Filed under: Korean, Northeast Portland | Tags: chicken wings, micro-restaurant, Northeast Portland, paleo, Portland
2329 NE Glisan St., Portland, OR 97232
(971) 271-8260
There’s a micro restaurant complex on NE Glisan and 24th. A couple restaurants opened that are small and “micro” meaning you order at the register, get a number and they bring you your food. We’ve been to a bunch of these restaurants and the quality of the food has been very surprising. The first one of the many micro restaurants that had popped up in this area is Basa Basa. It’s Korean-fried chicken. It’s gaining in popularity. In Korea, the fried chicken is a popular street and bar food, mostly eaten with some Soju or beer. It’s amazingly moist and crispy, so I’ve heard. There is a US food chain called Bon Chon that serves Korean Fried Chicken and I’ve been so curious to try it. So when we heard this place opened up in Portland, we had to try it!
What we ordered: Basa Box of 6 chicken wings, comes with mac salad and rice.
How we ordered it: Well, the menu is very simple. 1) Choose between a Box of 3, 6, or 10 wings. (Boxes come with two sides: mac salad and rice) 2) Choose between 3 sauces. 3) If you order a la cart wings, then the sides are mac salad or rice. That’s it. Here’s the menu:
Basa Basa Menu (Click to Enlarge)
What we received:
6 chicken wings
Cost: Box of 6 wings – $10, Box of 10 wings – $14, only 6 wings – $6.50, only 9 wings – $11.50
Quantity: I’d say they were a little on the small side. Small scoop of the sides was OK. I definitely was not full after this plate of wings. Probably because of all the gluten.
Quality: These wings were very tasty. Of course it could have been because I had forgotten how good meat is when it has flour breading on it and when it’s fried. It was hard to appreciate it, everything definitely tasted good, but as far as trying to eat “cleaner” when at a restaurant, this place is NOT the place to go if you are trying to go “clean”.
Meat-O-Meter says!
I so wanted this place to be awesome. The very simple menu didn’t have any options with vegetables. Unfortunately for us, we like to have a lot of options, especially if all there are high carb foods on their menu. Granted the fried chicken itself should have given us a clue, but what if the chicken was mind blowing? I had heard so many great things about Korean fried chicken that I couldn’t pass it up without first trying it out. (If Fire on the Mountain can not use flour on their wings, maybe this place could too?)
Well, now we know. Super tasty, but maybe it would be appreciated more by people on less dietary restrictions such as ourselves.
On another note, this micro restaurant complex does have an awesome taco place though, Uno Mas, review coming soon!
Filed under: Soul, Northeast Portland, Southern Food | Tags: paleo, Northeast Portland, southern food
Solid restaurant, solid food, solid drinks, solid service, solid environment, solid location…Go check this place out!
What we ordered: Pecan encrusted trout with creamed spinach, Side of sweet potato fries, Brisket with choice of two sides, Fried chicken with mashed potatoes and greens.
How we ordered it: They were very accommodating with substitutions. We could substitute any of their many choices of sides with the sides that were listed on the menu. The trout was ordered as is, sorry about the cream!, Brisket with 2 sides of collard greens. The fried chicken with the mashed potato, well that one was kind of a bust as far as Paleo goes, but we wanted to show the picture anyway.
What we got:
Fish with creamed spinach
Side of sweet potato fries
Brisket
Fried chicken
Cost: Fish – $15.75, Brisket – $15.75, Chicken – $14.75, Side of sweet potato fries – $3.50,
Quality: For the prices, you get what you pay for, the meat was tasty, moist and super flavorful!
Quantity: These were some pretty hearty portions as comfort foods should be.
MEAT-O-METER says!
OK you got us, these weren’t the most Paleo options that we could have chosen. We were celebrating a special occasion and decided this would be our 1 semi cheat meal we would have in a long time. However given the many choices of sides and the many Paleo options, and the ability to make substitutions, this place deserved a thumbs up! With our large party and the many substitutions we made, they were very accomodating. How nice! A slightly higher end restaurant that catered to our needs, solid thumbs up.
Filed under: Hawaiian, Northeast Portland | Tags: Hawaiian, Milwaukee Oregon, Northeast Portland, paleo
(503) 335-5800
Since moving away from NoHo’s – the Southeast Hawaiian Restaurant, we haven’t had that much Hawaiian food lately. Also continuing on our quest to find good Poki outside of Hawaii has been very hard to find. Ah well, we’ll have to settle for what we can get locally.
What we ordered: Large Kalua Pig Main Plate, Garlic Mahi Mahi Main Plate
How we ordered it: No rice, No Macaroni Salad, Extra Salad please!
What we got:
Kalua Pig
Garlic Mahi Mahi
Let’s take a closer look at the fish.
Wow, very rare, moist and perfect!
