Beverages

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Seasonal sipping

Fall cocktails at local restaurants
If you’ve got special reason to drown or celebrate this fall, Portland’s mixologists offer several autumnal elixirs that take advantage of the flavors and clean-slate feeling of fall.
By DEIRDRE FULTON | October 14, 2009

Boston Kebab House

An oasis of fresh Turkish and American food in the Financial District desert
Dozens of lousy fast-food chain outlets dot the Financial District. (If I worked there, I'd frequent Chinatown for lunch.)
By MC SLIM JB | October 07, 2009

Solid food, found

Hang on to your dosh -- visit the Lost Coin Café
The Lost Coin Café is unlike any other restaurant in Portland.
By BRIAN DUFF | October 07, 2009

North 26

A Jasper White protégé branches out with great success
I never call chefs before writing a review, but if I did speak with Brian Flagg of North 26, I'd ask him if Jasper White has ever paid a visit.
By ROBERT NADEAU | September 30, 2009

The Stork Club

Jazz and soul team up to make sweet music
Remember Circle: Plates and Lounge? The Stork Club has succeeded that short-lived restaurant and bar, which succeeded Bob's Southern Bistro, itself the recast version of Bob the Chef's.
By ROBERT NADEAU | September 23, 2009

Andrew's Bistro

Posh presentations, reasonable prices
It's not hard for a restaurant to aspire to an upscale experience at downscale prices. What's hard is actually accomplishing it.
By BILL RODRIGUEZ | September 16, 2009

Where everybody knows its name

J.J. Foley's Celebrates its 100th
In describing the changes that have shaped the South End since Jeremiah J. Foley poured his first glass of whiskey there one century ago this month, one need not look far for metaphors.
By CHRIS FARAONE | September 09, 2009

Not drinking in Portland

Non-alcoholic beverages — for your nights 'off'
You're under 21 and your fake ID got denied, or maybe you just need a night off the booze but still want to go out with friends. Never fear. There are plenty of non-alcoholic beverages on offer around town; we've picked out a few for you to try. Some of them, we dare say, are so tasty you should actually skip a PBR and enjoy something with a bit of flavor.
By ANNA PEROCCHI | August 26, 2009

Rowes Wharf Sea Grille

An acclaimed chef, a wonderful setting, and fabulous food
It's hard to believe Daniel Bruce has been executive chef at the Boston Harbor Hotel for 20 years, outlasting the managers that hired him and both of his original restaurants in these waterfront digs.
By ROBERT NADEAU | August 19, 2009

Teranga

The South End's Senegalese restaurant joins the bistro crowd
Teranga is Boston's first serious Senegalese restaurant, but belongs more in the upscale-import category with the Helmand, Lala Rokh, and Orinoco than with typical immigrant restaurants. It's a pleasant and beautifully decorated bistro where diners mingle and have a good time.
By ROBERT NADEAU | July 29, 2009

Max & Dylan's Kitchen & Bar

From the owners of Scollay Square, another fine bar-restaurant that does everything fairly well
Who is Max? Who is Dylan? The casual visitor cannot know. We know that the owners also have Scollay Square (which is not located in what used to be that square), so we have our suspicions that Max and Dylan are children or cats, or a confected evocation of the contrasting merits of ethnicity and cool.
By ROBERT NADEAU | July 15, 2009

Spiga Ristorante Italiano

A famed Boston chef moves to the 'burbs
I've had my eye on Spiga for a while — even though it is hard to keep an eye on a place tucked into a back street.
By ROBERT NADEAU | July 08, 2009

Franklin Southie

A popular chef's hangout branches out
The original Franklin Café in the South End won friends quickly with a unique combination of minimalist but inventive cuisine, comfort food like turkey meatloaf, an innovative wine-pricing scheme ($15 over wholesale), a terrific selection of draft beers, and the latest hours of any fine-dining possibility in town.
By ROBERT NADEAU | July 01, 2009

Mixing it up

"Two Sculptors and a Painter" at RIC's Bannister Gallery
It seems like a simple exercise you might give students: Get a bunch of plastic bottles, lots of thread, and make some art from it. It's the kind of assignment teachers give to get students thinking about sculptural form and structure. And usually the results feel like a dumb exercise.
By GREG COOK | June 24, 2009

Living Colour, Michael Madsen, and Rhody's new media

Rhode Island has seen its share of media strife in recent years.
The travails of the Providence Journal are the stuff of coffee house and talk radio chatter. And the troubles afflicting the local newscast fill the pages of this week's Phoenix .
By DAVID SCHARFENBERG | June 24, 2009

Living beyond their means?

