Thai Bistro

April 5, 2013

Date #78

I wanted to do Mexican food again tonight, but we are meeting friends at a previous location of date night tomorrow so I need to choose a different ethnicity. I plugged Thai and close to home into the search engine and found Thai Bistro, a cute little place on the man made lake in Tualatin. The chairs are covered with white linen, so beautiful.

We started with salmon stuffed won tons, with a sweet spicy dipping sauce. These were hot puffs of perfection, something we have never tried before.

I ordered green bean magic, on a recommendation from the server. The dish was green beans, carrots, and ginger in a sweet brown sauce, it also came with sticky rice.Very simple, but so flavorful. I love the freshness of the dish.

Chuck ordered yellow curry with chicken, this is one of his favorite dishes. It was so good, he had me try the sauce it was made with coconut milk, so creamy good. It was a bit spicy and a bit sweet, so very good.
They served vanilla ice cream with chocolate sauce with the bill, what a nice way to get a bill. This is my new favorite Thai restaurant close to home, cute decor, very friendly staff, great food, and great location. Yummy!!

Nuestra Cocina

March 29, 2013

Date #77

Chuck's beloved car was in an accident, not his fault, this week, so we are in a rental car tonight, a 2013 Ford Focus. I had a 1998 Focus that I loved, but this isn't even the same car, Ford has really stepped up to the plate. There are 2 screens one for car notifications, and one for radio things. Very nice car, but it's no Stella.
So we started out on our journey to South East Portland tonight from a recommendation from a co-worker. A small Mexican restaurant on Division called Nuestra Cocina. The place was packed, we were told to go to the bar and they would call our name. It was nice to stand in the bar and look out the nice big windows at the beautiful March evening.

 


After a short wait we were taken to our table and presented soft warm corn tortillas and salsa. Not our usual appetizer at a Mexican restaurant, but really good. We also had 3 small tacos that consisted of white fish and a green salsa. This was so fresh and very tasty, the grilled fish was so good.

Next I ordered gorditas rellenas which were 2 small tortillas stuffed with beans, avocado, green  chilis and cotija cheese. Again this dish was so fresh and tasty. I was happy it came with 4 tortillas because I could share one with Chuck.

Chuck ordered enfrijoladas con chorizo verde that consisted of tortillas, cheese, and chorizo. It was really spicy, but so good he couldn't stop eating it. He has to stop and have some of mine because it stopped the burn for a bit.

Because all of the dishes were small, and the server was such a good salesman we had dessert. It was a tortilla heated and stuffed with cream and bananas, and drizzled with caramel sauce. So wonderful!

La Fuente

March 22, 2013

Date #76

Tonight I had something else in mind because we were in Willsonville getting new tires for Chuck's car, but we were done early enough that we didn't need to stay in this town. I was also in the mood for Mexican food so I looked for restaurants in the towns close to home. And what I found was a great little gem, I have passed many times but never seen, La Fuente in downtown Tigard.

We started with chips and salsa, one of my favorite starters. The chips were good, but the salsa was great, nice and chunky, and not too spicy. We were able to watch, well Chuck was, March madness, he even brought his brackets and pens into the restaurant so he could keep score.

I ordered their chili relleno with rice and beans, that also came with 4 homemade corn tortillas. The chili relleno was made with cojita cheese which made it taste different than most I have tried. The waiter told me it was very good, and it didn't disappoint. We could tell the bean were made fresh that day, and the tortillas were wonderful, very fresh food.

 

Chuck ordered a combination plate that included an enchillada, taco, and sope. His plate looked like it came from a swanky Mexican restaurant. They tasted wonderful, very fresh, with juicy flavorful meat. The sope was something he had never tried before. The dough was so soft and flaky, very interesting combination.

I am so happy I changed my mind for our destination tonight, this was a wonderful find. And from Chuck's post on Facebook, many people know of this great restaurant.

TarBoush Lebanese Bistro & Bar

March 15, 2013

Date #75

We first tried Lebanese food a little over a year ago, and have grown to love it. Chuck found TarBoush Lebanese Bistro & Bar when we were on Hawthorn for the weekend of Chuck a few weeks ago, he's always on the lookout!

This restaurant is located in an old house with most of the rooms still in tact. We were taken to a table for two in the main room. We ordered hummus to start and oh was it good. It came with fresh out of the oven pita bread, and the pita bread kept coming, I could have just eaten this all night and been happy. I wanted to leave room for my meal, but the hummus was so good it was hard to stop.

I ordered Loubieh which is green beans, tomato, onions, garlic, and olive oil over basmati rice. It was basically green beans in tomato sauce with whole chunks of garlic, yummy! Because we cleaned up the hummus I only had a little room for the main course, but the good thing about that is I have leftovers for two lunches, lucky me!

