Advice Booth

A quintessential neighborhood bar - tucked away on a side street with a huge covered patio, good drink selection (not to mention Jello shots and booze-soaked cherries, which are a treat), and the staff is always a delight. Great for a quiet afternoon or a quick one-two punch with Old Gold.

Stopped in to try their trivia night, and it did not disappoint. It was a lot of fun and easy to follow along. There's only street parking which is annoying but there was plenty available. The inside is quite small but they have a pretty big outdoor area. The outdoor area is heated but it still gets pretty chilly so bring your jacket. I ordered the nachos and a non alcoholic drink called the Tight Trousers. Both of them were pretty good and they were reasonably priced. The bartenders were really friendly and everything came out quickly.

One of my favorite bars in Portland, local dive bar Advice Booth hits all the notes for places to sink into and disappear. Great bartenders, check! Good drinks, check! One of the best trivia nights one could ever hope for, yup Advice booth has that too! Advice Booth is a place just doesn't seem to go wrong and anytime I'm in Portland the Booth is a must visit. Surrounded by a very walkable neighborhood I'm not sure what more you could ask for in a watering hole. Just pop in and see, that's my advice!

The owner/bartender, Laura, is one of the nicest, frankest (haha, because she speaks directly AND makes delicious hotdogs) people ever! The day is gorgeous and I get to enjoy it on a nice patio with a perfect lunch thanks to her! The food menu may be limited, but who cares if you get to have exactly what you want?! The prices are fantastic; my whole lunch was under fifteen dollars, after tip! It's just really really nice. Good place to go. I'd recommend it to a friend and feel really cool, like, "oh yeah, I know this groovy little place..."

I would describe the service here as racist / xenophobic, but I think it's more accurate to call it plain stupid.What happened: my friend, who is an immigrant from Eastern Europe, came to this bar and was refused service bc she did not have her ID (valid reason). She then left, and called the bar asking if she could use her passport as an ID, and was told over the phone yes. So she comes back into the bar with her (foreign) passport, and the bartender spends like 5 minutes looking at her passport and finally says it's no good. (It's a foreign document so it's not easy to tell whether it's genuine or not, but as a rule of thumb, passports are a lot more difficult to falsify than ID cards). Even this so far is fine - annoying, but not one star service.But then the bartender gets weirdly aggressive. She claims that my friend wasn't the person on the phone who called with the passport question, and that she only told the person on the phone that passports are a valid form of ID "because that person did not have a Russian accent".What? So if someone has a Russian accent then the answer to the same question would be different? So my friend told me about this and it sounded like a whack job situation so I decided to call the bar to clear things up. My friend could have been too drunk, her passport could have been illegible / too difficult to read, she could have been causing a disturbance - I was honestly looking for any valid reason that's sufficiently different from blatant ethnic discrimination.Despite my calm and diplomatic demeanor, the same bartender starts speaking to me SUPER aggressively. She insists that it was I, the girl with the American accent, who called on the phone about the passport (I really hope that she checks her phone logs afterwards and sees that I was calling from a totally different number, because wtf) and keeps arguing with me that I called her before when 1) I obviously know that's not even true2) I don't really give a shit who called and what accent they had, when the bottom line is unethical to give certain customers one type of information based on what you think their accent is and withhold it from others bc they sound Russian to you.She then starts to talk about how "shady" it is to call on behalf of someone with an accent and that she doesn't serve "shady" people, and started condescendingly calling me "babe". I personally do not feel comfortable when people; particularly working professionals begin to escalate matters with a faux-familiarity so I ended the conversation there and suggested my friend to forget about this bar and the unprofessional woman who works there.I still cannot really understand if this was a case of xenophobia, confusion / ignorance / stupidity, or of a bad personality.Just in case it was ethnically motivated and has something to do with the war in Ukraine: it's important for Americans to understand that a huge amount of the "Russian" sounding people in this country; even if they have a Russian passport, tend to be deeply connected with Ukraine (either via being ethnically Ukrainian, having Ukrainian relatives, financially supporting Ukraines military, etc) to the point where they are an "enemy of the state" in Russia. So as an American, it is wholly inappropriate to make any kinds of judgments about individual people who are strangers to you.However, I do not think this particular bartender had the cerebral capacity to consider denying service out of political / moral reasons. My experience suggests that this person is what is commonly known as a "drama queen".For the bartender:Maybe it's not so much a question of being a drama queen, but of an inability to be self-reflective. At a certain point in the night I'm sure you realized you had made a mistake. But instead of trying to clear it up, you just kept up your stubborn, toxic act. I really hope you find a therapist or something, because this behavior was actually pretty screwed up. Next time a foreigner who looks kinda young comes into your establishment, you can just say "hey, I'm sorry, I don't feel comfortable serving you based on your foreign document. I can't read it and therefore can't verify its authenticity. Good luck at a bar nearby."There is ZERO reason to bring up accents, "shadiness" and accuse different people of making phone calls they didn't make and creating further unnecessary drama. Or calling people you don't know "babe". Even in the event that all your confusing suspicions are somehow true, it's best to behave diplomatically and assume that what people are telling you is the truth. News flash: you can still advocate for your boundaries / enforce your right to deny service without being disrespectful, offensive, and jeopardizing the reputation of your business by being ethnically discriminatory.

Nice simple bar to relax at that, more about atmosphere and the company. They don't have a large draft list or food. You can bring food in though which is great and there are a couple spots very close by. I wish they didn't allow smoking on the patio but it is what it is.

I just moved into the neighborhood and I couldn't be more enthusiastic about Advice Booth being just across the street!! Incredible atmosphere!! Excellent staff and owners and of course, awesome drinks!! Do not hesitate to pop in!!

Fun, local bar with weekly trivia, a monthly spelling bee and drag bingo with MAJOR cash prizes. So fun! Bartenders are very friendly. Menu is small but tasty. Definitely worth checking out

Cozy bar with lots of outdoors seatings. The Nachos was decent but drinks were on the weaker end. Lots of smokers for some reasons on the day we're there...Service also took a long time.

Haiku to Advice Booth TavernOld style bar in hoodYou can hear yourself and think Good peeps, chili too!