Gossip Should Have No Friends

[August 22nd, 2007] TRUFFLE SHUFFLE Sellwood’s Assaggio, now closed for renovations, will open again in mid-September with new a owner, Sean Herron, a new name, and a new chef, Scott Shampine, formerly of Gracie’s , according to buzz in the restaurant world. Once a PDX dining destination, Assaggio has gone south since Darryl and Sarah Joannides sold the restaurant in February 2005 to debut Cork, the couple’s stellar small producer-focused wine shop on Northeast Alberta Street. Things could certainly improve under a focused Shampine, a highly creative talent who cut his teeth at the venerable French Laundry in Napa, Aqua in San Francisco, Hurley’s in Northwest Portland and Olea in the Pearl. Speaking of Olea, Shampine’s replacement there, Daniel Mondok , has left to work at salt-focused eatery Sel Gris on Hawthorne, a few doors down from his former employer, Castagna, as first reported at wweek.com. Olea’s new chef, Aaron Barnett , a friendly and able native Canuck who’s moved to Portland from Palm Desert via kitchens in San Francisco and Vancouver, B.C., has the skills to continue the seriously good rustic Mediterranean-style cooking for which Olea is known. Barnett will present his first menu in the coming weeks.

LAST DANCE? For a mayor who’s kept us waiting for months to find out whether he’ll run again , news that the most mayoral of events is about to crawl out of its crypt, seems, well, curious. The last “Mayor’s Ball ” was in the early 1990s during Mayor Bud Clark’s second term (for those too young to remember, dozens of local bands performed in a mega-concert on three stages in the Memorial Coliseum—that’s the run-down building next to the Rose Garden). Since then, there have been several unsuccessful attempts to revive this leftover from the 1980s (including the Musicians’ Ball in 1995). That is, until now. On Nov. 23, the day after Thanksgiving, Artful Education, which is raising money for art and music education in Portland Public Schools, plans to have 40 local bands perform to a crowd of about 10,000 at $20 a head. Mayor Tom Potter’s wife, Karin Hansen, is on Artful Education’s board, which will reschedule the show in the spring if it can’t line up a headliner for November.…

…What will definitely come out, probably in October, is a calendar in support of the project. Called “Keep Portland Weird ,” it’s being photographed by Charles Waugh of Charles Fine Art Portraits (charleswaugh.com) and already includes images of police Chief Rosie Sizer, Darcelle XV, Tres Shannon, Storm Large and i]WW’[/i] s own John Callahan . And just last Thursday, Waugh shot former mayors Vera Katz and Clark, as well as Mayor Potter goofing on the infamous “Expose Yourself to Art” image of Clark .

BREW WITH A VIEW For the past two years, chances of getting a locally brewed beer at the Clinton Street Theater were shaky: There was only one Clinton Street Brewing beer available, and it often ran dry. “We frequently were the brewery without beer ,” says theater owner Seth Sonstein . But times—and taps—have changed. Clinton Street Brewing has hired Dylan Goldsmith (the homebrewer whose Captured by Porches ales have drawn raves in Southeast neighborhoods for a decade) as brewmaster, and doubled its keg capacity. Now, five beers—including a chocolate porter and a dunkelweizen—will be available on any given night. The new booze makes its official debut at a grand opening on Saturday, Sept. 8, the same weekend the theater is showing a new 35 mm print of Gus Van Sant’s Mala Noche .