Fire at Makoto in South Portland

| Posted in General News

There was a fire at Makoto yesterday. Co-owner Rattanak Tray shared that everyone was able exit safely. The timeframe to re-open the restaurant is unknown at this point. Extinguising the fire required cutting open the roof of the building.

Makoto opened in South Portland earlier this year. It’s was launched by Tray and Hope MacVane-Tray who also own Yosaku in Portland.

Update: The South Portland Fire Department has issued a news release about the fire which reads in part,

The building was occupied at the time of the incident. Those present exited when alerted to the fire. Upon arrival, crews encountered heavy smoke inside the restaurant. Firefighters quickly located a fire in the ceiling area near the kitchen exhaust hood system. The fire was extinguished promptly; however, significant damage was sustained to the kitchen and portions of the roof. No injuries were reported. The business is expected to remain closed for an extended period while repairs are completed.

Upcoming Food & Dining Events

| Posted in Events

Thursday – Kathy Gunst and Domenica Marchetti will be at Print bookstore to discuss Marchetti’s book Italian Cookies: Authentic Recipes and Sweet Stories from Every Region.

Saturday – It’s the opening day of Barkada, a Filipino fast casual restaurant located at 425 Fore Street.

June 6 – Absolem will be at Anoche for the release of their collaboration cider Last Night.

June 8 – Scratch Baking Company is teaching a corn baking workshop.

June 15 – The James Beard Foundation will be announcing the 2026 award winners. Thomas Takashi Cooke from Izakaya Minato and Dana Street from Fore Street, Scales, Standard Baking, and Street & Company are this year’s nominees from Maine.

June 27 – Mast Landing is holding the 2026 Wavy Days Beer Fest at Thompson’s Point.

June 28 – The Good Food Foundation will be announcing the winners of their 2026 awards program. 7 Maine food producers are finalists.

July 24-26 – The Kneading Conference is taking place in Skowhegan.

August 22 – The Maine State Cake Decorating Championship is taking place in South Paris.

August 28-30 – Maine Apple Camp is taking place in Hope. The biennial event covers a wide range of topics including “innovative orcharding methods, identifying and preserving heritage varieties, foraging wild fruit, cider making and lots more.”

September 25-27 – The Common Ground Fair is taking place in Unity.

Planning a wedding, holding a business event, or hosting visitors from away? Our printed guides are a great resource to help your guests explore the Maine restaurant scene.

The Portland and Midcoast pocket guides are now for sale in packs of 25 on our online store.

Barkada to Open Saturday

| Posted in Openings

Barkada (website, instagram) is opening for business on Saturday May 30th. The new Filipino fast casual restaurant is located at 425 Fore Street in the space formerly occupied by Paper Tiger. It will be open Tuesday through Sunday, 11 am – 9 pm and until 10 pm on Fridays and Saturdays.

Chefs Nicole and Ben Bowers and business partners Margaret and Luka Dow are serving a menu house designed bowls like the Spicy Baddie shown above as well as a Build Your Own option where customers select a base of grain or greens, a protein, toppings and sauce. Lumpia rolls and a noodle dish called pancit are available as sides.  In addition to soft drinks Barkada also serves an ube pina colada slush, and Singha, Tsingtao and Sapporo beer.

Nicole and Ben Bowers are the chefs for Barkada. Nicole Bowers is originally from the Philippines. She and Ben Bowers met while attending the Institute of Culinary Education in NY. They’ve worked in Michelin-starred restaurants including for Daniel Boulud. Prior to moving to Maine they worked as private chefs in Florida. The Dows also have a background in the hospitality industry including operating a cafe in Boston and in food distribution.

Barkada initially launched as a food truck late last June.

Rod Mitchell at Browne Trading

| Posted in People

Mainebiz reports that founder Rod Mitchell is stepping down as the CEO of Browne Trading.

More than three decades after founding Browne Trading Co. on Portland’s waterfront, Rod Browne Mitchell is stepping down as CEO of the specialty food vendor he built into a nationally recognized brand.

Mitchell will stay on with the company as brand ambassador, while David Yourd, who has served as president since May 2025, will take the reins as CEO.

Cocktail Mary on Market Street

| Posted in Openings

Isaac MacDougal has announced he’s relaunching Cocktail Mary (instagram). It will now be located at 30 Market Street on the third floor of the building above Oun Lido’s. Cocktail Mary will initially be open Fridays and Saturdays at 9 pm. In June MacDougal expect to expand the hours of operation to Thursday through Saturday, 5 pm – 1 am.

In an interview with the Press Herald, MacDougal shared,

“One of the thing that’s important about having queer spaces is the broader community coming in and experiencing queer joy,” he said. “I don’t want to be a gatekeeper. I want everyone to feel comfortable coming in and being a part of what we’re building here.”

Cocktail Mary first launched at 229 Congress Street in 2019 and MacDougal closed that location in January 2025.

