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Monday, May 19, 2008

What an Incredible Boar!

Primo Restaurant
2 S Main St
Rockland, ME 04841
207.596.0770

Vacation is the most inopportune time to exercise discretion or discipline, and yet, there we were. Sunday night, 5:15 p.m., stopping after one martini and one basket of homemade sourdough and onion focaccia. Moderation is a bitch.

Primo. We knew we were in for a special experience once we pulled into the driveway, past the restored Victorian that houses the restaurant, and to the parking lot that’s surrounded by gardens gardens gardens. The freshest herbs, greens, and vegetables ... all for our eating pleasure.

We’ve beaten the dinner crowd, and for most of our meal we have this particular dining room (there’s more than one in the manse) to ourselves. Christy, our server, tells us to jump at the stuffed calamari and boar chop--both very special the last of their kind for the night. We did--we also had the sauteed skate and the boar pate with pickled fiddlehead ferns and baby greens. One bottle of pinot noir. And then we stopped. No cheese plate. No chocolate tart. No cognac. Simply the check, thank you, it was absolutely divine, and nothing could top the boar.

So we head back to our charming suite in the Hartstone Inn. Back to our robes, some 12-year-old scotch, and the hope of catching the latest episode of the Tudors. At 6:45 p.m. ET. We certainly know how to coast.

Saturday, May 17, 2008

I Heart Camden and the Hartstone Inn Hearts Us All

I think it was C.S. Lewis who said that an experience is only fully realized when it’s remembered. I believe that the experience becomes sweeter when it’s revisited. Camden, Maine, 2008. We arrived late on Friday night for 48 hours of relaxation and peace and lobster. It’s good to be back!

Honey P. and I came here a couple of years ago--when work brought us both back at the same time to the area, we decided to return to one of the towns that made us long for retirement somewhere on the East Coast where honey grew up and where I’d like the chance to grow older. Wanting to be in the heart of town, we chose the Hartstone Inn (41 Elm Street, 800.788.4823), a lovely place with several choices of rooms and suites, as well what is arguably the best restaurant in town.

Saturday morning started with breakfast at the inn (ricotta flan, birdseed pancakes, and a delightful patty of chicken sausage, the recipe of which is in Michael Salmon’s Hartstone Inn Cookbook). Then, a walk about town in the grey and drizzle. We finished the Saturday Times puzzle in the Camden deli, shopped some more, and lunched on fried clams and shrimp at the Seafront restaurant. Then, back to our suite for digestion time, sequential massages with Clay-of-the-iron-grip, an afternoon perambulation in the better-late-than-never sunshine, and dinner.

Now, we’ve stayed in a number of B&Bs in our day, but none has been as welcoming and genuine and cozy as the Hartstone. The owners Mary Jo and Michael and all of the innkeepers created a marvelous experience for us--from leopard-print robes and the ultra-plush king-sized bed in our room to the spa treatments that they arranged on our behalf to the first dry martinis they served to us in their orchid-filled parlor to the creamy chocolate souffle that capped our lovely five-course dinner ... all fantastic stuff. Honey P. and I have fantasized about our move to Vermont--particularly, our weekends spent wandering around small towns and staying at country inns. In the best of all possible worlds, we’ll find ourselves back here many times again. 

Friday, May 16, 2008

555, Portland ME

Six fifty-five at Five-Fifty-Five. Friday night, Portland, Maine. Sometimes being in the wrong place at the wrong time can end in the right stuff.

Five Fifty-Five
555 Congress Street
Portland, ME 04101

The background. I’ve been in Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, and back to Maine over the last three days. Not a big feat, granted, and actually a fun series of road trips. Me, my Eagle Creek rollaboard, my macbook pro, the highway, and a Cadillac DTS to which I’d been upgraded at the Hertz counter. Honey P. had speaking engagements planned in the area on Sunday and Monday, so we decided to make a long and romantic weekend of it. I flew in early for business, with the plan of a rendezvous back in Portland on Friday.

Ten twenty-eight. Driving in from Woodstock VT, I get a call from my honey. Plane, missed. Something about showing up to the airport 15 minutes too late to check bags. Unspoken: someone took too long to get pretty and had one too many cups of coffee before heading to the world’s business airport on a Friday morning during rush hour. Standby, arranged for 1:45 p.m. CT.

Twelve twenty-two, my first beer at the brewport of the Portland airport. And fried chicken, the food of crisis.

Two-fifteen. Huzzah, seat confirmed. Reservations for Natalie’s in Camden canceled, we’ll never get there on time. Fore Street, booked until 10:00 p.m.. Arrows in Ogunquit has a table but finds my vacation attire (North Face hiking shoes and microfleece, and Tommy Bahamas khaki shorts) entirely too casual (though I disagree, I look adorable). My private food network (read, Michael, who just knows the best places to go) kicks in--minutes later, we have reservations for 555.

