It was a sad day for Portland's restaurant scene when Krista Desjarlais announced that she was closing her restaurant, Bresca. Fortunately, the news came quickly that she and her husband Erik (also a chef), bought the Snack Shack at Sabbathday Lake in New Gloucester. This summer, they served sandwiches and ice cream lakeside, and you could also rent paddle boats and floats, lounge in the shallows or dive off a swim platform.
Now Bresca and the Honey Bee is open on the weekends serving sandwiches, desserts, and hot beverages, with a bonfire and some Adirondack chairs to relax in. In the winter, they hope to have ice skating rentals too.
The blogger contingent set out for the lake last Sunday and were one of a few groups passing through the Snack Shack. We chatted inside the low-slung shack kitchen with Krista while she prepared our sandwiches - I ordered a mushroom and Gruyere panini ($8) which was like French onion soup in crispy, buttery sandwich form.
We were most looking forward to desserts at the Snack Shack since Krista's desserts at Bresca were always amazing. She told me she was looking forward to the slower pace of the fall to focus on desserts, in particular pastry. I had a hard time narrowing down my choices, since there were several tiers of pies, cookies, and tarts. (I wanted all of the fruit tarts.)
I settled on a raspberry plum tart ($4) and a peanut butter chocolate O cookie ($2) and took them to go. After enjoying the beautiful scenery, the autumn sun, and my friends' company, we hit the road back to Portland. While it was only a short trip away, it was nice to leave the city to do something different and come away with a low-key, inexpensive, and delicious lunch.
