Finally, a Saturday exactly right for an adventure. Not too cold. Not Raining most of the day. Just Right! By mid afternoon we were carrying our coats as we walked through Portland's close in Southeast, looking at retro shops and turn of the century architecture.
Our urban hike began at 50th and Belmont. We headed down the gently sloping hillside toward the Willamette. Al tho it had been our plan to grab our first bite to eat at the food cart pod on Belmont just East of Slappy Cakes, We were lured in by The Horse Brass. We were not disappointed.
As usual, on a Saturday at the Brit style pub some were cheering the Futbol team playing on a big screen in one corner, while another group played darts across the room. Families, friends and couples lingers in the warm, dim nest like Bastion of Englishness whiling away the afternoon. As usual again, the food was perfect. We split the veggie-burger, a correctly grilled cheese graced lovely, on a platter with purple onion slices beautiful fully ripe tomato, and ruffly lettuce. Crispy just salty enough burning hot fries rounded out the meal. Some times its hard to leave that place.
As tho on cue, reinforcing my belief that every wonderful meal should be followed by a tiny bit of exquisite dark chocolate, we were thrilled to make the acquaintance of "Chocolate lab". A tiny, artists jewel box of chocolate delightfulness. There are all the usual items, truffles, shaped chocolates, etc, but the thing that just astounded me was when the sweet person tending the counter offered us a sample of the sipping chocolate. Ive read about this elixir, and its been on the list of things to try. I expected it to be silky, thick and dark deep chocolate luxe. It was all of that. It was having your mouth lined with something so rich you almost wished you didn't ever have to swallow it. But there were more sips to be had.
Fed, Satisfied, ready to roam we wend down to MLK, accross and East up Burnside. There are so many little businesses and shops it would be hard to visit them all, so we focused on the ones that carried mostly vintage clothing and the sorts of things you would find at crafty wonderland.
For some reason a number of places we had considered for afternoon coffee were not open, either closed early, or opening late. All that served as a real blessing tho, when we finally steped inside Crema on SE 28th and Ankeny, in Retauraunt row. I had been by it, in the past, never making a point to try it out. Now I know what Ive been missing. First, the Cafe Americano was just right. Second, You will not have an easy time selecting from the pastry case. Everything looks as though some one just baked it and popped it into the line up right befor you came throught the door. The baked goods are excelent, attractive, and taste exactly like you hope they will. The Suprise is the price. Each serving is plenty for an afternoon treat along with coffee or tea.
We split two items and were almost over full, but every bite was so good we could not stop. Our choices were the cranberry pinapple coffee cake, and the lime tart. The first was such a balance of bundt style cake, soft sweet cranberries and pineaple, that nothing could have made it any better. The second was a tart, its shell so fine and delicate I could not understand how it held the filling in. In the center, a dense but creamy filling that was like a white ganche. On top was a thick glaze of the most intense lime fruit, more like a citrus "curd" than anything else. The lime part was so wonderfuly tart, that if it had not been resting on the sweet center It might have been too zippy. As it was tho, the perfect balance made it a magic moment of pastry eating.
Leaving Crema, it was with a vow to return soon. Resuming our walk in the late afternoon sunshine, we enjoyed a violet here, a carved wooden porch roof curlicue there. Eventualy the day ended where it started, but with the satisfying awareness that it had been a Saturday exactly right for an adventure. The adventure had unfolded exactly right for us.
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