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Ping (restaurant)

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Coordinates: 45°30′27″N 122°39′18″W / 45.50745°N 122.65495°W / 45.50745; -122.65495
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Ping
2016 photograph of the Old Town Chinatown building which housed Ping from 2009 to 2012
Map
Restaurant information
Owner(s)Kurt Huffman
Previous owner(s)Andy Ricker
Chef
  • Andy Ricker
  • Mike Kessler
Food typeAsian
Street address2131 Southeast 11th Avenue
CityPortland
StateOregon
CountryUnited States
Coordinates45°30′27″N 122°39′18″W / 45.50745°N 122.65495°W / 45.50745; -122.65495
Websitehttp://pingpdx.com/[usurped] (2009–2012)
https://pingportland.com/ (2020–2021)

Ping was an Asian restaurant in Portland, Oregon. Chef Andy Ricker and restaurateur Kurt Huffman opened the original restaurant in Old Town Chinatown in 2009. In 2010, Ping was a semifinalist in the Best New Restaurant category at the James Beard Foundation Awards. It was also named a best new restaurant by GQ[1] and earned a Rising Star award from The Oregonian.

Despite garnering a positive reception, the restaurant closed temporarily in 2012 and permanently in 2013. Huffman reopened Ping in southeast Portland's Hosford-Abernethy neighborhood in late 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, with Mike Kessler as chef. The take-out operation closed in 2021.

Description

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Ping originally operated in Portland's Old Town Chinatown neighborhood. The interior had "floor-to-ceiling windows, revealing vibrant Asian pop art-lined tables and white paper scrolls hanging from the ceiling over the open kitchen".[2] Ping served Thai and Vietnamese street food.[3] Eat Ink described Ping as "a pub-like space with an Asian fusion menu";[4] other outlets called Ping a "Thai izakaya".[5][6] The New York Times called Ping a "pan-Asian skewer house".[7]

In 2009, Portland Monthly's Martha Calhood said the "Pan-Asian [pub's] aesthetic seems right at home on this gritty corner in Chinatown" and wrote, "even as happy hour fades with the spring twilight, an assortment of diners—Pearl District businessmen, pipe-cleaner-skinny fashionistas, couples, families, perfectly unkempt twentysomethings—steadily stream in, talking and pushing tables together near the restaurant's large front windows".[8]

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The menu has also been described as "Asian-style pub food", and has included Laksa (chicken breast, fishcake, clams, prawns and boiled egg with rice noodles in a mild curry coconut milk base and sambal),[9] friend pork knuckles, stewed duck leg, skewers, and quail eggs wrapped in bacon.[2][10] Ping's "signature" drink was the Sapporo lager with sugar and yuzu.[11]

When Ping relaunched in 2020, the menu included salads, meats, noodles, skewers, and vegetables. According to Eater Portland's Brooke Jackson-Glidden, "The skewers [ranged] 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 [stuck] to Southeast Asia, with Singaporean laksa nonya and Hokkien mee, to Thai suki haeng, a stir-fried glass noodle dish with vegetables".[12]

History

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Original restaurant

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Chef Andy Ricker in 2011

Chef Andy Ricker and restaurateur Kurt Huffman (via ChefStable)[13] opened the original Ping in early 2009,[2] in the space previously occupied by Hung Far Low.[14] According to Michael Russell of The Oregoninan, "At first, chef Andy Ricker had explored the possibility of taking over the sprawling upstairs space long home to Hung Far Low... Working with partners Kurt Huffman of restaurant group ChefStable as well as Wieden & Kennedy executive creative director (and longtime Chinatown booster) John Jay and his wife, style consultant Janet, Ricker eventually settled on a smaller space downstairs."[11]

According to Eat Ink, Ping "made many food critics' 'must try' lists" but Ricker "sold his interest ... to his partners to focus exclusively on Thai cuisine".[4] The restaurant closed in temporarily in 2012 and permanently in 2013,[15] following an economic downturn and Ricker's departure.[16] According to Eater Portland, "The spot went through numerous iterations, including stints as hip cocktail bar Easy Company, the more casual watering hole Big Trouble, and as the commissary kitchen for the popular, pork-heavy sandwich shop Lardo, part of Huffman's now citywide restaurant group ChefStable".[17][18]

