Today’s Portland Daily Sun includes a profile of Coastal Maine Popcorn on Exchange Street.
Offering off-beat flavors from root beer and toffee to wasabi soy and buffalo wing, Coastal Maine Popcorn Co. offers over 60 varieties of flavored popcorn both sweet and savory.
“It’s a cross between an ice cream and Jelly Belly jelly beans,” said Paul Roberts, who along with his wife, Julie, owns Coastal Maine Popcorn Co.
Today’s Portland Daily Sun profiled Deux Cochon and its owner Adam Alfter,
“I love pickled pig’s feet, they are so good, but people are kind of scared of them,” said Adam Alfter, owner of the Public Market House’s newest BBQ joint, Deux Cochon.
“Probably about three people will eat it and I’ll eat the rest of them, but I’m cool with that, because those three people get to know what it’s like,” said Alfter.
reported on the upcoming return of the Groceria Cafe (aka Cafe at Pat’s),
“I had leased it for the last five years, and now I have it back with Greg Gilman, who is the original chef who built it with me. He’s coming back. Everybody’s excited,” [Jaime] Vacchiano said.
The cafe won rave reviews in local media, and one patron who dined at the cafe in its early years said Gilman’s return is great news.
and spread the word about Broke 207’s call for more affordable restaurants and the PFM Top 10 List.
Vincent Maniaci and Jill Dutton, owners of The Cheese Iron, were interviewed for a Boston Globe article that profiled the top cheese shops in New England.
“We like to talk cheese and geek out about cheese,’’ says Vincent Maniaci, who with his wife, Jill Dutton, opened this pine-paneled gourmet food, wine, and cheese emporium in 2007, just an olive’s throw from downtown Portland. “We have about 130 cheeses at any given time, about 50 percent from New England and 50 percent international,’’ says Maniaci, who learned cheesemongering at Formaggio in Cambridge.
The Portland Daily Sun has published a profile of Pat’s Meat Market.
In the era of “Big Joe” Vacchiano, Jaime’s great-grandfather who immigrated to Portland from Italy and started a butcher’s shop at the base of Munjoy Hill, there was a meat market in every neighborhood. Over time, Pat’s Meat Market held on while others vanished. Jaime Vacchiano said the business pressures are demanding, yielding little in profit, which may explain the scarcity of private butcher shops today. He also theorized that a 24/7 world is inhospitable to an old-fashioned family business built on quality over expediency.
The Food & Dining section in today’s Press Herald includes a profile of Dobra Tea. Dobra is located on Middle Street in the same building as Bull Moose and Videoport.
Walking into Dobra Tea feels like stumbling upon an eastern European cafe.
The arched windows, the warm mustard and burnt-orange walls, and the curvy woodworking details that look like something out of the genie’s bottle all shift your mood from rat-race mode to a lower-gear humming with old-world Bohemian tranquility.
Today’s paper also includes an update on the Urban Farm Fermentory. Among the many projects underway now is an experiment with Tilapia farming.
Under the glow of special lights, tomato plants and basil grow fast and lush. This unusual indoor garden sits atop two fish tanks where six freshwater tilapia swim, and the nutrient-rich water from the tanks is circulated through the hydroponic system feeding the plants’ roots.
Down East has published a profile of Figa and chef/owner Lee Farrington.
Lee Farrington was just six when she began to understand the alchemical power of an open flame. “My earliest recollection is coring a tomato, dropping it in boiling water, and watching the peel come off,” says Farrington, who first learned to cook in her grandmother Mary’s Kentucky kitchen.
Josh Christie profiles Novare Res and Ebeneezer’s in part 8 of his series on The Beer of Maine.
Maine is lucky enough to have two beer geek meccas known ’round the land. When beer websites, magazines, and periodicals list the best beer bars in the country, you can rest assured that Ebenezer’s, Novare Res, or both will pop up. Both combine the best of British pubs, German beer gardens and Belgian cafes. Good food? Heck yes. Great atmosphere? You bet.
And the beer? The beer?! Out of this world.
Today’s Maine Sunday Telegram included a profiles of the company and the Gifford family.
Roughly 30 years ago, Randall Gifford left the fate of his Skowhegan dairy in the hands of two of his sons, Roger and John.
They had a choice to make: Continue the dairy business, or sell their father’s company and switch to making ice cream.
It was a big decision — at the time, Gifford’s dairy was one of the largest in Maine.
A collection of food news and links for your Saturday morning:
Today’s Maine Sunday Telegram includes a report the parasitic disease MSX that’s threatening the oyster industry in Maine,
It was always thought that Maine waters were too cold for the parasite to take hold — until last July. That’s when dead oysters began to show up in the holding rafts, where they are stored for a couple of weeks of de-silting after being harvested from their muddy beds farther up the river.
and profiles of Stonewall Kitchen and its two founders Jonathan King and Jim Stott,
When the partners launched Stonewall Kitchen in 1991, they just wanted to earn a few extra bucks to pay off student loans.
But the market for specialty jams, jellies and sauces, which the partners initially cooked in King’s grandparents’ summer cabin, proved bigger than they imagined. Much bigger.