On its east end, the Morrison Bridge dumps out at Grand Avenue and Southeast Morrison Street. Aesthetically, this is not Portland, Oregon’s nicest neighborhood, or the most vital. The historic Weatherly Building, with its dove-gray, wedding cake-stencil façade, is chronically short tenants, and Oriental Lodge 17, once a meetinghouse of the Independent Organization of Odd Fellows (a 2-century-old fraternal organization that takes as its mandate “To Improve and Elevate the Character of Mankind”) long ago became an office store, itself abandoned. While the city’s youth infusion of the past five years has brought the area some commercial revivification—there’s a hipster bowling alley nearby, as well as Bunk Sandwiches, owned by a young chef who’s worked with Food Network megastars Mario Batali and Bobby Flay—there are, too, morning drinkers in parking lots and men checking for change in pay phones.

There is also Niki’s Restaurant, a Greek diner that wraps around the northeast corner. From the outside, Niki’s reflects the year it opened, 1972, with a brown awning and harvest gold lettering. The dining room is spacious, with butterscotch leather booths and counter stools placed far enough apart that you do not bump elbows with your neighbor.

Being a nuisance to a fellow customer is not a problem one Tuesday in July, when fewer than a dozen people dine between 8 in the morning and noon. The years of being busy at breakfast and lunch, with the adjacent banquet hall booked for corporate events, are waning. “Our customers are closing their businesses,” says waitress Cathy Belesiotis. “Now our average customer? I couldn’t tell you; he doesn’t exist.”

Not that Niki’s doesn’t have its loyal crew, the regulars who eat here three, four times a week; for the most part, they’re middle-aged men who appreciate they are going to get the same sassy banter with Cathy, who remembers their names and how they take their coffee; the same reliably fresh dishes from the kitchen. No surprises.

“I remember when Cathy’s dad put in those stained-glass light fixtures, in 1977,” says Dane Nelson, a 52-year-old retired textile executive who is making his way through his usual: chicken kebabs and “the best Greek salad in town.” In a nearby booth, a middle-aged man works through a similar early lunch. “I see him here all the time,” Nelson says.

While Niki’s reliability remains succor to the few, its charms are not bright enough to attract the many. People who might be expected to take up the constitutional of their parents —stopping in for a coffee regular and an egg-on-a-roll to go—do not stop; they do not work nearby, or they work unpredictable hours; some of them work at home. They go to Starbucks or one of Portland’s micro-roasters for their morning lattes; they eat where the food is faster, or where there’s more cultural currency; Bunk Sandwiches keeps nearly the same hours as Niki’s but always has a line out the door. The customer who sits at a lunch counter with a newspaper is going, it seems, the way of newspapers themselves.

But today they are here, the widowers, the retirees, the produce man taking his first break of the day, men who gladly anticipate the teasing they are about to get from Cathy, the restaurant’s only waitress, a job the blue-eyed 44-year-old has had, on and off but mostly on, since her teens.

Cathy Belesiotis: “I’ve been here pretty much all my life. I did go to college, did my thing, but I came back. The restaurant’s been good to us. People ask all the time, ‘Do you like running a restaurant?’ I say, ‘Yeah, but it’s a lot of work!’

“My parents started the restaurant in 1972. They came from Greece, and they found this corner. The people [who were here] before went broke. My parents didn’t know anybody, didn’t have any credit. At this point, we know everybody! In the olden days, our average customer was the middle-aged man – that was our niche. But those men, they got older, retired, relocated; we don’t see them anymore.

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Niki's Restaurant in Southeast Portland, open since 1972.

Cathy Belesiotis, Niki's only waitress, has been working at the restaurant since she was 14. "I basically grew up here."

Former model, now retired textile executive and 32-year Niki's customer, Dane Nelson

Niki Belesiotis's Greek Salad; according to all who eat it, "the best in town."

Niki's Restaurant in Southeast Portland, open since 1972.

Cathy Belesiotis, Niki's only waitress, has been working at the restaurant since she was 14. "I basically grew up here."

Former model, now retired textile executive and 32-year Niki's customer, Dane Nelson

Niki Belesiotis's Greek Salad; according to all who eat it, "the best in town."