Relaunch

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Eight years later, in December 2020, Huffman reopened Ping during the COVID-19 pandemic as a "takeout-and-delivery-only concept"[12] alongside Mike Kessler, a chef who had worked in the original restaurant's kitchen. Ping reopened in southeast Portland's Hosford-Abernethy neighborhood,[16] in a space which previously housed Holdfast Dining.[12] Willamette Week described the operation as a "takeout-only ghost kitchen".[19] Kessler shared plans to "introduce outdoor dining, before bringing seating indoors as vaccination rates go up", and eventually return to a brick and mortar operation. He told KATU, "finding new ways of doing business is the only way to stay afloat right now".[20]

The second iteration of Ping was even shorter-lived; by mid-2021 the restaurant declared a hiatus on its Instagram account, from which it did not return. Its last post was dated July 17, 2021.[21] By December 2021 its website was inaccessible.[22]

Reception

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In 2010, Ping was nominated in the Best New Restaurant category at the James Beard Foundation Awards. The restaurant was also included in Alan Richman's list of 10 best new restaurants in the United States.[23] In his 2010 review for Willamette Week, Ben Waterhouse wrote:

Any diners refusing a beer will regret their decision a few bites into the lime-and-chile-marinated baby octopus skewer or the chile-dappled yam mama ramen salad. The capsaicin-averse should stick to sweeter bites like the salapao, a steamed bun stuffed with sweet pork, or the pork meatball skewer. Don't care for meat? Ping doesn't offer a lot for vegetarians, but don't worry—the salty-sweet-smoky shishito chile skewer is the best item on the menu. I could eat hundreds of these things.[24]

Waterhouse said the "ideal meal" at Ping was "four hishito skewers, octopus skewer, Vietnamese-style short rib, salapao, Japanese cucumber salad".[24] Aaron Mesh of Willamette Week wrote in 2011: "It is blasphemy to suggest that any establishment surpasses Pok Pok for Asian cuisine, but I'll go ahead and say it: Andy Ricker's second restaurant, Ping, is more ambitious and even better than its older, more popular sister."[25] Mike Hodgkinson included Ping in The Guardian's 2011 list of Portland's "top 10 places to eat". He said the restaurant was "based on a reimagined, composite version of the Asian cafe/pub hangout scene ... and it works really well. The space has a Blade Runner-esque food stall energy, and strikes a balance between comfort and artful design. The baby octopus skewers in lime/chilli marinade are a highlight."[26] Spectrum Culture's Cedric Justic wrote a positive review of the restaurant in 2012. He said "Ping celebrates Thai food and is utterly authentic about what it doles out" and recommended, "for something special or for a tasty, light meal, you can count on [Ping's] innovative approach to Thai".[27]

Food Republic included Ping in a list of 5 "great places to eat" in Portland. The website's review said the Kobayashi dog was "outstanding" and ended, "besides the drinking vinegar weirdness and a lame pork chop bun, this was yet again a big win from Ricker".[28] In 2020, Michael Russell of The Oregonian wrote, "Ping was a cult favorite, earning a GQ Best New Restaurant nod, The Oregonian's Rising Star award in 2009 and enough fans that I still hear from people who lament its closure."[11]

