Chefy Tattoos

If I haven't talked about it here before...I'm going to say it now. Chef and food related tattoos are hot now. And more than ever, people are proudly showing off their skin and food related artwork!

A recent story from Portland Magazine talks about local Portland chefs and their tattoos. (Click here to read it!) Well, one of my favorite chefs, the super talented chef from Pazzo Restaurant in Portland is featured in the article! Read the article to read the full story (it's interesting, talks not only about the chef, but about the tattoo artist and the 'thank-you' meal!) In the meantime, here's a glimpse of Chef John Eisenhart's tattoo.

On loan from Portland Magazine

Are you seeing a rise in food related tattoos? Anyone hearing about the book, Inked Rouge Chefs? Anyone seen any really cool ones you'd like to share?

Meal of the Month: July

Back by popular demand…it’s time for my Meal of the Month! As my loyal readers will know, this is where I recap my favorite meal from this last month. Here’s a link to my first Meal of the Month column.

As I mentioned before, the Meal of the Month may not necessarily be the meal with the best food (although it certainly does help if the food’s good!), but it might be because of the overall experience. Here are some of the top contenders:

- Breakfast with celebrity/eco consultant/overall cool guy, Danny Seo

- A fabulous Fourth of July BBQ feast in Portland

The Jello shot American Flag

- Spanish tapas dinner at Lolo Restaurant with my chef friend John

- Yummy Thai street food with two good girlfriends at Pok Pok Restaurant

The Glowing Pok Pok Sign

Siobhan and I in front of Pok Pok (Sorry Tarlan, there wasn't one of all of us in it!)

- A home cooked ‘kid friendly’ meal in Diamond Heights

- Lunch in the courtyard café at the Legion of Honor Museum with two of my favorite kids

Will and Nate with their favorite Auntie!

- Casual Friday night BBQ at a friend’s house

- Yummy Italian meal at Tuli Bistro with my friend Denise, sitting at the chef’s counter, while chatting it up with the newest chef to join the team (best scallops I’ve had in such a long time)

- Enjoy a wonderful relaxing meal outside with old friends (and new ones!) at Parkhouse Eatery

Another glowing sign--this time at the Parkhouse Eatery


Old Friends (Bahram, Bowman J and Siobhan) with New Friends (Jason and Devin)

- Late night dinner with my friend Josh at one of my local favorites, Berretta Restaurant, after cocktails at the Grand Café (celebrating Bastille Day), and more cocktails at the Clock Bar opening party…oh, and before more drinks at Alembic Bar!

- Fun dinner at Poleng Lounge with friends Josh and Tim (see earlier post here)

Meals were enjoyed in San Francisco, Portland, Sacramento, and San Diego. Whew! What a lucky gal I am! How does one even choose a favorite? Well. For the month of July…I am choosing my recent dinner at SPQR Restaurant with my brand new foodie friends!

It was a late dinner, with four ‘new friends’ and they were all out of towners. All of them worked in restaurants (two were chefs, one was front of the house.) We were a motley crew of sorts. And it was awesome.

We had been drinking cocktails at another event for a little while (ok, so for more than three hours) before deciding to head to SPQR for dinner. There was still a wait when we got there, so we went down the street and had some wine while we waited. By the time we settled in for dinner, we were starving!

From the corner of my eye, I could see Chef Nate Appleman behind the line, and I knew we’d be in for a treat. We started right away with some of the antipasti: fried cauliflower with garlic, parsley, capers and lemon; fried chicken livers; (there was one more appetizer, but I can’t remember!) We also had the fried sweetbreads with celery, garlic, parsley and lemon as well as one of my all time favorite pastas, the cacao e pepe- rigatoni with pecorino romano and black pepper. So delicious!

We ended with two desserts. And I’ve got to be honest, I should have written this weeks ago after we ate the meal, because I don’t even remember the first dessert. Only the second one. The one I wanted. it was a hazelnut panna cotta and I don’t think I even put it down. It was so good (and again, my love for panna cotta remains true!)

I’m fairly easy when it comes to choosing dining companions. I don’t love eating with vegetarians (it just limits me in what we can taste!), I need to eat with people who are up for trying new things, and everyone needs to share! That’s it. Pretty basic. This night was one of those nights…where the food was yummy, service amazing, conversation was fun, and the wine just flowing.

Good vs Bad- Bad Meal in Portland

The Bad: Clyde Commons

Clyde Commons is a restaurant I had been wanting to check out ever since I had heard about it more than a year ago. When Siobhan and I walked in to meet some of my Portland friends for dinner, I was immediately loving the design and space. It was a nice open space, huge windows, a great bar and open kitchen, and a large communal table.

All in all, our service was horribly slow, and our server did not seem enthusiastic about anything on the menu. Neither the cocktails, starters, wines, anything. It was disappointing since I enjoy seeing the enthusiasm from servers’ faces and expressions. I have even been known to change my mind based on a servers’ description of a dish. What was almost worse, was that he knew one of the gals in the group.

