John Gottberg Anderson
The Bulletin
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Past articles by John:
Restaurant review: Oregon State University
Let’s get this out of the way first: I believe the Beaver Dam, the cafeteria on the Oregon State University-Cascades campus, is misnamed.A dam is a barrier that impedes the flow of water or other materials. OSU’s Beaver Dam, to the contrary, encourages the exchange of ideas and thoughts among students, faculty and community members. It would be better if this restaurant at Bend’s new four-year… → Read More
Restaurant review: Taj Palace
You know when you’ve dined at a good Indian restaurant.Hours after a meal, scintillating flavors of coriander, cumin, turmeric, cardamom and other exotic spices continue to ricochet between your tongue and your palate. Tandoori oven-baked chicken, marinated in yogurt and cayenne pepper; lamb stews seasoned with garam masala; creamy coconut milk curries; even lentil dhal slow-cooked with ginger… → Read More
Dining review: Croutons
Croutons has found a solid niche in Central Oregon. Since opening its first area cafe on Century Drive in 2005, the casual salad, soup and sandwich shop has continued to attract a solid core of customers. That patronage ballooned in 2013 with the addition of a second restaurant on Greenwood Avenue, half again as large as the original. Late last year, a new Croutons in Redmond’s Fred Meyer mall… → Read More
Restaurant review: Zydeco Kitchen & Cocktails
In Bend’s burgeoning dining world, one constant has been Zydeco Kitchen & Cocktails. Since 2009, when owners Steve and Cheri Helt relocated to downtown Bend from Third Street, the fine-dining restaurant has been a model of consistency.To say Zydeco has been perfect would be a misstatement. Every restaurant stumbles occasionally, and over the years, I’ve had occasion to tell Steve Helt — who… → Read More
Restaurant review: Crux Fermentation Project
Since it opened in June 2012, Crux Fermentation Project has been among the most successful of Bend’s many brewpubs. But its popularity eclipsed the size of its tasting room. Its management team decided last year that it was high time to expand the former AAMCO transmission plant beside the Bend Parkway.The new Crux was christened in December, a week before Christmas. The new capacity of 240… → Read More
Restaurant review: GoodLife Brewing Company
When the GoodLife Brewing Company opened its doors in mid-2011 in the Century Center complex on Bend’s west side, it really wasn’t set up for restaurant service.The beer was excellent. (It still is.) But without a deep fryer or a stove hood, the kitchen could not produce the sort of fare that quaffers come to expect at local brewpubs — hamburgers, for instance.GoodLife adapted, and it did so… → Read More
Restaurant review: Takoda’s Restaurant & Lounge
Kyle Harbick has come a long way with Takoda’s Restaurant & Lounge since he and his younger cousin, Trey Harbick, opened the business on the west side of Sisters in 2011.Now 29, Kyle had little food-and-beverage experience when the Harbicks took over the former Coyote Creek Café 7½ years ago in the Three Wind Shopping Center off U.S. Highway 20. After washing dishes and waiting tables at the… → Read More
Restaurant review: Zpizza and Tap Room
The owners of Bend’s new Best Western Premier Peppertree Inn, at Mt. Washington and Century drives, may have missed the boat in choosing the type of restaurant that now serves its clientele.Pizza and beer are not in short supply in Central Oregon. I can only imagine that Zpizza and Tap Room, this state’s first and only franchise of a Southern California-based chain, will be challenged to attract… → Read More
Restaurant review: Cuban Kitchen
Cuban is not a style of cuisine widely known in the Pacific Northwest. Sometimes described as traditional Caribbean cooking with Spanish and African influences, it has footholds in the United States in the Little Havana neighborhood of Miami and in suburban New York, where political exiles settled after fleeing their native island in the mid- to late-1950s.These were the neighborhoods where… → Read More
Restaurant review: J&J Bar & Grill
What is it with all the “J” bar-and-grills in downtown Bend?There’s JC’s, J-Dub’s and the M&J. And now, adding to the confusion, the J&J Bar and Grill opened July 4 in the former Summit Saloon space on Oregon Avenue. I’m not a fan. Not yet, at any rate.In the 1916 O’Kane Building, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the J&J has posed challenges for its new mother-and-son… → Read More
