Laurelhurst Market Scores Bon Appétit Recommendation
Every year, Bon Appétit comes out with their Ten Best New Restaurants in America list. This year Portland’s own Laurelhurst Market is on top.
3155 East Burnside Street, 503-206-3097, laurelhurstmarket.com
The Story: Part steakhouse, part butcher shop, 100 percent ode to all things meat–this is “The Year in Food 2010” distilled into a single restaurant. A chalkboard–with a cow diagram and “cuts available tonight” menu–hangs near the open kitchen in the industrial space. All the good steakhouse cliches (fun, raucous) without all the bad ones (super-expensive, boys’ club).
The Team: Owners Benjamin Dyer and Jason Owens and chef-owner David Kreifels (all partners in supper club Simpatica Dining Hall).
Must Order: Meat! More specifically, beef. Try cuts like culotte (a.k.a. baseball steak), rib eye, or hanger steak. Throw in a side of Millennium Farms creamed corn for good measure.
What’s in a Name: It’s a nod to both the neighborhood where the restaurant is located and the name of the mini mart that used to inhabit the space.
Laurelhurst Market, started by Simpatica alums co-owners David Kreifels, Jason Owens, and Benjamin Dyer is serious about all things meat but takes cocktails and service seriously too. You can pick out a cut to take home from the in-house butcher shop, or stay for a full meal. The steaks are excellent but are delivered without the pomp and circumstance of most traditional steakhouses.
Other winners: Anchovies & Olives in Seattle, Miller Union – Atlanta, Boston’s Menton, Marea – New York, Hatfield’s – Los Angeles, Ellerbe Fine Foods in Fort Worth, Bar La Grassa – Minneapolis, Frances in San Francisco, and The Purple Pig – Chicago.
Whitney says
YUM! We just had dinner there for the first time on Sunday (after eating their sandwiches – highly recommended – for lunch since they opened). The grilled green beans and the fresh mozzarella were amazing. Way to go!
Peter says
I just don’t get the hype with this place. I’ve tried it several times and have never been impressed. Service is not great and the food is, well, just fine. It just feels like everyone enjoys it because they’ve been told to enjoy it. Maybe I keep hitting the off night.
johnny says
I’ve been twice and this is a good restaurant but Top ten I don’t think so. I wouldn’t even put it in Portland’s top ten I haven’t had a bad meal or bad service but there’s nothing that really exceptional about this place.
JDG says
Maybe it’s just not to your liking, Peter. No need to denigrate the taste of people who do.
Mike says
I just had dinner there the other night and we discussed why the reactions to LM seem so binary. I think part of it could be that we are so spoiled by the great restaurants all over PDX that if the menu isn’t extraordinary or unique, it’s “just another restaurant.” LM really doesn’t break new ground, but does a restaurant really have to break new ground to be great? I had the steak frites the other night and it was outstanding – perfectly cooked steak, perfectly crunchy fries and a killer pan sauce. Nothing unique – a pretty standard bistro recipe, but perfectly executed . . . I think that should be enough to call a restaurant great.
Nico says
I agree with Mike, but only if that execution deserves the rating “excellent” *consistently*.
Note: I have not yet been to LM, so I can’t comment on it.
Mike says
that’s a fair point – I’ve been 4 times and it has been consistently excellent. They seem to have it together.
CO says
there are a fair number of people that always want to be the one to say the emperor has no pants. It’s nothing more than negative spitballing. New place opens to rave reviews and these schmucks call it crap with equal force as the people applauding it.
To all the people that “don’t get the hype”, first it isn’t hype when it’s actually good….it’s just deserved accolades. Second, please….PLEASE keep avoiding it so that perhaps my wait will go from 60 minutes to 30. :-)
karie says
Well said! I want my wait to be smaller too. All you folks that rant and spit fire can take yourselves elsewhere while we settle in to a perfectly executed meal! Mmmmmm. I hear a rib eye calling for me…..