Under Construction: The Purple House (Updated)

| Posted in Under Construction

purpleshack

Krista Kern Desjarlais has bought a small property in North Yarmouth where she plans to open a wood-fired bakery called The Purple House. The bakery is located at 378 Walnut Hill Rd, at the intersection of routes 9 and 115. Desjarlais will be serving Montreal-style bagels and wood-fired pastries along with Cuban coffee in the mornings. Ice cream will be on the menu year-round.

Desjarlais will also serve daily sit-down lunch in the 8-seat bakery as well as a monthly prix fixe dinners.

As you can see in the photo, the property does need some TLC to be ready and the wood-fired oven needs to be built, so the The Purple House is not likely to open until very late in 2015 or early next year.

Update: The Press Herald has interviewed Desjarlais and published an article about The Purple House.

This Week’s Events: Oxbow, Cookbook Club, Indonesian Dinner, USBG, Working Waterfront Women, Mystery Dinner

| Posted in Events

Monday — Lolita is hosting a tapas event and Oxbow tap takeover, and the Longfellow cookbook club is getting together to discuss Eating In Maine by Jillian & Malcolm Bedell.

Tuesday — The Honey Paw is holding Indonesian dinner in collaboration with Kaki Lima, and the local chapter of the US Bartenders’ Guild is having a meeting at Ri Ra.

Wednesday — author Kate McCarty will be at Maine Craft Distilling to sign copies of her book Distilled in Maine, the Monument Square Farmers’ Market is taking place.

Friday — The Public Library is displaying an exhibit on the Working Women of Portland’s Waterfront, Rosemont on Commercial and the West End Deli are holding a wine tastings.

Saturday — there will be a wine tasting at LeRoux Kitchen, and the Deering Oaks Farmers’ Market is taking place.

Sunday — Leslie Oster from Aurora Provisions is the featured chef at this week’s Cultivating Community Twilight Dinner.

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.

Review of The Honey Paw

| Posted in Reviews

The Maine Sunday Telegram has reviewed The Honey Paw.

A chef once told me that restaurants are a lot like relatives. There are those you visit frequently and always enjoy, a few you see only on special occasions, and several you tolerate. If you’re lucky, though, there are one or two you want to know better. Sure, they have a few quirks, but they’re bright, creative, known for their good taste, and filled with such energy that you look forward to your next encounter…The Honey Paw is that last kind of restaurant.

International Foodservice Editorial Council

| Posted in Events

ifecThe International Foodservice Editorial Council (IFEC) is holding their annual conference in Portland this November.

The IFEC is “a non-profit organization dedicated to improving the overall quality of business-to-business communication within the foodservice industry and to encouraging high professional and aesthetic standards among those working in and with the foodservice media.”

Maine Winners at ACS Cheese Competition

| Posted in General News

Maine cheesemakers took home 10 awards from this year’s American Cheese Society competition, reports the Maine Cheese Guild.

From among 267 companies submitting 1,779 entries seven Maine cheese makers won ten awards including four 1st place ribbons, four 2nd place, and two 3rd place ribbons.

You can see the complete list of winners on the competition website.

Interview with Heather Sanborn

| Posted in Beer, People

The Portland Phoenix has interviewed Heather Sanborn, co-owner of Rising Tide.

KB: You have a small rack of barrels aging in the back of the brewery. Will that be a bigger part of your model going forward, or are your barrel-aged beers more of a side project?
HS: I think that remains to be seen. Right now we don’t have more space for barrel aging, but that’s about to change. We have a 8,000 square foot warehouse in Westbrook that’s coming online in about three weeks. We just hired somebody to manage it and we leased a box truck that we’re going to use to bring things back and forth. So we should have a lot more space for barrel storage soon. Then it’s really just a process of ramping up that barrel program over time. It takes a long time to build up a successful barrel program at any kind of scale.