Maine Food & Dining News: South Portland, MDI, Falmouth, Oxford, Westbrook, Dover-Foxcroft, Cape Elizabeth, Yarmouth, Wells, Lisbon Falls, Woolwich, Pembroke, Solon, Buxton, Belfast, Sanford, Ellsworth

| Posted in Maine

New food and dining developments are taking place all across Maine. Here are some recent updates to keep you in the know:

  • The Dooryard (instagram) is scheduled to open on Thursday. The South Portland pub is being launched by Chris Beth and Lori Eschholz, the former owners of OhNo Cafe. It will initially be open Mondays and Thursdays 2 – 9 pm, and Friday through Sunday noon – 9 pm.
  • A new restaurant called Good Wolf (website, instagram) is set to open on June 2nd in Northeast Harbor on MDI. Good Wolf is being launched by Maude Kusserow, the owner of The Salt Market. She shared that Good Wolf “embraces the rustic and elegant spirit of the island, with a simple, hyper-seasonal menu focused on fresh crudos, vibrant vegetable dishes, and artisanal Neapolitan pizzas, as well as a beautifully curated cocktail menu and wine list.” The 50-seat restaurant is located 123 Main St and will initially be open Tuesday through Thursday, 5 pm to close.
  • The Barn at Smith Farm (instagram) is set to reopen Thursday. The menu includes lobster rolls, salads, a selection of pizzas, smash burgers, liguine with maitakes and peas, NY steak and a cod dish plated with fish broth, romano beans, spring peas, trout roe. They’ll be open Wednesday 4 – 9 pm, Thursday through Saturday noon – 9 pm, and Sunday 10 am – 4 pm. The businness is under the new ownership of Jill Moses and Frank Curran.
  • As previously reported, Bold Coast Spirits (website, instagram) in Oxford launched their first product this week. Marine 01 is an oyster shell vodka produced by resting the spirits on cracked Maine oyster shells sourced from Nor’Easter Oyster Company.
  • The Town Line Diner (facebook) in Westbrook has launched an ice cream food truck in their parking lot.
  • Woodwind Coffee Roasters (facebook, instagram) closed their Blue Hill location in early 2025, and are now operating from their new roastery in Dover-Foxcroft.
  • Luke’s Lobster is launching a food truck in Fort Williams Park in Cape Elizabeth this Friday. They’ll be open 11:30 am – 7 pm serving a menu of lobster and crab rolls along with sides, ice cream sandwiches and a children’s menu.
  • Magno Terra Cafe (website, instagram) will be leaving their current location in Yarmouth at the end of the month and has begun searching for a new location for their business.
  • The North Star Lounge in Wells has gone out of business. Owner Marina Pensinger has shared a thoughtful statement on facebook about the closure. The North Star opened last November.
  • Olive Pit Brewing has announced plans to shut down their Lisbon Falls brewery and tasting room. There last day in operation will be at the end of September. For additional reporting see this article in the Lewiston Sun Journal.
  • The owners of The Taste of Maine in Woolwich has announced they’re in the process of selling the decades old restaurant to new owners. “Four years ago, we quietly put The Taste of Maine up for sale, and today we are happy to say we have officially found a buyer. The deposit has been made, and sometime between the end of August and the beginning of September, the new owners will be taking over.”
  • The Fifth Annual Pennamaquan Alewife Festival is taking place this Saturday in Pembroke in Washington County.
  • Elise Schloff and Meera Chauhan have announced plans for Refectory a “monastic-inspired artist’s meal” that is taking place at the South Solon Meeting House on June 20th. “Refectory’s menu is inspired by culinary traditions of Medieval Catholic convents and strange food behaviors, from virgin lactation to food multiplication miracles, and will heavily feature wild foraged ingredients.” Schloff and Chauhan are workin on the event with Joshua Clukey and with support from The Kindling Fund. Tickets for Refectory are now on sale.
  • The Rooted Heart in Buxton is hosting the Slow Burn bakery for a pop-up this weekend and next weekend.
  • The Midcoast Villager reports that a new bar and Jewish deli caller Scullery Made (facebook, instagram) has opened in Searsport. Owner Mary Kate Labenski is operating Scullery Made as a New York-style deli and cafe by day and a cocktail bar at night.
  • The Sanford Springvale News reports that a food truck park called The Hangar (website) has launched at the Sanford airport. “The Hangar Food Truck Park, which recently began operating through a soft opening, will officially celebrate its grand opening on Saturday, May 23, with a full day of food, aviation activities, and family-friendly entertainment from 11 am to 8 pm.”
  • The Ellsworth American reports that the Palmyra Food Stop recently opened in Ellsworth. The business is owned by Sanjeeva and Menemsha Abeyasekera, the former owners of the Sri Lankan restaurant Serendib which closed last year.

For a statewide guide to eating and drinking see the Maine Food Map—a growing list of coffee shops, bars, restaurants, bakeries, cafes, plus other food and dining businesses in all of Maine’s 16 counties.

Chérie Opens Thursday

| Posted in Openings

Chefs Melody Medina and Quinn Williams are launching Chérie (instagram) on Thursday. Chérie is located at 249 Congress Street in the space formerly occupied by Quanto Basta.

The menu (see below)  includes dishes like steak frites (shown above), roast chicken, and halibut with tarbais beans as well as desserts like creme brulee and strawberry sorbet (shown above). Chérie also features a full bar program run by Lucie Anderson. The beverage menu includes wines by the glass and bottle, local beer and cider, appertifs and a cocktail program as well as non-alcoholic options. The Chérie Negroni as well as the asparagus and snap pea salad, and the leek vinaigrette are shown above.

Williams and Medina have made some light renovations to the 20-seat dining room but otherwise retain the same general layout—including the Fiero Forni oven. Cherie also has a 20-seat enclosed patio located behind the building.

The couple moved to Portland from Brooklyn in 2024. They met when both were working at Frenchette New York City. Medina is a 2011 graduate of the French Culinary Institute and helped launch the bread program at Frenchette and open the Frenchette Bakery in Tribeca. Williams’ career began in his hometown of Pittsburgh and once in NYC worked at Le Rock and Lords. Since last fall they have been holding a series of Cherie pop-up events at Lambs, Hunt & Alpine and the Big Tree event space.

Chérie will initially be open Thursday through Monday, 5 – 10 pm with plans to expand hours this summer to offer lunch and brunch on the weekend.