News Center Maine has a report on efforts to form a union among the staff at Holy Donut’s Park Ave location,
Employees at The Holy Donut said all eight staff members at the shop on Park Avenue have signed onto an effort to form a union. The workers formally submitted their request to the owners, who now have seven days to recognize or deny it.
The Maine Sunday Telegram includes a feature article about Maine companies producing bitters and bitters adjacent products.
Maine’s half-dozen or so producers of cocktail bitters and digestifs occupy a small, niche corner of the alcohol market. Yet they’ve seen interest in their products grow steadily in the past 10 years as consumers have gravitated toward more complex cocktail flavors. And even as many consumers choose to drink less these days, some producers are expanding their bitters and digestif lines, taking advantage of the demand for lower-ABV beverage options.
Gross Confection Bar has announced that after Saturday they’ll be shutting down their evening cocktail and dessert service. Moving forward they’ll focus the company on being a fulltime day bakery.
After seven years of late nights, plated desserts, and moments we’ll always be grateful for, this Saturday, February 14th, will be our final night of dessert service.
This weekend will be normal bakery hours, and starting Thursday, February 19th, we’ll be open Thursdays through Sundays with the sweet and savory pastries you know and love plus new additions we’re excited about.
Gross initially opened on January 4, 2019, with the bakery part of the business coming online in July of the same year.
A growing number of Portland area hospitality businesses are taking part in a one day shutdown strike on Friday including:
The stated goals of the strike include asking state and local government to take action, and legislation at the federal level to halt funding for ICE.
Additionally, other businesses plan to stay open and will be making donations to local organizations that are helping people impacted by the presence of ICE in Maine:
Portland Buy Local has issued a statement about businesses participation in the strike.
The Press Herald reports that Fork Food Lab is at risk of foreclosure.
“We are working diligently to restructure our organization and to create a sustainable financial plan that will allow us to continue to serve our members and the community,” Food Fork Lab Executive Director Bill Seretta said in an email statement on Tuesday. “We are actively engaged with our lenders in hopes of finalizing an agreement very soon.”
The Maine Monitor has explored the connection between housing costs and staffing challenges for restaurants.
Honey’s Fried Chicken Palace was an expansion of Bedell’s first fried chicken restaurant, Ancho Honey, which opened in Tenants Harbor in 2019. With five years under his belt and two finalist awards for best burger and best fried chicken in the state, Bedell started to expand, with the hope of starting a Maine-based chain.
Instead, just one year after he opened his new counter-service restaurant, Bedell made the decision to shut down Ancho Honey — a choice that was fueled in large part by problems finding staff.
And he’s not alone.
Today’s Maine Sunday Telegram includes an article about how chef Eric Bufo at Wayside Food Programs uses donated ingredients to prepare meals for members of the community.
Bufo isn’t running a fancy farm-to-table restaurant. He’s kitchen manager and head chef at Wayside Food Programs, where he works with a rotating volunteer crew to cook as many as 800 free meals a week for Greater Portland homeless shelters, schools, senior homes and other community centers where Mainers need hot, nourishing meals.