Chuck ordered the beef shawarma plate over basmati rice. This dish was plenty of tender, flavorful pieces of beef. I made a suggestion that he save half for lunches, so he also had leftovers for 2 lunches.

We have noticed that restaurants in certain areas of Portland, young hipster, have clientele that don't respect their neighbors. This was the case tonight unfortunately, one woman was so loud, we knew her life story, and when leaving we had to ask her twice to move her chair because it was in the isle. Some people!

The Verdict

March 8, 2013

Date #74

My co-worker told me about this restaurant, and another took his advise and tried it last week, both said it was amazing, so tonight's choice is The Verdict in Oregon City. The restaurant is located in the oldest commercial building in Oregon. It's also located across from the Clackamas county court house, hence the name, and names of dishes on the menu.

We both had a hard time deciding what to order, so Chuck and I both picked out 2 dishes we wanted, then we ordered for each other. I ordered seafood Alfredo pasta for Chuck and he ordered blackened salmon Caesar salad for me.

The salmon was cooked perfectly, it was crispy on the outside and juicy on the inside, and the Caesar dressing was just right, not too heavily coated lettuce, and plenty of garlic flavor. I love when Caesar salad includes shavings of Parmesan cheese, this one did not disappoint, very yummy. I have never had a Caesar salad with salmon, my first experience was oh so tasty.

The pasta was cooked right, al dente, and the Alfredo sauce was just garlicy enough. The added bonus were the shrimp, nice and juicy, oh and the garlic bread. We both finished our plates, but that's ok because we didn't have a starter or dessert. Too bad, no leftovers for lunch.

Jade

March 1, 2013

Date #73

Tonight is my Chucky's birthday, but because he/we are so dedicated to date night and the rules, it's his turn tonight. We go to a great part of Portland  called Sellwood, an old neighborhood with plenty of character like many old neighborhoods in Portland. Jade is his choice tonight, and there is a line up almost out the door. This is a good sign that this place is tasty, but a bad one when it's the type of restaurant that you have to wait until you order before you find a table. Not my favorite type of restaurant, but we did see a few that were ready to open up when we got to the cash register.

We started with salad rolls and peanut sauce for dipping. I love peanut butter, but not with savory food...I thought, but I was brave and dipped my salad roll into this sauce. It was spicy, and peanutty, but didn't taste like peanut butter, I thought this was an amazing combination.

Next I ordered shrimp with garlic, the neat and gross thing was they removed the shell from the shrimp, but it was still attached to the tail. This made the dish very flavorful, but it was kind of weird to have to remove the shell and tail before eating. Anyway, the dish was amazing, garlicy and sweet, it went well with the fluffy jasmine rice.

Chuck ordered yellow curry with chicken, he is becoming quite the fan of curry. The curry was a bit spicy, and very creamy. The veggies were cooked to perfection and the chicken was juicy.
The line never got smaller the entire time we ate, and it was later in the evening. We really enjoyed Chuck's birthday, but not Birthday dinner. Tomorrow starts the weekend of Chuck!

La Isla Bonita

February 22, 2013

Date #72

I have wanted to try this restaurant for a long time, but since it is so close to our favorite restaurant we never have. La Isla Bonita is very close to home, just off the I-5 on Nyberg in Tualatin, so hopefully this will be an alternative to our favorite. It's a colorful restaurant with friendly staff, we are sat at a booth with colorful flower/bird back rests. We started with my favorite appetizer chips and salsa. The salsa was chunky and a bit spicy, the chips were on the thick side and crispy.

I ordered my usual of chili relleno, and it was my favorite type, with just the egg batter. It's just such a delicate dish, but full of flavor. The rice and beans were also good, I love eating the beans with the chips. What a good combination.

Chuck ordered a combination plate that included a crispy beef taco, tamale, and enchilada. The tamale and enchilada were covered in a dark mole sauce that was so full of flavors. Chuck loves mole sauce because of the complex flavors, you don't always get this type of sauce on your enchiladas, he was pleasantly surprised.
Very yummy restaurant, but I think our favorite just down the road is still our favorite.

Shandong

February 15, 2013

Date #71

Chuck chose our restaurant tonight because a recommendation from a co-worker, these are usually the best spots. We start out going towards the I-5, he likes to go far from home and I like to stay close. We ended up in NE Portland on Broadway at a restaurant called Shandong, Northern China cuisine. The place was packed, so we gave our names and headed into another room to wait. This wasn't so bad because we were able to see what others were eating. The tea was so amazing, I didn't order another drink, Chuck had a Chinese beer.

