Category: General News

An article in the new issue of Food Network Magazine lists Duckfat’s Duck Confit Pannini as one of the 50  best sandwiches in the nation. Press Herald food writer Meredith Goad nominated the sandwich for consideration.

Saveur has published an article about their recent visit to Portland and their stay at the Inn by the Sea in Cape Elizabeth. (via Meredith Goad)

Considering the location, it didn’t shock me that the seafood dishes were first-rate—the appetizer of butter-poached lobster and gnocchi was simultaneously creamy and pillowy light, and the crab cake–avocado Benedict has now become one of those Platonic breakfast dishes against which I will judge others—but it was the chef’s way with meat that was a pleasant surprise.

According to a report from Maine a la Carte, Coffee by Designs is up for a $5,000 People & Planet Award from Green America for their solar panels.

This is where Coffee by Design had Revision Solar install 44 solar panels. These panels generate roughly half of the roastery’s electricity needs and offset 18,000 pounds of carbon dioxide that would have been produced if the electricity came over the grid from plants that burn fossil fuels.

For additional reporting see MaineBiz.

The Forecaster has published an article about Portland’s restaurant health inspector and the level of rigor she’s bringing to the job.

Sturgeon’s position was created to strengthen the public safety aspect of restaurant inspections, the city said. At the same time, the city also changed its inspection system from a numbered scale going up to 100, to a pass/fail system.

Now, to pass inspection, a restaurant can incur up to 13 code violations, no more than three of which can be deemed critical. Some violations may be resolved on the spot; for critical violations, Sturgeon returns within a week or two to check if they’ve been fixed.

This article is part of the paper’s ongoing coverage of restaurant health inspections.

The folks over at Zagat and Google, their new corporate owners, have sent out an email asking for people across the globe, including Portland to rate local restaurants. It looks like the everyone’s feedback will be compiled at made available on Google Plus.

You can participate in the Portland restaurant survey here.

Three Maine farms recently won awards at the American Cheese Society’s annual competition (via the Edible Obsessions twitter feed):

• Turner Farm Creamery was in first place in the Flavor Added – spices, herbs, seasoning, fruits –
  all milks category
• Pineland Farm Creamery received a 3rd place finish in the Flavor Added Monterey Jack – spices, herbs,
  seasonings, fruits – all milks category
• Spring Day Creamery was in first place in the Original Recipe/Open Category – made from
  cow’s milk category

In separate news, Avery Yale Kamila, who writes the Natural Foodie column for the Press Herald, won an award from the New England Associated Press News Executives Association contest for the quality of her Twitter feed.

The Bangor Daily News reports on the nascent restaurant valet industry in Portland.

“They said, ‘We’ve been driving around for 20 minutes and can’t find a place to park — can we leave the car with you?’,” [Carl] Loomis recalled Thursday.

Loomis, founder of the city’s first valet service, was happy to oblige. And Sebastien’s [sic] welcomed a car load of diners who didn’t have plans to eat there initially.

For those of you interested in offering valet service at your restaurant, the new valet company is called Valet4ME and you can find more info at www.valet4me.net.

Hot Suppa, Micucci’s, Novare Res, The Lobster Shack, Silly’s, Homegrown Herb & Tea, Saltwater Grille, Two Fat Cats and Miyake were all on the agenda when the the Re:Discover series visited Portland. Sarah Richards from Homegrown and Tolef Olson from Ocean Approved were two of the four local hosts for the show.

According to a recent press release VIA, the Portland-based marketing agency, has kicked-off a Facebook campaign to identify an all-American toast.

There’s a front page article in today’s Press Herald exploring how the drought in the rest of the country will be impacting food prices at restaurants and markets here in Maine.

But Tom Barr, one of the owners of Nosh Kitchen Bar and Taco Escobarr in Portland, noted that food prices have already been fluctuating a lot over the past couple of years, for a variety of reasons. He and his partners monitor rising prices, and just charge what they need to in order for the restaurants to survive.

“Basically the philosophy we take is you have to achieve certain margins to keep working,” Barr said, “and as long as we keep putting out quality (food), people keep coming.”

And in the Op/Ed section is a funny (and fictional) piece about the creative economy,

“Do you know that Portland has a higher chefs-to-accountants ratio than any other U.S. city with a population under 160,000? Do you know that 42 percent of the lobstermen who tie up at the docks are also taking Web design classes at SMCC? Do you know –” she started to tremble — “do you know that the Kokomo Tribune said our food carts were second only to Singapore’s and Berlin’s? No, you don’t, do you?!”