The Other Portland

Remember that kooky 7th-Day-Adventist eatery in downtown Manhattan with the $4 vegan lunch buffet? Well, in a gluttonous decision to spend my day off jetting up the Eastern seaboard, I visited Portland, Maine. And within the city’s small downtown area lies the smaller version of said eatery, Little Lad’s-Portland.

The price of the lunch buffet was the same as in New York City-4 smackaroos-but the selection and space was smaller. The charming, friendly and low-key ambiance was also the same, backed by a television looped with 7th-Day-Adventist propagan..I mean, footage. The wholesomely happy host loved that I was snapping pictures of my food. When I mentioned my visiting the NY restaurant he beamed and asked I tell them next time that Little Mike sent me.

I filled my plate with hearty heaps of Shepard’s pie, spoon bread, citrus carrot salad and herbed tofu and ended, as in NYC, with the delicious mint-chocolate “Needem”, pictured below the buffet plate. In the bowl, a superior fruit salad that seemed to have every fruit under the sun, including plum and yellow cherries, topped with Little Lad’s delicious cashew-based sweet cream (recipe here).

My lunch was scrumptious and super cheap. Sure, I wasn’t interviewed by a television crew or given a free bag of flavored popcorn, like in New York… but then again I was not with fellow vegan temptresses CP and FS/AS.