Category: General News

Chef Rob Evans shared his list of favorite places to eat and drink in Portland with GQ. Petite Jacqueline, Boda, Otto Pizza, Emilitsa, Miyake, Gorgeous Gelato, Novare Res, Bresca, Sangillo’s and Fore Street all made the cut.

Today’s Portland Daily Sun explores why people dine out for Thanksgiving.

For those heading out, the numbers are telling, and aside from the convenience factor, the NRA states consumers’ reasons for dining out on Thanksgiving are: Because people are traveling and don’t have the ability to cook (22 percent), they prefer to go to restaurants on special occasions (15 percent), somebody else is hosting and they prefer to dine out (15 percent), and they don’t have enough space to host a Thanksgiving event (12 percent).

Check the PFM Thanksgiving Resource Guide for a list of local restaurants serving Thanksgiving dinner.

Rabelais teamed up with Bon Appetite to publish a list of the Best Cookbooks of 2011.

Bon Appetit has recognized Rabelais as one of the 7 Best Culinary Bookstores in America.

Husband-and-wife owners Don and Samantha Lindgren preside over this bookstore-cum-foodie hub, where the shelves are stocked with cookbooks old and new, rare and commonplace. Here, you’ll find The Kitchen Directory and American Housewife (c. 1841) alongside the just-published Eleven Madison Park: The Cookbook.

As usual a number of Portland area restaurants plan on serving a Thanksgiving dinner. Here are the ones I know about so far. I’ll update the list as more info comes in:

• Black Point Inn, buffet served 11 – 4, $55 for adults, $25 for children
• Events on Broadway, $22.95 for adults, $16.95 for seniors, $12.95 for children
• Eves at the Garden noon – 6 pm, $38 for adults, $19 for children SOLD OUT
  
• Harraseeket Inn, 11 – 5:30, $60 for adults, $30 for children
• Saltwater Grille, buffet, noon – 4:30, $36.99 for adults, $12.99 for children
• Sea Glass Restaurant at the Inn by the Sea, 3-course, 11:30 – 9, $62 per person
• Season’s Grille, 11 – 4, $21.95 for adults, $18.95 for seniors, $10.95 for children
  
• The Inn on Peaks Island, buffet, noon – 5 pm, $16 for adults, $8 for children
• Zackery’s, 3-courses, 5 – 9, $24.99

For those of you hosting your own meal at home be sure to checkout:

• You can pre-order your free-range turkeys from Aurora Provisions or Rosemont Market (deadline to order is Saturday afternoon). Both markets are also selling pies, rolls, quick breads, side dishes and just about other item you might need for your Thanksgiving dinner. Aurora Provisions will be open 9-11 Thanksgiving morning for any last minute needs.
• Two Sisters Farm is selling their organic free-range birds in Woolwich. They are 10-20 lbs and are $4.75 a pound. Call (207) 443-5459 for more info.
• Standard Baking, Scratch Baking, The Cheese Iron, Foley’s Bakery, Bomb Diggity Bakery, and many of the other bakeries in the area are good sources for pies, breads, etc. They probably produce some holiday themed options in addition to their usual offerings.

Community Dinners:

• The Wake N’ Bakery Cafe in Westbrook is hosting a free Thanksgiving dinner for those in need.
• The Wayside Food Programs is serving a free Thanksgiving community dinner at the Portland Club, 11:30 – 1. They have enough volunteer for Thanksgiving day but are still in need of help to prep on the day before and with donations to help pay for the meal. Call (207) 775-4539 if you’d like to help out.

Wine and Beer Buying Advice:

• Mister Meatball has published a set of wine and beer selections provided by sommelier Scott Tyree and home brewer T.H Strenk.
• Wines; Tasted! has posted his take on how to select a good wine for Thanksgiving.
• Wine Wise has also weighed in with advice on what characteristics make for a good Thanksgiving wine.
• The Appel on Wine column has assembled Thanksgiving wine recommendations from Maine wine retailers.
• Aurora Provisions (Nov 17), Old Port Wine Merchants (Nov 16) and Rosemont (Nov 18) are all running wine tastings this week to help you select the right wine for the big day.

