BARS: “Yen-Ha”

From Willamette Week’s “DRINK GUIDE 2008″:
Entering Yen Ha is like going to a Saigon speakeasy: Walk through the often-empty storefront dining area, through the back door, and discover the wonders of this dingy-ass, smells-like-shit time warp filled with good people, loads of booze and cheap Vietnamese eats.

BARS: “Scandals”

From Willamette Week’s “DRINK GUIDE 2008″:
The nouveau-styled, airport-loungy Scandals is an all-boys stronghold, where there’s no door to the men’s room and flat-screen televisions regularly show scantily clad, sculpted gentlemen walking down runways.

FOOD: “Pause Kitchen”

From Willamette Week’s “DRINK GUIDE 2008″:
Belly grumbling for tasty grub and good drink? It’s almost worth pulling the emergency alarm on the MAX, so the conductor will screetch to a stop and let you off right in front of Pause. With a picnic table-laden, homey fenced-in backyard patio and a tasteful, TV-less dining room, it’s [...]

BARS: “Imbibe”

From Willamette Week’s “DRINK GUIDE 2008″:
If Imbibe’s “take it in” tagline were applied to any neighboring bar along Southeast Hawthorne, it’d probably refer to inhaling the thick cloud of cigarette smoke. But at Imbibe, the air’s a little cleaner—so we assume they’d like us to soak up the bar’s carefully crafted atmosphere.

BARS: “Ash Street Saloon”

From Willamette Week’s “DRINK GUIDE 2008″:
Any joint that has a Pirates of the Caribbean pinball machine is fine by me. Besides offering a place to destroy the Kraken, the Ash Street is a major fixture of downtown’s decidedly non-Barracuda nightlife, hosting one of the city’s heftiest lineups of local and West Coast live rock seven nights a [...]