Gossip Slightly Less Popular Than Fried Pies.

  1. CLASH OF THE FOOD CARTS: WW’s third annual Eat Mobile food cart festival finally arrived Saturday afternoon, and it was huge. How huge? We squeezed 30 carts under 2 1/2 blocks of the Morrison Bridge and packed in some 1,900 hungry Portlanders, who drank 150 gallons of Pabst Blue Ribbon and ate every last bite of food. The winners of the sorta-prestigious Carty Awards, chosen by a panel of foodie luminaries, were Italian cart Garden State for overall tastiness and Moxie RX for style. The People’s Choice award, to no one’s surprise, went to Whiffies Fried Pies. The surest way to a Portlander’s heart is, apparently, a deep fryer. Other crowd favorites included the People’s Pig, which showed off a whole roasted oinker in its cart window; FlavourSpot, whose epic line for maple-sausage waffle tacos nearly blocked the view of the Dirty Mittens rocking onstage, and Fifty Licks, which created a Red Bull Cola ice cream just for the event. Visit wweek.com for photos and more Eat Mobile highlights.
  2. IT’S A BEAUTIFUL BELMONT: The former It’s a Beautiful Pizza on Southeast Belmont Street will soon hold two new eateries: the record shot/wine bar Hall of Records and Cognito, a restaurant serving, according to chef Jeffrey J. Kingman, “New World Hemisphere cuisine, with strong influences from South and Central America.” Kingman, who has run the kitchen at Lake Oswego’s Riccardo’s (from 1993-'95) and at several restaurants in the Northeast, also runs a social media marketing company called Chalkboarder. Both restaurants will open in early summer. Between these debuts and last week’s announcement that Dixie Mattress Company will close after nearly 30 years in business, things are heating up on the 3300 block. The group that bought the Dixie building includes two of the co-owners of the Bye and Bye and a co-owner of Sorel Vintages on Hawthorne, among others. We’re keeping our fingers crossed for a restaurant or bar....
  1. DOUGH-NOT: Comics at this year’s well-received Bridgetown Comedy Festival laid some harsh love on Portland, knocking the city’s beards and bikes at nearly every show. But perhaps the most biting (and well-placed) criticism came from Adam Cayton-Holland. “The craziest thing to see is the zeal for fucking Voodoo doughnuts, ” the Denver-based comedian jibed. “[Locals] force them on you! I’m not 6. I’m glad they’re delicious, but call me in 1987 when I would have given a shit.”
  2. STUPID FINGERS! In last week’s roundup of new food carts (see “This Year’s Model,” WW, April 21, 2010), we described our favorite pie at Wy’east Pizza as “‘Three Sisters,’ topped with kalamata olives, mushrooms and red onion, $3.” It costs $13. We regret the error.

WWeek 2015

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