The Meadow - Mark Bitterman - Recommendations - Find. Eat. Drink.
The Meadow, Mark Bitterman, Portland, Oregon, OR, West Village, New York, NY, Manhattan, Salt, Flowers, Chocolate, Cocktail Bitters, Wine, Liquor, Pineau des Charentes, Flake Salt, Sea Salt, Sel Gris, Coarse Grey Salt, Hot Chocolate, Bitters, Adam Elmegirab, Hella, Miracle Mile, Brooklyn Bitters, Pineau Francois 1er, Rogue Chocolatier, Dick Taylor Craft Chocolate, Woodblock Chocolate, Valrhona, Michel Cluizel, Seattle, Chefs, Recommendations, Where to eat in Portland, Where to drink, Where to shop
BEAKER & FLASK
Industrial District
New American
CASTAGNA
1752 SE Hawthorne Boulevard, Portland, Oregon 97214
T: 503.231.7373 (make a reservation)
For dinner. Portland-style molecular craziness, but good, grounded and unpretentious. New chef, but it’s said he is cut from the same cloth as the previous one, and they came into the job together before the last one left for NYC. This is Portland’s only bastion of higher end, more technically challenging, refined cooking.
Southeast Portland
New American
Restaurants - Portland, OR
Great bartenders and chef, and one of the best places in town to find out just how geeky bartenders can be in pursuit of their own personal interest in the craft.
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PALEY’S PLACE
Alphabet District
New American
Chef Vitaly Paley: Ingredient driven fine dining in intimate setting. Great, constantly changing, yet classic menu. Brilliant, visionary chef who is integral to the NW food movement and community. Uses only natural fleur de sel and other artisan salts in their kitchen!
3925 Northeast Martin Luther King Junior Boulevard
Portland, OR 97212
T: 503.288.6900 (make a reservation)
Northeast Portland
New American
For brunch, not dinner. Chef Jason French has one of the most incredible treatments of veggies anywhere. Plus great wood-fired dishes. Funky, small, typically Portland setting.
DRIFTWOOD
www.hoteldeluxeportland.com/hotel-deluxe-restaurant-bar/
Hotel Deluxe
729 Southwest 15th Avenue Portland, OR 97205
T: 503.219.2094
Southwest Portland
Hotel Cocktail Lounge
Drinks - Portland, OR
Bartender Mike Robertson is a leader in the mixing community here. Comfortable, dark loungy relic of the old Portland I knew when I first moved to town back in my college days.
ANDY & BAX
Industrial District
Sporting Goods
Stores - Portland, OR
Lots of used rain gear, cheap.
TENZING MOMO
Pikes Place
Apothecary / Herbs
Stores - Seattle, WA
It’s an urban place apothecary shop and it’s just really old school. They sell things that can kill you. I love the fact they have these really beautiful, crazy exotic herbs. That’s so cool, when they have that kind of seriousness in what they are doing.
FAT RADISH
Jamie Olive- style great food. What is it with Fat in the name of restaurants that makes them good? Try the celery root pot pie with black garlic. Once in a while it actually seems feasible to become vegetarian.
Lower East Side
Modern British
Restaurants - New York, NY
MOMOFUKU NOODLE BAR
171 1st Avenue, New York, NY 10003
East Village
Asian / Korean / Japanese
I arrive 20 minutes before they stop their full menu. No line. The best cheapest and fun food in the city.
The most advanced salt user in the country, at an easily identifiable level, is Thomas Keller. He’s doing an amazing job now, but he’s been doing it for ten years. He’s treated salt like it’s something that is important and distinctive and worth educating customers about for longer than anybody else I know. It’s not very original, but he deserves that place in American food culture.
Upper West Side
New American
Pikes Place
Apothecary / Herbs
Drinks - New York, NY
A speakeasy and no singles allowed, which makes it imperative to meet or bring someone ahead of time.
CORNER BISTRO
West Village
Bar / American / Burgers
I’ve actually got Bistro fatigue, as the place is really a touch douchy now, and except for Harold and one fellow among the original help staff, not so friendly. My mother and father met there, and I have been going there since I was a lad. My apartment is now across the street, so I still go. But I don’t linger. The fries are pretty weak, but the burger still eats like sushi for me, so I drop in, wolf one down and move on. Burger as health food.
