Florentine omelet with toast and grits from Stacks Pancake Company. Photos by Aimsel Ponti

About two weeks ago, four of us went to Stacks Pancake Company in Portland’s Riverside neighborhood.

Spoiler alert: I loved my egg dish, but first I have to share why I’m still laughing.

Obviously, the specialty of Stacks is pancakes, but since I don’t eat sugar, I left it up to my dining companions to make a good choice and share their tasting notes with me.

Mouth-watering pancake offerings included That Honky Tonk (peanut butter chunks and topped with slices of fresh bananas), Turtle pancakes (chocolate chips and pecans), Oreo (Oreo cookies, chocolate syrup) and Coconut (shredded coconut), among several others.

But what did my spouse, Tracy, and our friends, Dianne and Mike, choose to share?

A raisin pancake.

A raisin pancake from Stacks Pancake Company.

I still can’t wrap my head around it, but they loved it, so what do I know? It’s a buttermilk pancake baked with plump raisins, and apparently the “plump” is key.

“Good bakers know that pre-plumping makes the raisin stay softer, juicier and more flavorful,” Tracy explained as I looked at her with a blank expression. She wasn’t done. “The butteryness of the batter really complemented the earthy sweetness of the raisins.”

To each their own, though I’m not letting this go anytime soon. Plus, if the raisin pancakes are that good, I can only imagine that the other varieties must be through-the-roof tremendous.

Vegetable Wrapper from Stacks Pancake Company.

The main part of Tracy’s meal was the veggie wrap ($11.95), described as containing breaded eggplant, mushrooms, onions, tomatoes, roasted red peppers, baby spinach, goat cheese and creamy balsamic dressing. Tracy was expecting a cold wrap, but what she got was hot ingredients inside a grilled, pressed flour tortilla. Apparently, Stacks grills all of its wraps – perhaps something to add on the next round of menu printing. Tracy forged ahead but said the vegetables didn’t have much taste. She ate half and the next day added pesto to the insides and turned it into a decent pasta dish.

Onto my omelet!

Described accurately on the menu as being “colossal,” the Florentine omelet ($10.50) was loaded with spinach and imported feta with rye toast and grits. I had quickly texted my nutritionist, who advised me that grits were a better option than home fries, and let it be known, french fries were also an option, and there was a time when I would have put serious thought into going that way.

The omelet was hot and delicious and I savored every flavorful bite. I ate half the grits and loved them as well. Ditto for the rye toast, which was a novel choice for this white bread girl.

Dianne was beside herself over the raisin pancake, describing it as “fluffy, cake-like perfection,” but was less impressed with her roast beef sandwich ($6.95), which was a bit on the dry side and fell short of the “Classic NYC Deli Sandwich” description.

Dianne’s husband, Mike, had the pastrami sandwich ($6.95), which he said contained a generous portion of well-cooked meat. He, too, loved the bites of pancake and said it was among the best he’s ever had.

Stacks has a massive menu that includes quesadillas, Belgian waffles, flatbread pizza, chargrilled burgers and much more. The interior is not unlike a Denny’s, but with huge windows, many booths and much better color choices and lighting. Everyone working there was friendly; this is the kind of place to bring the family after a kid’s soccer game or on a lazy Sunday morning when you want to feast but not wait for an hour at one of downtown Portland’s hipper spots.

I would absolutely go back.