The June Hit List: Fills, Palomar, Jacqueline, and More

Bamboo Sushi, Portland’s fully sustainable sushi restaurant-turned-West Coast chainlet, has been a go-to spot for years. Find TikTok-inspired crispy rice rolls, here topped with spicy tuna, spicy salmon, albacore, or yuzu avocado. Daily changing hand roll specials, poke, nigiri, sashimi, and signature rolls make up the rest, with abundant vegan options to boot. The green machine is one, filled out with tempura-fried green beans, and can be boosted with albacore, salmon, and crab for those craving fish. Purists, who might find tempura-fried Philly rolls drizzled in eel sauce and shrimp tempura and crab-stuffed rolls encased in tempura crunchies to be too rich (not us), can also find streamlined maki, simply filled with tuna, salmon, and avocado.

If you care about doughnuts in Portland, you have to visit Fills, from former Bar King bakery whiz Katherine Benvenuti. Though technically no longer in Portland “proper,” (though deeply worth the drive) Benvenuti’s fried-brioche Berliner shop is the treat we never knew we needed. Flavors rotate through more classic iterations, like a Boston cream pie, filled with vanilla pastry cream and dipped in Valrhona chocolate, and Oregon berry, stuffed with berry jam, to the wacky and must-trys, like our personal favorite, the everything bagel, filled with whipped chive cream cheese filling and brushed with Mike’s Hot Honey and everything bagel spice, and the decadent salted caramel brownie, filled with salted caramel pastry cream, dipped in Valrhona chocolate, and sprinkled with brownie pieces.

Breakfast sandwiches, too, are sinfully good, stacked with scrambled eggs and American cheese on a split Berliner bun with optional meats and chile aioli. Stay long enough and you’ll just have to get a burger, too. Try leaving without ordering a half-dozen of anything. We dare you.

Why mess with a classic? A Sellwood neighborhood stalwart, Gino’s, from husband-wife duo Marc and Debby Accuardi, has been serving quintessential, family-style Italian plates since 1996. Start with something light and bright, like the clams or mussels steamed in white wine, before delving into the pasta course with favorites like Grandma Jean’s ragu over penne or ravioli filled with beets and chevre finished in a tarragon-dill cream sauce with arugula. For balance, choose one of the meat-centric mains, which range from seared salmon to an herb-roasted half chicken with mushroom and Tuscan kale. Close out the night with a cocktail from the old-school bar. We recommend the Negroni.

This Clinton neighborhood oyster favorite is one of the city’s few seafood-centric spots. The $1 oyster happy hour (harvested and delivered the same day!) is what might get you in the door, but the simple and seasonal seafood fare will keep you coming back (especially with all the best summer produce has to offer). The menu is back to snacks and larger format dishes, with favorites like Dungeness crab toast with Calabrian chiles and pea tendrils, and whole, cedar-planked McFarland trout with grilled lemons. Non-seafood dishes abound, too, like the burrata with strawberries and pickled rhubarb, and green garlic gnocchi studded with end-of-spring musts, ramps, morels, and maitake mushrooms.

With a new coffee shop, mezcal concept, and a few more secrets up their sleeves on the way, La Fondita is the current newest project from the ever-innovating Republica team. A cozy and casual community-centric space, La Fondita is focusing on the daytime platos rotos once available at Republica only a few blocks away. Much of the menu will look familiar to Republica fans, those homey guisados with fantastic beans and piping hot, fresh tortillas (still made to order by Doña Chapis!) still holding center stage, alongside beautiful tricolor quesadillas and tacotes. The dedicated space has allowed for expanded offerings, including breakfast dishes like chilaquiles and molletes, and new lunchtime specials like three-course comida rapidas, with salad and fruit bookending those tasty stews.

Lazy Susan’s simple-yet-elevated menu of the backyard barbecue foods we all wish were coming out of our own kitchens has made this corner spot a favorite on Montavilla’s restaurant row. Start with the smoked whitefish spread with fried saltines, a dip so good we actually get emotional about it, before diving into at least one crunchy and bright salad to cleanse your palate. Mains run the gamut, from fatty-rich pork secreto, grilled until pink and served under a tangy salsa verde, and classic, American cheese-topped grill burgers (complete with hash browns to rival the golden arches) to bouncy pastas coated in Meyer lemon and Parm and market price steak, whose cut rotates but is always paired with a creamy turnip-horseradish salad to balance its richness. Top it all off with a slushy (boozy, of course), cocktail, or glass of wine for a perfect night.

This Cuban-inspired cocktail bar-by-way-of-Miami is a must-visit for summertime shenanigans. Find a long menu of rum-based Caribbean classics like daiquiris, pina coladas, and punches, alongside signature drinks spanning from matcha flips and Negronis to swizzles and sours. Food starts small, with handheld, fried favorites like croquetas and empanaditas, before expanding out into sandwiches (which of course include a Cubano) and large plates, like flat iron steak with chimichurri and seasonal vegetables and a grilled pork chop with a guava demi glace.

If there’s one thing we learned from the pandemic, it’s that Portlanders love a gourmet market. And Slabtown’s Rotigo, from restaurant and bar vet Cate Hughes, is no different. Find ready-made sandwiches like the spicy farmer, layered with fennel, arugula, zucchini, and herbs or the Tuscan picnic with roasted tomato, pecorino, salsa verde, and rotisserie chicken alongside classic salads like a beet and citrus, chopped nicoise, and vegan Caesar. The main event here is the herby rotisserie chicken, available by the quarter, half, or whole, and served with a choice of fun dipping sauces. To fill out your trip, find charcuterie plates, wines by the bottle, pasta, sauces, pantry basics, and more.

Reeva, a new pizza cart with Honduran and Peruvian influences from husband-and-wife duo Roberto Hernandez Guerrero and Roseva Alcerro, has been spitting out some of the best wood-fired pizzas in town from a former FedEx truck. Find more traditional pies, like a beautiful margherita pizza with punchy tomato sauce and handfuls of ripped basil and the spam-studded Hawaiian, alongside those Central and South American influences with the “pizza a portafoglio,” here reimagined as a Naples-meets-Honduran love child. The “pizzaleada” takes the beans, cheese, and sour cream of the baleada and wraps it in pizza dough. A growing breakfast menu is also shaping up, with dishes like chilaquiles and huevos rotos with speck or chorizo.

Diane Lam’s outdoor Mississippi Avenue restaurant Sunshine Noodles, the ultra-popular Cambodian noodle soup and fried chicken joint, paired with bright cocktails and beers, moved across the river earlier this year. The menu has some familiar players, those Phnom Penh noodles still making a headline appearance, though this time as a drier iteration, with lacquered egg noodles, ground pork, and shrimp.

Elsewhere, hand-cut noodles mingle in a clam dashi with shaved asparagus and manila and mahogany clams, and a lemongrass and lime leaf-scented madras curry is served over vermicelli noodles with potatoes and carrots. Lime pepper wings (a nod to the Prey + Tell days), egg roll-spring roll inception, prawn cocktails, sweet sundaes, and more fill out the rest of the menu. Cocktails, too, draw inspiration from the Southeast Asian flavor canon, shaken with coconut-washed pisco, tropical fruit juices, and pomelo rinds.