This time I was travelling with my friend Ashleigh. We flew with Hawaiian Airlinees, and had planned a trip visiting Portland, Seattle, Vancouver and Honolulu. A 10 hour flight, a 7 hour stop over, and a 5 hour flight after leaving home, we arrived in Portland, Oregon.
We were hungry after all that flying (Hawaiian air does not provide vegan meals, so we were living on noodle cups and snack foods), and arrived in Portland at about 11pm at night. But one of the benefits of our hotel, the Eastside Lodge, is that you can actually see Sizzle Pie from the entrance. We got the 'Bad Reputation', which had Daiya Mozarella, mushroom, onions and black olives. Heavenly! It was so hot we burned our mouth, but it was so good and we were so hungry we just couldn't slow down!
The hotel was also walking distance to a 24 hour Voodoo Doughnuts. There is something amazing about being able to buy a selection of vegan doughnuts at 1am in the morning. We got: Gaytime, Maple, Jam-Filled Voodoo, Jam-Filled Glazed, Cinnamon Cone, Coconut Covered Chocolate and... ummm... Cream-Filled Cock and Balls. The Gaytime was definitely the best!
Our hotel was also about six minutes walk away to Sweetpea Baking Company, which is in the vegan mini-mall, and we headed down there for breakfast the following day.
On the way we saw this SQUIRREL! We don't have SQUIRRELS! in Australia, and I am always so excited to see SQUIRRELS! when I am overseas. SQUIRREL!
We had a delicious breakfast of a hummus bagel (sprinkled with nooch), breakfast potatoes, a brown sugar scone and a lemon strawberry danish. And excellent way to start the day!
Sweetpea is also home to the best chai in the world. I am extremely picky about my chai, and their Spicy Chai (I had it with almond milk) is something I still dream about!
The first time I went to Sweetpea in 2011, they didn't seem to have much. However this visit was much more impressive. Look at their beautiful bakery display! After breakfast we headed up to watch a bit of the Rose Parade, which was on while we were in town. it was fun, lots of awesome marching bands. And a giant crocodile float made out of Brussels sprouts.
For lunch we met up with a friend of mine at Hungry Tiger Too. I had the Texas Burger with Slaw, which had crispy fried onions on it. For some greens, there was a vegan Greek Salad, and of course we had to order a side of vegan mac and cheese! Hungry Tiger Too seems to have undergone some changes in menu, but it still looks pretty good! It was also just a short walk from our hotel. Our hotel had such a good location! After lunch we visited Herbivore Clothing and Food Fight for a vegan shopping spree. Cute clothes! Fun food!
For dinner, we had reservations at Portobello, an amazing vegan restaurant that I had visited in 2011. We chose the tasting menu, and each chose a different item for each course to maximise the number of dishes we could choose. Behold!
For first we had a beautiful fresh beet salad and a very rich and delicious mushroom pate.
Portobello has a nice drinks list, including mocktails for me to choose from! I had a Citrus Reviver, which had orange, grapefruit, lemon and lime juices mixed with simple syrup and vanilla. Yum!
The second course included some of Portobello's famous gnocchi, served with asparagus and sugar snap peas. These are honestly the most amazing gnocchi anyone will ever have in their life! Our second plate was a lovely pea ravioli with mushrooms.
The third course was 'mains', which included portobello roast and cauliflower steak. The portobello was served with polenta, greens and a delicious cashew cream sauce, and the cauliflower had chickpea panisse, fennel and chimicurri sauce. Delicious!!
The tasting menu does not come with dessert, but you cannot go out to dinner and not order dessert! Ashleigh ordered the decadent Ice Cream Sundae, while I could not go past a Rhubarb and Strawberry Tart.
After dinner we took a bit of a stroll home, with very full bellies!
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All that food looks amazing, especially that drinky! Bummer about Hawaiian Air not serving vegan meals!
ReplyDeleteoh my gosh. this post made me hungry and also just sorta made me want to cry. Why does Portland get all the good stuff!!?? I've been there lots of times, but now I just urgently want to go back! :)
ReplyDeleteWait, what? You guys don't have squirrels? How did I not know that?! I visited and loved all of those places when I was in Portland last year. Reading about your experiences there's made me wanna go back even more!
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