The go-go '80s have receded into the oh-no aughties, but not everyone has gotten the memo.
I'm at Bond on a Thursday night, and it's simmering with testosterone and possibility. Spaghetti-legged cocktail waitresses coo at businessmen. Tables spill forth with bejeweled women speaking too loudly and young couples sipping Champagne.
By KARA BASKIN | June 17, 2009

Espèria Grill & Rotisserie

Come for the gyros, stay for the pizza, lamb shanks, subs, etc . . .
The Center House of Pizza was a regular neighborhood pizza place for more than 20 years, and then, two years ago, suddenly changed its name to Espèria and put up a sign for rotisserie.
By ROBERT NADEAU | June 17, 2009

Jack and the Bean Bowl

A tasty vegetarian/vegan cart sneaks past the Back Bay’s guardians of dullness
A tasty vegetarian/vegan cart sneaks past the Back Bay's guardians of dullness
By MC SLIM JB | June 10, 2009

Tory Row

The Miracle of Science guys do it again
Matthew Curtis and Christopher A. Lutes, perfect-pitch masters of minimalism at Miracle of Science, Cambridge 1, Middlesex Lounge, and Audubon Circle, have finally opened a restaurant with a few flaws.
By ROBERT NADEAU | June 04, 2009

Maria's Seaside Café

The place to be in Misquamicut
The recent mini-heat-wave that made us all optimistic that summer really would roll around again set us to thinking about seasonal restaurants along Rhode Island's shore.
By JOHNETTE RODRIGUEZ | May 27, 2009

Falling into you

Something old, something new from Honey Clouds
Between Ron Harrity's skills as recording engineer, label guru (Peapod Recordings), and guitarist/sideman, he's racking up an impressive resume (see the accompanying review of the Isobell record for more details), and the new Honey Clouds record just adds to the list.
By SAM PFEIFLE | May 20, 2009

Recession lesson

Drinkin 'n' thinkin'
Cigarette tax hikes in Rhode Island have smokers kicking the habit.
By MARY ANN SORRENTINO | May 20, 2009

Review: Off the Boat Seafood

Large portions, now served in a larger space
To find Off the Boat Seafood, a South Italian take-out joint that just this winter added a 10-table dining room and a wine list, mainlanders will pass through the Callahan Tunnel and embark on an exercise so challenging it's not unlike finding the Northwest Passage.
By ROBERT NADEAU | May 20, 2009

Trini's Mexican Grill

Splendid Mexican in a mall food court? ¡Absolutamente!
One of the joys of exploring Boston's cheap-eats universe is the occasional serendipitous encounter with an unlikely treasure.
By MC SLIM JB | May 20, 2009

The Local

New Newton favorite attempts less, achieves more
How many times have I reviewed fried calamari just in the last decade? Maybe 70, 80 times, right?
By ROBERT NADEAU | May 13, 2009

The Felice Brothers | Yonder Is the Clock

Team Love (2009)
You want to believe that an album like Yonder Is the Clock is conjured rather than recorded
By ROB TURBOVSKY | April 28, 2009

Letters to the Portland editor: May 1, 2009

Loving Maine
Is Rick Wormwood an inbred Maineiac as some would speculate?
By PORTLAND PHOENIX LETTERS | April 29, 2009

East Side Bar and Grille

What's old is new again — and still in style
Back in the day, a certain brand of bar-restaurant served Greater Boston neighborhoods well with plentiful food: fried seafood, steaks and chops, and usually some Italian-American dishes.
By ROBERT NADEAU | April 29, 2009

Poppa B's

Sweet Southern hospitality + fine Southern technique = matchless Southern comfort
Pity the poor transplanted Southerner in frosty New England. Iced tea comes from powder. Nobody's heard of a butter bean.
By MC SLIM JB | April 22, 2009

Panza Ristorante

A good North End restaurant without a line? Enjoy it while it lasts.
Panza, which replaced Cibo in a small space just off the busiest blocks of Hanover Street, strikes a nice balance between red-sauce expectations, a bit of cheffery, and prices you can live with.
By ROBERT NADEAU | April 22, 2009

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