Portland is coming to Portland.
Although we’re named after an older metropolis throughout the nation in Maine, Portland, Oregon, snags extra headlines as a foodie destination. However two distinguished eating places from Portland, Maine—Mr. Tuna, which has three sushi meals carts and a brick-and-mortar within the works, and Crispy Gai, a Thai road meals and cocktail scorching spot—want to put the East Coast metropolis on the nationwide meals map.
Naturally, they’re coming to the Rose Metropolis to just do that.
This summer time, Jordan Rubin (who owns and runs Mr. Tuna, and is a associate in Crispy Gai) and Cyle Reynolds, Crispy Gai’s chef/co-owner, bumped into a couple of of PDX’s favourite cooks in Texas. Carlo Lamagna (chef and proprietor of Magna Kusina) and Colin Yoshimoto (chef at Eem) met Rubin and Reynolds at Scorching Luck, the Austin barbecue pageant organized partially by Mike Thelin of the now-shuttered Feast Portland.
Quickly after, Yoshimoto and Lamagna invited their new New England buddies out west. What we lack in lobster wharves, we make up for in foodies—or that is what we’re imagining they lured them with.
The result’s an East-meets-West, Portland x Portland collection of pop-ups coming later this month. That is what bicoastal elite means, yeah?
Magna Kusina will host Mr. Tuna for a Japanese-meets-Filipino tasting menu on Sunday, January 22. The plan is for the 2 cooks to play off of each East and West Coast seafood dishes by means of the lens of their respective cuisines. We’ve heard point out of grilled East Coast razor claims, a mashup of toro (fatty tuna stomach) and the Filipino minced pork dish sisig, and kinilaw, the vinegar-spiked Filipino tackle ceviche, made with Maine scallops and uni. Reservations can be found by means of Tock.
Eem will host Crispy Gai on Tuesday, January 24. Collaboratively made à la carte Thai dishes will likely be folded into Eem’s always-bustling, walk-in solely night service. Because the two are already on the identical web page, serving Thai-spicy dishes and refreshing cocktails to convey you again right down to earth, there’s a bit extra synergy than fusion to their plan.
Three takes on fried hen wings are promised—crimson curry and lime leaf, Hat Yai–type with fried shallots, and a tingly Sichuan-inspired take—in addition to a really Eem play on the traditional Thai yellow curry noodle soup, khao soi, that works in brisket.
Mr. Tuna and Crispy Gai aren’t fairly able to open Pacific Coast outposts simply but. As a substitute, they’ve been touring and popping up across the nation to unfold the phrase and collaborate with a few of their favourite cooks. Lately they hosted a number of fine-dining chefs-turned-sandwich-superstars: Turkey and the Wolf from New Orleans and Massive Children from Chicago, in addition to Her Place Supper Membership, the Philly restaurant that sat subsequent to Kann and Okta on Esquire‘s Best New Restaurants 2022 list.
