Jojo (restaurant)

Jojo (also known as Jojo Food Truck and Jojo PDX) is a restaurant in Portland, Oregon. Established by Justin Hintze in 2018, the business operates in southeast Portland's Creston-Kenilworth neighborhood and northwest Portland's Pearl District.

Description
Jojo operates from a food cart in southeast Portland's Creston-Kenilworth neighborhood and a brick and mortar space in northwest Portland's Pearl District. The business specializes in fried chicken sandwiches. The menu has also included biscuits and gravy and milkshakes.

History


Justin Hintze, a former real estate agent, opened Jojo in Sellwood in October 2018. The food cart relocated to a pod on Southwest Powell in 2019. Jojo became known for its social media posts in 2019. In late 2019, Jojo and Vietnamese cart Matta collaborated to launch Chơi Luôn, a restaurant within the cocktail bar Lulu.

In 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Jojo offered free meals to children, restaurant workers, and hospital workers. In April, when Jojo reopened after a temporary closure, the business offered free sandwiches to all who asked.

In 2021, Hintze confirmed plans to open a sibling brick and mortar restaurant in the Pearl District. The restaurant opened on September 15, 2022.

Reception


In 2019, Jojo was a Food Cart of the Year finalist in Eater Portland Eater Awards. The website's Brooke Jackson-Glidden wrote, "Jojo stands out as a Portland icon for its social media alone, but luckily this Creston-Kenilworth cart’s hulking fried chicken sandwiches are similarly obsession-inducing. Owner Justin Hintze doesn’t hold back with spice, sauce, or smoke, topping chicken with potato salad and sambal mayo on a crisped bun, with a side of crispy-crackly jojos for gut-busting good measure."

In 2020, Nick Woo and Alex Frane included Jojo in the website's lists of "14 Outstanding Fried Chicken Sandwiches in Portland" and "14 Excellent Sandwich Shops to Try in Portland", respectively. Jojo was included in several additional Eater Portland lists in 2021, including Woo and Nick Townsend's "14 Real-Deal Fried Chicken Spots in Portland", Krista Garcia's "10 Chicken-and-Jojo Champs in Portland", Woo and Jackson-Glidden's "15 Outstanding Portland Food Carts", Daniel Barnett and Garcia's "17 Mind-Blowing Burgers in Portland and Beyond", and Jackson-Glidden's "The 38 Essential Restaurants and Food Carts in Portland". In 2023, Nathan Williams included Jojo in an overview of "where to eat and drink" in the Creston-Kenilworth neighborhood, and Waz Wu included the business in an overview of "Where to Find Top-Notch Vegan Burgers in Portland".

Portland Monthly included Jojo in a 2021 overview of "The Best Fried Chicken in Portland". Michael Russell included the restaurant in The Oregonian 's 2023 list of Portland's ten best new brunches.