December 31st

December 31st

I like to stay at home on New Year’s Eve, because it seems to be amateur night when all the people who don’t normally drink go out. I generally like to sit at home and make a lot of food and do a variety of small dishes. My wife however didn’t think we needed to eat huge amounts of food all night, so I changed my plans.

She had been craving chili dogs for quite some time, but we hadn’t made any, so it seemed like a good opportunity. Chili dogs may not seem like good celebratory food, but a chili dog, like most simple food, can be sublime if done right and prepared correctly with good ingredients. We had a small amount of ground beef, but we made a last minute run to the grocery store for other ingredients, and purchased hot dog rolls, sharp cheddar cheese, and a package of Hebrew national hot dogs, which are the best hot dogs widely available. Unless you have a good butcher nearby who makes his own hot dogs, Hebrew National is the only choice. They’re not cheap, but I don’t eat chili dogs every day.

The chili for chili dogs doesn’t have beans. It’s more like a sauce or condiment. I just used onions, ground beef, cumin, dried red chiles, garlic, tomato paste, chili powder and Mexican oregano. It had a little heat to it but wasn’t too hot, because you don’t want to overwhelm the hot dog. I broiled the hot dog to brown them and get them a little crusty, and then served them on the rolls with the chili, some yellow mustard and shredded Tillamook sharp cheddar on the top. I’m normally a Dijon or brown mustard guy, but yellow mustard just seems to work on a hot dog. The whole thing was a sloppy mess but was a truly sublime chili dog. My only complaint was that I had steamed the buns to make them softer and warmer, like a great NY hot dog. I ate far too many of them.

I had picked up a bottle of Pelican IPA at the store as well. I love Pelican’s beers, but unfortunately, this is the only one that they bottle any longer. It’s expensive at about $6 per 22 oz bottle, but it’s one of the great NW IPAs. It has great hop flavor, aroma and bitterness but still maintains good balance because of its strong malt backbone. What better beer to wash down chili dogs and what a great way to end the year. It’s hard to beat well made “junk” food.

Henry's Tavern

We went to Henry’s Tavern on Labor Day after a quick trip to Powell’s, where I was able to score a copy of Anya Von Bremzen’s terrific book The New Spanish Table on sale for $10, which gets me pretty much current with all the Spanish cookbooks I’ve been coveting over the last year. Henry’s is a corporate chain restaurant which is owned by the same parent company that owns a few other chains in the Portland area. I had been given a gift card by a very nice client, and was happy to see that it was good at a place that has real beer.

Henry’s has 100 taps, which is impressive, even in Portland, but unfortunately, there aren’t many things on it that you won’t find somewhere else. Still it is an impressive list and two blocks from Powell’s. We had been there once before for afternoon snacks and beer and had a good experience. They have gorgonzola fries which are essentially waffle fries covered with melted gorgonzola. It’s a huge portion that has enough calories to feed a small village but is a perfect snack with a couple of pints (assuming your splitting the order). We’d also had a perfectly acceptable salad. The food was good, the beer was fresh and the service was good.

When we went on Labor Day, we got there around 1:30 at the end of a huge lunch rush. We were able to get a table but the wait staff looked harried and I knew they were trying to get through the end of a large lunch rush (apparently we weren’t the only ones who thought that a trip to Powell’s and Henry’s was a good idea). We got our menus and I chose a pint of Pelican Doryman’s Dark, which I wanted to try last time but which was unavailable. My wife ordered an ice tea. The ice tea came within minutes. The beer didn’t. After five minutes, the waitress came back to say that they were very busy in the bar and it would just be a minute. Ten minutes later (with no other appearances from the waitress), my beer finally arrived. About a minute later, the food showed up. The Doryman’s Dark is a great beer and well deserves the honors it’s gotten. Brown ales are overlooked in this country which is a shame because they’re such good, subtle beers with food. My wife needed another iced tea and again it showed up in minutes.

We started in on the lettuce chicken wraps and fries and my beer was quickly gone. But, alas, where was our waitress. After waiting vainly for more than fifteen minutes, my wife flagged down the hostess and asked if it was possible that we could actually get our waitress. About five minutes later, she showed up, apologetic, and asked what we needed. I ordered an Amnesia IPA and she went to get it, but returned several minutes later to say they had blown the keg, and were too busy to be able to change it, so I ordered a Ninkasi IPA instead, which actually did show up about a minute later. Of course the food was completely cold at this point. Another waitress came by and asked if we needed anything, and I told her, politely, that this was the worst service I had gotten any place in a long time. She explained that our waitress had been pulled down into the bar area because it was so crowded but also said we weren’t the only ones who had complained about the service that day.

At this point we were ready for the check and I was ready to leave absolutely no tip since the service had been deplorable. I don’t do things like this lightly, but I felt it was well deserved. The waitress brought our bill, I put my gift card out, and she went to go ring it through. We had been there well over an hour for two appetizers and two drinks each. The manager did come over and talk to us without being summoned. He did explain again how the bar was crowded and did say that was no excuse. He took the bill and said "let me correct this" and came back a few minutes later. I was expecting him to comp a pint of beer or two, but he actually comped the entire bill. I have to admit that I was very pleasantly surprised and told him as much. He said he didn’t want us to judge them poorly based upon this and said that the service had been unacceptable.

In my mind, it turned a bad experience into a tolerable one. It had been aggravating, but when confronted with it, he was very gracious and more than fair. Because of him, I left the waitress a 20% tip (it wasn’t really her fault that she got pulled into the bar and only had our table left in the main dining room). I will go back again and with an open mind knowing that they tried to take a horrible experience and turn it around.