Category: People

Maine at Weiners & Portland Food Coma

| Posted in People, Profiles

Today’s Press Herald includes a profile of Joe Ricchio and his blog Portland Food Coma,

On a recent afternoon, Ricchio was enjoying lunch at Pizza Villa, reveling in it almost. Days earlier, he had survived an intense three-day kitchen lockdown to create “Buddha Jumps Over The Wall,” a Chinese meal that involves whole chicken and duck, abalone, quail eggs, bamboo leaves, dueling stocks and a shark’s fin. It was his 31st birthday and the occasion called for unbridled decadence.

and reporter Ray Routhier spent the day working at Wieners learning about what it takes to run the Commercial Street food cart.

I would not have thought there was any engineering involved in preparing a hot dog.

But I realized quickly – as I tried to sell franks from a cart called Wieners on Commercial Street last week – that there definitely is. The spatial relationship between the dog, the bun, the onions, the relish, the ketchup and the mustard is a delicate thing that cannot be trifled with.

My problem was, I trifled.

I would not have thought there was any engineering involved in preparing a hot dog.

click image to enlarge

Ray Routhier tries to get the squiggle of mustard to look just so as he works the hot dog stand of Jess Cady-Giguere in Portland.

John Ewing/Staff Photographer

click image to enlarge

Jess Cady-Giguere demonstrates her method for assembling a hot dog and condiments at her cart, Wieners, in Portland.

John Ewing/Staff Photographer

ABOUT THIS SERIES

MAINE AT WORK takes an interactive look at iconic, visible or just plain interesting jobs done by folks in Maine. Reporter Ray Routhier shadows a worker or workers, reports what he sees and tries his hand at some of the job’s duties.

IF YOU’D LIKE to suggest a job to be explored in this feature, e-mail rrouthier@pressherald.com or call 791-6454.

THIS WEEK’S JOB

TITLE: Hot dog seller and owner of Wieners, a cart at the corner of Dana and Commercial streets on Portland’s waterfront.

WORKER: Jess Cady-Giguere, 27, of Portland.

HOURS: Roughly 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., at least five days a week.

DUTIES: Towing the cart, buying supplies, preparing the cart, and cooking, selling and presenting hot dogs, sausages and chili.

SURPRISING FACTS: Cady-Giguere sometimes has to work in the rain just to make sure people know she’s still in business and to keep her spot. Also, putting a hot dog in a bun, with condiments, is surprisingly hard to do without touching them directly with your hands.

PERKS: Being outside on the waterfront on beautiful days and being able to take your dog to work.

But I realized quickly – as I tried to sell franks from a cart called Wieners on Commercial Street last week – that there definitely is. The spatial relationship between the dog, the bun, the onions, the relish, the ketchup and the mustard is a delicate thing that cannot be trifled with.

My problem was, I trifled.

Interview with Claire Stretch

| Posted in People, Uncategorized

Tuesday’s Portland Daily Sun included an interview with Claire Stretch, bartender at The Back Bay Grill,

What’s Underrated: Bubbly, like champagne, Prosecco, brut. Maine is number 50 in sales of bubbly, at the very bottom. Fresh squeezed juice isn’t used enough either.

and article that gathered opinions from diners restaurateurs and restaurant workers on this year’s Maine Restaurant Week.

Martha Bryon, co-owner of The Salt Exchange, has been very pleased so far. “It’s absolutely amazing. About half of the people who come in are for restaurant week and they’ve been very enthusiastic about making reservations. The experience has been beautiful, particularly coming off of a very hard winter. “

Interview with Declan McGough

| Posted in General News, People

Friday’s Portland Daily Sun included an interview with Declan McGough, the sous chef at Blue Spoon,

What’s missing from the Portland restaurant scene: My dad works on the waterfront and I know how much seafood comes across so I’m surprised that there aren’t more exclusively seafood restaurants, like cevicherias.

and a look at some of late night dining options in the city.

Interviews with Pete Sueltenfuss & Nicholas Nappi

| Posted in People

The Portland Daily Sun has continued its restaurant worker interview series. Wednesday’s paper included an interview with Pete Sueltenfuss, a line cook at Fore Street,

What’s missing from the Portland restaurant scene: Late-night dining. This town rolls up its sidewalks at 11. There’s a need and desire to have a place that serves until 1. There are lots of restaurant folks in this town and there’s nowhere to eat when we get out of work.

and Thursday paper included an interview with Nicholas Nappi, the Chef de Cuisine at Local 188,

What’s missing from the Portland restaurant scene: Chinese food that hasn’t been Americanized. We joke that Portland ought to put a moratorium on Thai restaurants until we got one good dim sum place.

Beer 30, Bar Lola Interviews and Food Snobs

| Posted in General News, People

Today’s Portland Daily Sun includes an interview with Josh Peck and Sue Taylor, the sous chef and pastry chef at Bar Lola. Here’s Peck’s response to the question What’s missing from the Portland restaurant scene?

A butcher shop similar to the one Barbara Lynch has in Boston where you can get rillade, pate and various salamis. We could also use a good raw bar that showcases the 15 to 20 types of oysters that you can get here in Maine.

In her weekly Locavore column Margo Mallar answers the question “what do you do if you’re a third shifter and beer thirty comes at 7 in the morning?”

It’s a funny co-existence, sort of like the shift change in the old Warner Brother cartoons. It seems a little odd to be drinking so early. But with an inverted circadian rhythm it’s not early at all … it only seems that way to those who get up with the bread, the bagels and the muffins freshly made by people they never see unless they start their day with a little breakfast at Ruski ‘s.

And columnist Bob Higgins admits to being a very bad restaurant customer and his own brand of food snob.

Hannaford: Super Market for Star Chefs

| Posted in People

A couple years ago when Jonathan Levitt introduced Boston Globe readers to Bresca (see A Chef’s Vision Becomes a Tiny Treasure of a Restaurant), he explained that “Because Bresca is so small, Kern can pick up a lot of her own groceries. She buys locally, from farmers, fish markets, and supermarkets. This morning her first stop is Hannaford’s.”
And recently when the Maine magazine published an article—also by Levitt—about Rob Evans from Hugo’s, I read that the James Beard Award winner also sources some of his raw ingredients at Hannaford: pommegranates, offal, pumpkin seeds, etc.
It makes me wonder if I were to hang out in the Hannaford produce section one morning would I see a parade of Portland’s culinary notables streaming through. Are these two outliers or would I see Corry, Hayward, Villani, Matthews, Desjarlais, Hernandez, Harmon, and others  shopping trips for the night’s menu?

Interview with Steve DiMillo

| Posted in People

Today’s Press Herald includes a ShopTalk interview with Steve Dimillo, manager of DiMillo’s Floating Restaurant.

Q: How many in the family are in the business?

A: My mother, Arlene, two aunts, Jeanette and Jay, two brothers Dan and Johnny, my twin sister Stephanie, me, my two kids, my brother-in-law Tony Quatrucci, who runs the kitchen. That would be 10. The most recent family member to join is Steve Junior; he’s the banquet manager. Stephanie does the bookkeeping. The primary management team is my brothers and I, and my mom works with the three of us. Another brother, Chris, doesn’t work in the restaurant, but he runs the marina. I’m one of nine kids, I think I mentioned. Gene now has his own place, G & R DiMillo’s, and my sister Vicki has hers, Bruno’s.