[Please see the bottom of this post for an update... Nutshell is unfortunately no longer vegan.]
I’m back from sampling Portland’s multitudinous vegan offerings, and have returned rejuvenated, inspired and over-fed satiated. I can totally see why Portland has earned the reputation of being a vegan town. For a city that felt tiny in comparison to the megalopolis I call home, they’ve packed in a hell of a lot of vegan and vegan-friendly restaurants into a small (yet lush) space.
I ate so much awesome food in fact that there’s no way I can get it all into one blog post without it being crazy long. Instead I’m going to break this up into sections, basically giving you a report on each place I ate at. Shall we being?
Hot off the plane, my fabulous and gracious hosts took me straight to my first food destination, Nutshell. This place gets mixed reviews but it was high up on my list of vegan places I had to try. I’m so glad I did because I loved every single thing here that made it’s way into mouth… and there was a lot of it!
Our first appetizer was the “Crispy rice fritters with avocado puree & chili sauce”. These were so great! They were made with a highly fragrant jasmine rice and seemed like they had been lightly fried in coconut oil… finger lickin’ good. Both of the dipping sauces were equally yummy in their own ways.
Appetizer two: “Bigfoot’s bamboo fries with kung foo sauce”. I don’t know what kung-foo sauce is all about but I can tell you that I like it. And I loved the bamboo fries. They had a firmer texture than fried potato, I really enjoyed the bite and chewiness they had going on. The flavor was good, not mindblowing but more on a simpler scale, something I could easily and happily stuff my face with alongside a burger or beer (if I was a beer drinker these would totally be the fries I’d be craving). They were cut thinner than regular fries and were slightly oily too, in an enjoyable “wow, these sure are some good, greasy fries” sort of way.
My friends ordered the “Fuji apple salad with beets, preserved marionberries, micro greens & muscatel vinaigrette” which they kindly allowed me to have my way with. Everything here tasted so fresh, both bold and subtle at the same time. The taste was surprising, not really what you would expect from looking at it, and I mean that in a good way. They’d also mixed in some finely chopped peppermint which woke up and brought together all the different flavors. I could eat this every day if someone would be nice to enough to make it for me. Thanks in advance.
For my main dish I had the “Fried quinoa & polenta. Tandoori roasted summer squash, quinoa greens, Romesco sauce & summer savory”. So delicious, and very hearty. This was a gourmet version of comfort food, the flavors leaning just slightly towards Italian, with the nice sweet twist of corn from the polenta and the refreshingly bitter bite from the earthy greens. It was excellent, and I left hardly a drop or crumble behind on my plate.
…which certainly didn’t stop us from ordering dessert: “Fresh local raspberries with coconut custard, brown sugar sauce, pistachios & phyllo cookies“. Yeah, the picture looks a bit of a mess, and it kind of was, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t taste great. It had a really nice mix of sweet and tart, the phyllo and sugar reminding me of baklava, and the coconut custard reminding me of very decadent Thai desserts.
Overall all, an excellent meal. The service is often complained about in various online reviews that I’ve read, but our waiter was friendly, informative and attentive. There was no wait, we walked right in and were seated and served immediately, which apparently isn’t usually the case either.
Now one controversy which does not sit well with me at all is that Nutshell is owned by the same person who owns another popular Portland restaurant, Ten-01, which serves foie gras (foie gras is a “delicacy” of fattened duck liver acquired by inhumanely force-feeding the birds until their livers are diseased and swollen well beyond normal… one of the most vile, unnatural and cruel things anyone could ever consider eating). So on the one hand, I am guilty of putting money directly into the pockets of a man who’s got disgusting foie gras on one of his menus, and on the other hand, I just ate one of the most unique & delicious, locally grown, vegan meals I’ve ever tried. Oh the irony and moral dilemma of it all! Knowing what I know now I probably wouldn’t go back and support this place if I lived there despite the amazing food, but I don’t live there, so I will leave it up to you to sort out your own ethics on the matter (to clarify: Nutshell is all vegan, the foie gras is on the menu at another restaurant by the same owner). I’ve done my part in giving you the facts. I’d love to be able to whole-heartedly recommend Nutshell to you based on the great food alone, but doing so without providing the above background info would be remiss. Maybe if enough people make a stink about this, something will eventually change. If not, at least you’ve got my pictures to show you what you’re deliberately not eating for a good cause.
www.nutshellpdx.com
Stayed tuned for ‘Foodeater Does Vegan Portland’, Pt. 2!
I’d like to thank all of you who took the time to send me your very helpful Portland food suggestions… as you’ll soon see I took you up on many of them! Special shout-outs are in order for both Stumptown Vegans and Veganazi, both being Portland based vegan restaurant blogs, and both being indispensable in my research of veg places to visit while putting together my itinerary. Your city rules and so do you.
Thank you also of course to OrganicGirl and The WolfMan for your steadfast and admirable foodeating abilities. I could not have accomplished this indulgent feat of feasting without you.
