FIRST NOTES FROM PORTLAND AND RUTH REICHL

“Go to Ox.”

I heard that so often while I was in Portland it made me skeptical. It can’t be that great, right?

Wrong. This is the most amiable restaurant I’ve been to in quite a while. It’s not just that the food is straight up delicious, the service sweet and the room casually comfortable. Somehow an aura of happiness permeates the place; I can’t imagine anyone going there and not having a good time.