12 minute read
Restaurant Review
around, thick Veal Chops a la Maria, Zuppa De Pesce Fradiavolo, homemade gelato, and Italian-style cakes. Lunch and Dinner Tuesday-Saturday, $13-$25. “Preserving the authentic Italian dining experience.” mariasrestaurant.com 772-9232 MJ’s Grille and Tavern offers casual fine dining in a comfortable environment, with a variety of dishes–from small plates and seasonal salads to steak and local seafood. Handcrafted wooden bar offers a wide selection of beers from around the world, local beers, fine wines, and martinis. Private rooms for parties. Downstairs Tavern open Friday and Saturday nights with DJs and bands. 94 Maine Street, Brunswick. mjsgrille.com 729-6574 North Star Music Café, 225 Congress Street, at the base of Munjoy Hill in Portland. A coffee shop and café offering soups, sandwiches, salads, and specials made from scratch. Eat by our sunny windows or take your food to go. A full coffee bar, sodas, beer, and wine available. Music most nights. Check northstarcafe.net for calendar and hours. 699-2994 O’Naturals serves natural and organic flatbread sand wiches, tossed salads, Asian noodles, soups, and kids’ meals. Quick service, but our leather couches, wireless internet, and com fortable atmos phere will entice you to stay. Flatbread pizza after 4 p.m. and pesto chicken, roast beef, wild bison meat loaf, wild Alaskan salmon, and many vege tarian items–something for everyone. Portland 321-2050 and Falmouth. 781-8889 The Pepperclub is a prize-winning restaurant (“Best Vegetarian” & “Best Value” in Frommer’s Guide to New England) with creative world cuisine. Blackboard menu lists five vegetarian, three fish, & three meat entrées, including an organic beef burger. Relaxed, affordable dining on the edge of the Old Port w/free parking. Open nightly at 5 p.m. 78 Middle Street. pepperclubrestaurant.com 772-0531
Pom’s Thai Taste Restaurant, Noodle House, and
Sushi Bar at 571 Congress Street in Portland (772-7999) uses only high-quality, fresh ingredients in all of their 90+ menu selections, guaranteed to satisfy. Featuring a kids’ menu, monthly specials, made-to-order noodle soup, and $1 SUSHI every Monday & Tuesday. Other locations in South Portland: Pom’s Thai Restaurant at 209 Western Avenue (347-3000) and Thai Taste Restaurant at 435 Cottage Road (767-3599). thaitastemaine.com. SeaGrass Bistro, 30 Forest Falls Drive, Yarmouth, an inti mate 40-seat dining room with an open kitchen. Chef Stephanie’s style of American Bistro Cuisine, with Asian, French, and Tuscan influences, uses fresh local ingredients. Menu changes frequently. Music while you dine Thursdays in October & December. Open Wed nes day-Saturday for dinner, reservations starting at 6 p.m. Visit our website for Cooking Class Information. seagrassbistro.com 846-3885 * Twenty Milk Street, in the Portland Regency Hotel, is proud to serve U.S.D.A. prime and choice steaks and the freshest seafood, combining award-winning classic American cuisine with fine wines in a warm and inviting atmosphere. Featuring crab cakes with lemon shallot mayonnaise, baked escargot, charbroiled chili-lime scallops, and sumptuous desserts. Dinner seven nights a week; also serving breakfast, lunch and brunch. Complimentary valet parking. theregency.com 774-4200 Walter’s, 15 Exchange Street, Portland. Cuisine with “worldly” influences–casual fine dining with a metro politan flair. Menu changes seasonally with popular blackboard specials. Bar manager Steven Lovenguth’s wine list complements Chef Jeff Buerhaus’s menu selections. Interesting cocktails and dessert drinks, also. Open Mon-Sat 11:30-2:30 for lunch; dinner from 5:00 seven nights a week. Private room available for up to 26 guests. walterscafe.com 871-9258 Wells Beach Steakhouse and T-Bone Lounge serves prime steaks, fresh seafood, and delicious salads, featuring Kobe sirloin steaks, stuffed smoked salmon and grilled swordfish in an upscale, plush atmosphere. Enjoy a selec tion from the highly allocated new world wine list, or a signature 28-ounce Wells Beach martini under the starry ‘sky’ of the lounge. 73 Mile Road, Wells. wellsbeachsteakhouse.com 646-2252 Yosaku, at 1 Danforth Street, is an authentic Japanese culinary experience, designed by owner Sato Takahiro and lead chef Matsuyama Masahiro. Premium sushi, sashimi, and rolls, including Yosaku roll, spicy scallop roll, Godzilla roll, Portland Pirates roll, and traditional cooked Japanese cuisine for the sushi-shy. Enjoy a bento box beside a tranquil Japanese waterfall. Lunch Monday-Friday 11:30-2, SaturdaySunday 12-3. Dinner 5-9:30, Friday-Saturday 5-10:30. 780-0880 *reservations recommended
Ms. Portland DinerMs. Portland Diner
The newly restored landmark is sure to be a favorite of early risers…and nighthawks, too.
