{"id":11602,"date":"2016-06-16T18:23:50","date_gmt":"2016-06-16T22:23:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/?p=11602"},"modified":"2016-06-16T18:23:52","modified_gmt":"2016-06-16T22:23:52","slug":"lobster-with-a-twist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/lobster-with-a-twist\/","title":{"rendered":"Lobster With a Twist"},"content":{"rendered":"

Summerguide 2016 | view this post as a .pdf<\/a><\/p>\n

Some of the cleverest chefs anywhere ply their trade here<\/em>. <\/span><\/h3>\n

By Claire Z. Cramer<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"SG16-Hungry-Eye\"Maybe we thought it couldn\u2019t get any more heavenly than truffled lobster mac & cheese at Five Fifty Five. Maybe we swooned over lobster poutine at Boone\u2019s. Maybe sometimes all life lacks is a glass of sauvignon blanc and DiMillo\u2019s lobster roll out on the portside deck in summer. <\/span><\/p>\n

Think again. As long as we have the best lobsters in the world right here, we\u2019ll have Maine chefs dreaming up new thrills for us.<\/span><\/p>\n

Grilled Cheese With Benefits<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe Lobster Melt<\/strong>\u2019s on the lunch and brunch menu year-round,\u201d says Karl Deuben, who co-owns and co-chefs with Bill Leavy at the East Ender<\/strong>. The popular two-story pub shares the eastern-most and hottest block of Middle Street with Duckfat, Ribollita, and the Hugo\u2019s\/Eventide\/Honeypaw row. \u201cWe do it on the Pullman loaf from Southside Bakery<\/strong>. We make our bacon jam and a peppadew relish with fennel and other things, and there\u2019s Pineland Farms<\/strong> jack cheese. Our mayo has lobster stock reduced down to essence. It\u2019s a nice sandwich.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Imperial Treasures<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

We<\/span>\u2019re seated alongside a flowerpot forest of jade trees at Empire<\/strong> watching Congress Street\u2019s usual circus parade. Empire runs like a clock; it has to, because it\u2019s almost always busy. The atmosphere is simple, elegant, and precise. The chopsticks are red lacquer, not disposable. <\/span><\/p>\n

Our waitress sets down a square dish on which four crisp Lobster Rangoons<\/strong> ($8) stand at attention. They\u2019re exceptional, filled with hot, fluffy cream cheese spiked with minced lobster and tiny bits of tobiko roe and scallion. Portland is where everything can be made more fabulous when it\u2019s made with lobster.<\/span><\/p>\n

Our server returns with a bamboo basket holding three steamed Lobster Dumplings<\/strong> ($9). We\u2019re still exclaiming over the tasty rangoons. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou picked some of the best things,\u201d she murmurs, slipping away.<\/span><\/p>\n

Go East<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOne Maine Roll<\/strong>,\u201d commands Yosaku<\/strong>\u2019s owner and sushi master extraordinaire. Takahiro Sato stands tall, bespectacled, and perfectly straight behind the gleaming sushi bar, working in a line with his minions, deftly rolling, filling, garnishing, and plating seafood. In a moment, a Maine maki sushi roll appears. <\/span><\/p>\n

Five perfect cylinders bound with ribbons of black nori seaweed are arranged artfully on a square plate with red-leaf lettuce, pale slices of pickled ginger, and a pyramid of wasabi completing the garnish. Dainty asparagus tips and pincers of lobster claw meat rise up from the rice, avocado, and julienned cucumber in each slice. The perfect Japanese lobster roll is as far east as you can travel from a lobster shack roll\u2013and it\u2019s delicious. It\u2019s $10.50.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe make a lot of these,\u201d says Taka-san.<\/span><\/p>\n

Frisky Bisque\u00a0<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

I<\/strong><\/span>\u2019s no secret that Maine Lobster Bisque<\/strong> is one of our rewards for living in a place where it might snow in April. At shiny new Scales<\/strong> on Commercial Street they\u2019ve taken bisque someplace truly exotic.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s been a little bit of blow-back,\u201d says chef Michael Smith. \u201cYou know, that we\u2019re not making the sludgy version with a ton of cream. Traditional food is like Thanksgiving food\u2013people have their <\/span>
\n<\/span>set expectations.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe make the lobster stock with the shells. We use tomatoes. The base is onion, celery root, thyme, bay leaf, a little smoked paprika, and sunchokes [Jerusalem artichoke]. I like what sunchokes and lobster do together. We deglaze with a good fino<\/em> sherry. We only add a bit of cream before serving.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Scales\u2019s bisque is spicy, nuanced, and more exciting than its simple Yankee forebear\u2013as if the soup pot had snuck off to Marseille on vacation. But it\u2019s served with house-made, hexagonal, flaky-crisp oyster crackers, as if to promise you it hasn\u2019t forgotten where it comes from. It\u2019s $9 a cup.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Golden Roll<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Seafood flies out of Eventide<\/strong>\u2019s kitchen pretty much constantly starting around noon. It\u2019s also around noon that every seat and stool is occupied and will likely remain so until closing time at midnight. It takes a good-sized staff to keep this machine running as smoothly as it does. A bartender, a cold-plate garnishing ace, and a ponytailed whippet shucking oysters are in perpetual motion. Servers crisscross the floor with lobster rolls, fancy crudo, foamy draft beers, and tray upon tray of oysters resting on beds of crushed ice and rockweed.<\/span><\/p>\n

Thee Eventide Brown Butter Lobster Roll<\/strong> is now so ridiculously popular that it\u2019s trademarked on the menu. \u201cWe took the mayo version off the menu,\u201d says my server. \u201cIt was like, why bother?\u201d When asked how many brown butter rolls they\u2019ll make for this Saturday lunch, she says, \u201cOh, I don\u2019t know. Maybe 300?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The roll is steamed and tender, a feather-weight vessel for the lobster meat\u2013bathed in sweet, nutty brown butter\u2013that\u2019s piled into it. A manageable splurge of a $14 lunch. <\/span><\/p>\n

They Ask Why Not<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Shanna and Brian O\u2019Hea, chefs and owners of the Academe Brasserie & Tavern in the Kennebunk Inn<\/strong>, know how to have fun with the beautiful dishes they create. Their award-winning Lobster Pot Pie<\/strong> has been featured on the Food Network show Best Thing I Ever Ate<\/em> and the Travel Channel\u2019s Food Paradise<\/em>. Poached lobster meat, peas, corn, potatoes are topped with pastry. \u201cYes I do make the puff pastry, and it\u2019s hand rolled\u2013very old school,\u201d says Shanna. \u201cAnd yes, Lobster Pot Pie will forever be on our menu.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

But why stop there? \u201cNow we have our Lobster White Truffle Pizza<\/strong> which was featured in Oprah<\/em> Magazine<\/em>. We also have our Lobster Lo Maine<\/strong>\u2013chilled lobster and miso noodles garnished with crispy Asian pork belly.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Summerguide 2016
\nSome of the cleverest chefs anywhere ply their trade here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11606,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[106],"class_list":["post-11602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","tag-summerguide-2016"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11602","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11602"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11602\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11607,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11602\/revisions\/11607"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}