Turkey Buying and other Advice:

• Delicious Musings has posted a buying guide for putting together a locavore Thanksgiving dinner.
• Forecaster columnist Edgar Allen Beam offered personal observations on buying a $100 turkey.
• The Press Herald has published a buying guide for Maine grown turkeys.
• The Blueberry Files has assembled a list of the turkey options and prices at Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, Rosemont and Hannaford.
• Frank’s Finest has published a recipe for making stock from your leftover turkey.

Is there a local restaurant, market, bakery, or Thanksgiving event that’s missing? Post a comment with the info and I’ll add them to the list.

Portland Daily Sun columnist Natalie Ladd gives a behind the scenes look an aspect of restaurant life, rules around shift drinks.

The employee shift drink is a slippery slope because management sanctioned or not, it is going to happen. Many, but not all restaurant employees will drink alcohol after, during and upon rare occasion, before a scheduled shift. Recognizing this to be true and accepting the inevitable, many managers and owners have policies that read something like this, “Each employee may have one draft or well beverage after their shift. Each drink must be rung up on a house tab. Employees may not sit at the bar during hours of service. Employees may not pour their own shift drink. Employees may only have one drink per evening. Employees may not sit at the bar in uniform and drink. Employees must be punched out before having a shift drink.” And, so on and on as it’s the stuff lined birdcages are made of.

Appetite Portland has the scoop on the new yakitori menu at Pai Men Miyake.

On this first visit, our favorite was the chicken liver — which rivals the stunning preparation at Emilitsa in that “close your eyes and imagine yourself hand fed by a Persian prince” kinda way.  All three choices, however, were rich, oily and pungent. The way animal parts and innards should be.

A great addition to solid restaurant that keeps getting better and better. I’m looking forward to trying the beef tongue skewer next.

Two members of the Maine food community have received recognition for their work:

• Sam Hayward, chef and co-owner of Fore Street is the recipient of Sustainer award from the Chef’s Collaborative for “his commitment to promoting local, sustainable foods in the culinary world.”
• The Utne Reader has named Maine organic farmer Jim Gerritsen to their 2011 list of Visionaries for his efforts to “spearhead a lawsuit against corporate agriculture giant Monsanto, filed last spring on behalf of 270,000 family farmers, gardeners, and consumers who are suing to keep some food crops free of genetic modification.”

There are a couple changes to the Portland food blogging landscape to announce:

• BeerBloggers.com has decided to call it quits and has put out a Last Call post where he explains that “My own enthusiasm for beer has not waned, but my time to blog about it has been near non-existant for over a year now. I’ve been thinking about what to do with this domain, as having it sit idle for months at a time seems pointless. I was approached about an opportunity to donate the domain name to a worthy cause, and I’ve decided to take it.”
• A video food blog called Parsley, Sage Rosemary and Tim has recently launched. In the initial episode, the blogger uses an innovative mix of interviews, cooking demos,  and real life situations to explain how to put together a meal featuring Brown Butter Sage Sauce, Goat Cheese, and Beet Pizza.

Chubby Werewolf has posted a detailed and critical commentary on Anthony Bourdain and the No Reservations episode filmed in Maine.

…What I do have a problem with is people who say shitty things about others under the veil of criticism and then can’t even be bothered to qualify their remarks. Take, for instance, the monkfish dish that Mr. Bourdain “didn’t love so much.” What did he dislike about it? Was it not fresh? Was it the taste of one of the components? Was it the pairing of the leeks and red pepper with the monkfish liver? A little bit of information would go a long way here. Ditto on the comment about Mr. Street’s “watery-looking sauce.” Did you taste it, Anthony? Or did you just decide that because you saw something that looked “watery” that it was bad?…