Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Portland Happy Hour: The Original

Posted by Katie

As Kel mentioned in the last post, I just returned from a week-long but still way-too-short trip to Portland.

Kel and I decided to be nice and invite the boys to a happy hour, which we were sort of forced to do since The Original was Adam's idea, but we did get to sample double the food...and the boys weren't bad company either so it turned out alright.


The Original calls itself a "dinerant" which from what I can gather means that they serve tempting yet completely bad-for-you food in a fancified diner setting. The boys could not pass up the chance to try The Original's claim to fame: the voodoo donut burger, which as you might suspect is simply a burger with two Voodoo glazed donuts instead of a bun. Definitely an interesting idea but we all agreed that its appeal is mainly in the novelty of the experience and not so much in the taste, and so while we wouldn't order it again, at $4 it's a toss up whether it's worth it to try it or not.

Along with the donut burger, we also tried the regular old plain burger with fries ($5), the chicken sandwich ($5), the pigs in a blanket ($5), and the hot dog special of the day ($3).

The burgers were good, but nothing too special and Kel and I were disappointed with the pigs in a blanket as the dough was flaky and really greasy rather than doughy like we expected. Nick gets points for ordering the hot dog of the day which was a hot dog with bacon served on a belgian waffle. He was actually the only one who had the privilege of being served that particular hot dog as, after he ordered it, the kitchen decided they took too long to make and changed the special. But we all agreed that hot dog, waffle, bacon and a little marrionberry syrup are pretty close to a perfect combination.

Of course, it's not happy hour without a drink and The Original offers a $4 "punch of the day" as well as $3 glasses of wine and $1 PBRs. The punch of the day was orange creamsicle which sounded good but really was just orange juice with vanilla vodka. Cute name but not the creativity we look for in a good happy hour drink.

We decided to end our meal with a homemade pop tart which was another highlight. We went with the pink-frosted strawberry pop tart which was flaky (in a good way this time) and filled with a liberal amount of strawberry jam.

I think Kel and I agreed that The Original is a great place for the guys to meet up since you can get a burger and a beer for only $6, but for us, we like to be able to order something besides a burger without having to worry that it will be so hit-or-miss.