{"id":6296,"date":"2011-11-01T16:28:40","date_gmt":"2011-11-01T23:28:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/burgersdogspizza.com\/?p=6296"},"modified":"2011-11-01T16:28:40","modified_gmt":"2011-11-01T23:28:40","slug":"remembering-romantic-meal-portland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.peterstromquist.com\/?p=6296","title":{"rendered":"Remembering a Romantic Meal in Portland"},"content":{"rendered":"

In my opinion (and I have a lot of them) one has to ‘create’ romance in Portland restaurants.\u00a0 There isn’t a single place that caters solely to upmarket, dressed to the nines, cooing diners in love.\u00a0 At least not that I have found, and I’ve asked around as well.<\/p>\n

Portland is a casual city.\u00a0 You and your date can be in gowns, jewels, and a tux, and sitting beside you in (even an expensive) at the restaurant will be a guy in a t-shirt, cut-offs, and flip flops.\u00a0 And a baseball cap.\u00a0 I spoke to the maitre’d of one of the old timey fancy places, he banned hats for awhile, and his biz dropped off significantly.\u00a0 Pity.<\/p>\n

So a few months ago, I wanted something special – Mrs. Burgerdogboy and I were celebrating our 5th anniversary, and I wanted great food, ambiance, and privacy.\u00a0 What to do?\u00a0 What to eat?\u00a0 Where to go?<\/p>\n

Well, for sure, dinner would have to include some of her favorite things.\u00a0 And we’re fond of small plates, so it could be a mash-up of cuisines, how to arrange that?<\/p>\n

I like city lights, think that’s a romantic setting, but I also like dining al fresco.\u00a0 What a conundrum<\/a>!<\/p>\n

I would have to create my own menu, my own situation, my own atmosphere, and I set out to do that.<\/p>\n

One thing was for sure, our night would involve one of the Kimpton Hotels<\/a> here, we’ve been in them several times, including our wedding week.\u00a0 Over the top service; yummy beds and furnishings.<\/p>\n

I chose the Vintage Plaza<\/a>.\u00a0 I was making arrangements a couple months in advance, so I hoped I would have my choice of some of their special rooms.\u00a0 I tried. I scored.\u00a0 Ah, the garden spa suite<\/a>.\u00a0 A great room, nice bed, and a private hot tub on\u00a0 a deck overlooking the city!\u00a0 God, I’m romantic.\u00a0 Mrs. Burgerdogboy LOVES hot tubs.<\/p>\n

Plus the Pazzo Restaurant<\/a> downstairs and from room service?\u00a0 We love that place.\u00a0 We once ordered their entire happy hour menu.\u00a0 And great pizza!\u00a0 (In case you didn’t know, BurgerDogBoy loves him some pizza!)<\/p>\n

We checked in, and jumped in the hot tub.\u00a0\u00a0 After a fashion, we exited the tub for our own happy hour with adult beverages.\u00a0\u00a0 While Mrs. BDB was relaxing with a cocktail, I headed out for our anniversary dinner, rounding a couple of blocks nearby, picking up the bone marrow appetizer at Little Bird<\/a>, and an order of mussels, and grabbed deluxe assortment of sushi down the street.<\/p>\n

My arrival was timed to coincide with a few delights from Pazzo, and we had a sumptious meal, and spent most of the balance of the night in the hot tub.\u00a0 Seems there was a sign that said we should limit our time in the spa, but oops.\u00a0 We didn’t follow the rules, watched the sunset, the downtown lights come on, and had a wonderful evening.<\/p>\n

Oh sure, blingy-type presents were involved, too.<\/p>\n

I’m a romantic.\u00a0 Sometimes you have to create romance, sometimes you can spend some dough, but sometimes it takes just the most simple gestures.<\/p>\n

I love my wife with all my heart.\u00a0 And I will treasure the romance she has shown me until the day I draw my last breath.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In my opinion (and I have a lot of them) one has to ‘create’ romance in Portland restaurants.\u00a0 There isn’t a single place that caters solely to upmarket, dressed to the nines, cooing diners in love.\u00a0 At least not that I have found, and I’ve asked around as well. Portland is a casual city.\u00a0 You… Continue reading Remembering a Romantic Meal in Portland<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4,16,35,22,26],"tags":[702,2771,2879],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.peterstromquist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6296"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.peterstromquist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.peterstromquist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.peterstromquist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.peterstromquist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6296"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.peterstromquist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6296\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.peterstromquist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6296"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.peterstromquist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6296"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.peterstromquist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6296"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}