On top of that, I was horribly disappointed with the dish I ordered. I went with the Braised Pork Shank with carrots and snap peas. Usually a pretty ‘safe’ and good dish. It looked great, but when I cut into it, although the meat came off the bone and apart fairly easily, the meat was dry. And I wasn’t happy with the flavor. I was so disappointed! I’ve had a lot of braised pork in my day (and I think Chef Michelle Mah and my friend Eric’s top the list)…and this was pretty bad. Siobhan could tell my disappointment (not that I was really doing anything to hide it!) When I was finally able to flag down our server, I told him I was really unhappy with my dish (all I had eaten were the snap peas), and told him I’d prefer to have a ½ order (he confirmed he could do that) of the pasta dish Siobhan was eating (not that her’s was incredibly delicious, but it was pretty good. It was a tagliatelle with spring onions and king oyster mushrooms.) The server asked if I disliked it so much, he could take the dish away. I said yes.

In the end, it was a fine meal, and with GREAT company and lots of good wine (that the wine experts had brought themselves!) The spinach, arugula, fava bean and mint salad was a huge hit!


We were in no hurry, so the slow service wasn’t too painful. In talking to Portland locals, the feedback has come back very varied. Some loving the place, saying they go multiple times a week, and others saying they weren’t so impressed. One friend went as far as to say he thought the chefs there cooked without soul and love. Maybe he was onto something? That there is something about a dish you can't exactly put your finger on...but that you can taste—that fifth umami flavor. Maybe it was an off night for the restaurant. Would I give them another chance? Most definitely. If I was only in town for one night and had to choose between returning to Clyde Commons or going somewhere new, would I? Probably not. Unfortunately, the highlights of the meal (food wise) are a little buried.

*Disclosure: It really isn't 'bad', it's just 'not as great'. But calling this column 'Good vs Not As Great' didn't seem right. Should I change the title of the column to be completely fair to the restaurant? It really wasn't bad...

Good vs Bad- Good Meal in Portland

The Good: Lolo

When I go out to eat with my chef friends, I tend to let them pick the restaurant. They don’t get nights off very often, and when they do, there is inevitably a place they want to check out, a favorite restaurant they want to return to, or a cuisine they’re craving.

So when I was able to have dinner with my friend Chef John Eisenhart of Portland's Pazzo Restaurant, and he asked me where I wanted to go, I told him it was completely in his hands! We ran into the problem of a lot of places being closed. It was the Sunday of the 4th of July long weekend and the Portland restaurant scene was dead. After a few unsuccessful phone calls (thank goodness we were at the bar and had drinks getting us through this tough time), he finally thought of a place, and we were in luck, it was open!

We ended up at a Spanish tapas place called Lolo in the Alberta Arts neighborhood. We had a great corner table (wish I had taken a photo now!) and could see the entire restaurant and bar, and even the street through the windows.

We ordered one to two small dishes at a time, and then keep going back for more and more…and all shareable! My favorite way to eat a meal.

Highlights included:

-A white bean gazpacho with grapes, nuts and an olive oil finish

-Fresh crudo with mango, local Oregon strawberries and rhubarb

-Octopus with celery and piquillo peppers (we had just spent a lot of time talking about squids and cuttlefish after all!)

-Almond ice cream with chocolate Madelines

-Poached pear with mascarpone ice cream

I especially loved the almond ice cream (still in the ice cream phase), so I think that’s going to be the next ice cream I make. Anyone have a good almond ice cream recipe? The owner, Giorgio, was actually working the night we were there. It was a reminder just how tough the restaurant business was. He owns two restaurants in Portland (Lolo and Giorgio’s), and because it was a slow night and the high cost of labor, he had decided to just work himself. Both he and our server were very nice, friendly and attentive. It was a great table, delicious meal and fantastic experience.

Stay tuned for a review of The Bad!! You'll be surprised to hear who it is...

More Questions Answered - And A Diagram!

In addition to being a fun dinner cohort, my friend John was also helpful in helping me further answer the age old question: "What is the difference between squid and cuttlefish".

Many of you saw my earlier posting. Although there weren't official comments about this topic posted, I'm sure it's resulted in many sleepless nights for you all. Fear not. John is here to save the day and to provide us with some answers.

To start, John drew me a picture. Being ill-prepared, I grabbed the only paper in my purse, a tourist map of Portland from Powell's Books. John appropriately drew the squid and cuttlefish in the blue water part of the map (“Where they belong” as he put it). Look hard...they're in there! Cuttlefish is the top one above the bridge, and the squid is the one below the bridge.

Note: diagram not drawn to scale

John explained that the 'hood' of the cuttlefish is bigger, and the squid tentacles tend to be longer. There are eyes on squid, I’m not sure why we didn’t talk about the eyes or lack of eyes on cuttlefish, but there aren’t any on this diagram. However after some researching online, I learned cuttlefish have eyes too. He also confirmed what I knew already, cuttlefish is much more popular in Asia and squid is much more popular in the U.S. And as he described it, the cuttlefish is almost a hybrid of or the perfect thing 'in-between' a squid and an octopus.

How is he so smart you ask? Well, doesn't hurt that he's a chef. Being the talented executive chef of Pazzo Ristorante in Portland, John is a very busy man. I was lucky enough to be able to spend time with John on one of his precious nights off. He talked about many of his cooking adventures and experiences (including cleaning out hundreds and hundreds of cuttlefish during some time when he was cooking in Italy).

The meal we had was great. More on that soon!

In terms of my squid vs cuttlefish debate, I think I’ve found enough answers and have done plenty of my own additional research online. At this point, what's most important? I like eating both of them. Onto the next food world unanswered question.