“It could be because the neighborhood’s changing, but they [the city] have been talking about changing the neighborhood for 20 years, and they’ve done jack, you know? They changed a few things, but they developed the Pearl District overnight. I think this is the best area in the city, close to downtown—and with a view of downtown! But they’ve neglected this area; the city has not focused and we’re not attracting business.

“My mom is in the kitchen —she does the cooking. People ask me all the time, ‘What’s good?’ Everything’s good! But I really like her Greek salad. I eat two meals a day here–and sometimes I take dinner home. I live with my boyfriend; we moved in [together] last year. I’m not married and you know how a Greek mother can be about having a 44-year-old daughter that’s not married. But I always said, ‘Mom, I am going to wait for the right one.’ And I did! I met him at the video store. He’s a doorman at the Benson Hotel, but he’s also an actor. He had a part in a movie last year, ‘The Music Within.’ Did you see that? They filmed it here [in Portland]. He didn’t have a big part but he was very good, and it’s his dream.

“My dad died a few years ago. I manage the restaurant, yes. My brother works here, too, but now he also has another job, at the airport; he works with the TSA, doing screening. But I’m here every day we’re open. It’s a little slow now; it’s the economy; people are just not eating out. Maybe they’re going to the Pearl or areas where there are more young people. What I think would be the best would be if you got these buildings full of office workers, then they’d come for lunch. And breakfast.”

Niki Belesiotis: “I came from Greece, from Tripolis [in 1959]; I was 17. I came with my husband, first to Toronto, then to Chicago. I hated Chicago! I hated the 50 locks on the door and the cockroaches. Then my husband goes to Palm Desert, you know, in California? He calls me and says, ‘I want to move here,’ and I say, ‘And do what there? Are there even schools there?’ We had two kids by then. So we go, and it was so fricking hot, and we got the truck stuck in the sand. And the houses they have? They’re not houses, they’re trailers. I said to him, ‘What are these? This is not a house!’

“We open a snack bar in Upland, it’s part of this mall. And one day we get up —and the mall is bankrupt! We lose a lot of things, but we get the equipment and my husband says, he is going to talk to his cousins in Portland. He has not talked to these cousins in years, but he calls them, and they probably think: Why is he calling? But they say, ‘OK, come to Portland.’ I said, ‘I’m not going! I need a house! A real house!’ But we load the equipment in a U-Haul, 24 feet—and it’s not enough! We need to make two trips!

“I’ve been cooking 37 years, my girl; cooking and cleaning is what I do. We were the first restaurant in Portland to go nonsmoking. This is maybe 15, 17 years ago. I wanted to do it because the customers would sit at the counter and blow smoke in my face, in my kids’ faces. My husband said, ‘You’re going to put us out of business!’ His friends said to him, ‘Why are you letting her do this?’ But I did it. We had the TV channels come, the news cameras. I remember, it was Friday, and I was making clam chowder, and I said, ‘if you want to hear me say something, you have to listen to what I say to one person, because I’m busy!’

“We used to be busy; we had breakfasts in the banquet room when the economy was good. Now, it’s slow. I’m not used to it being slow. All the diners in Portland used to be Greek. Now, there are not a lot left. Big business has fired us left and right. But are they giving you the good food? I don’t think so.”

Dave Rinella: “I come here practically every day for breakfast. I call here in the morning and [Niki] gets my oatmeal started – she knows my voice. Where else are you going to get this? Nowhere else. Even my wife would tell me to go to hell if I said in advance how I wanted my oatmeal.”

David McCallum: “I eat a lot of my meals out because my refrigerator’s not working, the wires got eaten by mice. I’m using it as a pantry. I could fix it but I can’t get on my knees. If I can get some kneepads, I can fix it. Right now, I’m using one of those little fridges you might have out at a cabin. Keep my cold stuff in there. I have a 13-year-old miniature schnauzer; she don’t care if the food is cold. She don’t do the dishes, either.

“I lost my wife 10 years ago. She had diabetes and it was hard on her kidneys. She only half took care of it. I tried to get her to but…. [He shrugs.] They told her they could keep her alive on dialysis but she didn’t want that. I took her to the hospital and she died.

