Our New Car(and Portland!)

So a couple of weeks back, Andi and I bought a 2004 mini cooper. It's perfect for her because it's small and she is still learning how to drive. It's in really good condition with only some minor cosmetic things that can be fixed later.

She loves it!! :D

We decided to give it a test run for a small vacation we took this past weekend up to Portland Oregon. It ran great with no issues. It's quite fun to drive and doesn't seem as small once your inside. 

As for the coast, it's beautiful. We drove around Seaside and Astoria.

This is called Haystack Rock and it's home to some really cool tidal pools.

Cool looking star fish

Some sea anemones.

Portland Oregon is a great city for food. One of the cool things they have are food trucks that circle entire blocks. We ate at this stand which had food from Georgia, a small country in between Turkey and Russia. I forgot to take photo's of the food because we were starving and scarfed it up fast. However, if you zoom in on the sign to the left, we had all five of those dishes: cheese bread, onion and bean bread, eggplant rolls, a tomato and cucumber salad, and the best was the stuffed dumplings with black pepper. Everything was amazing!! I've already found a couple of Georgian restaurants in SF that I'm going to try!

We also ate at a great restaurant called Gruner. It's a mix of German, Swiss, France, and some Middle Europe. The above photo is a shaved radish salad with pumpkin seed oil, toasted pumpkin seeds, cider vinegar and fresh herbs. Tasty and pretty to look at!

I got a charcuterie plate with several great meats, the best one being a house-made rabbit mortadella. I also loved the pickled fiddlehead ferns in the back!

This appetizer was called Maultaschen: a traditional German dumpling similar to ravioli. These where filled with pork, beef, onion, and spinach in a meat broth. Both the broth and dumplings had great flavor.

Beet pickled deviled eggs.....amazing!!

Spatzle with black forest ham, sugar snap peas, leeks, and asiago cheese. A super tasty kicked up mac and cheese!

Grilled golden trout with spring onions and yukon potatoes.

Coq Au Riesling-morels, fava beans, crispy shallots, and yukon potato puree.

And last but not least dessert. Berliners: small sugar coated donuts with marionberry jam inside. These reminded me of eating zeppoles at the New Jersey shore as a kid!

All in all a great meal and a great trip. Portland was a very cool city and I can't wait to go back with more time and explore!