The LA Times Takes on Portland’s Food Scene

Here are the six restaurants that are about to be overrun by Californians.

(Courtesy of Oma's Takeaway.)
By Suzette Smith

For the past week or so, the Portland restaurant scene was abuzz with news of an impending Los Angeles Times spread about the city’s surviving—and thriving—restaurant and food cart world.

Debuting on the front of the LA Times food section today, a piece by local food writer Jordan Michelman outlined the innovation of several restaurants and food carts that, in response to the pandemic and accompanying lockdown, were able to, alchemy-like, turn those challenges into statement-making food destinations.

Unfortunately, it’s behind a paywall, but all six will be very familiar to any local foodie.

Of the picks—Republica, Mama Dut, Ruthie’s, Lazy Susan, Flying Fish and Oma’s Hideaway—none were a surprise. These are doubtless some of Portland’s most talked-about restaurants right now. But Michelman—who won a James Beard Award in 2020 for a piece arguing that seltzer would soon be surpassed by mineral water—managed to draw a satisfying thread through the roundup of each eatery subject’s persistence, despite lockdown and, in many cases, expansion. The most extreme of those was chef Thuy Pham, who actually started Mama Dut during pandemic lockdown after no longer being able to work as a hairdresser.

We all knew about that, but it’s nice that LA. also knows that now. Come get some vegan pandan barbecue bun, LA.

Seeing as the LA Times is the fourth-largest paper in the nation, you may want to visit your favorites of those six before they’re overrun by Californians.

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