I have a new summer gig that I'm excited to share with you - I'm a guide with the Maine Foodie Tours in Portland! These tours are a lot of fun whether you're a local or from away, and the best part, of course, is that you'll get to hang out with me for 3 hours.
The tour I'm guiding is a 2-1/2 hour walking tour of the Old Port. We'll stop into local merchants and sample their products, while learning about the history (culinary and otherwise) of Portland and the food industries that drive our state economy.
And as you can see from the above picture of samples at the Vervacious stop, you get a wide variety of Maine-made products, including seafood, sweets, beer, mead, and cheese.
The tour covers about 1.5 miles in town and really highlights what makes our town and state so special. Not that I've seen them all, but I feel like few towns do as good of a job integrating local products with the tourist and service economy.
On the Maine Foodie Tour, you get a chance to learn about these industries (cheese, blueberries, craft beer, potatoes, seafood) while sampling the final product in a locally-owned shop. I mean, it doesn't get much better than that, right?
And you get the chance to watch a grown man play with a plastic lobster- where else can you find that? (OK, don't answer that question- I know the answer.)
And I'll admit that the first time I heard of the tour, I was a little apprehensive. Like, have you ever been on a duck boat tour? Sure, they show off the great city we live in, but I wouldn't be caught dead on one.
But after a few minutes on the Foodie Tour, I knew that this was something I could own and be proud of. I'd love nothing more than the opportunity to show off the rich cultural and culinary scene in Portland to both visitors and locals who seek to learn more about their hometown.
And for $41, you get a sample at each 7 stops, and 2 1/2 hours of edu-tainment. In addition to the walking culinary tour, there's a trolley tour and a walking chocolate tour of both Portland and Freeport.
So if you're looking for something to do when you visit Portland this summer or a unique way to entertain those out of town guests, check out the Maine Foodie Tours and maybe I'll see you on a tour!
