Grand Prix Fixe
The first prix fixe menu I ever loved was in France, in a little tiny bistro in a town called Bayeux. I had no idea what the neatly handwritten chalkboard menu said, but it was $14 euros and included an cup of earthy French cider and since I had exactly $14 euros and am very fond of cider, the chef and I shook on it. All sorts of beautiful things emerged from the kitchen and four glorious courses plus a few extra treats later, I was a prix fixe devotee. Slightly less common in America, the prix fixe menu is a firm friend to the frugal, indecisive, and trusting, and a stellar introduction to many of the city’s best restaurants. I can’t promise that these come with cider, but here are a few of my favorites around town.
3 Stops For $30
Rejoice, commitmentphobes and gourmet trekkers, because Belly, Lincoln, and Ned Ludd have joined forces to offer up 3 Stops For $30, a progressive prix fixe meal that lets you explore some of Northeast Portland’s favorite restaurants. Start at whichever restaurant you wish, and buy a $30 card that entitles you to a chef’s choice appetizer and the bartender’s choice of a drink from each of the three. Use your card all in one night, or if you decide you’re having too much fun to leave wherever you may be, carry on, and complete your route another time. The card is valued at around $45, but a progressive dinner you don’t have to clean up after traveling around all evening is priceless.
Beast
Two years later and still one of Portland’s hottest dining tickets, Beast is the premiere prix fixe menu in Portland, six fixed courses lovingly prepared by Chef Naomi Pomeroy and her sous chef Mika, in an open, intimate kitchen so close to your chair that you can feel the heat coming off the tomato & lobster bisque as it’s being plated (or is that bowled?). While the courses change weekly, the charcuterie plate remains constant, and it feels like Christmas every time it’s brought to the long communal table, each piece of the assortment a little gift to your palate—particularly the foie gras bon bon and chicken liver mousse with candied bacon. Whether you opt for the Steve’s Cheese plate or dessert–or both–determines your course count, and the price is $52 or $45 accordingly, which has to be the best prix fixe value in any US city, in my unscientific opinion. Unable to make it to dinner due to a debilitating case of nyctophobia? Beast’s four-course Sunday brunch, served at 10am and 12pm, is a modest $28 and reservations are recommended.
Bewon
Bewon’s prix fixe menu, or Han Jung Shik, is not only one of the best prix fixe values around, but is a sublime introduction to Korean cuisine. A traditional Korean meal that includes your choice of a main dish and seven courses like Hobak-juk–a rice porridge made with three different pumpkins, and Japchae–delicately translucent stir fried sweet potato noodles tossed with fresh vegetables, each course positively sparks with exotic flavors and each dish is like an delightfully surprising little gift, for a mere $24.95.
Bluehour
The Pearl District’s trendy spendy fiefdom of chic Bluehour isn’t the first thing that comes to mind when one thinks of dining values, but their nightly prix fixe, or “prix de occasion” menu is an excellent way to breathe the same truffle-oil scented air as the beautiful and monied classes, with a three-course lineup that might include a local radicchio salad with chevre and a basil vinaigrette, linguine with manila clams, leeks and preserved lemon, and a raspberry parfait with hazelnut ice cream. The price tag? Just $25 per person, so you won’t even feel the least bit guilty ordering the $20 glass of Nicolas Feuillatte Brut. Or maybe just the $9.50 glass of Prosecco.
- Location: 250 NW 13th Ave. Portland, OR Map it!
- Phone Number: 503.226.3394
- Hours: Sun-Thu 11:30am-10pm, Fri-Sat 11:30am-10:30pm
clarklewis
Smart and sophisticated clarklewis is a hidden oasis in the still slightly gritty industrial East waterfront district, so whenever you’re taking someone you don’t know all that well there, if they tend to be skittish, you might need to reassure them that you aren’t taking them to swim with the fishes. That said, nothing will put your companions at ease like the clarklewis 3-course Blue Plate Special–$12 for three courses that might include a warm, creamy tomato soup, mozzarella en carrozza with heirloom tomatoes and basil (possibly the tastiest grilled cheese sandwich you’ve ever had), and a refreshing apricot sorbet with almond biscotti.
- Location: 1001 SE Water Ave. Portland Map it!
- Phone Number: 503.235.2294
- Hours: Lunch Mon-Fri 11:30am-2pm, Dinner Mon-Sat 5pm-close * Happy Hour Mon-Sat 5-6:30pm
Park Kitchen
Park Kitchen lovers, Chef Scott Dolich has a prix fixe menu that will get you so excited, you’ll forget all about that nasty bocce ball injury you sustained before dinner across the street. This special multi-course menu is Chef’s choice, meaning that the kitchen chooses what you’ll eat, the only confines being that one course per person is sweet. Here’s how it works–if you’ve got four people in your party, the kitchen sends out a total of 16 different dishes, a few at a time, over the course of the dinner–12 of which are savory, 4 sweet–served family-style, to be shared with the entire table. Each dish is different, each dish is prepared in Park Kitchen’s imitably delicious seasonal and local-centric manner. Dinner costs either $40 or $50 per person, depending on how much food you desire. I was told that the $40 dinner will leave you “still light on your feet but satiated,” while the $50 is “really generous, for hearty eaters.” And there you have it.
- Location: 422 NW 8th Ave. Portland Map it!
- Phone Number: 503.223.7275
- Hours: Lunch Mon - Fri 11:30am-2pm; Dinner Mon - Sat 5-9pm
Simpatica Dining Hall
Every Friday and Saturday evening, Simpatica Dining Hall hosts unforgettable communal prix fixe dinners that brilliantly showcase Pacific Northwest cuisine, much to the delight of those who are able to secure a reservation. The four-course menu reads like exactly the sort of gourmet lineup you’d rustle up with all beautiful food you bought at Farmer’s Market, if only you’d gone to culinary school instead of journalism/medical/cosmetology school. A sample menu might feature Moorish Cucumber Gazpacho with Grilled Rock Shrimp and Croutons, Fingerling Potato and Fennel Salad with Prosciutto, Seared Halibut on Basque Pepper Piperade with Saffron Aioli, and Fig Tart with Almond Ice Cream, all for the bargain price of $35, which comes with a free side of mandatory socialization.
Tabla
Tabla has one of the most well-known and well-loved prix fixe menus in the city, perhaps because it doesn’t confine you to the chef’s choice but lets you roam the entire menu to assemble your perfect supper. For $24, you choose one appetizer, pasta, and entree from each section, creating a customized menu that might include delicata squash flan, pork sugo tagliatelle and and rosemary marinated flank steak one night, and heirloom tomato and watermelon salad, mushroom and sherry agnolotti and pan-seared chinook salmon another. One warning, many of the items come with a supplement charge, which means you might end up paying upwards of $35 for your $24 meal–a conundrum, to be sure.
- Location: 200 NE 28th Ave. Portland Map it!
- Phone Number: 503.238.3777
- Hours: Mon-Sun 5pm-close
