Bette's Place — Restaurant in Hood River

We ate here on recommendation by a friend. A crowd is always a good sign!

ATMOSPHERE: A feeling of "country kitchen" best describes the ambiance with simple décor and seating in three sections including an indoor patio. The fluorescent lighting is bright and awful.

MENU: Breakfast selections & combos, burritos, children's menu.

BEVERAGE: Orange Juice Being from Hawaii, I'm a guava juice guy but when in Hood River... I'm 99% sure this came out of a carton as it was pulp-free and a bit bitter. Some sparkling wine mixed in would've been perfect!

FOOD: Fresh Dungeness Crab Benedict - $17.00 I was torn between this and the crab omelette. This won only because I wanted to taste the hollandaise sauce. Talk about an abundance of crab meat! No holds barred, two English muffins were topped with mounds of crustacean, perfectly poached eggs and way too much of their soupy hollandaise sauce. Flavor-wise everything was spot on, but the hollandaise sauce wasn't the best I've had. For my side I chose hash browns that were crispy and moist. English muffins aren't my favorite choice for the bottom of a benedict as they're too dense and filling so one always goes to waste, no different here. My ultimate choice would be ciabatta bread like how Kitchen Story in San Francisco does it which is hands-down the best crab bene I've had yet. TIP: Ask for less hollandaise sauce.

Biscuits & Gravy, One Egg - $8.00 No idea why the spouse chose this sloppy mess. He said he just "wanted to try it" and ended up eating the egg and just half of the biscuits and gravy.

Homemade Cinnamon Roll - $5.00 Looking for a bang-for-your-buck meal? This is it! A Mount Hood-sized "cake slice" of carbs was topped with sweet frosting, swirls of cinnamon and a melting ball of butter. I knew this'd be too sweet for me but I did have a few bites which were good as the batter was very moist. It's not a roll but a hunk of cake!

SERVICE: Host greeting was immediate and semi-friendly. We had a 15-mintue wait on a Sunday morning around 10am.

Our female server was very friendly, professional and checked on us throughout.

Your bill gets dropped off but you have to pay at the front of the restaurant. The male cashier was also friendly and professional.

OVERALL: A nice little breakfast spot...

Thursday morning, July 25th, 2019 dawned and in need of breakfast, we left our overnight accommodations in Stevenson, WA and headed for Hood River to seek out a new place to begin our day. Crossing the toll bridge to Hood River off Hwy 14 we asked the attendant where we could get a good breakfast or lunch. She immediately said "Bette's Place. 5th & Oak". Paid our $2 toll we found this place shortly after. From that point on it was a fine choice! Lots of tables inside were fairly full of diners. That in itself tells you are in for a decent meal. Impeccable service with very good coffee, which we find very important to begin anyone's day. Wanting lunch, I chose the Cream of Brocolli soup and a BLT sandwich. One sandwich I love and hadn't had one in over two weeks! Wife enjoyed their Philly Steak Sandwich, not too hungry, chose not to have potatoes, but was given a bag of chips. Her sandwich featuring very tasty beef, red pepper, onion and swiss cheese on a tasty roll. Delicious. A full menu is presented and with so many choices, it's hard to make decisions, but you'll find something, we're sure!

Those looking for new places to try, we would certainly recommend coming to Bette's Place. Bette passed about a year and a half ago. Now owned and operated by an employee who worked for Bette for many years and Bette's daughter still helps out. We are so fortunate to have the "continuation" that a restaurant such as this continues on, where many other popular places closed because no one was available to continue with "the tradition".

Bette's photos of her and her husband who passed over 10 years ago live on! Memories of her past are certainly here for others to enjoy. Thank you to those people who keep this...

This place is not worth the wait, service, or food. I expected a wait on a Saturday morning, that is not what the low rating is for. I ordered the cinnamon french toast with a side of hash browns, and my fiance ordered the monterrey omelet with hash browns. His order mistakenly came with fruit instead of hash browns but we were never able to tell our server because she didn't come back after dropping off the food. The hash browns were burnt anyway (and I like them crispy but they were way past that). Our server told us she would bring syrup for the french toast after she dropped off the food but as previously stated, she never came back. We had to wave down someone else but even that took so long that my french toast was barely warm by the time I got syrup to eat it with. It took us a while to get our bill and I timed 16min before we were actually able to pay for our food. We did not even get the chance to tell our server the issues so they could be corrected. She never asked us how everything was or if we needed anything since she only came by to deliver our food and to give us our check. Bad service and mediocre food. Not sure how this place has such good reviews when it's not what we experienced. Would...