EMPLOYEES ONLY
West Village
American / Cocktails
Right next to our shop -- after teaching a salt class and winding down with a drink or two.
JANE STREET HOTEL
West Village
Bar / Cocktails
Just go there, you’ll know what I’m talking about.
HOTEL DELMANO
Williamsburg
Bar / Cocktails
Drinks - Brooklyn, NY
Best Manhattan in… wait… well, that’s just how things are. The best Manhattans have officially forded the East River.
MURRAY’S CHEESE SHOP
West Village
254 Bleecker Street, New York, NY 10014
T: 888.MY.CHEEZ / (212) 243.3289
Midtown East / Grand Central Market
43rd Street & Lexington, New York, NY 10017
T: 212.922.1540
Multiple Locations
Cheesemonger
Stores - New York, NY
They are great.
STINKY BKLYN
Cobble Hill
Cheese / Provisions
Stores - Brooklyn, NY
A cute little shop. I love their store so much, I think of them as a competitor.
SOCARRAT PAELLA BAR
259 West 19th Street New York, NY 10011
T: 212.462.1000 (make a reservation)
I love the paella at Socarrat, and I’ll unconditionally order anything they do with squid ink, no questions asked.
Chelsea
Spanish / Paella
THE FRENCH LAUNDRY
Yountville
New American
Restaurants - California
The most advanced salt user in the country, at an easily identifiable level, is Thomas Keller. He’s doing an amazing job now, but he’s been doing it for ten years. He’s treated salt like it’s something that is important and distinctive and worth educating customers about for longer than anybody else I know. It’s not very original, but he deserves that place in American food culture.
HANA FLAKE
Buy at The Meadow
Japanese
Flake Salt
Salt
Taut and menacing as an origami time bomb. Flavors that rasterize on the palate with digital speed. If you were off-planet somewhere, throwing down grilled eel donburi between fusillades with Kevlared warriors in a video game, this would be the salt. But if anything, its charms here on Earth are even greater. There is no salt in the world that expresses such vitality with such elegant restraint. For salad and other fresh vegetables, seaweed salad, any mollusk or fish sashimi, very dark chocolate ganaches, tart berry or stone fruit compotes.
Halen Môn
Buy at The Meadow
Wales
Flake Salt
I love to recommend Halen Môn, another one from the United Kingdom, that’s from Wales.
BALI RAMA / BALI TAKSU
Buy at The Meadow
Flake Salt
A beautiful arrow head shaped salt that just crunches and pops.
MALDON SALT
United Kingdom
Flake Salt
I don’t often recommend Maldon Salt, because it is not very original of me to do so, but it is damn good salt.
TAKESUMI BAMBOO
Buy at The Meadow
Japanese
Flake Salt
After months away, the legendary salt is back. Icarus-like, Takesumi is hatched from bamboo segments that were packed with Japanese deep sea salt and incinerated. The result, not so much a salt as a carbonated topping. Takesumi Bamboo is the most exciting salt around for lean meats like venison or lean seafoods like halibut.
TAKESUMI BISAI
Buy at The Meadow
Japanese
Flake Salt
A new version of Takesumi Bamboo salt, it’s finer in grind, reminiscent of something settled to earth after the unlikely stratospheric collision between a comet and a water buffalo. Dust it over aioli for dipping with French fries. Take any food you like and roll it around in Takesumi Bisai to lend an umami-silvered sensation to the dining experience.
DICK TAYLOR CRAFT CHOCOLATE
USA / California
Chocolate - Small Production
It’s a new favorite and I’ve had my eye on them forever. It’s just unbelievable. They have a Dominican Republic that is just wild, intense acidity and brightness and the most complex Ecuadorian chocolate I have ever tasted in my life. He’s from California and five years ago, you couldn’t find an artisan chocolate maker in California.
AMMA CHOCOLATE
Brazil
A really beautiful one from Brazil from a fifth generation cacao farmer. It’s very, very exquisitely crafted and probably the best crafted bar in South America right now.
ROGUE CHOCOLATIER
USA / Minneapolis, MN
From Minneapolis and it’s a fantastic chocolate bar.
