The top four new restaurants in Portland

By Maddie Snyder ‘26

Dishes from Jojo (the Restaurant), Masala Lab PDX, Cafe Olli, and Maisha PDX

Portland has been known for its prominent food culture for many years, but when the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the restaurant industry suffered. During the pandemic, restaurants all over the United States were forced to close.

Once Portland started to lift COVID-19 regulations and case numbers fell, the restaurant industry found new life. As restaurants began to open up again, new ones appeared as well. Here are four of the most promising new restaurants of 2022.

Jojo (the Restaurant)

Jojo (the Restaurant) is a fried chicken restaurant located in the heart of the Pearl district. It opened in October 2022, but that was not when owner Justin Hinze started the franchise.

Four years prior to the opening of the brick and mortar restaurant, Jojo was a food truck. The truck gained attention due to its creative and satirical Instagram captions.

“Please help, my son. He is a sandwich,” one caption back in early 2019 read.

Customers may have been drawn to the cart by the joking social media presence, but they stayed for the food. The menu consists mostly of fried chicken sandwiches and smash burgers.

When Hinze opened the restaurant this year, their food menu stayed the same, but they added a large menu full of drinks, desserts, and milkshakes.

Both the food cart and restaurant also have an entire menu dedicated to only vegan options, with fried tofu sandwiches and Beyond Burgers.

Masala Lab PDX

Masala Lab is an Indian brunch place located in Northeast Portland. The restaurant’s founder, Deepak Saxena, is a first-generation Indian American who started his food career in Portland back in 2015.

Saxena’s first restaurant was a food cart called Desi PDX, which he started eight years ago. However, the food cart has an entirely different menu than Masala Lab. Masala Lab’s website describes itself as a place that “spins traditional American breakfast favorites into richer, spicier Indian versions of themselves.”

Masala Lab does exactly that with menu items such as Pakora waffles made out of chickpea flour, and topped with dahl, chutney, and yogurt.

The restaurant is open seven days a week from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. and has been since the restaurant's opening in July of last year.

Saxena already has another project on the horizon with another food cart opening in the winter of 2023.

Cafe Olli

Cafe Olli is a versatile all-day cafe located down the street from Masala Lab on Martin Luther King Boulevard. Customers can come in for a pastry or a pizza depending on the time of day.

The all-day cafe takes its label seriously, as they are open for twelve hours with breakfast starting at 9 a.m. and dinner ending at 9 p.m.

The dinner menu, however, is very different from the breakfast and lunch. While the menus are not as large as the operation, they still have a decent amount of options. Across their three menus, they have many different salads, pizzas, and french style main dishes. The restaurant is not just focused on its food though.

“We believe the only sustainable future for the hospitality industry comes from more equity, democracy, and transparency,” says the website.

Cafe Olli is employee-owned, meaning all employees that work for the restaurant also own a share. The restaurant offers healthcare for employees, a benefit not normally seen for restaurant staff.
Maisha PDX

Maisha PDX is a Kenyan food cart located in the Piknik Park Pod, in Southeast Portland.

The owner, Tachibana Sheikh, lived in Kenya as a child with his family, most of whom were chefs. When Sheikh moved to Portland, he found himself longing for the food of his childhood, which led him to the creation of his food cart.

Sheikh cooks and sells Kenyan dishes he ate growing up such as montok curry and bariis (a flavorful Somali rice dish). However, there is one difference between Sheikh's childhood and the food he serves at Maisha; Maisha’s entire menu is vegan-friendly.

Sheikh uses meat substitutes in all of his dishes in his food cart. Meaning if someone is looking for a meat-filled meal, Maisha is not the restaurant for them.

The cart opened up in September of last year, but Sheikh has been testing his recipes since 2018. The pandemic allowed him an opportunity to revisit his food truck idea and make it happen.

Maisha has only been open for a few months but has already gained attention for bringing authentic Kenyan food to Portland.

These four restaurants are among many interesting places to eat that opened in 2022 in Portland. New restaurants or food trucks may be down the street from you or across the river but they are always worth a try. Trying new restaurants can lead to discovering interesting and diverse foods, and maybe finding a new favorite place to eat in the process.