Portland Food Map

12/16/2025

A new wine🍷and cocktail bar🍸 called Marquis Lounge is under development in the Arts District at 150 Park Street. Meg Bartos and bartender Jacob Coombs are taking over Sagamore Hill from owner Ryan Deskins who founded the bar in 2018. Following Sagamore’s last day in business on New Year’s Eve, Coombs and Bartos will begin renovations and hope to fully launch Marquis in time for Mardi Gras on February 18th.

Bartos and Coombs are looking to French American history, New Orleans speakeasies and contemporary French bistros as touchpoints for the concept and design of Marquis. Their vision for the business is as a a welcoming and inclusive neighborhood bar that has a “vibe [that] is sophisticated, elegant, and a touch eclectic”.

Coombs will be developing a cocktail list includes New Orleans classics like the Sazerac and Vieux Carre, and Absinthe Frappe, along with a rotating menu of house designed cocktails and after dinner drinks like an Underberg Grasshopper. Marquis will also offer formal absinthe service with the option of three different labels of the spirit. The beverage program will also include a set of non-alcoholic cocktails, as well as a set of beer and spirit pairings.

The wine program will include a list of 12 still wines by the glass and bottle as well as a selection of champagnes. A food menu of desserts and New Orleans-inspired bar snacks, flatbread pizzas, will be available along with caviar and champagne.

Coombs is originally from Skowhegan and the couple met while he was bartending in Saint Croix. Since moving back to Maine he’s worked at a number of local establishments and is on staff at Sagamore Hill. Bartos has lived in France. She is a serial entrepreneur; this will be her fourth company and the first in the hospitality industry.

The name of the business is a reference to the Marquis de Lafayette whom the Lafayette Building was named for. On his tour of America in 1825, Lafayette visited Portland and stayed at the Mussey Boarding House which was located near the corner of Park and Congress Streets. The motto for the bar will be “Cur non?” which translates as “Why Not?” and was used by Lafayette on his coat of arms.

12/14/2025

The highly anticipated Tuan Yuan Hotpot is officially opening for business this week. The restaurant is being launched by Qi Shen, the owner of Sichuan Kitchen, and is located at 29 Forest Ave in the former Able Baker space on the first floor of the Portland Stage building. The name of the restaurant means reunion dinner.

The menu includes a short selection of appetizers like wings and the four-fold crispy pumpkin cakes (shown below). The bar menu includes wines by the glass, beer, cider and nonalcoholic drinks as well as sake. The sake menu features sakes from Japan and also from Farthest Star, a producer located in Medfield, Massachusetts.

The heart of the menu are the Sichuan hotpot options. They have a both a vegetarian Mala-spicy soup and a chicken with pumpkin soup. Vegetable options for the hotpot include winter melon, napa cabbage, and lotus root. Meat options like lamb shoulder, frog legs and rib eye steak, seafood options like mussels, prawns, and seafood dumplings, and the soy-based options are 5-spice pressed tofu and two types of tofu skins. Overall there are 28 add-ins to choose from for a hotpot meal.

Tuan Yuan seats 79 overall with a number of 4-seat hotpot tables and a bar area on the first floor, and seating for 32 with two 8-person marble-topped tables in the mezzanine dining area.

Tuan Yuan will be open Monday through Friday, 5 – 11 pm, and will open at noon on the weekends. While the official opening is this Monday, they’ll be soft opening this Saturday and Sunday for any who happens to walk in.

12/12/2025

Blue Barren Distillery & Restaurant has taken over the former Sweetgrass spot on Fore Street in Boothby Square where they’ve opened a tasting room. Their December hours are Thursday through Saturday, noon – 5 pm operating in a pop-up mode selling their spirits.

They plan to hold a grand opening this spring with an expanded set of retail offerings to include glassware, shakers, syrups, bitters, wild blueberry-based products, apple cider vinegar, hot sauce, salts and soaps made with the botanicals sued in their spirits, and Barren’s merchandise.

Jeremy Howard and Andrew Stewart founded the business in 2019. Their restaurant is located at the Lyman-Morse wharf in Camden and their distillery is in the Midcoast town of Hope.

