Category: General News

The Press Herald reports that Maine will be receiving more than $1M in federal funding to “address a lack of food processing infrastructure and an inefficient distribution network”.

Maine businesses and food projects will receive over $1 million in funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, including $500,000 designated for food processing and distribution in the Greater Portland area, according to U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree.

The biggest single grant is to the Greater Portland Council of Governments, which will receive $500,000 for its project “Scaling for Growth in the Portland Foodshed.”

The Press Herald has published the penultimate article in their apple series.

“You don’t even have to go to a rural part of Maine to find wild apples,” said Abbey Verrier, co-founder of Rocky Ground Cider in Newburgh and an avid wild apple forager. “Just start on your road and go check out the trees because there are a ton of interesting varieties that are free for the picking.”

An article in today’s Press Herald reports on restaurants that sublease access to their space to second business during off hours.

The idea of restaurants sharing their kitchens has been coming to life all over the country in the past three to five years, and the trend has recently reached Maine. Portlanders may immediately think of the former Good Egg Cafe and Pepperclub, restaurants that were housed in the same Old Port space. But today’s arrangements are different. The Good Egg and Pepperclub were owned by one person, while these new arrangements are marriages of two or more businesses and take shape in myriad ways.

The latest issue of Edible Maine has hit newsstands. It includes:

• Advice from chefs on throw holiday parties
• An article by John Myers on bourbon and rye cocktails
• An interview with Michael Landgarten, owner of Bob’s and Lil’s in Kittery
• A profile of David Buchanan, ciderman and orchardist

The Food & Dining section of today’s Press Herald includes:

Fork Food Lab – A feature article on Fork Food Lab with profiles of three of the member businesses

A year after the food lab opened, Spillane has developed an eye for who will make it, and who will remain in hobby business limbo. He quizzes entrepreneurs in initial meetings to see how prepared they are: Do they have a business plan? Have they raised enough capital to keep them going for six months to a year? Have they chosen a distinctive name for their business, and is it trademark-able? Have they already reserved their handles for social media?

Apple Sleuthing – how to seek out and identify older trees that are one of Maine’s lost apples

What most excites me is the possibility that any tree could turn out to be one of the dozens of “lost” apple varieties that have vanished from the farms, yards and orchards of Maine. The need to find these varieties before the trees die – or the people who know where they are do – is urgent. Apple geeks, like me, like to play detective. We’re willing to invest the time and effort to track down every clue. But this is a team effort, and the apple historians of Maine need your help.

This week’s Food & Dining section in the Press Herald includes:

• For the next installment in the apple series, Sean Turley has written about appreciating late summer early season apples
• An article on the various ways you can develop and feed your enthusiasm for Maine oysters
• A one-dish write-up about the seared duck breast on the menu at Miyake on Fore Street

As part of their seasonal Apple series, the Press Herald has published a map of orchards that stock heritage apple varieties, a guide to when various apple varieties are in season and a new article by Sean Turley about heritage apples.

At the same time average apple consumers are strolling through orchards, there’s a manic search under way by apple obsessives on the hunt for unconventional and heirloom varietals that grow in small quantities across the state. Whereas most orchards in Maine grow only McIntosh, Cortland and, occasionally, Macoun, there are other orchards that provide a dizzyingly diverse array of varieties, from the latest creations provided by university agricultural experiment stations to apples that have been grown continuously in New England since the colonial era.

The first of this Fall’s weekly apple column was published today in the Press Herald.

Heirloom apples, though, are another matter. They are beguiling subjects of intense adoration for many people because they have so much more to say. Each one offers insights into our region’s history, its values, its sense of community and the interplay between the landscape that surrounds us and the terroir of the food we consume. Oh, and they often taste great, too.

You can follow columnist Sean Ryan Turley on instagram at The Righteous Russet.

Tom and Shannon Bard, who closed Zapoteca in June, are the target of several lawsuits, reports the Press Herald.

Celebrated chef Shannon Bard and her husband are facing at least a dozen lawsuits from vendors who say the couple left a trail of unpaid bills when they closed Zapoteca, their popular Portland restaurant, in June.

American Way magazine has published a well written article about the Portland food scene.

Portland certainly has the right ingredients for culinary success: a natural bounty from land and sea, a tradition of locavorism and a wealth of homegrown gastronomic talent combined with an influx from elsewhere, improving the quality and variety of food on offer. Sure, you could argue that the city has been on the nation’s food radar since at least 2009, when Bon Appétit named it “America’s Foodiest Small Town.” But in the years since (especially the last three), it’s upped its own ante, thanks to a second wave of chefs and a populace that’s literally eating it up.

The author interviewed Paige Gould, Andrew Taylor, Mike Wiley, Michelle Corry, Courtney Packer, Clayton Norris and Peter Hale for the article.