Category: Under Construction

On the agenda for tonight’s Zoning Board of Appeals meeting is a request regarding 184 State Street, former home of The Frame Shop. Building owner Geoffrey Rice and “prospective lessee” Mike Keon are seeking variances regarding the required number of on street parking spots and closing hours “for a proposed restaurant”.

Keon and business partner Anthony Allen own Otto Pizza and Ocho Burrito. The opening of a new restaurant at 184 State Street, would provide Keon and Allen 3 spots in Longfellow Square: the former Petite Jacqueline space now being converted into an Ocho Burrito, the original Ocho space just around thee corner on Congress, and 184 State St.

Raw foods producer Blake Orchard (website, instagram, facebook) has leased the subterranean space at 19 Exchange Street for a production kitchen and retail shop. The 1200 sq. ft. space was most recently occupied by the House of Jerky.

Portland Magazine has published an article about Fork Food Lab.

“This is going to be the face of Fork Food Lab,” Spillane says. Fork Food Lab is a self-described “collaborative commercial food kitchen serving new and existing businesses.” Spillane and Holstein are now standing in the square, cinder-block former garage attached to the left side of the 1910 brick building. A few days before renovations begin, the future face of Fork Food Lab doesn’t look like much. But this garage will become a tasting room and shop welcoming retail customers.

Eighteen Twenty (website, facebook) has leased space at 219 Anderson St in East Bayside. Co-owners Pete Dubuc and Amanda O’Brien hope to open their rhubarb winery and tasting room sometimes this fall.

Read Joe Appel’s recent article in the Press Herald for more information on the Eighteen Twenty.

It’s the eighteen twenty wine’s “mystery,” as Dubuc puts it, that is so compelling. The flavors are at once intense and other, hinting at sweetness but not presenting it outright, offering substantial mass on the palate without weighing you down, combining a vegetal leafiness with the bright drive and vividness of a well-made cocktail. It’s tasty, savory, refreshing, with balanced sweetness, but the best thing about it is that it doesn’t taste like grape wine yet you can’t pin it down. It invites repeated inquiry.

Sisters Gourmet Deli (website, facebook, instagram) has passed their final inspections and announced plans to open on May 1st.

The Bangor Daily News has published a report on the growing number of juice bars serving the Portland market.

Smoothies and juice bars are to 2016 what espresso bars were to 2003. Not entirely new, but taking off and here to stay. While Greater Portland is a far cry from San Diego, where liquid kale in a cup is dispensed from every streetcorner, new concepts abound this spring. They promise health, vibrancy and vitality by the ounce.

Farm Truck Juice opened earlier this year, Fly Fox and Blake Orchard are under development, and a new firm called the Maine Juice Co recently leased production space in Biddeford.

The City Council approved a 5-year lease of the Deering Oaks Castle to Deen Haleem and Carol Mitchell, the owners of Tiqa restaurant. Their plan is to operate a year round  cafe called Tiqa Cafe serving breakfast, lunch and dinner. They hope to be open in time for the summer.

Tiqa has approval to make modification to the building to put in a small kitchen and also has been granted a beer and wine license for the establishment.

Urban Eye has posted an update on Solo Italiano (website, facebook), the restaurant taking the place of Ebb & Flow on Commercial Street.

Solo Italiano, which translates to “only Italian,” will feature authentic Northern Italian cuisine, something this food city could use more of. An Italian native from Genoa, Paolo Laboa will shake things up in the kitchen.

A new food cart called Maker’s Mug Coffee (website, instagram) is under construction. Owner Jacob Perry plans to launch in the next few weeks. He’s sourcing coffee from Crossroads Coffee, a small roaster in Gray, Maine run by his father-in-law. Perry has been building the cart at the Open Bench Project facility on Thompson’s Point.

A new food truck called The Sugarbird Coffee Truck is under development. Owner Justin Dewalt  plans to provide seating, music, wi-fi hotspot and other items to create a cafe-like feel in the immediate area around the truck.

Sugarbird will serve coffee from Unrest, a small Mid-Coast roaster founded by Micah Beaulieu, that roasts their coffee outdoors with specific hardwoods matched to the qualities of the beans.

Dewalt recently spent time in South Africa running the tasting room for Springfontein Wine Estate and it was while he was hiking in the Western Cape region that he came across a Sugarbird that became the inspiration for the name of the business. Prior to his time in South Africa he worked as the wine manager at Central Provisions.

Watch for Sugarbird to be out serving coffee and baked goods on Commercial Street and the Eastern Prom sometime next month.