Portland mourns loss of award-winning chef Naomi Pomeroy
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We went to Cornet Custard, Naomi Pomeroy's ice cream shop, to talk about the chef's legacy. Photo: Meira Gebel/Axios
Portland is still mourning the loss of award-winning chef and restaurateur Naomi Pomeroy, who died earlier this month in a tragic drowning accident.
In the days following her death, the city showed an outpouring of support for her legacy as a driving force in putting Portland on the culinary map, as well as her fierce pursuit of excellence and advocacy.
The latest: Cornet Custard, the ice cream shop Pomeroy recently opened with longtime business partner Mika Paredes, has seen lines out the door — and nearly sold out of pints recently.
Context: Pomeroy was a self-taught chef who hosted roving dinner parties in people's homes before she opened Beast in 2007, for which she won a Best Chef Northwest James Beard award.
- Pomeroy wanted to demystify cooking — and with Beast's open kitchen in the small, 600-square-foot space, she could always be seen on the line tinkering with dishes before delivering them herself.
What they're saying: "She tried a lot of things and sometimes failed, but she was very intrepid about that try, try again idea," Audrey Van Buskirk, the former features editor at Portland Tribune, told Axios. "She didn't follow trends, she did what she wanted to do."
Joseph's thought bubble: I had brunch at Beast in 2018, and although I don't remember much about the food — lots of meat and runny eggs — I do remember my feelings.
- Being at the communal table was a pleasure because our fellow diners were very friendly and high on the exclusivity factor. Pomeroy made people feel special, and hard-to-get reservations were one way.
- The food was visual art, always presented in a nouvelle cuisine way, with blobs of sauces and edible petals, which felt adventurous. And there wasn't much choice — a vacation for the brain.
Meira's thought bubble: When I was assigned to interview Pomeroy for Willamette Week in 2020, I had never covered restaurants before. I was intimidated.
- What was meant to be a 15-minute call about what she was up to after closing Beast during the pandemic turned into an hour-long chat about the future of restaurants and her advocacy work — co-founding the Independent Restaurant Coalition to give small businesses the support they needed at the time.
- When she opened Ripe Cooperative, I dined there several times. Pomeroy always made a point to say hello. I spent my 28th birthday there, and she was the one who came out with a candle.