In the pantheon of Portland’s lunch and brunch jungle Sur-Lie is the sleeper in the group.  In fact it receives so little attention when it should be a bold-face contender.  They ‘ve already established their might at dinner, but I urge all you foraging diners to take a turn down Free Street for innovative food from their lunch and Sunday brunch menus.

The dining room is flooded in sunlight at lunch and brunch

Chef Emil Rivera’s particular sense of taste delivers some of the best cooking in town. At lunch, for instance, the prix fixe $15 4-course menu packs quite a wallop of flavor and value; I love the idea that you can walk out with a dessert packet to take back to your office or nibble on as you walk down the street.  See the menu below.

The lunch menu served Tuesday to Saturday; the dining bar

On Sunday, however, I had the chance to experience their food when I stopped in for a late brunch around 2:00 PM.  My original plan was to visit the new OCHO—Otto Pizza’s food iteration to launch burrito mania only to see a sign on the door saying in part, “Closed…to collect ourselves, regain our bearings and figure out how to better serve you.”

The 5 by 10 service counter at OCHO

They must have been overwhelmed in their short stint of a few days. I peeked inside and it’s hard to imagine yearning foodie hordes fitting into their miniscule space.

Onto Sur-Lie, which had pretty much cleared out at the end of Sunday brunch hour, I sat at the bar and asked the waiter to recommend a light dish on the menu since I was going to an early Sunday dinner in a few hours.

He immediately suggested the cracked eggs. These turned out to be a sort of fried egg scramble with confit of onions and fried potatoes set over a charred tomato.  For an extra seven bucks you can add “Surryano” ham, which they cure in-house using heritage breed pork.  Another item on the menu that intrigued was the Lox Toast–house-cured salmon served over a dilled egg salad.

Cracked eggs served over a charred heirloom tomato and “Surryano” ham

The serving of cracked eggs had an amazing texture and flavor.  After the eggs are fried to be crisp on the underside, Rivera scrambles them in the pan and mixes in an egg yolk to become a sort of gravy to moisten the eggs.  Served on the tomato and mixed in with the ham it was an incredible dish, which Rivera described as one typically served in Spain.