I love that place! I live in Portland too, and if someone from out of town comes to visit, I always take them to Susan’s Fish and Chips.
Oh, do tell. When not here, I find myself quite often at industrial-looking little strip malls along Royal Windsor.
I love The Keg (usually go to the one in Mississauga near Streetsville).
For a couple of summers I worked in an industrial compound owned by our local electrical utility. I would sometimes wander around it on my lunch, just seeing what was there and which doors I could get through without someone questioning my presence. One day I found an unmarked cafeteria which had the best soups I have ever tasted. It was like a world class chef had just decided to appropriate the room to sell ambrosia to whatever workers might pass through. To this day I am still not sure it wasn’t an art project.
Hands down best fajitas I have ever had came from a sort of “bar” unadvertized inside a tiny butcher shop and grocery way at the back of a run down strip mall off Bissonet in Houston. I think it was originally a coffee or smoothie bar, only had around ten seats and the chef didn’t speak a word of english and your order was freshly made while you watched and dirt cheap.
They were loaded with fresh lime juice and cilantro, god I have craved these things over the years.
Harrah’s Tahoe has (had?) a fantastic little seafood nook as well. Outstanding cioppino, stews and pan roasts. John’s Oyster Bar in the Nugget (Sparks) is fantastic as well.
The very best pulled pork/barbecue sandwich I’ve ever had was about five or six years ago at this rather non-descript middle-of-nowhere grocery store/shack in Eads, Tennessee, called Morris Grocery. I did my research to find it (I didn’t just stumble upon it by accident), but otherwise, there would have been little to zero chance that I would have come across it. Another link with reviews. If you’re in the Memphis area, it’s a must-stop if you’re on a barbecue trek.
Oddly, Wendy’s (yes the fast food Wendy’s) had a special on pulled pork sandwiches last summer. They where excelent, and I wish they kept them on the menu.
Down the street from me is a little strip mall - a liquor store, a barber shop and Papa’s Cafe. The decor is kitschy, sometimes dusty, all pretty cheap looking. But the food is divine. Everything is handmade - from the burgers to the pies. I love going there, if there are any open seats.
Some of them had really good fried chicken, too. That was about 20 years ago.
Poppies, a restaurant in a dying strip mall in Denver. The interior is a lot of red velvet and dark woods. Ya expect the rat pack to walk in the door any minute.
Use to go there for breakfast. Not necessarily for the food, but the the make 'em yourself Bloody Mary piano bar. Fun times.
Hardee’s, of all places, had really good fried chicken in the early 1990s. I was still in college, and my roommate and I got it several times.
A Phoenix swap meet years ago. Someone set up a BBQ trailer, and OMG. We’d go down there just for that.
I have to put in a word for Papa Joe’s Casa de Pasta in Mishawaka, IN.
The are located in what once was the office area of the factory where they have made fresh pasta for local restaurants for several generations.
After years of being told “you should open a restaurant!”, they finally did in 1973. The first version of the restaurant had 6 tables set up in what had clearly been office space in the very recent past. The waiting area was what had once been the reception area.
Much has changed in the intervening years, but because of the factory, they are still open only on Friday and Saturday. The office space has been remodeled and is now on kitschy Italian overload, but the food is just spectacular. Even in the dead of winter, I’ve never had anything but full-flavored tomatoes in the salad, none of the orange cannon balls you buy in stores. And their breads are as wonderful as their sauces and pastas.
I’m wanting to make a trip back to Indiana just thinking about it!
Yup. Been there, ate that. Stellar food.
I’m reminded of Sadie’s, a Mexican-food restaurant in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It started out as a small diner inside a bowling alley and became so popular that people would line up inside the bowling alley outside the diner’s doors waiting to eat. They’d come for the food but were not interested in bowling. There were often more diners than bowlers.
Eventually they opened their own place next door to the bowling alley, and I understand they have several locations now.
If you visit Oahu, right near the airport in the nearby industrial buildings there’s a great place called Mitch’s Sushi. It’s in the side of a warehouse building.
Spin the street view around to get a feel for the neighborhood. Amazing sushi. Not hugely expensive.
I was surprised at how many good restaurants there are in Portland. I’ve been to Duck Fat multiple times. And they have some of the better craft breweries around.
Oostend,Belgium some hole in the wall pizza place. Couldn’t find it a second time,but the pizza was great. They had a small bar with stools and there was a cat sitting on one.
Chinese food in Marshfield, Wisconsin, a couple of decades ago, before Asian cuisine filtered north of Madison. I believe it was Bamboo Garden.