Restaurant Guide 2007

[October 17th, 2007]

A week ago, a local restaurateur asked me this question: “Can you make us Restaurant of the Year?” My one-word answer: “No.”

If it were that easy, there wouldn’t be any reason at all to put out a guide to Portland’s most enjoyable—and recently much- lauded—kitchens. Truth is, no matter how fun it may sound, eating for this guide is hard work. First you have narrow what adds up to around 1,000 local restaurants down to a mere 130 or so, visit each one and hope that the final 100 you’ve picked live up to the standards you’ve set for the guide. Then, consider: What if one of your favorites is having an off night? Or what if the entrée you’ve totally fallen in love with isn’t going to be on the menu by the time the guide comes out?

Or…well…it’s enough to give one gas.

It’s much easier to explain how we put together what you are holding in your hands. Then it’s up to you to decide if we did a good job or not. That’s the funny thing about food—everyone’s a critic. This is just our critical take on what we see as one of the most fascinating scenes in Portland—a list of our 100 favorite fine dining restaurants in town. Now, that doesn’t mean these places are perfect. This year’s guide comes with a healthy dose of tough love for some of the city’s most well-known dining rooms.

RESTAURANT OF THE YEAR: It’s been a good year for foodies. For the first time since 2004 we picked one single restaurant over all the others. A team of eating experts gathered at the WW office and came up with a place that met our stringent criteria for this honor. Check out Heidi Yorkshire’s explanation of why we say “Bravo” to one Northeast Portland restaurant.

LISTINGS: Unlike other city guides, we’ve decided to keep an alphabetical format to our guide. On top of that, each listing is based on the following five criteria: taste, ambience, service, space and innovation. We also included Signature Dish, Standouts and Regrets, for those who want to get straight to the point.

HIGH FIVE: We did this last year, and we liked it so much we brought it back. In these short features, five of our best contributors recognize restaurants that pull double-duty and should be recognized as such. That includes hotel eateries, steakhouses, dessert and wine joints, and our favorite from last year: specialty-food vendors or markets.

NO-SHOWS: If you don’t see your favorite place, it might be in our Cheap Eats guide (it comes out next spring). Or perhaps we didn’t like it. Tell us about your must-visit eatery by emailing bbeck@wweek.com or posting a comment on wweek.com. We’ve indicated the places that have opened since our last guide with [NEW]. The key for restaurant costs as rated in this guide is:

$$ Moderate : most entrees under $20
$$$ Expensive : most entrees under $30
$$$$ Very expensive : most entrees more than $30

And make sure to check hours and days, as restaurants’ hours can change as quickly as the chefs at Roux.

Enjoy,
Byron Beck, Editor

EDITOR
Byron Beck

ASSISTANT EDITOR
Ben Waterhouse

CONTRIBUTORS
Kevin Allman, Byron Beck, Sue L. Ceswick, Kelly Clarke, Shoshanna Cohen, Liz Crain, Ian Gillingham, Kat Hyatt, Casey Jarman, Jessica Machado, Amy G. McCullough, Aaron W. Mesh, Joanna Miller, Kerry Newberry, Becky Ohlsen, Brian Panganiban, James Pitkin, Nancy Rommelman, Laura Shinn, Beth Slovic, Ethan Smith, Hank Stern, Mike Thelin, Miriam Wolf, Ben Waterhouse, Heidi Yorkshire, Mark Zusman

COPY EDITORS
Kat Hyatt, Ian Gillingham, Hanna Neuschwander, Matt Buckingham

ART DIRECTOR
Thomas Cobb

DESIGN&PRODUCTION
Laura Atkinson, Erik Blad, Brian Brown, Maggie Gardner, Soma Honkanen, Tom Humphrey, Ben Mollica, Cari Vander Yacht, Christie Wright

PHOTOGRAPHY
Jenna Biggs, Darryl James, Brian Lee, Tom Oliver, Amy Ouellette, David L. Reamer, Chris Ryan, Matt Wong

PUBLISHER
Shawna McKeown