portland oregon, foodie restaurant review: Besaw's
after a nice week of conference on the coast, di and i decided to go hang out in portland for a while. i'll blog about that later.
while there, we went looking for a nice place to eat dinner on a friday evening.
we stopped at Besaw's on NW23rd. it looked promising, kind of homey with a bit of trendy overtones. the menu looked respectable, with only one or two entres hitting the $20.00 range. not bad.
it was around 1930 (that's 7:30 PM for those of you that don't know how to tell time) and the restaurant's capacity was nowhere near full. as a matter of fact, there were only 6 or 7 tables filled, of the many they have including the outside ones. since it's a little early for friday dinner, we figured the barrenness didn't have anything to do with the food, and everything to do with the time.
we were seated, and our waiter basically forgot about us.
when i was finally able to order a beer and an appetizer, it took 10 minutes for him to come back to tell me that they were out of that appetizer. at 1945, on friday evening, at a restaurant that stays open until 2200 (10 pm). he rattled off the specials after changing our appetizer selection to a hummus plate (which, when it finally came 30 minutes later, was pretty dang good. credit where credit is due). by this time, the restaurant filled to the brim. i listened as the waiter came back to table after table informing them that the item they'd ordered was out, so the chef substituted something else. soups and appetizers, mainly, but even a few entres were out, before the dinner rush hit.
we finally got our dinners. i'd ordered the coconut prawns and batsmati rice. i didn't ask what the price was (it was one of the evening's specials).
no soup, salad or side. 5 overcooked, tough and chewy prawns, a scoop of rice, and some sort of tasty red sauce drizzled on the plate under the rice. $21.00. ok, so that's not an unfair price for the dinner special. but 5 prawns and a scoop of rice? we didn't take our time eating, and it still took 2 hours to order, get our dinner, scramble through it, and get out.
i talked to several locals afterwards, and they were all surprised to hear we had a bad experience. that place sucked ass. i just hope that it was an off night, and not their typical operation.
while there, we went looking for a nice place to eat dinner on a friday evening.
we stopped at Besaw's on NW23rd. it looked promising, kind of homey with a bit of trendy overtones. the menu looked respectable, with only one or two entres hitting the $20.00 range. not bad.
it was around 1930 (that's 7:30 PM for those of you that don't know how to tell time) and the restaurant's capacity was nowhere near full. as a matter of fact, there were only 6 or 7 tables filled, of the many they have including the outside ones. since it's a little early for friday dinner, we figured the barrenness didn't have anything to do with the food, and everything to do with the time.
we were seated, and our waiter basically forgot about us.
when i was finally able to order a beer and an appetizer, it took 10 minutes for him to come back to tell me that they were out of that appetizer. at 1945, on friday evening, at a restaurant that stays open until 2200 (10 pm). he rattled off the specials after changing our appetizer selection to a hummus plate (which, when it finally came 30 minutes later, was pretty dang good. credit where credit is due). by this time, the restaurant filled to the brim. i listened as the waiter came back to table after table informing them that the item they'd ordered was out, so the chef substituted something else. soups and appetizers, mainly, but even a few entres were out, before the dinner rush hit.
we finally got our dinners. i'd ordered the coconut prawns and batsmati rice. i didn't ask what the price was (it was one of the evening's specials).
no soup, salad or side. 5 overcooked, tough and chewy prawns, a scoop of rice, and some sort of tasty red sauce drizzled on the plate under the rice. $21.00. ok, so that's not an unfair price for the dinner special. but 5 prawns and a scoop of rice? we didn't take our time eating, and it still took 2 hours to order, get our dinner, scramble through it, and get out.
i talked to several locals afterwards, and they were all surprised to hear we had a bad experience. that place sucked ass. i just hope that it was an off night, and not their typical operation.
Labels: portland, restaurant review
posted by bothenook at 17:45
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