Category: General News

Hot Suppa! has applied for a Community Development Block Grant to expand the restaurant, according to a report from the Portland Daily Sun.

After narrowly missing the cut last year in a request for $75,000, [owner Moses] Sabina is back and poised to receive $66,000 to expand the breakfast-and-lunch restaurant to include dinner. Sabina, who has owned the Hot Suppa! restaurant on Congress Street with his brother since 2006, awaits a City Council vote on March 22 to confirm his selection as a CDBG recipient.

According to an article in The Forecaster, Trader Joe’s has secured a lease for the old Wild Oats space.

Documents filed with the Federal Trade Commission indicate Trader Joe’s has agreed to lease the former Wild Oats grocery store space on Marginal Way.

According to the FTC, the Monrovia, Calif.-based grocery store chain has worked out a lease agreement with Whole Foods Market.

Additional reporting on the market and Portland’s reaction to the news can be found in the March 11 Press Herald. There are  also a pair of articles in the Portland Daily Sun.

According to a report from the Munjoy Hill News, Sebago Brewing hopes to move out of their spot at 164 Middle Street into a building at the site of the former Jordan’s Meat plant.

Mark Woglom, president, of Opechee Construction Corp. ( N.H.) requested that the planning board put the process on a fast track at a meeting yesterday afternoon. The reason given for that request is that the lease of the restaurant expires about a year from this spring and the Sebage Brew Pub on Middle Street in the Old Port wants to be able to move right in to their complex at that time.

For further information see this article in the Press Herald and this one from The Forecaster.

Today’s Press Herald reports on a SMCC team that’s training to compete in the Northeast Region Baron H. Galand Culinary Knowledge Bowl.

Boardman reads the “Jeopardy”-style question Bradeen has chosen from the board: “From top to bottom, what order should duck, ground beef, salmon and strawberries be stored?”

Ding! Bradeen’s team hits the bell by the time the word “salmon” comes out of the coach’s mouth.

and a Local Foodie article on the monthly macrobiotic potluck dinner.

I loaded up my plate with a delicious assortment of barley, gingered chickpeas, steamed collard greens, azuki beans and squash, cabbage with poppy seeds, spring rolls, tofu salad, alfalfa sprouts, udon salad with sesame ginger sauce, pesto pasta, and lasagna made with tofu filling and a carrot-beet sauce.

Coffee by Design won out over the competition in a coffee taste test by a “roughly two-to-one” margin among USM students.

Wicked Joe came in second and Pura Vida was last. “The overwhelming choice of our customers was Coffee By Design,” he said. “It was very clear people didn’t like Pura Vida.”

Additionally, the USM food service vendor has switched from Hood to Oakhurst.

USM’s food service provider, Aramark, decided to switch milk to Oakhurst Dairy in their effort to be more environmentally conscious. Retail locations on the Portland and Gorham campuses already sell Oakhurst Dairy products. The change USM will see is in Gorham’s residential dining hall.

Delights & Prejudices, the official blog of the James Beard Foundation, has published a set of photos from chef Mitchell Kaldrovich’s dinner at the James Beard House in February. Kaldrovich is the Executive Chef at the Sea Glass Restaurant in Cape Elizabeth.

Delights & Prejudices, the official blog of the James Beard Foundation, has published a set of photos from chef Mitchell Kaldrovich’s dinner at the James Beard House in February. Kaldrovich is the Executive Chef at the Sea Glass Restaurant in Cape Elizabeth.

Press Herald columnist Justin Ellis takes a look at what attracts younger workers to the restaurant industry,

The thing with restaurant work is that it stuck, and it suited a need for in-between work or, on-the-verge-of-making-new-plans work. It offers prime conditions for young workers.

”I see people of all ages,” she said. ”But I do see a lot of young people coming in.”

Today’s paper also includes a report on Sunday’s CSA Fair, “Think of it as speed dating for vegetables.”