Foxtrot Opens in the Pied Cow Space with Tapas, Cocktails, and Coffee Service

For decades, the Pied Cow was a crucial part of Portland’s iconoclastic identity. Housed in a 130-year-old, reportedly haunted Queen Anne home, the café and hookah lounge filled the tables of its eclectic dining room with flavored lattés and desserts baked in-house, while servers carted carafes of wine and beer out to the unkempt garden patio and set up hookahs for the many diners. It served its last brownie boat and espresso in the fall of 2023, when owner Jimmy Chen sold the property, equipment, and furniture without explanation.

But over the last summer, passersby peeking at the garden may have spied a silver trailer parked next to the former Pied Cow’s imposing entrance. Once the food cart for Viking Soul Food, the trailer now serves as the bar for Foxtrot, the new cocktail bar and café that has taken over the Belmont property. From a team of Portland industry vets, Foxtrot pulls inspiration from the dining culture of Spain, France, and Italy, serving low-proof Basque cocktails and Spanish wines alongside pintxos, tinned fish, and escargot. And starting in mid-November, the new concept will also include morning coffee service with espresso drinks and pastries, a revival of the café-to-bar third place once ubiquitous in Portland.

Foxtrot founder Britain Stephens had long dreamed of opening a combination coffee shop and bar, a model that has become vanishingly rare in Portland. He  imagined a place where people could visit in the morning for caffeinated beverages and pastries while the evenings would be devoted to cocktails, wines, and snacking. Stephens had been idly looking around for a few years when a friend told him that the Pied Cow’s former space was available. He had long loved the building and jumped at the opportunity to take over the house and garden.

To pull off his combination cocktail bar and cafe, Stephens enlisted an old friend and seasoned restaurant, bar, and café maven, Daniel Gruska, to handle the overall beverage program. Spanning 18 years, Gruska’s career includes time at tiki bar the Alibi, revered institutions like Wildwood and Pok Pok, and an extensive stint running the bar program at Italian mainstay Caro Amico. He also spent time in coffee with Nossa Familia and even managed a similar type of café and bar at the now-closed Nook Café in NW Portland.

To manage the shift from day to night, Gruska wanted to focus on vermouth and low-ABV sippers, in the spirit of Spain’s drinking culture. In his research he came across the marianito, a low-proof tipple popular in the Basque region of Spain. It’s generally vermouth spiked with gin and Campari, like a lower-proof Negroni, though variations abound. At Foxtrot, Gruska makes four versions with different spirits, each named for its color. Red is like a low-proof boulevardier made with bourbon, Pink marries vodka with rosé vermouth and Aperol, White resembles a white Negroni, and Golden kicks things up with mezcal, Italian vermouth, Cynar, pomelo, and a bit of heat from Ancho Reyes. 

The four marianitos are joined by four stronger drinks, including an amaro-spiked martini with Castelvetrano brine and a clear margarita made with Supasawa, a distilled citrus mixer. Four spritzes, including a Fernet and cola and sherry with lemon soda, round out the mixed drink menu with more Spanish vibes. Wines by the glass come from France, Italy, and Spain, and Gruska has four beers on tap, as well as bottled beers like Peroni and a few nonalcoholic beverages.

The Western European vibes continue on chef Ben Chase’s food menu. A fellow Wildwood alum, Chase had also helped reopen Besaw’s in 2016 as a sous chef. He emphasizes that Foxtrot’s menu is inspired by Western European cooking rather than adhering to specific cuisines—don’t expect straight-out-of-Barcelona paella or by-the-numbers choucroute garnie. The pintxos are the star of the show, bite-size savory snacks served on sliced baguette from Ken’s Artisan Bakery. Chase often crafts his food around whatever produce is available at the time, but pintxos like his take on a gilda—a classic Spanish anchovy and olive snack, which he upgrades with olive oil–poached albacore—will be “steadfast” on the menu, along with a seasonal special pintxo, like a late summer tomato spread or a cold-weather meatball pintxo, almost like a tiny open-faced sandwich.

Beyond the pintxos, diners will find other snacky dishes like charcuterie and tinned fish, as well as a few larger dishes including salads and sandwiches. One highlight is escargot, a classic French snail dish now harder to find on Portland menus. Chase was partially inspired by a version of escargot bordelaise served at the now-closed Paley’s Place—he describes it as one of the best dishes he has ever eaten.

Starting Sunday, November 24, Foxtrot will open for morning service, with coffee drinks using beans from local coffee roasters Old Friends alongside pastries from Italian bakery and deli Sebastiano’s. Down the line, Chase wants to add a charcuterie program and a Tandoori oven for dinner service, but for now, he’s focusing on getting everything dialed in.

Pied Cow regulars will find the space familiar, but with some distinct tweaks. Stephens brought his own touches, like a commissioned tetraptych from local artist Amarette Gregor that uses dried plants and other materials to depict the four seasons. An homage to The Seasons by Alphonse Mucha, it hangs on the wall of a dining room filled with tufted couches, vintage carpets, and hanging draperies. In the main dining room, Stephens has what he calls his “chaos wall,” an eclectic assortment of paintings, busts, and mirrors with a floral wallpaper backdrop. Outside, he has erected a few covered and heated enclosures for cozy patio dining year-round, and one corner of the spacious garden patio features a wooden stage for live music and other shows. But the unrestrained nature of the spacious garden and the cozy, vintage appeal of the dining room serve as a welcome reminder of an earlier Portland era.