Walking into the Miss Portland Diner catches you off guard if you’re expecting nostalgia alone from this 59-year-old lady. Our first impression was a spanking new 48-seat addition to the classic Worcester dining car–quelle nouveauté. Waiting for a table, we were asked if we’d mind sitting at the counter. Of course not, but where was the counter? Whooshed up a small flight of stairs, we entered a time-capsule paradise. Snuggling onto our low bar stools at the gorgeous original marble counter, we were immediately greeted by fellow diners marveling, “They’ve done a great job with this!” Indeed they have. Owner Tom Manning, who hails from Munjoy Hill (his father still lives in the family home on Morning Street), is returning to Maine from a long stint in New Jersey as Director of Administration at Newsweek Magazine.
“I have three young children (6, 4, and 2) and am tired of spending hours and hours commuting. My wife (Stefanie Hirsch Manning) has fallen in love with Portland, too, and will eventually be leaving her position as Associate Publisher of Marketing at O, The Oprah Magazine.”
The whole atmosphere at Miss Portland seems as transforming and energetic as the medical and office high-rises that have spurted up next door. But back to bacon, how good’s the food here? This is as good diner fare as we have ever enjoyed–not ‘gourmet,’ but the real deal. Heavenly, meaty corned beef hash ($8.29) mingled sensuously with my perfectly poached eggs and crisp tasty homefries. My partner’s Southern style sausage gravy with biscuit ($7.49) was rich, creamy, and flavorful, the homemade biscuit light and just right.
We’ll be back in a heartbeat for the Ben edict encounter, including the Classic with Canadian bacon ($8.49); Maine crabmeat or lobster ($10.99-$13.99); vegetable, with zucchini, yellow squash, mushroom, red pepper, asparagus ($10.99); or Florentine, with sautéed spinach, and grilled tomato ($8.99); all served with hollandaise. From the griddle, dive into pancakes: buttermilk, blueberry, banana, chocolate chip, banana walnut, or strawberry. Or how about Belgian waffles with blueberries, strawberries, yogurt, or maybe cinnamon raisin French toast?
For breakfast sandwiches, tear into the Southwest burrito ($6.49) with eggs, mushroom, onion, green pepper, black olive, and cheddar, and the vegetable burrito ($6.79). Or sail into the “Miss Portland Diner”: English muffin, egg, and American cheese ($2.79); add ham, bacon, Canadian bacon, or sausage ($1.29).
All this and parking, too. Welcome home, Tom! We’re glad you’re here. ■
Miss Portland Diner, 138 Marginal Way, Portland. 210-6673 Breakfast 6-3 p.m. weekdays; 9-3 Saturdays and Sundays; dinner menu/hours coming soon.
Actors shown: Evan Thompson and Daniel Noel | Photo: Darren Setlow
Sponsored by: LL Bean, Maine Home + Design, Diversified Communications, Port City Life and Whole Foods Market
PORTLANDSTAGE STAGE where great theater lives Tickets: 207.774.0465 | www.portlandstage.com
White Noise (continued from page 45) a binding-free plywood plank with a leash that the rider held. Half a million were sold as toys in the 1960s and 1970s. But it wasn’t until legendary boarders (including Jake Burton Carpenter of Burton Snowboards) developed the sport and its equipment, and Dimitrije Milovich (founder of the snowboard company Winterstick) got snowboards covered under ski liability insurance, that snowboarding took hold.
Then the snow wars began.
“Those punk knuckle-draggers are dangerous,” outraged skiers protested. Initially snowboarders were limited to a few trails; still skier-boarder crashes proliferated.
Bridgton native Sven Cole, who’s worked in the ski industry in Maine and New Hampshire, says a lot of the problems between skiers and boarders grew out of a lack of understanding. “Unlike skiers who face down hill, snowboarders have a huge blind spot—their heel-side edge.” When skiers and snowboarders first brushed up against one another, “Skiers who came too close in the blind side or who didn’t give the boarder a wide enough berth often got hit— and blamed the boarder, even though the skier had a share of the blame. Add to that the fact that inexperienced snowboarders generally chew up the surface of the snow—and in the early days of the sport, nobody’s snowboarding skills were all that good—and you had a pretty volatile situation.”
Seth Wescott, Maine’s most famous snowboarder and gold medalist in snowboard cross at the 2006 Olympics, saw it all. “I started snowboarding at age ten, and I experienced a lot of name-calling. It was strange for a little kid to deal with. I loved the physical sensation of snowboarding, but it was odd to run up against adult prejudice.” Wescott admits in the early years, people on snowboards weren’t always in good control; there were no metal edges on the boards to aid in carving turns and stopping, and “riding styles were pretty unrefined.”
