Just some photos of a dinner of small samplers at Aviary Restaurant in Portland. Between the two of us, we shared 3 appetizers, and then 3 of the slightly larger and heavier small plates (everything at Aviary is small plates though). First to appear at the table was the bread with butter dipping sauce (I particuarly liked that one of the breads was an olive bread), it was a thoughtul and welcome start. Then came the first dish from the kitchen, tempura pumpkin with red curry, scallions, thai basil. This was our favorite of the appetizers thanks to the crispy lightness of the batter surrounding the warm firm/softness of the pumpkin with a bit of spice from the curry which was rounded out by some coconut cream in the curry.
Second best was the ox tail croquettes tomato jam which were tender bites of rich meatness. The fried chicken skin salad with watermelon, bitter greens, baba ganoush was raved about in reviews, but we found it the weakest- I was expecting a better pop of contrasting flavors between the luxury of fried chicken skin with the bitterness of the greens, acid of watermelon, and smokiness of baba ganoush, and this just wasn’t realized. Part of me was also hoping the fried chicken skin would be really crunchy crispy- sort of the equivalent of when you get extra crispy from fast food place- and I guess I expected the fried chicken to be in the kind of quantity ratio to the salad like a normal chicken breast would be in a salad with chicken breast. You can see from the picture the greens seem to barely qualify this dish as a salad.
In terms of slightly heavier small plates, we went with a trio of one pork, one beef, and one chicken. The weakest was the crispy pig ear atop coconut rice, chinese sausage, and avocado and greens, again where similar to the fried chicken skin salad, the fat wasn’t balanced well enough by the other components, and leaned instead towards layers of different types of oils. I did like the smoothness of the coconut rice, but then the rest of the dish didn’t balance out for me.
Her favorite was the hoisin glazed short rib with farro and turnips and yuzu pickles, which I really did like- it was so juicy tender and the meat disintegrated on your mouth while teasing you with a bit of the pomegranate and the creaminess of the farro mixing in with that savory melting meat- and a playful texture difference betwen them all- but it was also a very heavy dish. That’s why my favorite was the four cup chicken with taro root, dried apricot and truffle, wood ear mushrooms, all subtle flavors that you could individually appreciate but also harmonized well with the tender juicy chicken. I could probably actually eat that whole dish, but would get overwhelmed after a while with any of the others even though they were good for the first shared portion.
Honestly, we ordered 2 small plates too many- although all the plates are small, this would have really been better at a table of four rather then two. The clean simple decor of a lot of warm wood and candlelight made the space seem very empty and open, but this minimalism also lacked a bit of character- we could have been in any Portland restaurant, I wish there had been a little more there in terms of atmosphere to give a better feel of its personality. However, the service was smooth and friendly, paced wonderfully as we enjoyed our bottle of ’08 Scipt & Seal Bourdeaux to get us food quickly but then considerately let us linger with our conversation without much interruption. Also, they did survive a fire (started from fireworks that landed on the roof) that closed them down for a while, so I give them a break for rising like a phoenix from the ashes.
If you visit, make sure you take more people to share dishes and reduce how much of a single dish you need to eat (four seems like it would be a perfect number). Aviary is really a restaurant that seems best suited to lots of little bird bites of many of the rich dishes- so plan your dining party accordingly.
