Half a year has already passed, but thinking about Portland still gives me warm, fuzzy feeling (although literally, the weather in January was slightly chilly and mostly drizzling). In addition to the hike into the waterfalls, one of the highlights of the trip was visiting the Powell’s Books. Powell’s Books is an independent bookstore headquartered in Portland, Oregon, and has a history that goes back almost half a century. According to its website, the bookstore began when a then-University of Chicago graduate student named Michael Powell launched a bookstore in Chicago in 1970. His father Walter Powell decided to bring the spirit to Portland and opened a used bookstore there, which eventually became a successful family business with five locations and an online component.
Living in a world where offline bookstores are gradually disappearing, I definitely found Powell’s Books to be an impressive, niche place. The dark-green, antique exterior invited us into an extensive space with endless shelves of books. The shelves were labeled with brief, personal staff notes that explained how they were categorized and why they were chosen to be displayed in certain ways.
There, I picked up “The Sympathizer” by Viet Thanh Nguyen, a Pulitzer-winning novel that I’ve heard of but haven’t bothered to pick up. It has been a really long while since I read books, especially English books, for pleasure. I ended up finishing the book months later, and I absolutely loved it. It was captivating, beautifully-written, shocking and touching. The plot itself was about (spoiler alert!) a spy during the Vietnam War, but it made me contemplate about culture, ethnicity, racism, religion, ideologies, family and so much more. Some comments he made about being Asian in America strongly resonated with me, a Korean student studying in the U.S. I would 100 percent recommend it to anyone who needs a summer read — it’ll make you laugh, cry and think.
Books are great food for the mind, but let’s talk about actual food for our bellies. We went to a very instagrammable doughnut place named “Voodoo Doughnut.” The bright, pink neon sign invites a long line of people into its mysterious store. There were a lot of flavors that I’ve never heard of, including the one I bought: the Voodoo Doll. Voodoo Doll was covered with chocolate frosting, filled with raspberry jam and had a little pretzel stick stuck in its belly. It had a fun shape (but I don’t like jam nor chocolate), so I brought it back to Chicago as a souvenir for a friend. For novel flavors and shapes of doughnuts (and a trendy Instagram post), Voodoo is probably worth a try! But another place we wanted to go to but didn’t have time for was the Blue Star Donuts, which supposedly has better-tasting doughnuts. Hopefully someone can share the reviews of that place with me!
Last but not least, there were two cozy brunch places we went to that I’d love to share: Screen Door and Mother’s Bistro.
At Screen Door, we sat in the outdoors patio area, under a clear roof decorated with fairy lights that sheltered us from rain drops. I remember the walls being a warm, welcoming color of yellow. Screen Door was (supposedly) known for its savory waffles, so we tried the Fried Chicken & Waffle as well as the Screen Door Praline Bacon Waffle. I remember both tasting very different from what I’ve ever tried. The Praline Bacon was sugarcoated and crunchy, while also retaining the saltiness of bacon. It was a fun balance between sweet and savory for sure, and mimosa added flavor to the mix.
Mother’s Bistro was cozy in a different way. It felt much larger than Screen Door, and the entire place was painted in light green. If Screen Door felt like a millennial/Gen Z brunch place, Mother’s Bistro felt like a family restaurant. Rather than being ostentatiously decorated, the food here gave off the feeling of a simple but delicious home-cooked meal.
Mother’s Bistro was the last place we went to before going back to the airport. From bookstore and trail in the nature to cozy brunch food, this quick getaway to Portland was filled with warm, fuzzy feelings.
