Vegan in Portland

We met up with some dear college friends over bowls at Harlow.

Harlow is a favorite of our friends, and they’d been talking it up to us in messages for months. The restaurant offers a mostly vegan menu with lots of gluten-free options, juices, and smoothies.

There was already a line forming when we arrived. So we had a chance to peruse the menu as we inched closer to the register. (You order at the counter. Then food is brought to you in the large, airy seating area.)

We were swimming in choices. So David and I decided to order two things and split them.

I got the Adobe Salad. It’s a bowl of shredded spinach, kale, and red cabbage that’s topped with smoky tempeh, black beans, and corn.

It was tossed in a sunflower chili cream, and finished with a smattering of toasted pepitas. The chili cream had the essence of chipotles in adobo (as you might guess from the name).

It was filling and comforting in all of the best ways.

David chose the Mercy Blues. Two piles of garlic herb polenta were topped with steamed kale, beans, corn, and a generous spoonful of chipotle cashew hollandaise.

The hollandaise was similar in flavor profile to the chili cream. Of course, when there’s an option of adding avocado, the answer is always yes.

After lunch, we walked up and down Hawthorne Boulevard, where there are loads of cute shops and an offshoot of Powell’s Books. While we perused the bookstore, we noticed we weren’t getting a ton of shopping done, as we kept lingering in the aisles to catch up.

So we headed back to Harlow, where we could grab a beverage and leisurely chat.

I got the Melody, which is a freshly-squeezed juice mix of kale, cucumber, spinach, apple, and lemon. It usually comes with ginger as well, but I asked for it to be omitted.

The drink was refreshing and went down easy. David got the Marionberry Chia Lemonade.

I’ve now been to Portland three times, and every trip has involved a trek around Powell’s City of Books. Powell’s is a chain of independent bookstores. And its headquarters is world-renowned.

It claims to be the world’s largest independent bookstore and seems to make every list of bookstores you must visit.

The store itself is massive, taking up an entire city block.

Walking around it feels like you’re touring a Clue board game with color-coding to jump from one section to the next. Or maybe it’s the IKEA of bookstores?

Of course, there’s a sizable vegan cookbook section with lots of titles that I recognized from my own collection.

Rabbits Café is a small restaurant that focuses on bowls.

I got the mini-barbecue. A layer of rice was topped with barbecue Soy Curls, kale tossed in tahini dressing, and a generous ladle of nacho-ranch sauce. And of course, those three words I live by – always add avocado.

The flavors melded beautifully, and every bite worked well together.

David got the mini chickpea bowl. The bowl included curried chickpeas, kale in tahini dressing, and green chutney on top of brown rice.

He added avocado too.  He’s no fool.

I had a bite for myself, and this bowl did not disappoint. Even though we opted for the small size, the bowls were plenty filling.

Off the Griddle is a vegetarian restaurant, where everything can be prepared vegan. There are loads of gluten-free options, and in fact, the only thing on the menu that isn’t available gluten-free is the reuben.

I’d visited back in 2013. I was so inspired by that visit, I developed a recipe based on their breakfast nests. The nests are made with hash browns and cooked with tofu scramble baked into them.

Being a huge brunch lover, I was excited to reacquaint myself with one of their platters.

I ordered the blue plate. It was a smorgasbord of brunch classics – hash brown nests, vegan sausage, and biscuits and gravy.

The nests come with your choice of eggs or herbed tofu. Obviously, I went with the latter.

I was surprised that the nests were a little different than I remembered from my earlier visit.

Instead of being baked into a single unit in muffin cups, the hash brown nests were more like hash brown patties that had scramble spooned on top. It was still tasty, but I missed the cute execution.

Biscuits and gravy are something that I never make at home, and so it feels like a real treat to get them out. The sausage at A. N. D is very unique and different from the standard veggie links or patties you find elsewhere. It’s served as a sprawling thin pancake of a sausage.

David sided with Aumie’s Awesome Plate. It comes with half of a waffle, maple syrup, greens, and your choice of eggs or herbed tofu. Again, he took the latter option, of course.

An unusual addition to David’s plate was jackfruit bacon. I’ve had savory jackfruit dishes a million times over, but I’ve never seen jackfruit bacon.

It was flavored like the tempeh bacon that you see more commonly – smoky and sweet. However, it had the piecey quality of jackfruit. I liked that it was cooked until dry and wasn’t wet or soupy.

St. Johns Bridge is a steel suspension bridge that stretches across Willamette River.

It was just breathtaking, and I couldn’t stop snapping photos. Currently my computer is filled with pictures of this massive beauty.

I also found a necklace featuring St. Johns Bridge in a neighborhood store selling local artwork.  So now I have a reminder of our visit to wear around my neck.

Ready to rest for a while, we returned to our AirBnb to kick back and relax over drinks.

Fun fact: The design on these coasters is from the carpet at the Portland Airport before it was renovated.

Apparently that carpet has something of a cult following in Portland.

There’s even a hashtag on Instagram where people share pictures of the design. More than 80,000 pictures have been posted with the hashtag #pdxcarpet. (This guy even covered his car in the design!)

The Des Moines Airport carpet must be seething with jealousy.

The next morning while I packed, David picked up Voodoo Donuts and coffee for us. Then it was time to say goodbye to PDX and its new airport carpet.

I can’t wait to go back another time for more vegan donuts, bowls, and brunch in the city that knows how to do it right.