Experience Proud Mary's unorthodox ricotta hotcake

Traditionalists, get your pancake fix elsewhere. This Aussie coffee roaster slings an inch-thick ricotta hotcake strewn with edible flowers, berries, and seeds with a dollop of Chantilly cream up top and a puckery, Lemonhead-esque citrus syrup below. 

Load up on mofongo at Carlito’s Cocina food cart

Karlo Prado’s Portland Mercado cart doles out one of Puerto Rico’s definitive dishes: starchy fried plantains mashed with a bit of roasted garlic sauce—topped with smoky fried pork or addictive fried chicken nibblets and a squiggle of tasty mayo-ketchup sauce. It’s the equivalent of a whole homey chicken dinner in a single to-go cup. 

Eat breakfast like a Lebanese native

Beirut’s answer to the American breakfast sandwich is called Kanefe: a savory-sweet pita hand pie stuffed full of melted cheese and rose-flavored honey. World Foods owner Mirna Attar occasionally sells it at her prepared food section when she’s feeling generous (it’s difficult to make), or anytime at her landmark Montavilla Lebanese restaurant, Ya Hala.   

Go into a food coma at Wares

Remember Wares? The miniaturized version of Johanna Wares’ old Northeast Portland, inauthentic Asian restaurant? Well, it’s still chugging along at Northeast Sandy's The Zipper restaurant micro-complex, turning out some flavor-busting bowls on the cheap. The spicy noodles—thin, bouncy strands slicked in a thick sauce of heavily-spiced pork sausage, big bites of cucumber, mouth-puckering black vinegar, and crunchy breadcrumbs— hit the same sweet spot as chow mein takeout, but in a much better way.