One thing I have missed since going Veggie, is pot stickers, no one makes them without chicken. We ordered shrimp dumplings which were almost pot stickers, they just weren't fried. To accompany the dumplings were a bottle of rice wine vinegar, soy sauce, and a spicy sweet sauce. We combined these ingredients and made a pretty good dipping sauce for the dumplings.

Next I ordered hand made eggs noodles with veggies, and shrimp. While we were waiting for our table I had eyed this dish, and the server recommended it as well. It was so amazing, the noodles were tasty and cooked to perfection, one of the things I dislike the most is overcooked noodles, this chef knows how to cook noodles. This was the perfect dish for me, and leftovers for lunch on Monday, yummy!

Chuck's favorite Chinese dish is sweet and sour pork, and luckily they had it on the menu. He enjoyed it so much, and probably because it's been a while since he's had it. The pork was tender, breading crispy, and the sauce was just the right combination of sweet and sour. He was so happy. But not so happy on Monday at lunch because he ate everything. Very tasty restaurant.

La Sierra

February 8, 2013

Date #70

My favorite food is Mexican food, and thank goodness Chuck loves it as well. I am also thankful that it's date night and we have to go to the restaurant we choose. Tonight I would have turned around when I saw the restaurant, but I'm so glad we didn't because it was really good. It's located in a small strip mall off of Hall Blvd. in Beaverton.

My Chuck love menudo and to our surprise they server it during the week. Most restaurants only serve it on the weekend. Menudo is a Mexican soup with tripe (cow stomach), hominy, onions, and spices. Chuck's favorite is a white version, but he likes the chili version as well. This soup usually includes a side dish of onions, cilantro, chili peppers, lime, and warm corn tortillas. Chuck is in heaven.

I am still on my search for the best chili relleno, so this is what I ordered. Their version was a cheese filled egg wrapped chili with a tomato sauce. I think I like the egg wrapped instead of the breading wrapped chili relleno. There's something about the egg, chili, and cheese combination that I have grown to love. I also love any Mexican dish that includes rice and beans, these did not disappoint.

 

Chuck ordered a combination plate for his main dish, this included a beef enchilada, pork tamale, and beef crispy taco. He was pretty full from his menudo, but he was able to eat the taco, very yummy, he said the beef tasted like it was cooking all day. He took the rest home for lunch, we both love to do this now, we figured out we don't have to eat everything at the restaurant, leftover restaurant lunch is very good.

Caro Amico Italian Cafe

February 1, 2013

Date #69

I have grown to love date night, especially the times Chuck takes me out, I love the surprise of it and not having to plan anything. So tonight, we head out towards downtown Portland to a small restaurant just off the I-5 called Caro Amico Italian Cafe. We are taken upstairs, because we are able bodied, the people ahead of us were taken to a table on the first floor; they were elderly. I don’t know what downstairs looked like, but upstairs was nice with a really great view.

We started out with beer, yes me, I had a bad day and needed one, and it tasted so good!

We also had a capresi salad which was amazing, one of the best we have tried.

 
I had a onion, mushroom, and pineapple pizza, my favorite toppings, and Chuck a manicotti and cannelloni. I want to say the pizza was amazing, because the restaurant and waiter were, but it was just good, the crust was too thick, and had no flavor. Chuck’s on the other hand was wonderful he enjoyed both the pastas. We also enjoyed a bowl of coffee ice cream for dessert, very nice. Great restaurant and really great service.

Yuzu

January 25, 2013

Date #68

I have a tendency to always want to go to the same types of restaurants, so I wanted to change things up a bit tonight. I chose a small Japanese restaurant in Beaverton called Yuku, it is definitely small, and hard to find. It is in a small strip mall just off Canyon Rd, but no neon sign on the outside, just a sign on the door. We were told we would need to wait for 20 minutes so we went across the street to PetCo to look around. We got back right in time to be seated at the bar, which really wasn't a bar. The place was packed and didn't empty out the entire time; many people were turned away because of the long wait.

Chuck started off with pork, veggie, and mozzarella spring rolls, he said they were yummy. They didn't have any appetizers without meat that looked good to me, but that was ok because I wanted to leave room for the ramen.

I had soy sauce ramen with egg noodles and a soft boiled egg. To my surprise the egg was very tasty in this dish, and the noodles were the best ramen noodles I have ever tried, I almost asked for a second helping of noodles, but I didn't. This isn't the best place for a vegetarian, but I did ok.

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Chuck had the kakuni ramen with pork belly. There was plenty of pork and noodles in a very tasty broth. He enjoyed it so much the bowl was dry at the end; he said he wanted to see the picture at the bottom of the bowl. 

Very nice place, but very busy,  I heard people coming in saying they had a reservation, next time we will do this.

