Walnut City Kitchen Opens,Thai Noodle Slated for NW

Out in wine country, another new restaurant pops up: Walnut City Kitchen, a second project by Community Plate co-owners Scott Cunningham and chef Jesse Kincheloe, debuted in late December on SE Stratus Avenue. Unlike the breakfast-focused Community Plate, the spot offers hearty dinner options like cider-braised pork chops, roasted chicken, and a 1/3-pound burger. Hours of operation: 11a.m. to 3:30p.m., daily; 5p.m. to 9p.m., Tuesday to Saturday.The space once home to Limo Peruvian has a new tenant: OLCC paperwork reveals that a second location of Thai Noodle Etc. is slated to take over the 1,700-square-foot space. Co-owner Piya Promlukkano opened the first location of Thai Noodle at Beaverton's Cedar Hills shopping mall in spring 2012. More as it becomes available.
I had watched Top Chef a few times before and my last terrible vision was of these people shooting guns at the possible things they had to cook with and then they had to go skiing [in Season 9's biathlon challenge]. I was like, "Oh my God. What the f--- happened to this show that I used to love?" So I asked them, "Am I the only one coming back like a d-----bag? Will there be circus acts that we have to perform?" I just wanted to cook. They reassured me that the reason we were coming back was to make it far more culinary-driven for Season 10 and they wanted to make it more serious and stick to the food.If I were them, I'd be like, "What the f--- is this? What's that guy's problem? Why is he coming back? What does he have to prove?" All of those things. But I didn't really go there for their feelings. I'm there because I want to do well and I loved it the first time.
I had one rule from before: Just be yourself. So if you lose, at least you were yourself and you don't have any regrets and then feel like a jackass. I think that's why I was sort of pissed off when I lost with Tyler. First of all, it was a team challenge, and I'd rather go down with the food I wanted to make, but we had compromised with that burger. That's why I was so pissed off and ready to kick some ass with Last Chance Kitchen.He was really, really that bad. This is the guy who watched every episode of Top Chef since the beginning and applied to Top Chef every single year it's been on. He knows everything about every single episode and has analyzed everything. And [he] has this mental database and all of his weird ego and this sense of he missed the boat. He had cooked with all of these guys, you know? He cooked with [Anthony] Bourdain ... and then he had to deal with all of these "kids" 20 years or younger on the show. I'd probably be a surly weirdo too.But he's not really terrible. After Last Chance Kitchen, he relaxed. I like him a lot and respect him a ton. We're actually friends now because on Last Chance Kitchen there's a lot of downtime, so he and I hung out a lot, played tennis.