Tag Archives: restaurant

Power Lunching

March 19, 2012 By in Restaurant Review Tags: , , , , , , , , , , 9 Comments

sportello


Fort Point is now home to some lunchtime giants. I know first hand that a swooping line of hungry nine to fivers occupies Flour without end from 11-3. Their patience comes from visions of tender lamb sandwiched with spunky-sweet chutney, a palm-sized oreo cookie, and a seltzer to wash it all down. The queue at Channel Café is similarly long and proof that Fort Pointers just don’t pack lunches. Why would they? For those looking for a real power hour, though, Sportello is sit-down chic with its lunch counter style and all. It’s mod and clean, almost stark in its whiteness, but somehow the space also proves warm and charming with its friendly (and very “Boston”) servers, place mat menus and casual, up-close and personal open kitchen. Sure, there’s a “takeout” bakery in the same space, but if you have the time, the counter experience makes the meal.

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Finally Fore Street: A Story & Review

November 21, 2011 By in Restaurant Adventures Tags: , , 6 Comments

Hype is a dangerous thing. Hype can lead to elevated disappointment. And, in the case of my family, it can cause heads to butt and food tantrums to spontaneously occur. Fore Street is probably the most well-known restaurant in a sea of fine establishments in the farm-to-table-loving town of Portland, ME. There is some serious hype here, but it’s backed up by a wealth of accolades, including chef/partner Sam Hayward’s 2004 James Beard Award. With an ever-changing menu of seasonal selections, noteworthy desserts and housemade chocolates, three flavor-making heating elements (wood grill, wood oven and turnspit) and a shed-sized in-house vegetable crisper to boot, Fore Street is a restaurant I have wanted to experience for several years now. I have been hilariously unsuccessful in making this happen.

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Area Four: A Lesson in Innovation

October 13, 2011 By in Restaurant Adventures Tags: , , , 1 Comment


I had been anxiously awaiting the opening of Lumière Chef Michael Levitan’s new restaurant “concept,” Area Four. Never having ventured to the Chef’s “project”, Persephone, during its single year of service to hungry hipsters and haute-couturists, I had nothing to gauge the potential success of the Leviton-Krupps partnership. Taking its name from that technological epicenter between Kendall and Central Squares in which it resides, Area Four strives to be all things to all people. On paper, the idea of basing a restaurant around both a bakery/café and a bar/oven seemed intriguing, like a high bow, new-age Cheers for Cambridge denizens and the scientific intelligentsia.

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A Tail of Two Lobster Rolls

September 9, 2011 By in Restaurant Adventures Tags: , , 4 Comments

“Tail”, get it?

Typically, I avoid the North End like the plague.
Well, perhaps not the plague. Maybe I avoid the North End like the flu, as I do head there occasionally for a less than perfect, but satisfactory cannolo from Modern, a sandwich from Volle Nolle, or for the adorable individual packages of imported Nutella from Salumeria Italiana. 
Ok, so maybe I avoid the North End like the common cold, but the point is that the hordes of tourists and the restaurants that get by serving their unknowing patrons lackluster, and often, inauthentic cuisine, prevent me from staying too long. In fact, my favorite places in the North End aren’t even 100% Italian: Taranta is an Italian/Peruvian restaurant (must order: the house made antipasto and the saffron butter brushed grilled trout), and my new favorite and the subject of our long-winded post today, Neptune Oyster, is a seafood restaurant with an emphasis on shellfish.

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