Category: Openings

Broadway Bowl (instagram) opened Tuesday. The pub and bowling alley is located at 725 Broadway in South Portland and is an outpost of Bayside Bowl in Portland.

The 220-seat facility includes a 10-lane bowling alley, a bar serving beer, wine and house cocktails, a private dining area and a heated and semi-enclosed outdoor seating area (lower left photo) with a view over the water of Portland. Broadway Bowl will be open 3 – 10 Monday through Thursday, 11 – 11 on Friday/Saturday and 11 – 9 on Sunday.

The kitchen is open nightly until 9 pm serving (see menu below) pizza, soup, salads, sandwiches, hot dogs, wings and other pub standards. Vegan, vegetarian and gluten-free options are available.

Thistle & Grouse (website, facebook, instagram) will open Friday at 4 pm. The restaurant is located at 10 Cotton Street. The newly renovated space features a 2-story dining room with a bar on the first floor.

The menu (see below) includes raw bar options, cheese and charcuterie boards as well as small plates like a Maplebrook Farm Burrata plated with apple, celery and walnuts and entrees like the Seafood Cassoulet and Sunday Roast Prime Rib.

Thistle & Grouse serves custom cocktails and mocktails, wines by the glass, beers, and ciders (Norumbega and Freedom’s Edge). The bar is stocked with a wide selection of spirits including 14 bourbons, 10 ryes, 19 Scotches as well as whiskeys from Ireland and Japan.

The restaurant is being launched by Kimberly Kraus and chef Bobby Will. Will has worked at restaurants run by well known chefs like Jean-Georges Vongerichten, Ken Oringer, and Jamie Bissonette. He was the executive chef at Saltaire Oyster Bar in Port Chester when the New York Times gave it a rating of Excellent in 2015. Also on the team are general manager Julia Mcinnis and bar manager Corey Schallek. All four worked together at Kraus’ and Will’s former restaurant Salt and Steel in Bar Harbor.

Thistle & Grouse will be open Tuesday through Saturday starting at 4 pm with late night hours on the weekends and happy hour each day they’re open, 4 – 5 pm. Reservations are available on Resy.com.

The opening announcements just keep coming. Mark your calendars:

• November 17 – Orange Bike Brewing is opening their East Bayside gluten-free brewery at 3 pm.
• November 18 – Prairie Baking is opening their bakery cafe on Romasco Lane at 9 am.
• November 28 – Broadway Bowl, the SoPo outpost of Bayside Bowl, is launching at 3 pm.
• December 1 – Chocolate Passion is opening their new location at 175 Spring Street (the former Mercy Hospital building).

Chef/owner Harding Smith reopened The Grill Room on Saturday night. This comes after a 4-month repair and renovation of the Exchange Street restaurant following a fire in June.

The Grill Room will be open Tuesday and Wednesday 4 – 9 pm and Thursday though Saturday 4 – 10 pm.

Renovations are ongoing in the former Swiss Time space which is slated to become part of The Grill Room when completed.

Fans of the former Rick’s Lobby Cafe will be happy to hear that The Proper Cup is starting to serve chef Rick Wood’s breakfast sandwiches starting October 24th.

Rick’s Lobby Cafe closed on September 1st. The Proper Cup was launched in 2018 and is located at 500 Forest Ave. They’re open 7 am – 1 pm.

The Porttown Public House & Coffee Bar (facebook, instagram) opened on Friday. The coffee shop and pub is located at 123 Commercial Street next to Olive Cafe. Porttown serves baked goods, breakfast sandwiches and coffee in the morning, and transitions to a bar with pizza and paninis for the rest of the day.

York-based bakery When Pigs Fly (website, facebook, instagram) opened their Portland retail shop this week. They’re open 10 am – 6 pm daily.

The shop is located at 65 Hanover Street in West Bayside. It carries the full range of the breads they produce at their central bakery as well as other baked goods like cookies, muffins, and scones, and oils, jams, butter, and other pantry items that pair well with their breads.

The bakery was founded by Ron Siegel in 1993. When Pigs Fly has retail shops in Kittery as well as Somerville, Jamaica Plain, Lexington and Brookline in Massachusetts.

Two new businesses have moved into the second floor of the Public Market House in Monument Square.

La Benedicion (facebook) opened just last week. They’re located in the space formerly occupied by the Frying Dutchman. The menu includes dishes like pollo con tajada, monjarra frito, burritos and tamales.  La Benedicion is open Tuesday through Saturday, 10 am – 8 pm.

Rathanin Chhloeum is just about to open Asia Eats (facebook) in the space formerly occupied by Pho Co. The menu includes buns, dumplings, soups, rice plates (katsudon, teriyaki, orange chicken, etc) and boba tea. Chhloeum hopes to open Asia Eats within the next week.