A quick mid-may trip to Eugene, Oregon (home of the University of Oregon Ducks!) gave us the opportunity to try a restaurant that had been recommended by a friend: Cafe Zenon. We're glad we did.
The downtown street corner location offers dining outside in good weather, not the case when we were there, unfortunately. The menu was innovative, with lots of interesting edibles to entice us. We opted for a pair of appetizers to start with. One was Samosas, which were described as "East Indian fried pastries stuffed with curried potatoes, zucchini, peas, shallots and yogurt, served with cilantro chutney." These were interesting, and we liked the chutney, but we had enjoyed some very authentic Samosas before that contained lamb, and found them a lot more to our liking than the vegetarian version served here.
The Cafe also has streetside dining.
The other appetizer was sensational: Chicken Liver Pate, served with a candy cap mushroom syrup, house cured bacon crisp and toast points. We are somewhat ashamed to admit it, but we had never eaten candy cap mushrooms before, and they were aptly named, reminiscent of maple syrup. The pate was a little softer than usual, but really tasty, and the home baked breads (two kinds) were the perfect accompaniment. Heavenly.
A Caesar Salad was, well, a Caesar Salad, and was about what you would expect.
The entree we chose was Braised Beef Shoulder, described as "slow cooked beef in a morel mushroom marsala sauce with onions and garlic, served with a farro salad and wilted spinach." Farro turned out to be a North African grain, which we initially confused with couscous; to be honest, it wouldn't have occurred to us to pair it with the beef, but it turned out to be an interesting choice. The beef was good, the sauce was very pleasant, and the morels were yummy, as you would expect.
The very attentive server made an excellent, and moderately priced, wine suggestion, and was very knowledgeable about all the items on the menu. This is a very interesting restaurant that lived up to the recommendation of our friend.
Cafe Zenon
898 Pearl Street
Eugene, OR 97401
541.684.4000