References

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  1. ^ "Alan Richman Reviews Portland Restaurants". GQ. 2012-11-05. Retrieved 2023-04-27.
  2. ^ a b c Gottberg, John; Lopeman, Elizabeth (2010-06-01). Best Places: Portland, 8th Edition. Sasquatch Books. ISBN 978-1-57061-699-0. Archived from the original on 2023-04-26. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  3. ^ Wolf, Laurie (2012-07-17). Portland, Oregon Chef's Table: Extraordinary Recipes from the City of Roses. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-0-7627-8711-1. Archived from the original on 2023-04-26. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  4. ^ a b O'Halloran, Birk; Holton, Daniel Luke (2013-11-01). Eat Ink: Recipes. Stories. Tattoos. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-1-4405-4344-9. Archived from the original on 2023-04-26. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  5. ^ Garcia, Krista (2018-02-08). "11 Incredible Izakayas in Portland and Beyond". Eater Portland. Archived from the original on 2023-01-31. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  6. ^ "This Week In Portland Food News: Ping Returns, Hungry Tiger Closes, and To-Go Cocktails Have Arrived". Portland Mercury. Archived from the original on 2022-12-05. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  7. ^ Moon, Freda (2010-03-02). "Restaurant Review: Whiskey Soda Lounge in Portland, Ore". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on 2015-09-09. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  8. ^ "Street Cred". Portland Monthly. Archived from the original on 2023-02-05. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  9. ^ "Where to Get Food in Portland This Week". Willamette Week. 2 February 2021. Archived from the original on 2021-07-17. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  10. ^ The Rough Guide to the USA. Rough Guides UK. 2014-04-01. ISBN 978-1-4093-7230-1. Archived from the original on 2023-04-26. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  11. ^ a b c Russell, Michael (2020-12-17). "Ping reborn: Pok Pok's beloved izakaya spinoff returns". The Oregonian. Archived from the original on 2021-01-28. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  12. ^ a b c Jackson-Glidden, Brooke (2020-12-21). "Long-Closed Old Town Spot Ping Has Returned as a Delivery Concept". Eater Portland. Archived from the original on 2023-01-26. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  13. ^ The Mighty Gastropolis: Portland: A Journey Through the Center of America S New Food Revolution. Chronicle Books. 2012-12-26. ISBN 978-1-4521-0596-3. Archived from the original on 2023-04-26. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  14. ^ Jackson-Glidden, Brooke (12 September 2018). "Hung Far Low is Trying to Evict the Hip Bar Fortune in Chinatown". Eater Portland. Archived from the original on 30 January 2021. Retrieved 22 January 2021.
  15. ^ Russell, Michael (2013-09-20). "Chinatown's Ping officially closes; cocktail bar, Lardo commissary planned for space". The Oregonian. Archived from the original on 2022-01-21. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  16. ^ a b Zusman, Michael C. (2021-01-20). "Pok Pok is Gone, but Andy Ricker's Other Restaurant is Getting a Sudden Second Life". Willamette Week. Archived from the original on 2021-01-22. Retrieved 2021-01-22.
  17. ^ Frane, Alex (2020-09-17). "Old Town Bar Fortune Closes After Years of Legal Battles With Its Landlord". Eater Portland. Archived from the original on 2023-03-21. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  18. ^ DeJesus, Erin (2013-09-19). "Oven & Shaker's Ryan Magarian Opening Bar in Ping". Eater Portland. Archived from the original on 2022-01-24. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  19. ^ "ChefStable Is Reviving John Gorham's "Tasty" Restaurant Brand in Lake Oswego". Willamette Week. 24 December 2020. Archived from the original on 2021-10-19. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  20. ^ Allison, Megan (2021-02-26). "Portland restaurants find new ways to keep doors open". KATU. Archived from the original on 2021-02-27. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  21. ^ Ping. "Ping (Instagram account)". Archived from the original on 2022-07-18. Retrieved 2022-07-26.
  22. ^ Ping. "Ping (website)". Archived from the original on 2022-01-31. Retrieved 2022-07-27.
  23. ^ Brooks, Karen (2010-02-19). "Oregon chefs get big slice of James Beard Award semifinals nominations". The Oregonian. Archived from the original on 2022-08-17. Retrieved 2023-04-27.
  24. ^ a b "Ping: Restaurant Guide 2010". Willamette Week. 20 October 2010. Archived from the original on 2023-04-26. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  25. ^ "Pok Pok Is Gone, but Andy Ricker's Other Restaurant Is Getting a Sudden Second Life". Willamette Week. 21 January 2021. Archived from the original on 2021-01-22. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  26. ^ Hodgkinson, Mike (2011-03-08). "Top 10 places to eat in Portland, Oregon". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Archived from the original on 2022-07-03. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  27. ^ "Ping: Portland: Restaurant Review". Spectrum Culture. 2012-10-25. Archived from the original on 2021-09-25. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
  28. ^ "5 Great Places to Eat In Portland, Oregon". Food Republic. 2011-07-01. Archived from the original on 2021-04-18. Retrieved 2023-04-26.
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