Quality Bar Opens, Plus Two New Places to Try This Weekend

WEST BURNSIDE -- After opening and selling The White Owl, the Sizzle Pie crew is back in the bar business with Quality Bar. Opened today at 931 SW Oak St next door to Sizzle Pie West on W Burnside, it has the upscale dive-bar vibe you'd expect, but it also has a small mezzanine and veggie and herb garden for cocktails and pizzas (a window connects the Sizzle Pie West and Quality Bar, so find a menu of vegan, gluten-free,veggie, and meat-smothered slices, too). Open daily beginning at 11 a.m. [EaterWire]

ST JOHNS -- How does a side of collard greens with an aggressively seasoned pork meatball bahn mi sound? Opened September 10 and located at 8037 N Lombard St in St. Johns, the casual dining Mama San Soul Shack pairs Southern and Asian soul foods, and it also offers some full-on fusion dishes, such as its best-selling banana leaf-braise pork bowl. It's owned by chef Christopher Hopkins (Tasty N Alder) and wife and husband Rana Albert and Andy Boggs (Boggs set up the bar program at Trifecta). [EaterWire]

KERNS-- The Zipper, the artsy building full of microrestaurants and the Paydirt Bar at 2705 N.E. Sandy Blvd has been in full swing for weeks, so it's hardly newly opened. Regardless, the official "grand opening" is today. It's home to a knockout patio and the following: Seven Virtues Coffee Roasters at the Zipper; Chickpeadx; Bywater Grocery; Slice Pizza; Rua; and the rock 'n' roll Finger Bang nail salon. [Oregonian]