Restaurant review: El Caporal
Twenty years is a long time for a restaurant to succeed in one location, especially in leased space tucked into a corner of a back-street building complex without prominent signage to attract drop-in business.El Caporal has survived and thrived — so much so that the popular Mexican restaurant now has a new home all its own, two blocks from the original. Owners Carlos and Luz Delia Anaya, natives… → Read More
Restaurant review: Spork
In its five brick-and-mortar years on Bend’s west side, Spork has earned a reputation for its eclectic international menu — nurtured by locally sourced ingredients — and praise that has extended beyond Central Oregon and into national media.Much of the credit for its continued success falls on the shoulders of executive chef and co-owner Jeff Hunt, whose continued world travels provide… → Read More
Restaurant review: Astro Lounge
It’s impressive for a night club and cocktail lounge, regardless of the location, to persist for 17 years. The dynamics of the music and beverage industries tend to roll with the fickle behavior of patrons, who aren’t the same people in their 40s as they were in their 20s.Bend’s Astro Lounge is a survivor. Established on Minnesota Avenue (in the location of the Dogwood Cocktail Cabin) in 2001,… → Read More
Restaurant review: Bend-O Bento Japanese Kitchen
For more than six years, the Bend-O Bento Japanese Kitchen has captivated lovers of true Tokyo-style street food.Yet, it remains an enigma in Central Oregon. Occupying a tiny corner shop in a secluded industrial-park building on Bend’s east side, the cafe has no more than 10 seats at a couple of narrow counters, making it more suitable for takeout than dining in.And many Central Oregon diners… → Read More
Restaurant review: Currents
If you liked the menu at Currents, the fine-dining restaurant at Bend’s Riverhouse hotel, when it opened two years ago, you may be even more pleased.A Pacific Northwest-themed bill of fare has been enhanced with the arrival of new executive chef Michael Stanton. Formerly of The Heathman in Portland, previously in Los Angeles and New York, Stanton has infused regionally sourced ingredients with… → Read More
Restaurant review: Bronx Born Pizza
“Bronx Born” is not just a name. Thomas Schiffer was born and raised in the New York city borough of the Bronx. It’s where he got his first job making pizzas when he was 13. He took his skills with him when he moved to Boston, then to greater Los Angeles, where he established Abbot’s Pizza in Venice Beach. When he met a girl from Central Oregon, she, too, was captivated by the thin crispy → Read More
Restaurant review: Toomie’s Thai Cuisine
When I last reviewed Toomie’s Thai Cuisine seven years ago, I deemed the restaurant overpriced, especially during the dinner hour. That’s no longer true. Thai restaurants have come and gone since 2011, but Toomie’s — which burst upon the Central Oregon dining scene in 1995 — has been as steady as can be in all regards.In fact, the cost of a dinner hasn’t notably changed. Today, by comparison… → Read More
Restaurant review: Depot Café
Pam Wavrin believes in the “Great Grandma Standard.”The co-owner of Sisters’ Depot Café (with her husband, Chris) still remembers childhood visits to her great-grandmother’s house, where she was greeted by the aroma of fresh bread baking in the oven.That loaf, Wavrin recalls, was made with “just a handful of ingredients, and she probably knew the people who had grown the wheat.” So it should… → Read More
Restaurant review: The Blacksmith Restaurant
When The Blacksmith Restaurant was established in Bend in 2003 by a young Texas chef named Gavin McMichael, it almost singlehandedly propelled the entire Central Oregon restaurant scene to a new level of recognition. Within a few months after its opening, The Blacksmith had been placed on Condé Nast Traveler’s Hot List of the best new restaurants in the world, bringing regional fame to the menu… → Read More
Restaurant review: South Side Pub
It was just last month that I received an email from a reader who wrote in praise of his local watering hole, the South Side Pub.His words were enough to inspire me to visit: “It is truly a locals and blue-collar sort of place — with some occasionally colorful language — but it’s friendly and safe, and it sure does have some great food!”My conclusion: He’s right, on both counts. The South Side,… → Read More