Cost: Large Kalua Pig Plate – $10, Garlic Mahi Mahi – $12. Add $.50 for substituting green salad.
Quality: The Kalua Pig was a bit salty, but overall very moist and well done. The Mahi Mahi was Perfect! That’s how fish should be made. Melts in your mouth, on the very rare side, not fish smelling and definitely NOT DRY!
Quantity: OK. We were starving and after we ate this meal, we were still a bit hungry.
MEAT-O-METER says!
Even though it wasn’t an incredibly large quantity, the quality way exceeded our expectations. Meat is fer sure their specialty and they do it very well. The fact that eating Paleo here was so easy was awesome! They are great and a sure bet. They’ve also expanded to Milwaukee too!
Filed under: Northeast Portland, Thai | Tags: Northeast Portland, paleo, Thai
They moved to:
3024 NE Alberta St., Portland, OR 97211
(971) 255-1082
This place had been recommended to me so many times that I am kicking myself for not coming here sooner! I was thinking, “but how can one top Dang’s Thai Kitchen, or Thailand Restaurant?” Well, the only way a Thai restaurant could top these two is if it were closer into the city. Could this be the restaurant with all the traits we have ever wanted?
What we ordered: With any new Thai restaurant we had to order our staples: Barbecue chicken, Larb, Tom Kha Soup. Since we were eating with friends we went All Out. We also ordered a “dry” curry – Hor Mok Talay and an entree named Chu Chee Shrimp.
How we orderd it: Everything was pretty much ordered as is. We made sure they did not waste their food by bringing us any rice. The waiter, of course, gave us a weird look and did a double take. We’re pretty used to it by now.
What we got:
Tom Kha Soup
Larb
Hor Mok Talay - we dug in already before we could get a pic!
Chu Chee Shrimp
Cha' Ba Thai Barbecue Chicken
Cost: Tom Kha Soup – $8.50, Larb – $8.50, Hor Mok Talay – $13.50, Chu Chee Shrimp – $13.40, Cha’Ba Thai Barbecue Chicken – $9.00. Pretty average for a Thai restaurant.
Quality: Everything was soooo tasty! Hor Mak Talay had squid and shrimp and was a little bit spicy. The “dry” curry implied that it was not super liquidy, like other curries you’re probably familiar with. It was more of a paste like substance. No matter! It was delicious! Barbecue chicken wasn’t the best I’ve ever tasted, but still good nonetheless.
Quantity: All this fed 4 people and then some. We all probably could have afforded to eat a couple of spoonfuls less, but it was just too good to let go to waste.
MEAT-O-METER Says!
The Thai restaurants keep getting better and better!
Cha’ba Thai has got one up on Dang’s Thai Kitchen because it’s closer into town! Some of the dishes were unique to the restaurant and we had never seen them at other Thai restaurants, so that was welcome surprise. If you think you can top this one, please let us know!
Filed under: Barbecue, Northeast Portland | Tags: Barbecue, Northeast Portland, paleo, ribs
5410 Northeast 33rd Avenue, Portland, OR
(503) 288-3836
Parking lot of New Seasons on 33rd and Killingsworth.
There is a new coupon on Restaurant.com for Cannon’s, so we had to go there! (If you missed the blog post about restaurant.com, let me recap: Restaurant.com sells $25 gift certificates for $10. www.slickdeals.net posts Promo Codes for restaurant.com. The promo codes give you anywhere from 60 – 80% off the price of the gift certificate. We never buy a gift certificate at full price! So it makes your meal even cheaper!)
OK, back to Cannon’s….
What we ordered: Half pound of brisket, Full rack of ribs, 2 corn on the cobs
How we ordered it: No barbecue sauce please! There’s a lot of sugar on the sauce and they load it up on the ribs and brisket.
What we got:
1/2 pound of brisket
2 pcs of corn
Rack of Pork Ribs
Cost: Rack of pork ribs – $23, Brisket – $10 for half pound, Corn – $1 each
Quality: Ribs were a little dry. Even though we said to hold the barbecue sauce, doesn’t mean it still shouldn’t be dry….Brisket was spectacular. Moist and tasty.
Quantity: OK, half pound of brisket really was not as much as we had hoped, but the quality was pretty good. Ribs were really just OK, not as good as Podnah’s. They did keep the rib tips on the ribs which definitely added to the meat amount.
Meat-O-Meter says!
(picture was not taken at Cannon’s) Definitely not the best in Portland. It was just OK. For the price and the amount, it’s right smack in the middle. RIbs were definitely a bit disappointing. But there’s a new Special price on the Bucket of Rib Tips – $18. Though because this is a special, it doesn’t work with the restaurant.com coupon, it’s not a bad deal by itself. In general though barbecue places are great for any Paleo needs. All meat all the time, with no need for substitutions, usually, it’s great if you’re in a bind and not sure what to eat for the protein part of your meal.
