Long-Closed Old Town Spot Ping Has Returned as a Delivery Concept

Izakaya-Adjacent Ping Returns as a Ghost Kitchen Restaurant on Third-Party Delivery Apps

Restaurant group Chefstable has revived a long-lost restaurant Ping, once home to Pok Pok’s Andy Ricker, as a takeout-and-delivery-only concept. The restaurant’s team called it a “Thai izakaya,” with skewers, noodles, and a killer bar. Former Ping chef Michael Kessler has landed in the former home of Holdfast Dining, bringing back some of the hits from the original restaurant. The menu is split into an array of skewers, salads, noodles, vegetables, and meats: The skewers range from soy-and-yuzu-marinated pork belly to the Thai pork dish mu ping, as well as its popular Japanese chicken thigh yakitori. The noodles, on the other hand, generally stick to Southeast Asia, with Singaporean laksa nonya and Hokkien mee, to Thai suki haeng, a stir-fried glass noodle dish with vegetables. Find the whole menu on apps like Caviar or Postmates. [Oregonian]

Hungry Tiger Is Going on a Winter Hiatus

Hungry Tiger, the Southeast Portland bar known for its hardcore vegan comfort food, is closing indefinitely after service today. The bar, which served corn dogs shockingly similar to the meaty originals and tasty vegan nachos, announced the plan to shut down on Twitter. “We don’t know if this is bye for now, or bye forever,” a tweet from the bar reads — hopefully it returns in 2021. [WWeek]

The Family Behind Hotel and Restaurant Chain McMenamins Asks Governors to Reinstate Indoor Dining

The five members of the McMenamin family have sent a letter to Oregon Gov. Kate Brown and Washington Gov. Jay Inslee asking them both to reinstate some form of indoor dining. “With no federal assistance in sight, we are now making an urgent plea to allow indoor dining on some level in our restaurants,” the McMenamin family writes. “The current model is not sustainable with government relief, and staying in business until the end of the pandemic gets more difficult each day.” McMenamins received a $10 million Paycheck Protection Program loan earlier this year, which the family’s letter references directly: “We exhausted personal funds to ensure our employees were paid, and we have leaned heavily on banks, a PPP loan, and other available assistance programs to get us where we are today.” The Pacific Northwestern chain employs more than 3,000 people at 56 hotels, bars, restaurants, distilleries, breweries, wineries, and more. [Portland Business Journal]

In Other News...

• SmartAsset named Portland the fourth-best U.S. city for beer drinkers, based on total number of breweries, breweries per 100,000 residents, average number of beers per brewery, bars per 100,000 residents, and the average cost of a pint. Bend lands at seventh place nationally. [SA]
• Oregonian food writer Michael Russell published a list of the closures that hit us hardest this year, including places like Le Bistro Montage, Beech Street Parlor, and Kargi Gogo. Some restaurants on the list haven’t closed for good just yet: Cheese Bar and the Bakery at Bar King will close in January. [O]
• John and Renee Gorham, the minds formerly behind restaurant group behind Toro Bravo, have left the city. The couple has started a restaurant consulting agency and private chef business, Bull and Bee Hospitality, in Central Oregon. In other leaving-the-city news, Nick Ford, once known for PREAM and Pizzeria Sul Lago, has also left Portland. [O]