USA / Nashville, TN
It’s really neat stuff and beautiful -- it’s sweetened with brown sugar. They are not quite as deadly serious as some of the others because of the brown sugar note, but as the same time, they are every bit as skilled. It’s a very beautiful chocolate.
WOODBLOCK CHOCOLATE
USA / Portland, OR
It's Portland's very first bean-to-bar chocolate! Venezuelan beans roasted, conched, tempered, molded, and wrapped in Southeast Portland. Every bar is a triumph of craftsmanship and deliciousness--so show them (and yourself) some love and try one.
MICHEL CLUIZEL
France
Chocolate - Large Production
I also love Michel Cluizel, who are another popular French brand. In New York, you see a lot of Cluizel around. It’s a quality product. It’s not a very original purchase, but you sure can’t say it’s not a very good purchase.
GUITTARD
USA / California
Made in America. It’s very respectable company that I like a lot, but I don’t see it too much around. It’s cheaper, but nevertheless, they are good and very high quality. The company has extraordinary values with relationship to the industry and to growers.
VALRHONA
France
I will always love and defend Valrhona. Not that they are ‘large,’ they are quite small as compared to the big guys. In the realm of high-end chocolate, they are larger.
DR. ADAM ELMEGIRAB’s BITTERS
Buy at The Meadow
Cocktail Bitters
Bitters
Dr. Adam Elmegirab has concocted this blend of cocoa, coffee and spices that will turn your drink into a veritable love potion. Add a few dashes to a Spring Cocktail (gin, Bonal, and Benedictine) and let Cupid fly it down the bar to the cute thing with whom you've been trading glances. Adam is amazing.
BROOKLYN HEMISPHERICAL BITTERS
Cocktail Bitters
He does really good fruit bitters. They are the only artisan rhubarb bitters producers -- a rhubarb gin and tonic is the best thing ever.
MIRACLE MILE BITTERS
Buy at The Meadow
Cocktail Bitters
It’s a small batch bitters line from LA, from a former Hollywood executive. Girded with a firm bitterness, these bottles come in novel flavors like gingerbread, yuzu, sour cherry, and one of the best takes on chocolate-chili we've tasted.
The yuzu bitters, I’ve been drinking straight-up in club soda. I go a little heavy and use four to five drops.
HELLA BITTERS
Cocktail Bitters
Hella’s citrus bitters in a Negroni -- yum!
Aperitifs
PINEAU FRANCOIS 1ER
Available at the following retailers
French
Wine-based Aperitif
Enjoy you day with a glass of Pineau. One of our favorites is Pineau Francois 1er.
Resources - books
SALTED: A Manifesto On The World’s Most Essential Mineral, With Recipes
The only book on culinary salt that looks at it seriously is, unfortunately, my book. I say unfortunately, because I wish there were three or four. Which is weird as hell. It’s kind of what I said when I got the James Beard Award. I do deserve the award, but only because I wrote the only fucking book on salt. I got to be the guy to write a book on the most universal, powerful, ancient ingredient in the world that no one had ever written a book about.
Purchase at: Amazon.com
Author: Mark Bitterman
THE NEW TASTE OF CHOCOLATE
My current favorite book on chocolate and we are selling in the store. She actually is one of the authors that deflated my interest in writing about chocolate because she is so brilliant. It has a very organic or synthetic relationship to chocolate. She grew up with cacao and she knows it, not as a confection, but as an agricultural product and as an integral ingredient in cuisine. Her book is packed with the most beautiful written descriptions of chocolate from the ground up, along with brilliant and inventive recipes.
Purchase at: Amazon.com
Author: Maricel E. Presilla
Who
Mark Bitterman and Jennifer Turner Bitterman are the owners of The Meadow stores in Portland, OR and New York, NY.
Why
Purveyors of flowers, artisanal salts, chocolate and cocktail bitters. Let their expertise guide your selections.
North Portland - Portland, Or | West Village - New York, NY
The Meadow | Mark Bitterman & Jennifer Turner Bitterman
November 8, 2011
Photographs courtesy of The Meadow
Book
- Salted: A Manifesto on the World's Most Essential Mineral, with Recipes [buy it]
Recommended By
Recommendations
Mark Bitterman’s recommendations for salt, bitters, cocktails and chocolate, plus where to eat, drink and shop in Portland, Seattle and New York.
Recommendations
