This Week’s Events: Farmers’ Market, Thanksgiving, James & Julie, Black Friday, Duckfat/Oxbow Dinner

| Posted in Events

Wednesday — the Monument Square Farmers’ Market is taking place.

Thanksgiving — If you plan to eat out for Thanksgiving make your reservations now.

  • Brian Boru, Thanksgiving buffet, $23.99 (children under 12 are half priced), noon – 5:30
  • C-Squared, 3-course, $65 per person, 11 – 8.
  • Eve’s at the Garden is serving a buffet, $55 per person, ages 6-12 $24.95 and children under 6 are free.
  • Five Fifty-Five, 4-course dinner for $80 per person, there’s also a 3-course children’s dinner for $35 per person, 1-8.
  • Harraseeket Inn is serving their Thanksgiving Grand Buffet.
  • Old Port Tavern, $20, 3-9.
  • Saltwater Grille is serving a Thanksgiving buffet, $49.99 per person, $14.99 for children.
  • Sea Glass is serving their Thanksgiving Grand Buffet, $60 per adult, children 5-12 are $22, kids under 5 are free, 12-8.
  • Tempo Dulu, 5 courses, $85 per person.
  • Timber, 4-course dinner, $35 per person, vegetarian options available, 1-8.
  • Twenty Milk Street is serving a Thanksgiving dinner.
  • Union is serving 3-($55) and 5-($79) course Thanksgiving dinners, 12:30 – 8:30.
  • Wayside Food Program is holding their annual Thanksgiving Dinner at the Portland Club, 11-1.
  • Zackery’s is serving a Thanksgiving buffet, $27 per adult, $22 for seniors, children under 10 pay their age.
  • While making your own dinner plans, please consider making a donation to the Good Shepherd Food Bank to help them fight hunger in Maine.

Friday — Allagash is holding a bottle release for James and Julie, a “Flemish Sour Brown and offers an aroma of raisins, figs, cherries, and caramelized sugar”, and Oxbow is celebrating Dark Friday with all dark beers on tap and the release of the Black IPA, Snowball.

Sunday – the 4th Annual Duckfat/Oxbow Dinner is taking place.

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 Terlingua

| Posted in Reviews

The Maine Sunday Telegram has reviewed Terlingua.

Terlingua is a boutique BBQ restaurant serving at least three – sometimes as many as five – house-smoked meats, plus a variety of Latin American specialties. With almost every dish available as a large or small plate, it’s also an affordable place for trying and sharing. Start with the bean and corn salad – it’s light, fresh and beautifully balanced – or the intensely flavorful chicharron, a square of pork belly with a crispy, scored skin that’s drizzled with a rosy ribbon of house-infused hibiscus honey.

Why Not Wild Game?

| Posted in General News

Today’s Maine Sunday Telegram explores why it isn’t legal to sell wild game.

…All these local foods are fair game for the innovative local chef who relishes the concept of terroir – the French term for the distinct flavors of the environment foods grows in…But not local wild game, which can’t be sold commercially in the United States. It was regulated out of the retail market so long ago that even some food professionals don’t know why they’re not allowed to serve it.

Under Construction: Mast Landing Brewing Co.

| Posted in Under Construction, Beer

The Press Herald reports that Mast Landing(website, facebook, instagram) is under construction at 920 Main Street in Westbrook. Owners Ian Dorsey and Neil Fredrick hope to open in January.

The nautical theme is carried by the names of the company’s brews. Its flagship beer, the Tell Tale Pale Ale, is a reference to a ribbon of the same name that’s tied to a sail, indicating the direction of the wind.

It’s fitting, [co-owner Ian] Dorsey said, as the company will look to that beer’s reception as an indicator of whether it’s going in the right direction.

The company also has two India pale ales, a blonde ale, an amber ale, a milk stout and a peanut butter stout.

Under Construction: Rhum

| Posted in Under Construction
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Here’s a look inside the construction site for Rhum, the new tiki bar and restaurant under development just off the corner of Cross and Free Streets.

The center of the room is dominated by a large rectangular bar which in addition to being tiki cocktail central will also house Rhum’s raw bar. The east wall of the subterranean space is a long and low serpentine lounge area where larger groups can gather and share some of Rhum’s large scale cocktails.

Rhum is a collaboration between Jason Loring, owner of Nosh and Slab; Mike Fraser, owner of Bramhall Pub; Nat Towl, builder and designer. The kitchen and bar will be led by the talented team of Frank Warren Anderson and Rebecca Ambrosi.

They’ve made a lot of progress on construction since the project began and hope to open Rhum this winter. You can get a taste of the menu at the Rhum sneak peak being held December 1st at Bramhall.

Fall Portland Eating Tour

| Posted in Reviews

Bill Addison, Eater’s roving national restaurant critic, has posted an article about his recent visit to Portland.

Given its favor as a vacation destination, it’s widely known that the town has an astounding breadth of quality restaurants. And the options only keep growing broader and better. It is Maine’s largest city, though the population of the town proper only numbers around 67,000. In my 16 months of near-constant travel for Eater, I’ve yet to encounter a U.S. metropolis of its modest size where I eat more superbly.

The article provides tasting notes and observations on: Central Provisions, Chez Okapi, Emilitsa, Eventide, Fore Street, Hugo’s, Miyake, Palace Diner, Rabelais, Tempo Dulu and The Honey Paw.

Chef Mike Smith at Scales

| Posted in Under Construction, People

Mike Smith has been hired to lead the kitchen at Scales. Smith is a Culinary Institute of America graduate. He has spent six years in Boston working for Ken Oringer and Jamie Bissonnette. Rising through the ranks of their restaurant group to serve as chef de cuisine at Toro. Smith returned to live in Maine last year.

Sam Hayward shared with me that he’s looking forward to working with Smith and to seeing his interpretation of the vision for Scales. The 100+ seat waterfront seafood restaurant being developed by Dana Street and Sam Hayward. It’s currently under construction on the Maine Wharf off of Commercial Street, and is  set to open in 2016.

Food & Wine/Bon Appétit

| Posted in General News

Retiring Food & Wine editor Dana Cowin named a dinner at The Lost Kitchen this summer as one of her Favorite Meals of 2015.

The new issue of Bon Appétit calls out Maine & Loire as an exemplar of what a good wine shop should be, “a small, focused shop with a staff who has probably tasted most of what they’re selling and who genuinely want you to find something great—in your budget.”

Ben Alfiero, 59

| Posted in People

benalfieroBen Alfiero, co-owner of Harbor Fish Market, passed away earlier this week at the age of 59.

Alfiero and his brothers, Nick Alfiero and Mike Alfiero, have been involved in the operation of the Harbor Fish Market since their father Ben Alfiero Sr. founded the business in 1969.

For years, Benjamin A. Alfiero ran the retail store for Harbor Fish Market, which is located at 9 Custom House Wharf on the city’s waterfront.

For more information and public comment see this facebook post by Harbor Fish.