Adam Berger’s breathtakingly beautiful restaurant had already more than recovered from its rocky launch by our 2007 Restaurant Guide, but the place just keeps getting better. Chef Jack Yoss continues to refine his signature dishes that emphasize excellent ingredients and interesting flavors over show. Don’t miss the crispy Thai-style pork ribs, a sugar-glazed, two-hands-required appetizer that’s as compulsion-forming as Whiskey Soda Lounge’s infamous Ike’s Fish Sauce Wings. A recent entree of duck breast with braised greens and wee pork meatballs leaned toward East Asia with accents of lemongrass and green onion, while a sweet corn-and-crab bisque stayed right here at home. Match the terrific food with the most elegant dining room in town after Bluehour, and you’re in for a memorable meal.IDEAL MEAL: The Bentley (Calvados and Dubonnet, served up with a lemon twist), Thai-style pork ribs, lamb chops with goat cheese gnocchi, flourless chocolate cake with sage ice cream.1001 NW Couch St, Portland, OR, 97209(503) 226-3463Also Check Out:

Ten 01 2nd Anniversary Party

Chic Pearl District eatery Ten 01 has plenty of reasons to celebrate on the occasion of its second birthday. Sure, it had a rough start (remember “Ishtar of local restaurants”?), but now it’s receiving food kudos from pretty much every publication in town—and that includes garnering a “Best Dessert 2008” nod from little ol’ WW. The restaurant welcomes another year with a cocktail party featuring taste tests from Chef Jack Yoss as well as “signature” cocktails and bubbly from sommelier Erica Landon. Proceeds benefit local nonprofit Salud!, which helps provide Oregon farmworkers with health care. Regular dinner hours. $20. Call to RSVP.

Featured in Restaurant Guide 2008The dining room is concrete-floor/open-kitchen/cinderblock-walls loud and often brimming with families filling up on immense portions of Southern food while zigzagging servers do their best to keep up. In other words, Screen Door isn’t exactly a romantic spot—unless your heart goes pitter-patter for buttermilk-battered fried chicken or fried green tomatoes. Screen Door is all about fresh, local sides and salads and fried, often smoky and salty entrees. The local/organic menu might include a sweet corn pudding or peach fennel salad in late summer, while the main menu starts with pimiento cheese and housemade benne seed crackers, hush puppies with Creole honey-mustard sauce, and fried oysters. Entrees that’ll knock your boots off: the cornmeal-dusted trout, beef brisket and Creole jambalaya. House-specialty cocktails are stiff and well priced. The Scarlett O’Hara mixes Southern Comfort, lime and cranberry juice served up.IDEAL MEAL: Mint julep, crawfish cakes, shrimp and grits, banana caramel pie with pecan shortbread crust.2337 E Burnside, Portland, OR 97214(503) 542-0880

 Win Passes to Supertrash Saturday Screening of Halloween (1978)!   The cat is de-bagged.  Truth spills out.  Simplicity runs amok.  SuperTrash Saturdays are on.  The new cult is mainstream.  Don’t be addicted to movies, be ridiculously addicted.  Go to the neighborhood theater-pub with the biggest screen and sweetest, loudest sound around–it’s the BAGDAD!  I’ve heard it referred to as the “bag,” or the “dad,” even “bagdaddy-o,” or my favorite–the “baggydada.”  Moving on, look at this movie line up…and, good news-all shows $3!  Shows start at 10pm, with live sets from Bridgetown Comedy; awesome 35mm trailers; unreleased vintage rock performances from Classic Concert Series (Bowie, Sabbath, Miles Davis, Pink Floyd, The Clash, etc.); and animation curated by Floating World Comics.  Then at 11pm, the movie!

Satuday, November 8th, HALLOWEEN (1978) Dir. John Carpenter

Okay, Rob Zombie tried, but Carpenter’s homicidal groove is the stuff of thumping perfection–steady and terrifying as death itself. 

(check theater listing for additional showtimes during week)

Halloween Synopsis:  Perhaps the most influential and successful independent film ever made, HALLOWEEN is the movie that put director John Carpenter on the map as a viable filmmaker. An exercise in simple, pure horror, HALLOWEEN takes us into the world of a mad killer, Michael Myers, who at a very young age stabbed his older sister to death. Locked away for many years in a mental hospital Michael escapes one night and returns to his hometown to continue his killing spree. Jamie Lee Curtis, in her first role, plays the resourceful babysitter who is chased by the killer on Halloween night. Produced for very little money and a tight shooting schedule, HALLOWEEN was a stunning success when it was released. Written by John Carpenter and his longtime producer Debra Hill, the film set their careers on fire, with both of them working together many times over the next 25 years. The film also made a star out of Jamie Lee Curtis and turned the slasher movie into a viable, successful genre. HALLOWEEN has been copied, parodied and even turned into a franchise of its own, but the original is still considered the best of the bunch. HALLOWEEN was John Carpenter’s first foray into horror, and remains the standard to which all other modern horror films are measured. 

