Portland Food & Gardens by V. Rains

Our exhaust system troubles only made us lose about 3/4ths of a day site-seeing with Lyle & Linda.  Fortunately we didn’t lose any time eating.  Lyle and Linda are Foodies and when you are with them, you eat really well.  Our first night was with Roger’s & Lyle’s cousin, Pam and her husband, Brian, at McMenamins Rams Head pub and grill.  Portland is famous for its abundance of microbreweries and yummy beer.  So we had our first tasting then.  Hopefully Roger will address the beer better than I can.  We especially enjoyed the company & conversation.

The next morning we ate a wonderful breakfast at the Buffalo Gap.  Linda & I split an oyster omelet type dish, the name of which I forget.  You can tell I’m not a Foodie (but I really do appreciate one).  Linda would know.  We also split one of their humongous cinnamon rolls with bacon.  We were disappointed because we thought it would have cut up bacon mixed in but it was just placed on top.

Afterwards we toured the Japanese Gardens at Washington Park.  We didn’t have any sunshine but it didn't make much  difference.  It is mostly shaded by tall trees.  The Japanese Gardens are supposed to be the largest and finest outside of Japan.  They were lovely.  I’ll let Roger’s pictures speak for themselves.

Crane pond

Don't be koi

Waterfall

Rock garden

Next we visited the Rose Gardens while Roger walked the dogs.  Yes, they pretty much go everywhere with us.  Unfortunately they weren’t allowed in the gardens.  So I’ll let my pictures do the talking.

A type of rose

Another type of rose

Do you see a pattern here

Walking the dogs

We finished up the day with sample beers at the Deschutes Beer Pub.  We then went to dinner at Andina, a Peruvian restaurant where we met and ate with Richard & Donna, friends of Lyle & Linda.  The next couple of hours were culinary Nirvana.  Richard is clearly a Foodie, as well.  He decided we were going to sample at least half of what was on the menu.  The food was superb.  We tasted duck, lamb, chicken, scallops, asparagus, quinoa, rice, potatoes, etc.  The food & spices were all ones that we eat fairly commonly but the mixtures were unusual.  For example there were capers in the potatoes that were paired with the scallops. The meal was paired with a white wine from New Zealand & a Zinfandel from Chile.  We completed the meal with a passion fruit mouse and a mango raspberry sorbet.  Oh, and did I mention we had delightful conversation again?

Dessert for six