Gabriel Rucker’s Canard Hits Eater National’s Best New Restaurants

The secret, if it ever existed, is out, and it now may be even harder to get a table at star chef Gabriel Rucker’s “bistro-du-jour” Canard. Eater National just named the wine bar one of the 18 Best New Restaurants in America, alongside restaurants like New York’s elevated bistro Frenchette and Seattle’s soba palace Kamonegi.

Echoing many of the local critics, Eater’s Bill Addison was taken with Canard’s playfulness. “The food may careen into French territory here and there, but this is really exuberant, zigzagging American cooking,” he writes. “Downing a last few drops of Champagne, I bounced out the door humming with a single thought: That was fun.” He calls out many of the restaurant’s signature dishes, including the steam burgers “revved with French onion soup” and the “already-infamous” duck stack, pancakes dripping with gravy and duck egg yolk.

Canard opened in April with massive amounts of anticipation, the first restaurant multi-James Beard winner Rucker had opened in eight years. His other two restaurants, Le Pigeon and Little Bird, have their own sets of accolades, but Canard stood apart by serving breakfast, late-night cocktails, and swirly cones of soft-serve. A high-end diner disguised as a neo-bistro, Canard quickly became an all-day hangout as soon as doors opened at 8 or 9 a.m., garnering rave reviews from diners and critics. Addison’s is the latest, and the first on the national stage.

• Canard [Official]
• The 18 Best New Restaurants in America [E]
• All Canard coverage [EPDX]
• All Little Bird coverage [EPDX]
• All Le Pigeon coverage [EPDX]
• Frenchette [Eater NY]
• Kamonegi [Eater Seattle]
• Canard Brings Out the Kid In You [Portland Mercury]
• With Canard, Star Chef Gabriel Rucker Unleashes the Full Breadth of His Creativity [Willamette Week]