Best Dining Bets

The Best Dining with a View

Chart House (Portland; 503/246-6963): Perched high on a hillside, this restaurant boasts the best view of any restaurant in Portland. The Willamette River is directly below and off in the distance stand Mount Hood and Mount St. Helens.

Roseanna's Oceanside Café (Oceanside; tel. 503/842-7351): You can expect a long wait to get a table here on a summer weekend, but the view of the haystack rocks just offshore makes this place an absolute legend on the Three Capes Scenic Loop.

Pelican Pub & Brewery (Pacific City; tel. 503/965-7007): Cheap pub food and good microbrews are usually enough to keep an Oregon brewpub packed, but this one also has a head-on view of Haystack Rock and is right on the beach.

Tidal Raves (Depoe Bay; tel. 541/765-2995): When the surf's up, you can practically forget about getting a table at this oceanfront restaurant. The windows overlook a rugged shoreline known for putting on some of the coast's best displays of crashing waves.

Saffron Salmon (Newport; tel. 541/265-8921): As you dine at this restaurant at the end of a pier on the Newport bayfront, keep an eye out for sea lions and fishermen unloading their catch.

Lord Bennett's Restaurant and Lounge (Bandon; tel. 541/347-3663): The beach in Bandon is strewn with dozens of huge monoliths that make this one of the most impressive stretches of shoreline in the state, and this restaurant has the perfect view for enjoying sunset over the sand, surf, and giant rocks.

Multnomah Falls Lodge (Columbia Gorge; tel. 503/695-2376): This historic lodge is at the base of Oregon's tallest waterfall, and although not every table has a view of the waterfall, there are plenty that do, especially in the summer when there is outside seating.

The Best Off-the-Beaten-Path Restaurants

The Joel Palmer House (Dayton; tel. 503/864-2995): Mushrooms are the chef's obsession at this wine-country restaurant, and you'll find them in almost every dish on the menu. The restaurant is quite formal, housed in an immaculately restored old home.

Cascade Dining Room (Mount Hood; tel. 503/622-0700): Located inside the historic Timberline Lodge, the Cascade Dining Room is Oregon's premier mountain-lodge restaurant and has long kept skiers and other hotel guests happy.

Log Cabin Inn (McKenzie Bridge; tel. 800/355-3432 or 541/822-3432): This place is an Oregon classic and in the past has served the likes of Clark Gable and President Herbert Hoover. Try the venison medallions.

Steamboat Inn (Steamboat; tel. 800/840-8825 or 541/498-2230): Set on the banks of the North Umpqua River, this is ostensibly a fishing-lodge dining room, but the multicourse gourmet meals served here have become the stuff of legends.

Kokanee Café (Camp Sherman; tel. 541/595-6420): Located amid the ponderosa pines on the banks of the Metolius River near the Western theme town of Sisters, this rustic restaurant has the look of an upscale fishing lodge, but its clientele is much broader than just the foolish fly anglers who come to test the waters of the Metolius. The trout is, of course, always a good bet.