They produce a wide range of gins, vodkas and rums, as well as a whiskey made in collaboration with Cushnoc Brewing, an apple pommeau, a blueberry eau de vie and some other spec

12/09/2025

UPDATE: Tickets for the dinner have sold out.
Krista Kern Desjarlais is relaunching The Purple House with a new menu and concept on December 18th. The North Yarmouth restaurant will be open Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays serving multi-course “fancy luncheon” with a menu (a sample menu is on The Purple House website) that will feature dishes influenced by her time in Paris and Rome tied together with seasonal Maine ingredients. Reservations/Tickets: https://thepurplehousebakery.com/winter-seatings
With regard to the menu, Desjarlais shared, “Fancy lunch will feature a mix of individually plated dishes as well as family style with cheese, multiple desserts and sweet treats to round out the experience. And to accompany the food there will be a non alcoholic pairing selected from producers throughout the world. Lunch is the perfect time to explore non alcoholic ciders and wine alternatives. Lots of fun flavor profiles to taste without needing a nap before you drive home! There are many wine makers in Europe as well as Quebec and a few in the United States who are exploring producing terroir driven non alcoholic beverages that are delicious and interesting for pairing with foods.”
The Purple House🏡 will be serving a 3+ course lunch on Thursdays and Fridays, with an indulgent 5+ course meal available on Saturdays. There will have a single seating of the 8-person table each day. Dishes will be accompanied with nonalcoholic pairing. Customers will also have the option to BYOB wines of their choice.

Tickets are now on sale for dates in December, January and February with dates in March and April to be released in early 2026.

Desjarlais got her start in the late 1980s cooking at The Elms in Westbrook, and after many years working in leading restaurants in New York, Paris and Las Vegas returned to Maine in the early 2000s. She operated her first solo venture, the acclaimed pocket-sized restaurant Bresca, from 2007 to 2013. Desjarlais then went on to launch her seasonal lakeside ice cream shack Bresca and the Honey Bee in 2014, and The Purple House in 2016. Desjarlais was a Beard Awards nominee in 2011 for her work at Bresca, and again in 2020 for The Purple House as well as an awards semifinalist five additional times in the Best Chef: Northeast category.

12/08/2025

Aomori Restaurant is set to open this afternoon. The restaurant is being launched by acclaimed chef Masa Miyake along with his son Reo Miyake and Reo’s partner Helen Carter.

The self-described Japanese soul food restaurant will be serving a menu inspired by Maine and Japan’s Tohoku Region. The menu—which has the option for a 6-course Kaiseki prix fixe—includes chilled small plates like stir-fried celery (see below), medium sized dishes like shio-koji marinated pork chops, braised vegetables, and fried seafood (Kaisen Katsu, below) and final course Shime dishes like udon with duck and meatballs (bellow). The menu also includes soups, onigiri, a rotating selection of desserts as well as a raw bar, and selection of hand rolls and sashimi. Aomori is donating $1 of every order of the Yodare Dori to the Food for All Services Food Pantry.

The bar (see menu below) offers sake by the glass, carafe and bottle, draft beer and wine by the glass, classic Japanese drinks like a whisky highball and house designed cocktails like the Hato which is made with reposado tequila, Cointreau, daidai, jasmine and Mitsuya cider.

The 47-seat restaurant will include a bar, table seating including a 10-seat table for larger groups, and a 6-seat chef’s counter. During the summer Aomori will also have outdoor seating.

Aomori is located in West Bayside on Parris Street. They’ll be open Sunday through Thursday 5 – 10 pm, and Friday/Saturday 5 – 11:30 pm on a walk-in basis. The team also plans to launch Aomori Kitchen and Market in an adjacent space next year. It will be modeled after the conbini convenience stores in Japan—an all-day combination convenience store, cafe, bar and quick service eatery.

The restaurant is named for the region of Japan that Miyake is from. The similarity in climate was part of why he opened his first Maine restaurant, Food Factory Miyake, in Portland in 2007—the small BYOB sushi bar quickly developed a reputation for excellence. The restaurant moved to its present location on Fore Street in 2011 and for a time the original space was home to Miyake Diner, an izakaya-style restaurant. Pai Men Miyake opened on September 15, 2010. In early 2024 he sold his restaurants to two members of his staff.

12/04/2025

This week's Maine Food & Dining Report includes word of new restaurant called Sea Salt Fry Company under development in Wells, a new candy shop 🍭called Oh, Grow Up! under construction Bangor, a 4½ review of Finestkind in S**o and additional news from Harpswell, Gardiner and Bath.

Read more about them all here:

12/03/2025

Wow India opened for business today. The new Indian restaurant is located at 649 Congress Street in the Arts District.

The kitchen is headed up by owner Prakash Jayavelu Singh and chef Pardeep Prasana. Singh started his career in India. For nearly a decade he was a chef at Tulsi in Kittery where he and Prasana crossed paths.

The menu includes a wide selection of Indian dishes and some that are at the crossroads of different culinary influences like the dish of mussels shown above which is prepared with a cilantro-kokum coconut broth. The bar menu has local draft beer from Allagash, Lone Pine, Maine Beer Company and Batson River along with Indian beers, wines by the glass and bottle, mocktails, and a selection of house cocktails that tap into Indian ingredients and flavors like a tamarind margarita and a lassi cocktail made with mango lassi, rum, Cointreau, coconut milk and Cardamon.

