Portland, ME food and drink
posted September 3, 2014 2:16 PM   RSS | iCal | +googleCal

Sat October 4 at 4:00 PM, Great Lost Bear
540 Forest Avenue, Portland, ME, USA (Map & Directions)
Hi! We'll be meeting up (some of us for the first time in Portland!) at Great Lost Bear on Saturday, 10/4, at 4 pm. We'll be bringing our one-year-old daughter, and hope you'll bring your young kids as well! (Of course you're welcome to bring your old kids but they probably don't want to be seen with the likes of us.) Food, beer, whatever...it's going to be superb.
posted by supercoollady to Meetup (23 comments total) 1 user marked this as a favorite

Welcome to Portland! We moved here in December. It's awesome.

We've had a meetup before at Salvage BBQ, it's kid friendly and has awesome food and drink options for kids and adults alike. What part of town are you in? Salvage is West End-ish. Weekends are good in general, but I'll be gone the weekends of Sept 20/21 and maybe 27/28, so selfishly I hope you pick October.

MeMail me if you have any questions (like how to handle trash, holy jebus that about killed me to figure out for some reason) about living here. I can give you newbie perspective!
posted by donnagirl at 3:49 AM on September 4, 2014


Salvage worked well and I can confirm both it and donnagirl are kid-friendly since she was kind enough to take ours off our hands during part of the last meetup.
posted by yerfatma at 5:36 AM on September 4, 2014


Sounds good! I have a 2.5 year old and a 4 month old... depending on how many kids there turned out to be we could do something playdate-y, and/or I'm always up for Salvage or other Portland food options.
posted by selfnoise at 5:44 AM on September 4, 2014


Hooray! Great!
posted by supercoollady at 10:24 AM on September 4, 2014


Don't know if we'll be able to do Salvage, though, we're both vegetarians and it seems pretty meat-exclusive. Donnagirl, for your sake (and our own -- we'll be doing some out of town time in mid-late Sep as well) let's shoot for early October?
posted by supercoollady at 10:32 AM on September 4, 2014


Ah sorry, then yes Salvage is totally out. First places that come to mind are Silly's or Flatbread Company? Both have non-token vegetarian options, both are larger places that kids tend to like, both have beer on tap.

OTOH, both can be a bit too busy at the wrong times, particularly Flatbread which sometimes has epic wait times for a table in the evenings.

Any other suggestions anyone?
posted by selfnoise at 1:34 PM on September 4, 2014


Yeah, no love for the veggies at Salvage. Sillys is good, and cute. Great Lost Bear might also be a decent place, veg options there, as well as copious beer. Outside of normal dinner/happy hour, we should be able to manage a bigger group there.
posted by donnagirl at 4:55 PM on September 4, 2014


My landlord works at Great Lost Bear so that might be a little weird (although he's totally lovely.) What's this Silly's? Would they be amenable to, say, a late afternoon-type thing?
posted by supercoollady at 1:35 PM on September 5, 2014


Silly's is a sort of big somewhat ramshackle restaurant on the East End with a large menu and some beer/sangria/etc. It's kind of a dive but fun. You can see their menu on the website. They always make a point of having vegetarian and vegan options.

There are probably more good vegetarian options in Portland but I can't think of them off the top of my head, someone else might know.
posted by selfnoise at 7:35 PM on September 5, 2014


How does Saturday, 10/4, seem?
posted by supercoollady at 1:54 PM on September 8, 2014


Works for me.
posted by donnagirl at 8:34 PM on September 8, 2014


I don't have any plans on that day after mid morning or so, so it would work for me.
posted by selfnoise at 6:59 AM on September 9, 2014


I am disappointed neither of you went with "10/4 good buddy". What time?
posted by yerfatma at 7:44 AM on September 9, 2014 [1 favorite]


Damn, can't believe i missed that opportunity. 4:00? That way we're pre-dinner rush.
posted by supercoollady at 10:34 AM on September 9, 2014 [1 favorite]


4:00 sounds good. I just checked their website for the menu, and noticed this: "We do not take reservations and we don’t seat large parties till the whole party is here as we don’t save tables and have limited large party capabilities. Sorry about that. We can only split checks 4 ways".

I don't know that any of that has to be dealbreakery, but it's just something to keep in mind. Bring cash to solve the split check issue, everyone try to actually come at 4 and not do the trickle in meetup thing? I've only been there once, and we were just a party of 2, so I don't really know how strict or problematic any of that would be.
posted by donnagirl at 6:04 AM on September 10, 2014 [1 favorite]


Yeah, it might be an issue depending on how large this ends up being. They are usually pretty slow around that time but more than say, six people might be an issue.

I don't immediately have a better veggie suggestion, other than Flatbread Company? I can't really remember how they do large parties and their website is not really helpful in that regard.

Unfortunately I don't eat out much these days so I'm probably missing someplace obvious.

(also are we trying to keep this walk/transit friendly? Not sure what the radius is)
posted by selfnoise at 6:26 AM on September 10, 2014


We're happy to go anywhere where they're kid-friendly and serve food that doesn't feature meat. We'll be driving since we're in South Portland, and I have no clue, so whatever you all think is best is great with me, assuming there's some possibility of parking!
posted by supercoollady at 10:04 AM on September 10, 2014


Family-friendly pub with food menu also a good option. Thanks to you who are putting up with me proposing a meetup but then having no clue where to do it!
posted by supercoollady at 11:32 AM on September 10, 2014


Unless the landlord thing is horrifically weird for you (totally fine if it is), I'd suggest Great Lost Bear again. I see kids there all the time, decent vegetarian section on the menu, beer and other drinks for days. Unless your landlord is waitstaff, you won't see him, and even so, you might not. It's biggish. Lots of little areas and nooks we could commandeer and expand into if necessary. Bar area seating is open, seat-yourself style,which would work for trickle-in. Parking typically not a problem between their lot and street parking on Forest Ave. Easy to find even if you don't know the area well.
posted by donnagirl at 11:56 AM on September 10, 2014


OK, Great Lost Bear it is! I'll confirm above. Please come and bring your many mewling children!
posted by supercoollady at 12:00 PM on September 12, 2014 [1 favorite]


Awesome! Can't wait to meet you!
posted by donnagirl at 8:54 AM on September 13, 2014


We are here, anyone else?
posted by selfnoise at 1:05 PM on October 4, 2014


We grabbed a table in the back room to the left when you're coming in.
posted by selfnoise at 1:09 PM on October 4, 2014



This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments