Mother of The Month

ABOUT M.O.M.

Through her travels, Chef Lisa came to realize that the best meals of a country are not found in its restaurants. They’re found in its homes, made with love by mothers cooking for their families. So, in addition to Mother’s regular menu where she serves food from mothers around the world, Chef Lisa highlights a different mother each month and features some of her special dishes.

The special mother is called the Mother of the Month (or M.O.M.™), and her photograph, story and menu take a prominent place at the beginning of Mother’s menu. We choose a mother that allows us to take advantage of the seasonal availability of ingredients, such as a Greek mother in the summer months and a Polish mother in the winter months.

If you’d like to nominate a mother to be the M.O.M.™, CLICK HERE and tell us something about her and her special dishes.

M.O.M. Menu

MRUNALINI (MINI) BIRADAR GIRI

DINNER

Badam Almond Chicken

chicken thighs braised with almonds, spices & yogurt,
served with green pea basmati rice pilaf

23

Dessert

Saffron Panna Cotta

with mango compote

10

CURRENT M.O.M. STORY

MRUNALINI (MINI) BIRADAR GIRI

Mini was born in Bangalore, India in 1977. Her father was a physician and the family moved around a bit.
Germany, where Mini spent her first 10 years, then New Zealand for the next 5 years and finally Saudi
Arabia. Wherever they lived, Mini’s mother taught Indian cooking from their home kitchen with the
assistance of Mini and her younger sister. Cooking and teaching Indian cuisine kept the family culturally
rooted to India. When Mini was 20 years old she decided she wanted to rediscover what it means to be
Indian, so she moved back to India and stayed with her mother’s family. She learned the language (her first
language was German) and planned to stay only a couple years.

As fate would have it, she met her husband while in India and they married in 2002. Their daughter was
born in 2014. Mini’s parents rejoined the family and moved back to India in 2000. Mini ended up staying
in India for 20 years, until she moved to Portland 6 years ago for her husband’s job at Intel.

Mini always loved to paint but her dad wanted her to go to college. She obliged and got a degree in teaching
German but returned to painting after school. To this day, painting is her passion (besides cooking). She
creates works of art using traditional Indian painting techniques to create contemporary images. She even
mixes her own paints! Her work can be found at the Waterstone Gallery in the Pearl District, and we have a
piece hanging in our lobby in her honor this month.

Click here to See Former M.O.M.S

Nominate A M.O.M.

The M.O.M. menu has been an important part of Mother’s since we opened in 2000.  This allows our guests to experience both new flavors and dishes from around the world and meals prepared with love by mothers cooking for their families.  Our past M.O.M.’s include a wide variety of individuals- mothers, sisters, grandmothers, daughters, friends, and wives- and we’ve even had a few honorary male M.O.M.’s!

If you would like to nominate somebody (or yourself) to be a future M.O.M. at Mother’s, please fill out this form and return it to the host at Mother’s or [email protected].  Once we receive your form, we will contact the nominee (if possible), or you, (if it’s you or if you’d like to be the intermediary) to discuss potential dishes for the M.O.M. menu.

When making menu suggestions, please keep in mind that our M.O.M. menu typically includes an appetizer, salad and/or lunch item, 2-3 entrees (usually a meat, poultry, and/or vegetarian/fish dish) and a dessert.  When making suggestions, feel free to make your list as long as you’d like, but don’t suggest dishes that replicate those on our main menu (even if yours is the best meatloaf in the world, meatloaf is on our regular menu, so couldn’t be offered on our M.O.M. menu).

It’s likely we’ll have a bit of back and forth where I may ask you to list ingredients in a dish to gain a clearer idea of how it might taste, but keep in mind that we won’t need any recipes until after we finalize the menu.

Thanks again for your interest in the M.O.M. program.  Feel free to contact us with any questions you have!