The Press Herald has published a bar review of El Rayo in Scarborough.
Expect to find parents, kids and grandparents at El Rayo in Scarborough, but a young, professional crowd at the bar area. The service is super quick, the drinks are tried and true, and what better bar food is there if not fish tacos and Mexico City-style corn on the cob?
CNN has included Portland in their list of Up and Coming Foodie Destinations.
There are nearly 600 restaurants in the city of 66,000 — one of the highest ratios of any town in the country. Many of them specialize in fresh, local fare.
Five Fifty Five currently has a local beef tartar on the menu, as well as Gulf of Maine cod and truffled lobster mac and cheese. Hugos is doing a tasting menu that includes rabbit with Brussels sprouts, spaetzil and mustard, grilled swordfish and a cream of broccoli soup. And Piccolo is putting an Italian spin on a local pork chop, hake, and an eggplant, tomato and ricotta dish.
Food Republic has included Allagash Coolship Resurgam in their list of the 20 Big Beers of the Year.
The beer writer Joshua Bernstein introduced me to this older release at a bottle share this fall, and its funky, citrus-forward flavors have lodged firmly in my memory since. Resurgam is part of the company’s coolship program, meaning it ferments spontaneously via interaction with natural yeasts in open-air vats. It won a GABF medal in 2010 and again this year, with silver in the Belgian-style lambic or Sour Ale category.
Paste magazine has included Bissell Brothers in their list of the Best New Breweries of 2014.
The bros actually opened the doors of their nano-brewery late in 2013, but this year has seen them gain considerable momentum; The Substance IPA continues to sate Portland-area hopheads, and hoppy amber Bucolia didn’t do too bad a job either, but Bissell Brothers really spread its wings this past month with the release of Angels with Filthy Souls, an Amarillo-laced milk porter that should immediately assuage any fears of a redundant portfolio on the brewery’s part. If expansion is not on their radar, then the rest of us are worse off for it.
Thursday — it’s Christmas Day.
Saturday — the Winter Farmers’ Market is taking place at the Urban Farm Fermentory.
New Year’s Eve — restaurants have started announcing their New Year’s Eve dinner plans. I’ll add more listings as information becomes available:
For more information on these and other upcoming food happenings in the area, visit the event calendar.
If you are holding a food event this week that’s not listed above, publicize it by adding it as a comment to this post.
Map & Menu has posted a list of their favorite Maine food and drink of 2014.
We’re finishing up our Best of 2014 posts with the most challenging to whittle down and write – our favorite food (and drinks!) from our home state of Maine. There are plenty of spots in Portland and beyond that we wish we could include on this list, these are simply the dishes and restaurants that stood out to us and kept us coming back for more in 2014.
The Golden Dish has published a second review of Sur Lie.
But with so many good restaurants in town, Sur-Lie has matured and can stand on its own merits as a fine place to have a wonderful meal casually or with as much pomp as you like.
The Press Herald has published a bar review of The Jewel Box,
The Jewel Box is mellow and classy, but not in a fancy way. There are moments when you feel like you’ve stepped inside a Wes Anderson film, and others when you might be on the set of Mad Men. Either way, Nan’l Meiklejohn, a.k.a. “The Bearded Lady,” and his staff will see to it that you have a well-crafted cocktail, some light snacks and a whole lot of good service.
Maine Craft Distilling is having a soft opening for their new Freeport tasting room/mixology shop today.
Maine Craft Distilling-Freeport edition is now open for biz. We are calling it our “soft” opening and are sure there is much that we will need to improve upon but come on by and try us out!!! The gala grand opening will be in the new year.
The tasting room is located at 7 Mill Street.
The Golden Dish reports that Steve and Michelle Corry have leased 46 Market Street where they plan on opening a
casual restaurant serving French-inspired café salads, sandwiches, soups and wine throughout the day with breakfast, lunch and dinnertime service. The focus, however, will be on pastry, headed by a highly regarded local pastry chef, whose name was not, as yet, revealed. Count on Parisian-style espresso and coffee, killer croissants at breakfast and classic eclairs and Napoleons, French onion soup and salad Nicoise as part of a casual menu of light fare.