Clackamas Town Center
503-654-3700
I know…I’ve gone and done it. I ate at a chain restaurant! Normally, I steer clear of these restaurants in favor of restaurants unique to Portland, hole-in-the-walls, or regional cuisine, but since today was E’s special day, he got to pick the place. I wasn’t expecting to be blown away–we’ve both eaten at other CJ’s in various locations. Still, I am glad to see that Clackamas Town Center is currently revamping it’s style and going for a blend of outdoor/indoor stores and restaurants. We arrived at 6:20pm today, and found the parkinglot completely packed with cars and people coming in and out of the restaurant. Just getting to the hostess booth was a struggle, and we were told that there would be a wait of almost 2 hours for a table. Good thing we’ve done this sort of thing before, because we moseyed on in to the patio area for a few minutes, then slid right up into the bar when a space vacated. I love first come first serve seating! Even though the house was packed, these servers were beaming, introduced themselves, and were so pleasant to be around! Their happy hour menu is solid: $1 off most drinks, $2 off well drinks, and appetizers ranged from $4-$8. A little pricey for a town with ginormous $1.95 happy hour cheeseburgers, but the portions here are quite big. We did not order off the menu, mainly because it consisted mostly of battered and fried foods, but people around us were thoroughly enjoying meal sized plates of hot wings and fish & chips.
Off the menu, we chose the Ore Cart, which consists of 3 huge beef back ribs, half a slab of pork baby back ribs, and half a rotissiere chicken. It was so huge that the sides (grilled asparagus) came on a different plate, as well as the signature cheesebread. I thoroghly enjoyed the pork ribs–the flavor was smokey and highly flavorful, and the accompanying sauce is my favorite kind: tomato based but not sour. I’m sure somewhere in Texas, a diehard BBQ fanatic is groaning right now, but darn it, this is tasty! The beef ribs were meaty, but also had a thick layer of fat on one side that wasn’t pleasant when all the melted oil runs out. Be careful to eat around it! The chicken was good–not memorable, but not disappointing. The skin wasn’t as crisp as I like, and the white meat was very flavorable, but the sauce helped it out a lot.
(better rib shot)
The accompanying bread option, garlic cheese toast, was not as good as I’ve had before. It was lukewarm, chewy, and lacked the hot crispy bite that a good Texas toast should have. It tastes like it was mass baked in advance, which it probably was.
The grilled asparagus was fine. Not stellar, but not disappointing. It was lightly oiled, sprinkled with garlic and salt, then grilled. Simple, but it worked.
Between the two of us, we licked the platter clean. At $27.95, it was well worth it for the taste, comfortable/sports bar atmosphere (except with cattle prods instead of team emblems), and the excellent service. I do feel my arteries clogging and I will definitely need to eat lightly and work out for the next few days to compensate for this splurge, but I just may come back here if I’m in the Clackamas area, especially after a hard day of shopping.