Win Yours!

Submit your steamiest TWILIGHT inspired fan fiction to win a VIP prize pack.
The favorite fan fiction entry will be posted on wweek.com and a taste of it will be read at the screening.

Screening Date Tuesday, November 18.

Submit stories to bbeck@wweek.com
Submissions must be original, 100 words or less and received by November 11 at 5pm.

The restaurant arm of Simpatica Catering is sub rosa dining at its best. Access to its Friday and Saturday sit-down, fixed-menu dinners can only be granted via reservation, and only if you respond in a timely fashion to the weekly emails. They take a more egalitarian approach with the Sunday brunch: Mainstream breakfast standbys such as biscuits and gravy and corned beef hash are on the menu—and they are excellent across the board—but the real draws are the dishes that exemplify Simpatica’s desire to push diners out of their comfort zones. Firm chunks of oil-poached tuna sit embedded in their frittata, balanced by a tangy, salty eggplant caponata and roasted potatoes. A strata (a savory bread pudding) bursting with pork shoulder is offset by a small dish of field greens, remarkable in their minimalist vinaigrette dressing. During busy mornings, the spoils go to the gregarious, as much of the seating is communal. With food this good, even strangers make excellent company.

IDEAL MEAL: Anything with the house bacon, fried chicken, waffles. *From Restaurant Guide 2008

(503) 235-1600

828 SE Ash St.

www.simpaticacatering.com

Seemingly every Portland restaurant worth its Malden salt has some sort of happy hour, but not all specials live up to the name. Delectable, inexpensive morsels might come with $9 cocktails, and bars often sacrifice liquor quality for cheaper drinks.

We were surprised to find, after a comprehensive survey, that our favorite happy hour is one that has been around for years and refrains from envelope-pushing. Carafe serves cheap, generous and good food and drinks—all we want at 5 pm on a Monday.

Carafe’s Frenchiness is not the snobby, meticulous-gastronomy kind, but the average Pierre-Parisian-stopping-by-for-a-sandwich kind: You can get plump mussels, fries served in newspaper and a Lillet for nine bucks. Items like these or a croque monsieur ($3.95) aren’t exactly refined, but they are well executed, satisfying and thrillingly Euro. The burger ($3.95), served on a Ken’s mini ciabatta, is so juicy it squirted on my dining companion when he bit into it. An aperitif like Lillet (an herby-sweet white wine, $4) is refreshing and interesting but not stiff enough to get you loaded before sundown. If getting loaded before dark is actually your goal, knock back a couple of liquid-candy French martinis (vodka, Chambord and pineapple juice, $4) and let loose the office gossip.
Happy hour 3-6 pm Monday-Friday (3-5 pm when there’s a show at Keller Auditorium).* From Restaurant Guide 2008

200 SW Market St
Portland, OR 97201
Phone: (503) 248-0004

Come one, come all to Celebrate or Commiserate on Election Night.Cheap Food. Cheap Bowling and Election Results on over 25 50″ Plasma Screens!Plus a live broadcast of the Rick Emerson Show with Storm Large and the Bus Project.All ages. FREE.

Sing your heart out and win tickets to a screening of Warren Miller!

We will be giving away 20 pairs of tickets to Warren Miller Film, during Karaoke with Ali. 9 - 11:00 p.m.

Enter to win a trip for 2 to Mt. Bachelor for the weekend and a chance to win a trip for 5 days to Canada on a snowbound adventure. There will be Lawn Golf, prizes to win and pairs of tickets to see the show. Drink and Food Specials. Come down and sing your heart out with Ali and pray for snow!

Focused on providing an irreverent look at politics and getting young people to vote, Candidates Gone Wild is an unusual part of the Portland electoral tradition. Since first opening in 2002 as “Jabbin’ at the Aladdin,” the event has drawn thousands of young people to each show. Past events have included a candidate talent show in which City Commissioner Dan Saltzman programmed a VCR and also a high stakes “board room” interrogation, where candidates are asked how many jobs they would cut from City government to whose jobs would be lost. Additionally, the event showcases local independent filmmakers and musicians.

Monday, Oct 13
Roseland Theater
Tickets only $5: Available at Willamette Week 2220 NW Quimby

Would you like to show your art work to hundreds of people everyday? How about on 16′ HD projectors? Together with Grand Central Bowl, Willamette Week is accepting submissions for our local artist digital gallery. The gallery will run during Grand Central business hours and is a great way for you to get your work in front of the public.

For more info & submissions please email graphics@cegportland.com

Also, join us for our Gallery Opening Party: Oct 16, 9pm at Grand Central Bowl.
Live Dj. Cocktails. Appetizers
SE 8th & Morrison St. Portland
503.236.BOWL