La Cerreta Mexican Restaurant

January 18, 2013

Date #67

We started our night out by driving towards downtown Portland, as we got closer Chuck asked me if I knew how to get to the Ross Island bridge. Unfortunately, this is not one of the areas of Portland that I know well, so we had to follow the signs on the I-5. The problem with going over this particular bridge tonight was another popular bridge, the Sellwood bridge, was closed because it is being rebuild due to its age, and bad bridge rating of 1 out of 100, yikes! And we didn’t know an alternate route to the Ross Island bridge, so we had to stay where we were, and it took about 30 minutes to cross, not too bad. We finally got to the other side of the river and found La Carreta Mexican restaurant, yummy my favorite ethnicity.

This is a very old building, and I am told the restaurant has been there for ages. We were taken upstairs to a banquet/bar room with plenty of tables and people, and were presented chip and salsa, my favorite appetizer. I think the most exciting part of going to a new Mexican restaurant is tasting the salsa to see if we like it. I love mild chunky salsa, and this was it, just a bit spicy and plenty of veggies, so good! A mariachi band consisting of 3 very small men came by to sing us a song, it was something about a beautiful diamond. It was fun, but also a bit embarrassing to have everyone in the restaurant looking at us. 

I ordered my new favorite Mexican dish chili relleno, it came with rice and beans, and a cabbage salad. The chili relleno was heavily breaded which wasn’t that tasty, but it was easy to remove the breading and just eat the chili, egg, and cheese. It was very good, and the red sauce complemented it nicely. The rice and beans were excellent as well, the plate was very large, and I wasn’t able to finish all the food.

Chuck order a combination dish of a taco, tamale, and enchilada, and rice and beans. The taco was placed in the enchilada sauce so it was a bit soggy, but the taste was great. He could tell the meat had been simmering all day long, so soft and flavorful. The tamale tasted very good, but the meat was too big and chunky, would have tasted much better with the taco meat. He agreed with me that both the rice and beans were very tasty.

Really good restaurant, we both commented that we should bring our parents here on their next visit, this place was pretty authentic, not Phoenix, but great for Portland. Great find Chuck!

Sushi Hana

January 11, 2013

Date #66

When I first tried sushi I didn’t like it because of the texture. Over the years I have grown to love it, mostly the California rolls, and had it at quite a few different places. The one style of sushi I have never had is the restaurant that offers it on a conveyor belt. So tonight is conveyor belt sushi at Sushi Hana, people from work have gone there often and say it's realy good.

We arrived around 8pm, and the place was packed, and not much room to wait for a place in front of the conveyor belt, but we add our names to the list and watch the fun. We are sat at a corner which is good, just a little more room for us to move around. We had to sit on our jackets because there’s not much room for anything but your body to sit on the stool. We order out drinks and are set free to pick from the interesting offerings on this wonderful conveyor belt.

   
We are a little nervous to start, we don’t want to pick the wrong thing, and me not picking any weird meat. They had a small picture guide to help us out, but it was still hard to find what we wanted in the beginning. After our first selection it became easier, Chuck was in heaven and I the same. Each plate cost around $1.75 and had 3-6 large pieces of sushi. Everything was very fresh and flavorful.  It was so much fun watching everyone doing their picking, and hoping if we spotted our next selection that no one if front of us would pick it. We never had this happen, there was always plenty to choose from. The only one Chuck couldn’t find was one made with eel but I think we could have special ordered it.
Besides the sushi the conveyor belt also offered fruit, pie, drinks, and cream puffs. I had to try one of the cream puffs, they were drizzled with chocolate and so delicious, perfect dessert after sushi. We left stuffed and with a bill of less than $30, very nice! Now off to walk around Petco and some groceries at Winco, two things Chuck loves to do.

Muu Muu's

January 4, 2013

Date #65

We were off to one of our new favorite areas of Portland, the NW 21st area and Muu Muu’s. It’s a bar but a restaurant or a restaurant with loud music, anyway it’s a hip place in Portland.

We started out with your favorite salad, caprese. We just love the combination of tomato, basic, and mozzarella, this version came with a bowl vinaigrette for dipping, very nice.

Next I had a grilled cheese sandwich with tomato on Straun bread which made the sandwich. I had never had this type of bread before, it is hearty and flavorful, I think it would be good for any grilled sandwich. This was a simple sandwich and very tasty, so happy I tried it.

Chuck had jambalaya with shrimp, Andouille sausage and chicken over rice. It was a bit spicy for him, but he ate the whole bowl.
Chuck’s friends from work showed up, we had a nice visit before leaving around 11pm. The streets were packed with people out for a fun time on Friday night.