Scoop: Barkeep, get this gossip another Mekong please.

BURGERVILLE
By WW Culture Staff
  1. FLY-BY BURGERS: Previously, PDX’s only connection to beloved burger chains was as a conduit between California immigrants and animal-style In-N-Out burgers. But the Port of Portland has announced we’ll be getting a Burgerville in our airport this winter, hopefully early enough for pumpkin milkshakes. But for those ready to tout the port’s commitment to local foods in the airport, not so fast: Port of Portland’s in-house magazine, Portside, also breathlessly announced the “first-ever PDX location” of the “world’s largest global food retailer,” McDonald’s.
  1. FIFTY TO LOVE: Seattle’s Coastal Hotel Group is already selling off its briefly fashionable Hotel Fifty at 50 SW Morrison St., which opened in 2008, to another set of Seattleites, Pineapple Hospitality, run by Columbia West Properties. The reboot is anticipated in August, and the hotel will be renamed Hotel Rose. The hotel’s H50 restaurant and bar, known both for $3 chichi happy-hour snacks and $300 Spanish coffees, will be retained. As for other changes? Columbia West’s website invites readers to “watch us as we Pineapple our newest acquisition.”
  1. MICHAEL RUSSELL UNMASKED?: The last semi-anonymous food critic in town, The Oregonian’s Michael Russell, appears to be featured in a collection of photos from local barbecue joints published last week. Russell—an everyman food critic who is normally represented with an avatar that depicts him as an elderly hobo eagerly awaiting a pot of possum stew—is shown eating a sloppy pork rib in Lake Oswego. To see the photo of Russell, as well as photos of every other food critic in town, go here. >> In other O-related blog news, you can now read the triumphant conclusion to WW’s survey of area diners and the cease-and-desist letter from The Oregonian that delayed the project for a few weeks.
  1. CORRECTED AND CLARIFIED: In our Fugitives and Refugees cover story (“Capture or Asylum,” June 3, 2013), WW incorrectly stated that the building that housed the Jefferson Theater was torn down to build an apartment building called the Jeffrey. In fact, the theater lost its lease, and the building’s apartment tenants were later relocated to the newly constructed Jeffrey building on the same block. Also, in a review of Sok Sab Bai (June 3, 2013), WW called the eatery “Portland’s only Cambodian restaurant.” Readers pointed out that other restaurants, such as Mekong Bistro on Northeast 82nd Avenue, serve Cambodian cuisine in addition to other Southeast Asian food from Vietnam and Thailand. WW regrets the error and Cambodian confusion.

WWeek 2015

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