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UPDATE- AUGUST 27: Word on the streets is that Nutshell has now bowed into the wrong kind of pressure… rather than the owner removing foie gras from his other menu, he’s changed the menu at Nutshell from being all vegan to now being only vegetarian… eggs and dairy are on the new menu. True, at least it’s still a vegetarian place, but I seriously doubt this new menu is going to do much to help their business, and will only add to the controversy of why some people just won’t go there.
... If you liked this article, please give it a Stumble!Related Posts:
- My Top 9 Vegan Meals in Portland, Oregon.
- Foodeater Does Vegan Portland, V.5: Tin Shed
- Foodeater Does Vegan Portland, V.6: Voodoo Doughnut
- Foodeater Does Vegan Portland, V.8: Veganopolis
- Foodeater Does Vegan Portland, V.9: Vita Cafe
Glad you liked Nutshell - I’ve heard only great reviews about it (except for service - but that’s good that you didn’t have issues with that, because I hate it when the service is poor).
I look forward to installment 2. That all looks wonderful. I very much want some sugar and phyllo dough and coconut custard and raspberries and pistachios.
wow, that food all looks SO AMAZING….and then i had to read about the awful Foie Gras. :( to be honest, i had to look it up because i’d never heard of it. i don’t blame you for not wanting to support a place that gives money to people who do such disgusting things. looking forward to more portland posts!
oooh and i loved your old posts on SF! i owe my wonderful lunch and breakfast i had at herbivore to your recommendation!
quarrygirl: I’ve now added in a bit more info on foie gras so that everyone will know what I’m talking about. There are some links you can follow that are embeded in the post as well.
I’m so glad you enjoyed Herbivore! Seems like there’s a whole lot of people out there who don’t like them, but I’ve always enjoyed everything I’ve had there wanted wanted to go back for more :)
wow, oh wow.
A new definite destination in my life, and very soon I hope, thanks for enlightening about this very under-estimated cuisine capital.
thanks for the awesome post. i am wondering about the owner doing horrible things in his other restaurant. it is possible that supporting nutshell is placing a very important vote for the good way and by supporting nutshell one will help keep it in business so that more people will get a chance to try AWESOME vegan food which will help encourage more people to go vegan. i am not sure what the owner does with the money that comes from nutshell - for some reason he has a vegan restaurant so maybe there is some part of him that is waking up … and the more support that part of him gets - the more that part of his heart will come back to life. that’s the pro side of supporting nutshell. if one chooses not to support nutshell what good comes from it? i am not sure of the answer for this. nothing readily comes to me. i want to encourage the most kindness for animals possible, to encourage the most people to go vegan… it is an interesting question and each must go with what one feels will produce the most kindness -
What a wonderfully informative post! Not only do you supply beautiful photos and descriptions of your meal, but you also stand up and educate people about the extreme contrast between the owner’s 2 restaurants. This is a very thought-provoking review!
Oh I am so jealous!! That sounds like an amazing trip and is now definitely a city I have to eat my way around. Thanks!
Anna: Yes, it is an interesting question indeed. I’m not sure either what good would come of not eating at Nutshell other than sending an important message. Sometimes enough people making noise can make a difference, and other times it’s just a bunch of noise. There’ve been plenty of boycotts in the past that have successfully brought about change. I really don’t know that boycotting the awesome vegan restaurant will have any direct effect on the other restaurant that serves the foie gras.
I eat at restaurants on a daily basis which aren’t vegetarian… they serve cows, chickens, pigs, fish, etc… which ultimately is just as messed up as the end result of foie gras… it’s still animals as food… yet I still eat at these places. It would be hypocritical of me to single out Nutshell, which in and of itself doesn’t even serve any animal products, while continuing to eat at normal restaurants and shop at normal markets and businesses. I guess it’s a matter of picking our battles as they say. However, in a town like Portland or even here in L.A. where there are so many plentiful choices for awesome vegan food that don’t have that stigma of foie gras lurking in their backgrounds, I would probably choose not to go back to Nutshell. It just feels wrong to me, despite how much I truly enjoyed the meal and the place itself. If there were no other good vegan or vegetarian places around to eat at, I might feel differently. But with such abundance all around… there are so many other choices. I wouldn’t call it a boycott, but I probably just wouldn’t go there.
I’m right on your foot steps! Heading up to Portland on the 28th for a vegan adventure! Thanks as always for doing the hard work for all us copy cat vegans!
I really, really enjoyed Nutshell as well. I wish there were more places like them.
By the way, Nutshell is no longer vegan. They have all kinds of cheese and dairy on their menu now. Very dissapointing to go from vegan to vegetarian and not the other way around.
[...] likely cause much cheer among Portland’s militant vegans, a number of whom angrily called for a boycott of the restaurant to protest the continued presence of delicious foie gras on the menu at Berger’s other restaurant, [...]