Get A Chicken Parm The Size Of Your Head At Gabbiano's PDX

Forbes

3 hours ago

Part Sopranos swagger, part nonna's Sunday dinner—Gabbiano's is Portland's answer to the classic Italian-American joint. Tucked behind a playful pink door on NE 30th Ave, Gabbiano's serves unapologetically hearty, red-sauce classics with just the right amount of kitsch. Think: chicken parmesan big enough to feed a village, binge-worthy calamari fritti and cocktails strong enough to make you forget you're in Oregon and not Jersey.
With vintage vibes, cozy seating and a menu that feels straight out of a Martin Scorsese dinner scene, Gabbiano's isn't trying to reinvent Italian food—it's making you wonder why you ever eat anything else.
Gabbiano's: A Love Letter To Italian-American Comfort Food
Owners David Sigal and Blake Foster met behind Portland bars, drawn to each other's shared style of hospitality, creative spark and ambition. Sigal grew up in San Francisco's North Beach dreaming of opening a restaurant, working in bars across Portland (and briefly in Beijing) before realizing hospitality was his true calling. Foster started in an Italian-American restaurant at age fifteen in Manhattan Beach, CA, working nearly every role before moving to Portland in 2013 and rising through the city's restaurant ranks.
After years of collaborating on cocktail pop-ups, the two decided during the pandemic to open a restaurant together. Both had grown up on Italian-American food but struggled to find it in Portland. Over beers, they committed to bringing it to the city. When David suggested naming the restaurant after his surname's Italian translation ('Gabbiano,' meaning seagull), Blake agreed, and Gabbiano's was born.
'The ethos of Gabbiano's has always been that 'we don't need to be the best restaurant in Portland, but we want to be everyone's favorite restaurant in Portland,'' Foster writes in an email.
That was how the duo approached the entire Gabbiano's vibe, from menu to space. 'We wanted it to be warm and inviting and feel like a stylish version of your grandma's living room, minus the plastic-covered couches,' Sigal writes.
Gabbiano's hums with a pleasantly loud energy, the kind that makes you lean in to talk over shared, family-style plates. The wine flows freely, the staff are warm without being fussy and the whole place feels built for lingering.
The space shifts with the seasons, adapting to Portland's rhythms. In winter, the glass garage doors stay closed, casting a warm glow onto the street and drawing people in from the cold and dreary to eat shoulder-to-shoulder with fellow Portlanders. Come spring and summer, those same doors roll up to the ceiling, transforming Gabbiano's into an open-air gathering place where the boundary between indoors and out all but disappears. 'It's your neighborhood restaurant, all year long."
As for the menu, you can expect generous portions of elevated comfort food and classic Italian-American staples; house-made focaccia, spaghetti and meatballs, chicken parm, creamy Caesar salad and a trio of fried mozzarella stay loyal to the menu, but that doesn't mean the restaurant isn't taking risks.
Chef Liz Serrone walks a fine line, balancing the comfort of nostalgia with the thrill of something new. Take the Dungeness Crab ala Vodka, my personal favorite dish on the menu. The sauce is pure tradition—creamy, tangy, and exactly how you remember it, while the sweet local crab roots it firmly in the Pacific Northwest. A pistachio chili crisp brings the heat and a modern edge.
It started as a one-night special two years ago, Sigal and Foster explain, but guests refused to let it go. Now, it's a permanent fixture, the kind of dish that perfectly sums up what Gabbiano's is all about.
If you're craving the red-sauce comfort of upstate New York or the best of Hoboken's Italian-American joints (only with a little Pacific Northwest flair), you'll find it here. It's the kind of place you'll keep coming back to—for the food and for the feeling.