy, no more than any Saturday night, I’m sure, but our waiter Daniel was great.  He was attentive, and went out of his way to answer my pesky questions.  He was funny and friendly, too. (Something that was missing from Pambiche earlier, I forgot to add in my last post.)  It was a half hour from when we ordered to when we got our food, but it didn’t seem like a long wait, we were well kept with drinks in the time. If you are a fan of Deshutes Brewery, be sure to check out their specials on tap.  Located at 210 NW 11th Ave in the Pearl, open daily 11 am to midnight.