Late last month we visited Fore Street on a whim while passing through Portland, Maine. In the main dining room tables are arranged on two sides of an open kitchen scene that includes a wood-fired oven, line, and a glassed humidor of sorts for fresh produce. Although the presence of bread seemed to dominate customer reviews (after all, Standard Baking Company is on premises), it is merely an element that competes for attention within the non-stop bustle.

The overwhelming daily menu flowed from garden salads punctuated with mizuna, Hokurei turnips, and grilled Vidalia to chilled meats and offal offerings that included Maine farm rabbit liver pâté and Pekin duck sausage. Wood-grilled meats, oven-roasted seafood, and fresh vegetables ranged from quail and veal sweetbreads to Atlantic bluefish and hake.

Various menu options provide multiple reasonably-priced smaller portion offerings for relief from selection anxiety: Oysters from Nonesuch River, Winter Point, and Hog Island; tastes of Pekin duck rillettes and Maine farm heritage pork brawn; a chilled seafood platter that includes Maine lobster with pickle and tarragon mayonnaise, sliced yellowfin tuna with favas and grilled scallion sauce, summer flounder tartare with lime, shallot, and fresh herbs, and house-caught Atlantic mackerel with pea tendrils and pistachio gremolata. We cannot make the reach to entrees.

Dessert choices include seven artisan cheeses from York Hill Farm and Hahn’s End in Maine and Jasper Hill Farm and Cabot in Vermont. There are also “simply ripe Maine strawberries” from Wayne, Maine (I love saying that) and delectable hand-made chocolates such as orange and white chocolate bon bons and sage flower ganache truffles.

Are you hungry yet? Service and general staff friendliness are high here. Waitstaff take pride in both their tenure and the quality of this restaurant family. So much so that we elect to visit sister property Street & Company on a future visit (Fore Street remains our favorite), but we never make it to Standard Baking Company, Scales at the Public Market, or Two Fat Cats. It is also interesting to note that Fore Street has an always-open reputation that endears it to locals when they occasionally seek shelter from winter storms. Lucky locals.

Fore Street occupies a warm brick building with an open kitchen in the Old Port District of Portland, Maine