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Niki's regular David McCallum

David McCallum's lunch: "It looks good, doesn't it?"

Produce vendor Dave Rinella says Niki's cooking is "very close to my Italian mother's, everything I like."

The mural behind the counter was hung in 1977.

Niki Belesiotis, for whom the restaurant is named. "People used to think, it was named for my husband," she says. "No, for me."

Niki's regular David McCallum

David McCallum's lunch: "It looks good, doesn't it?"

Produce vendor Dave Rinella says Niki's cooking is "very close to my Italian mother's, everything I like."

The mural behind the counter was hung in 1977.

Niki Belesiotis, for whom the restaurant is named. "People used to think, it was named for my husband," she says. "No, for me."

“I’m 83. I was in the Navy, in Buccaneer Bay, in Okinawa. I was there when we dropped the bomb. We didn’t know about it, of course; we were getting our news from Los Angeles. I was about a few hundred miles away but I didn’t know about it for a few days. Earlier, we had a torpedo hit our ship but it didn’t detonate. It did put a big dent in the hull.

“I eat about one meal a day out. Black coffee. Today, I’m having lentil soup and a chicken sandwich. It looks good, doesn’t it?

“Sometimes I go to the Denny’s near where I live; that’s pretty good. But I’ll come here when I’m in this area. I’m here now because I went to a camera shop and got a Yashica 120 that can also turn into a 35mm. I got it because I’m curious. I take pictures of everything; I could take a picture of you, for instance. But you have to be careful taking pictures of ladies. Some of them don’t like it.”

Dane Nelson: “I don’t live anywhere near here – I live on the west side, but I come all the way, just to see if Cathy is as cranky as usual. I started coming here in 1977. I worked around the corner at the time. The reason I keep coming back is, it never changes. The art is still the same.

“Her dad was so sweet. I never understood a word he said, but we’d sit here anyway and talk. He was salt of the earth. And her mom will come out and say, ‘The tangerines look good today’ or, ‘I have a nice melon.’ They take care of you; they take care of everybody. And I see the same people, such as that gentleman behind me; I see him all the time.

“You know how you go to the market and get a tomato and it has no taste? The tomatoes here are so amazing; Niki goes and she picks them! You can go to the Pearl [District] to places with chandeliers and leather sofas, but this place brings you back to reality. There is no snobbishness. Customers are laughing — and you get entertained by Cathy. She’s been waiting on me since she was 14.”

Cathy Belesiotis: “Dane was a model back then; he was very handsome – he’s still handsome! He’s one of our loyal customers; we have a lot. But I think we’re on the last leg. That sounds bad – I don’t mean it in a bad way. But my mom will probably retire in a year, my brother has a new job, and we will probably not continue. I’ve done this most of my life, you know? Maybe it’s time to follow other dreams. The future? It’s a question mark.”

Niki Belesiotis: “I have people who come here 10, 20, 30 years. Sometimes, they move, to the coast, and when they come to Portland, they come back. They don’t even know if I’m still here. I say, yes, we’re still here.

“Before you go, you can take a picture of a Greek salad? I’ll make it, but you don’t have to eat it; I’ll make it for someone else. I’ll put it in the window and you can take a picture.”

Niki’s Restaurant

736 SE Grand Ave.
Portland, Ore.
(503) 232-7777

Open Monday – Friday, 7 a.m-3 p.m.

Photo credit: Nancy Rommelmann

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Great piece, Nancy! I look forward to reading more. Happy to reconnect with you via Zester! Susie Norris (from The Oaks & old neighborhood!!)

Susie Norris , August 10, 2009

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A very thoughtful and well-crafted piece. Unfortunately, this scenario is becoming all too common in a pinched economy and with eating out becoming increasingly trend driven. Thanks for the poignant and timely profile.

Tobin Robert Steers , August 10, 2009

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I've lived in Portland for two years, love eating out, and read food blogs constantly... and yet this is the first I've heard of Niki's. It sounds like an amazing place. Great article- I'm hungry for a real Greek salad now.

Sara Gates , August 10, 2009