“Naomi Pomeroy, 49, Chef Who Made Portland a Dining Destination, Dies” —Kim Severson, The New York Times, July 2024
Mika Paredes, Naomi Pomeroy’s “kitchen wife” who now runs Pomeroy’s legacy restaurant, L’Echelle, remembers Beast’s opening night, September 27, 2007:
Our first seating was at 5pm. Beast was tiny—two tables, 24 seats, and a “kitchen” with only two induction burners and a convection oven. No flame, no range. We were still building shelves minutes before guests walked in. I remember stripping off our grease-stained prep clothes, sliding in earrings, hair back, and red lipstick on. Showtime.
Then: Todd Haynes, Gus Van Sant, M. Blash walked in. Local royalty. Candles glowed, Sade played, and three feet away guests watched us plate under the low lights, every move exaggerated, deliberate—and you never, ever let them see you sweat.
In true Beast fashion, irreverent and imperfect, of course something went sideways. A yellow jacket had snuck in and stung M. Blash on the hand midservice. He laughed it off, but it felt almost like the universe demanding its own cameo.
Just hours earlier the place had been a madhouse, every surface buried under raw meat, tubs of lettuce, towers of towels. We even ran next door to Yakuza to sear duck breasts over their flames, borrowing fire where we could. Scrappy, desperate, and honestly beautiful.
That night we served six courses, centered on the charcuterie board that became Beast’s signature. Foie gras bonbons on peanut shortbread with Sauternes gelée—our twisted peanut butter and jelly. Beef tartare with quail yolk. Our house saltine crowned with chicken liver mousse and a swipe of orange marmalade. Forty-two steps to build that plate, each one obsessive, excessive.
When it was finally over, we shoved pans aside, cranked the music, popped sparkling rosé, and danced—Naomi and me, our hair flying, colliding in laughter and delirium. It was chaos. It was theater. It was Beast. It was fucking fun, and in that moment my life changed. —as told to Karen Brooks
Dining and Cooking