MaineBiz has reported on two grocery delivery services operating in Maine, a local business, MaineGroceryDelivery.com, and Instacart, a national company that’s now expanding into Maine.
Category: Profiles
Victorieux Champagne
The Press Herald has published an article about Victorieux Champagne and Thomas Brems who launched the company earlier this year in Maine.
In the Champagne region of France, about 100 miles east of Paris, there are 14 acres in the Côtes de Sézanne where the family vineyards of Cédric Guyot have been producing grapes and making Champagne for three generations. One day, a fresh-faced college kid from America came knocking at the door, in the small village of Fontaine-Deni [and now a few years later] two of the small grower’s Champagnes are being sold in 13 locations in southern Maine and nowhere else in the United States: Brut Millésime 2009, a traditional vintage Champagne, and a Rosé Brut.
Victorieux Champagne is donating $1 per bottle sold in December to Full Plates Full Potential.
Hardshore Distilling Co.
MaineBiz has published a profile of the Hardshore Distilling Company, a gin distillery located on Washington Ave.
[Owner Jordan] Milne starts with juniper, the basis for all gin, and infuses it with rosemary and mint. It’s distilled three times, the third to soak in the botanicals. Each batch is quality tested so it’s identical to the one before it. In the year he’s been selling it, he’s had success convincing local stores, supermarket chains and bars and restaurants to stock it.
Veebie
The Spoon has published an article about Veebie.
Veebie rolled out (pardon the pun) it’s first kiosk in downtown Portland earlier this week. The bright orange containers on wheels have 48 numbered cubbies. Order your food through Veebie on your phone and pick it up from your assigned cubby between 11:30 and 1:30. The menu features items from a different restaurant every day, so today (Thursday), for example, the items available are from B.Good.
Adweek: Might & Main
Adweek has published an article about Might & Main and how they “Helped Make Portland, Maine, the Hippest Foodie Town in New England”.
“Eventide set things into motion for us,” adds Wilkinson. “By fate of timing, and being in the right place at the right time, and stumbling into what was going to be the most exciting restaurant for Portland for a while, we ended really being at the front of a lot of what has made Portland’s food scene what it is today. We’ve continued to try to put that effort into every other restaurant that’s come along, and it came at a time when every other restaurant opening up was better than the last. It built a really cool, robust scene that keeps getting better. Our work with restaurants is beginning to taper off, so we got to own a really nice moment in time in Portland.”
Cups of Sea
The Forecaster has published an article about Cup of Sea (website, facebook, instagram), a Portland company selling seaweed teas.
Each blend of tea uses a different type of seaweed, Rogers said, including bladderwrack, dulse, kelp and sea lettuce. He buys only sustainably harvested seaweed from sources like the Atlantic Holdfast Seaweed Company in Deer Isle.
Once the seaweed is harvested, Rogers said it is dried and milled into flakes. Then, he said, “I get to do the easy part: blending it with other ingredients. The final product is a loose-leaf tea that you can brew just like regular tea.”
The New Roma Cafe
Today’s Press Herald includes a feature article about the memories of the old Roma Cafe and new incarnation.
The first weeks of the restaurant’s second life were filled with diners who told the staff that the Roma, closed for more than a decade, was where they’d celebrated birthdays and anniversaries, held wedding rehearsal dinners and romantic Valentine’s Day celebrations, and gotten engaged. Teenagers trying to impress each other suffered through awkward prom dates at the Roma.
Mainely Hotdogs
Mainebiz has published an article about Mainely Hotdogs and its owner Derke Gibbs.
In case you missed it, July was national hot dog month, but the occasion wasn’t lost on Derke Gibbs, who started his Mainely Hotdogs push cart business at the corner of Commercial and Silver streets in Portland’s Old Port last month.
Ice Cream Delivery
Today’s Press Herald includes a feature article on ice cream delivery services with a special focus on Rosanna’s, the craft ice cream operation run by Salli Wason.
While having ice cream delivered to your home is convenient, Wason’s customers say her creative flavors play just as big a role in enticing them to pick up the phone and order intriguing flavors like Thai iced tea, fresh nectarine and honey lavender. Wason posts her daily menus on her Facebook page, and changes flavors often. Like a musician, she also takes requests from customers. Most recently she tried her hand at a flavor she calls “rose red” – made with raspberries and housemade beach rose syrup – because someone told her it was popular in Paris. A customer request for blueberry-lemon with gingersnaps sold so quickly she still makes it.
Portland Barrel Co.
Mainebiz has published an article about the Portland Barrel Co. and its owner Ed Lutjens.
Lutjens works alone, planing staves so they fit together tightly, sculpting the staves’ inside and shearing off some wood outside so they’ll form a round barrel when set into hoops. He starts from the top of the barrel, placing the staves, which are of different widths, inside a metal hoop that he also hand makes. No glue is involved, so the sides of the staves need to be planed flat and fitted carefully.