Hop To It

I wanted to take Eddie somewhere fun after work tonight.  I started following a certain restaurant's twitter feed and learned they had just tapped two kegs of our beloved Russian River brews from Santa Rosa, CA. And on top of that, as if we needed another reason to go, I learned this place has happy hour from 3pm to close on Sundays.  So of course we had to check it out.  It's The Hop & Vine in North Portland.  We started out with a round of the two Russian River brews - the consecration & temptation and an order of bread & flavored butter.  Then we had a second round of beer (the first round were small six-ounce pours) and dinner.  I ordered the happy hour burger (pretty darn good) and Eddie had the red bean & rice risotto.  I was worried they wouldn't let me order my plain burger because the menu clearly said no substitutions on happy hour items, but the server was very friendly and didn't mind my food oddities.  And then we splurged on a third round of drinks.  Eddie had a third small glass of beer and I had some yummy cream sherry.  And all of that came to just $42!  I love living up here.  There is no way you could order six drinks and two entrees in California for just $42.  Okay, maybe you could at Dave & Busters during happy hour, but you'd be sacrificing quality.  Big time.

On another note...  I finally watched The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.  Maybe I was too tired, but I really didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would.  I loved the costuming and makeup.  And I even enjoyed the characters.  I think it was just too slow of a film - clocking in at almost three hours.  I guess I just don't have the attention span to sit still that long.

Okay...  I need to mention something else about The Hop & Vine: best bacon ever!!!  It was thick cut & peppered, but I swear I've never had this brand of bacon.  Or maybe they cooked it a special way.  But it was amazing!