Restaurants in Portland, Maine
IF YOU KNOW | JAN 31, 2021
Briana Holt
WHO
Restaurants
WHAT
Portland, Maine
WHERE
About
Briana Holt was born and raised on Martha’s Vineyard, a small island rich in east coast agriculture and foodways. Briana moved to Maine in 2013, a year after Will and Kathleen opened the first Tandem Coffee location. In 2014, Briana helped them open their second location, the now-acclaimed Tandem Coffee + Bakery. At the bakery, you’ll find the pastry counter full of familiar classics with a bold, whimsical edge. Briana and the rest of the team have a commitment to building strong relationships with Maine farms, featuring as many locally grown grains, fruits, produce, and meat as possible.
In 2015, Tandem Bakery was among Bon Appetit magazine’s “50 Best New Restaurants in America” with Briana touted by the editors as a “pastry genius.” Come 2020, she was named a semifinalist for Outstanding Baker by the 30th Annual James Beard Awards, an annual roundup of excellence in the restaurant and food industry.
PHOTO BY GRETA RYBUS
A family-style super cozy Salvadoran spot on Washington Avenue. I almost always get more pupusas than I think I can eat as one human, but it’s so worth it. The curtido alone would bring me back begging for more, doused in the red and green salsas and piled high on a hot cheese pupusa. The enchiladas are a close second fave, but the miracle happens when I can get there on a day they make menudo. The beefy tripe broth and the crunchy plantains soaking in it? Come on.
Atsuko Fujimoto has been baking mind-blowing desserts and pastries here in Portland for half my lifetime. She’s my Portland superstar crush for sure. Her adzuki bean sweet treats, laminated doughs and sake chocolate cakes are so killer. She made a black sugar St. Louis gooey butter cake this past year and the memory has sustained me ever since. For a time, she ran a pastry shop at Ten Ten Pie and it was a joy to go in and see what she’d made that day. Now she bakes and delivers to several coffee shops in Portland and I consider her skill and style to be a citywide treasure!!
Steffi and Brian Davin run this homestyle German restaurant (they are the nicest and coolest). Breakfast or brunch is my favorite here, but dinner is just as revelatory. Homemade breads all smell and taste like my Austrian nana used to make. I have a hard time not getting two orders of potato pancakes. The gulasch is as brothy and paprika-y as I always want it to be. The spatzle is done southern style, with emmenthaler and onions and a cucumber salad – don’t skip it! And I like bringing my own wine to a restaurant. Along with all the books and comfy chairs and perfect atmosphere, it makes me feel like I’m going to a friend’s house.
Vien and Jess, the owners of this Vietnamese restaurant, are old friends – they operate what I think is the prettiest spot in town (I’m a sucker for pink, a sucker for animated waterfall art and a sucker for that high BTU wok stove). It’s really, really hard to go there alone (and I love going to restaurants alone) because I want every goddamn thing on the menu. The mouthwatering chicken haunts my dreams. The pho ga is just what you need, every time. And the spicy noodles (don’t even try them if you ‘kind of’ like spicy food) are so good I suffer through the pain. And don’t tell anyone, but they make the best desserts in town.
Vien and Jess run a space and a company that I value in this city. They care for their staff, care for their community and have made a commitment to using the kitchen and the resources for mutual aid and collaboration. I love eating there but even more I love having these folks in town with the values and creativity that can help push the food industry forward!
If you’ve met me, you’ve heard me talk about wings (and probably onion rings) more than you’ve ever wanted to. Tomasos makes them both so well; their onion rings are transcendent. Their two-red-hot-dogs + fries deal is too good to be true, and nothing tickles me like a good dive bar with shot-and-a-beer specials. It’s a chill, fun staff, and they play all the baseball games I want to watch. When the world is once again safe for dive bars, I’ll be at Tomasos three times a week surrounded by all the dirt wings and onion rings to love me and carry me through.
Sun isn’t a restaurant, it’s a market and grocery store (although I might eat enough ongiri there to consider it a lunch spot). I go here all the time and always spend three times as long as I mean to, getting into rowdy conversations with the owner, Sejong. I can find almost everything I need here: tea that I love, tea I've never had, all the spices I need, my favorite brand of dark sweet soy sauce, dried and frozen fish products I can't get anywhere else and everything I need to make cheesy tteok which I simply can’t.stop.eating. Sejong and his family have worked tirelessly to transition Sun to a safe and welcoming place to shop during the pandemic and I’m so grateful to be in the same city as them!
This Eritrean spot is one of my favorite places in town. I’m so grateful they were able to stay open for takeout despite not being able to spread into the street like many other hot-spots in Portland. I sure do miss sitting inside the sunny yellow room. The injera here, though it's made similar to Ethiopian injera with teff flour (the world's tiniest grain!), is somehow so extra delicious and sour and spongy to me. I tend to go for the spicy lamb and ANYTHING they make with okra. And if you call ahead you can get the Bun Coffee Service which is so special: sweet, fresh roasted coffee made for you at your table. I really look forward to going in here again.
The Honey Paw is a spot that makes me feel like family, every time, no matter what, no matter when. The food is always changing, always tasty, always heavy on the sweet and acid combo, which I can never get enough of, and it feels celebratory no matter the occasion. They make a mezcal drink that I'd like to nominate for drink of the century. The Vietnamese style crepe that’s made with masa and stuffed with mussels is my kinda snack – you get to dress it yourself with butter and maple nuoc cham (and that means no one gets to police my butter usage … I use it all). It’s a spot that feels fun and fancy for when pals are visiting, but also magically like a neighborhood noodle spot. I love the long window bar where I can go in, slurp up something right quick, blow a kiss to anyone I know working and head out. Bob's your uncle. Done and done. I love it there.
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“Head bartender at Camparino In Galleria , Tommaso Cecca, is quite possibly the best in town and makes a perfect Negroni.”