Cole, like many snowsports professionals, says snowboarders like Wescott were the saving grace of the ski industry. “There’d been an aging of the sport of skiing: Participants were getting older, there were fewer new and younger skiers, and we had to be glued to the snow. Then along came snowboarding with its young riders who wore baggy clothes and were disrespectful to the buttoned-down, wealthier skiers who
thought they owned the slopes. Suddenly this new sport was driving the growth.”
At first limited to a few trails, snowboarders claimed more and more of the mountain. (Today only three U.S. ski resorts still ban snowboarders: Alta in Alta, Utah; Deer Valley Resort in Park City, Utah; and Mad River Glen near Burlington, Vermont.)
Boarders were looking for different kinds of challenges–more like what they attacked on skateboards–and so terrain parks were born. At least the parks kept snowboarders away from the skiers–but then skiers found they like to play in the parks, too. Skiing became cool again, and participation in the sport grew.
According to National Ski Area Association, 16-year-olds—55 percent of whom are snowboarders—account for more total ski area visits than any other single age group. This bodes well for the future of the sport and suggests that snowboarders may dominate the slopes in the future.
Barb Schneider, manager of Mogul Meisters, Sunday River’s program for 7- to 14-year-olds, says a lot of youngsters see riding as “cooler” than skiing. “Often, the parents are skiers, and the kids have skied before trying riding. Most parents are accepting of both, but I have had parents say, ‘I don’t want my kid on the dark side.’”
Rick Bisson, a Sugarloaf skier, admits when his youngest son asked to board at age three, “I told him he had to learn to ski first, which he did. Then, at five and a half, he came to me and said, ‘I can ski. Now can I snowboard?’” Bisson takes a balanced view. “You have to do both. How can skiers confront or look down on riders when they haven’t tried it–and vice versa?”
Located at Sugarloaf, Carrabassett Valley Academy has turned out some of the most accomplished competitors in both sports, including boarder Wescott and fellow Olympic skiers Kirsten Clark and Bodie Miller. CVA’s snowboard coach, Chris Clark, started out as a skier. “We still run into people who don’t understand boarding and what the sport has become. For the most part, the misconceptions are humorous–and it’s mostly the older generation who haven’t had an opportunity to embrace the sport.”
Talk to some of Maine’s most accomplished young riders and it’s clear that, while they and the freestyle skiers generally hit the slopes in baggy clothes, they’re not the rude rebels the stereotypes might suggest. Dylan
Tues-Wed
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Darienzzo, one of CVA’s hottest snowboarders, is articulate and thoughtful.
“You can’t really compare skiing and riding. We try to be interested in each other’s sport, but we have different mind-sets.
When riders see something at the side of the trail, we try to hit it. There’s creativity in the jumps and spins we do; it’s not all about going fast.” Makayla Brown, a Naples native who specializes in giant slalom at CVA, says, “Skiers make fun of riders and riders give it right back. At the end of the day, we respect each other.” Josh Harrington agrees. The 20-something started skiing Shawnee Peak at 3. He later snowboarded for two seasons, but today he’s primarily a freestyle skier who applauds what snow-
boarding brought to the snowsports industry. “However people get on the mountain, it’s good for the sport and good for the participant. We’re all out there together, sharing a mountain sport.” n
A SnowboArder’S View of the world
Snowboarders are to skiers as...
❆ Red Bull is to Viagra ❆ Buffalo Wings are to Shrimp Cocktail ❆ iPod is to 8-Track ❆ Jägermeister is to Hot Toddy ❆ Saw V is to Pillow Talk
A Skier’S View of the world
Skiers are to snowboarders as...
❆ Grace Kelly is to Paris Hilton ❆ Cary Grant is to John Krasinski ❆ Obi-Wan Kenobi is to Luke Skywalker ❆ Bart Starr is to Bartman ❆ All About Eve is to Saw V
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THE MAINE NARROW GAUGE RAILROAD announces service to the North Pole!
Inspired by the award-winning book by Chris Van Allsburg–listen along with the story as the train makes its roundtrip journey to the North Pole. Meet Santa and enjoy caroling, hot chocolate, and a cookie. And, for those who believe, a collectible sleigh bell for each child. Kids are encouraged to wear their pajamas! An unforgettable journey, departing the Ocean Gateway depot.
TRAIN SCHEDULE Nov. 28, 29, 30; Dec. 5, 6, 7; 12, 13, 14; 17-23 at 4, 5:15, 6:30 & 7:45 pm
TICKETS AT PORTTIX: WWW.PORTTIX.COM (207) 842-0800 $25 Adult / $22 Child
FOR MORE INFORMATION: Call the Maine Narrow Gauge at (207) 828-0814, e-mail at info@mngrr.org, or check the website at www.mngrr.org
TM & © Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (s08) Based on THE POLAR EXPRESS book and characters. TM & © 1985 by Chris Van Allsburg. Used by Permission of Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
