Feb 19, 2025

Portland, ME restaurants & bars

A list of all of my favorite places to eat and drink in and around Portland, ME. This is mostly just a list for list-making’s sake - who doesn’t love a good list - but also figured it would be a useful thing to send to folks who are visiting and looking for recommendations. If that’s you, enjoy your trip!

Unless a list is numbered, assume it’s unordered. If a business doesn’t have a blurb next to it, it just means that I don’t have anything particularly insightful to say about what to get (probably because it’s all good!)

Eats

🫶 Go-to spots

  • Palace Diner (Biddeford) - the best version of normal diner food. Pancakes, french toast, fried chicken sandwich are all 10/10
  • Little Pig - everything is bright, flavorful, and made with love. No wrong answers, but I always have to get Piyathida’s dumplings and usually GraPow Gai Kai Dow
  • Quanto Basta - took me a while to remember how to pronounce “cynar” but yeah get the cynar spritz. Always good to try the special and the Amatriciana is my fav of the regular pies
  • Goodfire (Freeport) - if there’s a special, get it. Otherwise the chicken sandwich is always a good call and the Little Spruce pretzels rock
  • Crispy Gai - obviously all their chicken is great but don’t sleep on the Crying Tiger Ribeye. Top notch cocktails too
  • Sichuan Kitchen - mapo tofu, fried green beans, and eggplant are go-tos. If you’re in person with a group, get the poached fish in fiery suace
  • Boda - usually go apps-heavy, including quail eggs and bacon-wrapped scallops
  • Fish and Whistle (Biddeford)
  • Little Chippy

🎩 Special occasions (or when someone else is paying)

  • Scales - everything is good but be sure to get cornbread
  • Izakaya Mintao - do the omakase
  • Wayside Tavern - best sazerac in Portland. Gotta get the beer battered cod cheek. I love the roasted chicken on ricotta toast and hope some day to try the Monday-only burger
  • Fore Street
  • Leeward

🥪 Lunch

  • Savlatore’s - best sandwich in Portland and it’s not close. It’s also a lot of sandwich - could pretty easily feed two
  • Nura - it’s not always on their menu, but I still think about the schnitzel pita I got there
  • Taco Trio (South Portland) - costs a lot more than you want it to but also the only place around you can get a true cali-style burrito
  • Indy’s Sandwich (South Portland)
  • Little Pig

😎 Nice in the summer (outdoor seating)

  • Terlingua - a board is always an easy call. If you’re only getting one dish, make it the brisket taco. Also don’t sleep on the veggie apps
  • Mami

🥡 Takeout

🥐 Bakeries

🌯 Burrito rankings

  1. Taco Trio (South Portland)
  2. Tacos La Poblanita (South Portland)
  3. Chipotle 😐
  4. Quiero Cafe
  5. Sal de la Tierra

Still need to try:

🥯 Bagel rankings

While these bagels are all good, none of them are truly elite. On a (mostly) unrelated note, I wish one of them would make an egg bagel (Rose has something they call an egg bagel but it’s just a brioche).

  1. Rover Bagel (Biddeford) - they show up at a lot of other businesses, including most Big Tree Hospitality spots (e.g. South Freeport Market, Higgins Beach Market)
  2. Rose Foods
  3. Forage
  4. Scratch (South Portland)

Still need to try:

🥞 Pancake rankings

  1. Palace Diner (Biddeford) - really in a tier of its own here
  2. Miss Portland Diner

Drinks

🍹 Best cocktails

  • Papi - ask for the bartender’s recommendation and be willing to get something that sounds crazy
  • Night Mares - The Gulfaxi is my personal fav but they’re all good
  • Crispy Gai

🍻 Best places for a beer

🍸 Misc. bars

  • Anoche - cozy and a vermouth-heavy menu
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