Wow India will be open Monday through Thursday, 11 am – 2:30 pm, 4 – 10 pm, Friday/Saturday, 11 am – 2:30 pm, 4 – 11 pm, and Sunday, 11 am – 2:30 pm, 4 – 9:30 pm.

11/30/2025

There's a lot going on in the Maine food scene right now! This week's Maine Food & Dining Report includes word of a new 🍔🌮 food truck in Rockport, a restaurant in Old Orchard Beach, and of Modestman's plans to relocate their 🍻tasting room South Portland. There's also news about a 🍞bakery coming to Oxford and a bakery in Hebron launching their retail shop, an interview with Ger Liang Tysk the owner of Red Kettle Kimchi, an article about the Amish-run Savory Meat Shop in Unity, the auction of Burger Boy in Caribou and lots of other food news from Brewer, Ellsworth, South Portland, Rockland, Camden, Westbrook, Veazie and Skowhegan.

You can read the full report here:

New food and dining developments are taking place all across Maine. Here are some recent updates to keep you in the know: A new restaurant called The Local OOB (website, facebook, instagram) recently opened in Old Orchard Beach. They’re located at 23 Washington Ave in a space previously occupied b...

11/27/2025

The owners of Arcadia have leased the former Soakology space at 511 Congress Street where they plans to open Bad Neighbors. Dave Aceto, Nicole Costas and Dennis Gaines envision the establishment as a “Hi-Fi Listening Space”. 🎺🎵🎸

Aceto shared, “We’re excited to bring another third space and unique nightlife experience to Congress Street and the 500 Block. The programming is inspired by independent radio stations like WFMU and WMPG. While the bar will play album sides throughout the evening, each night will have a dedicated 3 hour block focused on a different genre, band or influence.”

Costas will be working with chef Evan Richardson to develop the food and beverage program for the new establishment. Watch for menu details to be released next year. Richardson was the founder of Eaux and of Cafe Louis in South Portland and is the owner of Costa Media, the Cafe Louis outpost in Camden.

Bad Neighbors will seat 75 people (see floor plan below) with a mix of bar, booth and table seating along with a standing room area and pool table. The sound design of the space is being developed by Gaines who is a sound engineer.

The team hopes to launch Bad Neighbors in the spring, and plan to be open starting at 4 pm Wednesday through Sunday, with weekend service including brunch, cocktails and coffee, available 10 am – 3 pm.

11/23/2025

Rambler Cafe recently reopened for business. They’re located at 463 Stevens Ave in the space formerly occupied by Rwanda Bean, and prior to that by the Black Cat Coffee.

Owner Charlee-Ann Charron took over the coffee shop earlier this year and relaunched it last week after a redesign of the cafe. Charron and her team are serving a full line-up of drip and espresso-based coffee ☕️ drinks utilizing Rwanda Bean coffee including their house special The Brambler Latte which is made with house made blackberry and vanilla syrups (shown above).

The food menu includes croissants 🥐, Danish, muffins, bagels 🥯 from Orchard Ridge Farm in Gorham, and on Sundays pastries from their neighbors at Norimoto Bakery. Shown above is the Za’atar special from this last weekend which was topped with whipped feta, honey, cucumbers and fresh dill.

Billed as Portland’s “Original Flower Cafe” Rambler also sells flowers and bouquets. Charron previously operated a mobile flower truck which she launched in 2022. 🌸

Rambler is open Tuesday through Friday, 7 am – 2 pm, and Saturday/Sunday, 8 am – 2 pm.

11/20/2025

This week's Maine Food & Dining report includes word of a new coffee shop in East Machias, and new restaurants in Wells, Winslow, Biddeford, Belfast and South Berwick as well as ones under development in Bethel and Kittery. There's also additional news and information from Naples, Eastport, Ogunquit, Old Town and Fort Fairfield.

New food and dining developments are taking place all across Maine. Here are some recent updates to keep you in the know: Bold Coast Coffee (website, facebook, instagram) has opened a cafe in East Machias. They’re located at 447 Main Street in a newly renovated space in the building behind their f...

11/10/2025

The latest edition of the Maine Food & Dining report includes word on the launch of a new wine and cocktail bar called 🍋🍸Lemon Bar (see menu in post) in Rockland, a new bakery 🥐 opening this week in Brunswick and the upcoming launch a new pan Asian restaurant in South Portland. It also has additional food news and info from Sanford, Hallowell, and Kittery.

New food and dining developments are taking place all across Maine. Here are some recent updates to keep you in the know: Carly and Wesley Summers have launched their wine and cocktail bar Lemon Bar (website, instagram) in Rockland. The menu (see below) features natural wines, spirit forward cocktai...