Four fifty-five. My back is aching and my thighs have laptop burns. Honey P. should be here in just a few minutes. Wait! Plane delayed until six.

Six twenty-three. Bag claimed, car found, we’re on our way.

Six fifty-five. Pretty, pretty place. The menu is a short staff of cream-colored papers binder-clipped to a copper tablet. The place is decorated in shades of warm brown and sleek black. On the wall above the bar hangs an award from Food & Wine magazine--the chef Steve Corry was voted best new chef in 2007. We’re early for our reservation, so we decide to sit and eat at the bar instead--a decision I’m happy with ... until I see the main dining room. The space manages to be cozy and airy. Narrow with a lofted ceiling, the room adjoins small, open kitchen where four chefs work with intense zeal. A small number of tables ring the perimeter of the second-floor seating space--lucky diners art those tables have a perfect ringside view. Sigh, back to the bar.

Seven twelve. Our martinis, as well as homemade focaccia and chive butter arrive. Fantastic. Then our appetizers: baby octopus with heirloom garbanzo beans for me, and a lobster crepe for my honey. Entrees were truffled mac & cheese and seared divers scallops with a vanilla-butter emulsion. All, fantastic. But it gets better, still. A young man comes up to us, smiles and says “My name is Ryan. I waited on you two years ago at Natalie’s in Camden, and it’s wonderful to see you two again!” Ryan moved to Portland for grad school and tells us that our restaurant selections for the next two nights can’t be beat. As Ryan leaves, honey P. and I smile at each other--our wonderful weekend has just begun.

Thursday, May 15, 2008

Red Arrow Diner

”Attention, please, virgins in the house,” bellowed our server.
“Red arrow virgins! Welcome, virgins!” she cries in our general direction. A group of gentlemen occupying two booths to the left smile amicably in our direction. One quips, “I’m a red arrow slut.” Indeed, if we lived in Manchester, New Hampshire, we would be, too.

The Red Arrow Diner, stumping ground for political hopefuls, hiding place for tired rock stars, eating space for the rest of us. I sit where Hillary Clinton one parked (the brass plaque says she did, so it must be true). The Barenaked Ladies sat across from me, but unfortunately not on the same day or time. Two orders of corned beef hash and eggs, one order of steak tips and eggs, and coffee all around. One of the things I love about a diner is the expectation of solitude in the midst of company that the settling allows. Damn near expects. It’s OK, then, for us to enjoy breakfast in comfortable, relative silence--not quite awake, not quite social, not quite ready to face the day. And very happy to have found a place that makes perfect dropped (poached) eggs and double-crisp hash browns. 

Next time I’m here, I’ll be back. Who says it’s never as good as the first time?

Sunday, May 11, 2008

In Fine Form

”Indigo?"
“No.”
“Navy?”
“Too light.”
“Midnight blue?”
“No, not that dark. More like a dark dust.”
“It’s darker than dusk.”
“That’s why I said dark dust.”
“How about the walls?”
“Olive?”
“No.”
“Seafoam green?”
“No.”
“Perhaps avocado?” volunteers Annie, our server, who’s done a remarkable job not laughing at our stilted Sports-Night-on-alcohol dialogue.
“Hmm. Like a cross between olive and avocado?”
“Olivado!” we say, in unison.
Fantastic.

Whatever the colors of the walls and ceiling, In Fine Spirits is in fine form with the launch of their adjoining wine bar (5420 N. Clark Street, Chicago), which opened its doors a scant month ago. Michael at the wine shop has been my go-to man for the last year for everything from the perfect birthday gift to the quintessential scotch by the fire to reasonably priced and universally appealing drinks for a crowd. Their new wine bar extends the experience in such a lovely way. Our neighborhood wine shop has now become the neighborhood rendezvous, and not a moment too soon.

I’m told that the tile floors and tin ceiling are original. So is the seasonal wine list created by the four owners (Jill, Shane, Paul, and Johnnie). They’ve got an overflow room space and private rental room on the second floor, as well as the largest off-Clark backyard terrace in the city. A nibbles menu that uses the best of local ingredients (some from fellow shops in Andersonville) keeps one semi-sober as one sips from glass to glass.

And so my friend Jeff and I pass the time at our leisure on this Sunday afternoon. Three drinks and two hours later, we’ve covered the latest in our careers and love lives, waved to several friends passing by our windowfront perch, and declared this our new spot. Annie tells us that the owners want to make the wine bar everyone’s third place: work, home, here. Here--and now--are a wonderful place to be. And while my buddy makes a quick mobile call, I sit and enjoy the color of the ceiling, which reminds me of the hue of the Pacific, roughly a half-hour before sea and sky become indiscernibly one in the night and about a quarter-hour after I’ve remembered how to relax.