SMCC is offering a set of three culinary classes as part of their Continuing Education program. A collaboration with the state’s Inland Fisheries and Wildlife department, the classes focus on cooking with wild game and fish.
The classes will consist of a cooking demonstration and tasting with SMCC instructor Geoffrey Boardman and discussion with IFW staff.
The Bangor Daily News has published an article on Fore River Brewing Co.
Since the spring, LeGassey and his two business partners, Alex Anastasoff and TJ Hansen, have worked around the clock converting a former salt storage shed into South Portland’s newest commercial brewery and tasting room. The space, created with salvaged materials that include 200-year-old bricks and wood milled from local trees, is a fitting setting for a modern Maine beer company.
The brewery is planning to open later this month.
Portland Phoenix columnist Chris Papagni has written about the recent visit by chef Alfie Mossadeg to Portland for Tempo Dulu’s Singapore Sling dinner.
Raymond Brunyanszki and Oscar Verest, owners of Tempo Dulu and the Danforth Inn, are known for doing things in a big way. They believe that their Executive Chef Lawrence Klang, whose cuisine has been widely celebrated, can benefit greatly from exposure to great chefs from all over Southeast Asia. Flying Chef Alfie to Portland is the first of several chef visits planned for 2016. Each chef will work alongside Chef Lawrence, collaborating and creating a new and exciting menu. This big-picture thinking is what sets Brunyanki and Verest apart from the rest. It’s all about learning, questioning and improving. Chef Alfie has great respect and much gratitude for the two men who brought him to the United States.
Down East has reviewed Portland Patisserie,
The pastries, quiches, soups, and sandwiches at Portland Pâtisserie and Grand Café, in the Old Port, are well on their way to standing on their own, with authentic French underpinnings and just enough New World innovation to keep things interesting. This is thanks to 34-year-old pastry chef Catherine Côté-Eliot, enlisted by owners Steve and Michelle Corry (the duo behind classic Portland restaurants Petite Jacqueline and 555) to translate French patisserie conventions into innovative confections fit for Maine palates.
and the Press Herald has published a lunch review of The Works.
On a nasty late-fall noon hour with a hard rain falling, I dashed across Temple Street from One City Center to finally try what most of my co-workers know is one of the finest sandwich shops in Portland.
The Forecaster has published an update on The Purple House, the cafe Krista Kern Desjarlais’ has under construction in North Yarmouth at the intersection of Routes 9 and 115.
Montreal-style bagels, one of the Purple House’s key offerings…Also anticipated for the menu will be naturally-fermented levain breads, baguettes, seeded breads, and a mishe, or larger loaf, she said. There will also be boulangerie-style pastries, thanks to the wood oven…Roman-style pizzas, vegetables, sandwiches with smoked fish or smoked meat, and other savory morsels are also among Desjarlais’s anticipated midday offerings.
Desjarlais hopes to open sometime in January or February.
The Press Herald has published an interview with James Schwartz on the advent of his 1-year anniversary as the restaurant critic for the Maine Sunday Telegram.
Q: If you could give advice to a restaurant about how to do things right, what would you say?
A: The first thing I would say is cleanliness makes a huge difference. Nothing turns off a diner more than a sticky table. Next, warm service is good. Warm, professional service is better. It’s very nice to have a waiter or waitress who is nice. But it’s better to have a waiter or waitress who is nice but knows what they are doing. The last thing for me would be, simple is always better. A beautifully prepared piece of sautéed fish or chicken is better in my opinion than a poorly prepared piece of fish that is exuberantly sauced. I think gilding the lily is unnecessary.
Today’s Press Herald includes an article on former chef Erik Desjarlais and his business Weft & Warp where he makes knife rolls, aprons, and leather goods.
Most of his customers – as much as 80 percent – are in the restaurant industry, although he also counts serious home cooks as fans. Cooks, bartenders and front-of-house staff all over Portland use his gear, as do employees of such well-known restaurants as Toro in New York City and Atelier Crenn in San Francisco.
“We love his work,” said Ken Oringer, chef/co-owner of Toro in Boston and Manhattan. Toro’s New York service team wears custom Weft & Warp waist aprons. “We love to support any chef/artisans who take risks to follow their hearts.”
Desjarlais has a retail shop under development in Freeport called Intervale Mercantile Co. which he hopes to have open this Saturday.
The owners of Asylum have proposed a renovation and expansion to their building at the corner of Free and Cross Streets. It would add about 5,000 sq ft to the building and include a 2-story addition to the parking lot located between Asylum and the parking garage.
The addition would have the unfortunate impact of eliminating the Greetings from Portland mural wall.
The American Journal has published an update on Mast Landing, the new brewery under construction at 920 Maine Street in Westbrook.
Dorsey, the president and CEO of the company, and business partner Neil Fredrick were already hard at work Tuesday, creating their first “pilot batch” brew in the company’s new 12,000-square-foot space at 920 Main St…When work is complete, Mast Landing Brewing will open a tasting room, another first for the city, but it will also have room to expand. The Westbrook Planning Board approved a special exception for the building on Nov. 17 to allow it to be used as a microbrewery. Dorsey estimates the tasting room would be ready in three weeks.
The Golden Dish has posted a report on the new Winter Farmers’ Market, now located at 84 Cove Street.
The space itself is a bit labyrinthine as the flow of rooms are tight, but overall the multi-room layout works, making the space feel more like a charming boutique than a cavernous warehouse.