the Front Room

The Room Up Front: Quintessential Munjoy Hill Restaurant Has Not Changed One Bit

February 8, 2022 / / Restaurants, Uncategorized

It took a long time for the The Front Room to get back to normal  after Covid-era dining upheavals.  It’s not yet open 7 days per week but enough of the days (Wednesday to Saturday, dinner only) to make it a steady neighborhood hot spot for dining.  The food is well prepared, peppered with plenty of home-grown ingredients to deem it locally sourced.

The room, however, is not much different.  Tables are not as close together as before but still packed into the room.  I’m not aware that when the restaurant was “closed for renovation” that it included one of those new air filtration systems.  I’d have liked to see tables spaced  farther apart,  and until Portland requires vaccination (x3) cards for entry in all restaurants (and public spaces) as in New York City, I’ll still remain wary of dining-in at places that I’d love to return to.  But any regulations regarding masks, vax cards or otherwise are met by the inane political divide that shrouds our pandemic ideology.  Ultimately the mask rule here and elsewhere  is useless without more stringent controls like proof of vaccination in your back pocket. Today the City Council voted to repeal the mask mandate, another misstep by an out-of-step council.

The bar, the dining room and starter mixed green salad

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The Verdict Is In: IHOP’s Pancakes are Classically Mediocre–Where to Go Instead

April 13, 2019 / / Discoveries, Restaurants

Is there a town in America whose pancakes are world-famous?  The short answer is no.  Yet the national chain, International House of Pancakes (aka IHOP), has institutionalized this breakfast and brunch staple nationwide, and in my local report on pancakes I thought I should experience how flapjacks from a chain pancake house stack up against local hot spots.

I ordered the buttermilk blueberry pancakes.  I asked the waitress if the blueberries used were Maine berries.  She said yes. I should have asked whether they were wild Maine blueberries.  They were not.  They were as large as mini-mothballs, with a striking resemblance in taste.

The conclusion is these pancakes were classically mediocre–doughy, floury and rough tasting.  What’s more, a knife and fork was needed to cut them apart.  The two big blobs of butter that topped the pancakes tasted like butter facsimiles as was the array of pancake syrup on the table: classic, strawberry, pecan and blueberry.  Real maple syrup is available for a $1.99 surcharge.  The classic syrup was nothing more that high fructose corn syrup with traces of maple flavoring and coloring.  I tried the blueberry syrup, too, which had a medicinal taste.

Filled with high-bush blueberries, choice of syrups

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Briefly Noted: The Front Room, the first of Harding Lee Smith’s Rooms, Still Does It So Well

December 16, 2016 / / Uncategorized

We wound up for dinner at The Front Room by default.  Our first pick was the convenience of Roustabout, a few minutes from home.  It was closed for a private party.  Second choice, up the hill to Lolita.  And that, too, was closed for a private party.  It was as though we had spiraled into a conspiracy to keep us from enjoying the dinner hour.   But it’s holiday time and many restaurants in Portland are enjoying increased dining traffic with seasonal fetes.

We found a parking space, however, near Lolita—a   near miracle since the arcane parking rules on Munjoy Hill, Portland’s most trendy neighborhood, defy urban ease, probably the most difficult place to park in the city with No Parking signs everywhere.

Then it occurred to us to repair to the Front Room, a few blocks away. As we approached the restaurant it looked dark.  Oh, no.  Closed too?  It was just the angle of light and darkness that gave that impression.  But as soon as we walked in we were so glad.  What a warm and welcoming room, with its beamed ceilings and open kitchen lauding over the room.

The dining room is warm and welcoming

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The Success of Neighborhood Dining Are Vitally Alive and Well at Lolita

August 5, 2016 / / Restaurants

Neighborhood restaurants have that innate appeal.

They don’t even have to be special, though it helps if they are. Though any restaurant along any street in Portland could be considered a neighborhood place, I define one as this: within the density of a residential neighborhood is the anomalous eatery nestled into the streetscape of row houses, apartment buildings and single family homes.  A perfect example of the genre is Lolita, a dining focal point of Munjoy Hill’s continuing gentrification.

A convivial crowd convenes nightly at Lolita

A convivial crowd convenes nightly at Lolita

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The Front Room: Still Going Strong with Solid Home-Style Cooking atop Munjoy Hill

May 20, 2016 / / Restaurants

The Front Room was a pioneer in 2008 when it opened on Munjoy Hill as a precursor to surging real estate values that now define this revivified East End neighborhood.  Then, however, neo-millennials packed its space for the modestly priced comfort food that its founding chef Harding Lee Smith did so well.

The busy dining room never stops

The busy dining room never stops

Three rooms later (The Grill Room, The Corner Room and Boone’s  Fish House and Oyster Room) packed with patronage of all ages, the original one is still going strong.  I don’t think I’ve dined there in over a year until this past Wednesday when I dropped in to have dinner at the bar.

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LFK: At Sunday brunch it’s all about a very winning heap of homemade hash

October 19, 2015 / / Discoveries, Restaurants

There’s a lot of good corned beef hash served at Portland restaurants–especially those with brunch menus.  In fact, you can get hash on any day where breakfast is served—from hotel dining rooms to dives and everything else in between.

LFK's delicious curried corned beef hash

LFK’s delicious curried corned beef hash

Hot Suppa, Marcy’s, Becky’s, Local 188, Front Room, to name a few have admirable dishes of corned beef hash.

But the winner for the most unusual is cooked up at LFK.  The bar/restaurant follows an interesting concept of offering two plate sizes for many of its dishes.  Whatever size you choose you get a heaping helping of hash in the small ($9) or large ($16) portion size. Unless you’re feeling voracious the small  portion is  plenty big filling an 8-inch round dinner plate to the rim.

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Weekend brunch, Portland: Are you still standing on line to get in?

September 14, 2015 / / Restaurants

From the divine dining annals of  Middle Street (Eventide, Duckfat, East Ender,  et al) to the proprietors on the four corners of Longfellow Square,  the legion of brunch buckaroos waiting on line to get into Portland’s trendiest eateries has spiraled to new highs.  All that craving rush for variations on eggs Benedict or the latest take on tater tots define this culinary madness.

The hot spots, Local 188, Eventide, East Ender and Duckfat

The hot spots, Local 188, Eventide, East Ender and Duckfat

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