What does a vegan fine-dining restaurant look like for Portland in 2025?

At Portland’s Astera , hushed waiters in dapper suits deliver delicate squash tartlets and ovals of inky black seaweed caviar, then remove each wooden platform or puck-sized pedestal simultaneously from every spot at the table.

For a vegan dining capital like Portland, where so many people shun not just meat but animal products of all stripes , a higher-end restaurant serving plant-based food is almost an inevitability. And for nearly two decades, Aaron Adams has been the chef to build those restaurants, maturing through the years from a midscale Italian spot like Portobello to a locavore chef’s counter like Farm Spirit.

Now it’s Astera , a restaurant with a homey dining room, fine-dining ambitions and so

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