Vena’s Fizz House (facebook, twitter) has launched a line of infusion kits. They come in three flavors: Spiced Apple, Fruit Cake and Pirate Punch.
This Week’s Events: MBC Dinner, Black Truffles at Piccolo, BiBo’s Wine Dinner
Wednesday — Portland Taste Tours is running a Maine Beer Company progressive dinner.
Thursday — Piccolo is holding 4-course black truffle wine dinner, there will be a wine and cheese tasting at the Public Market House, and it’s Industrial Way vs Yeast Bayside at the Great Lost Bear.
Friday — there will be a wine dinner at BiBo’s Madd Apple Cafe.
Saturday — Browne Trading is holding a wine tasting, and the Winter Farmers Market is taking place at the Urban Farm Fermentory on Anderson Street.
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 Twenty Milk Street
The Maine Sunday Telegram has reviewed Twenty Milk Street.
For solid steak-house, American bistro-style fare, the kitchen excels with simple yet well-prepared dishes. Their unique stone-heated bread basket holds a delicious house-made cranberry wheat bread. The lobster stew is classic, and steaks and chops are simply prepared in the Continental style. Fillet of beef from heritage Piedmontese beef is highly prized, as are grilled local lamb chops and Kurobuta heritage pork chops. Desserts are house-made, and the wine list is well represented with bottlings from the major wine-producing regions.
Review of Pai Men
The Golden Dish has reviewed Pai Men.
The next dish was revelatory. Listed under ramen, “mazeman” was a breathtaking bowl filled with scallops, aka miso dashi — a luxurious soup broth enriched with spicy porchetta, yam croquettes, miso cured egg, uni cream, wakame and menma (seaweed and simmered bamboo shoots). This was certainly the evening’s highlight…
Portland Brewery Incubator
If My Coaster Could Talk has written a piece about Industrial Way and the role it plays as an incubator for new Portland breweries.
There is a special neighborhood in Portland, Maine, one that’s developing a pretty solid brewing history, a place that has seen a brewery start up and become one of Maine’s most successful, a place that has seen small startup breweries find their place in the Maine beer scene, pack up and move on to bigger and better things and has also been a place that has seen a brewery close its doors and now is witnessing a new batch of young breweries entering the market.
D.L. Geary, Allagash and New England Distilling are all in that neighborhood. Rising Tide, Maine Beer Co. and Bull Jager started out there, and now Bissell, Austin Street and Foundation Brewing are continuing the tradition.
Off the Wagon @ Oxbow’s Goods from the Woods
The new episode of Joe Ricchio’s show Off the Wagon is now online. In this episode Joe visits Oxbow for their fall festival, Goods from the Woods.
Map & Menu’s Best of 2013
Map & Menu has published a list of their favorite meals from 2013.
The food scene in Portland outdid itself once again last year with plenty of new openings and the continued excellence of many of the city’s existing establishments. And while we tried our best to continue eating our way through town, keeping up proved to be a very tough undertaking. It’d be almost impossible to list all of our favorites, but from our meals of the past year, here are a few of the memorable ones that stood out to the two of us.
Photo Credit: Map & Menu
Immigrant Kitchens: Sudanese Gheema
In the latest entry from Immigrant Kitchens, Lindsay Sterling learns how to make Sudanese Gheema from Ekhlas Ahmed (read the story, get the recipe and see the photos).
Review of C-Squared
Booze, Fish & Coffee has reviewed the C-Squared restaurant at the new Westin.
C2 at The Westin Portland Harborview, Portland, ME — Do you know where you are? You’re in the jungle, baby. You can’t bring this kind of food here and hope to compete with the amazing restaurants in this town. While not truly horrible, C2 is just kind of…meh. We’re in Portland, Maine, a wondrous playground of dynamite local seafood and world-class farm-to-table choices, not to mention a craft beer scene that’s exploding right now. But at C2, you’d never know it. The menu is uninspired, a collection of ho-hum offerings that are perhaps a step above the national chain restaurants, but not much above.
Draft Magazine List of Best Beer Bars
The Great Lost Bear and Novare Res along with Ebeneezer’s in Lovell Maine have once again made it on to Draft magazine’s annual list of America’s 100 Best Beer Bars.