A taste of Maine

Dig your teeth into seafood and other regional specialties

	Lesley Spencer of Malvern, Pa., holds up a lobster roll and onion rings at Five Island Seafood in Five Islands, Maine, July 16, 2006.
Pat Wellenbach / AP

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By BETH J. HARPAZ

Associated Press Travel Editor

updated 6:01 p.m. ET July 18, 2006

Lobster pounds and clam shacks. Pick-your-own berries and local corn. Whoopee pies and Italian sandwiches. Baked bean suppers and fiddlehead ferns.

Those are just a few of the ways you can experience Maine through food when you're on vacation. A new book called "Dishing Up Maine" offers recipes for classic Maine dishes like baked beans, strawberry shortcake and blueberry muffins, as well as listings for culinary experiences around the state, from farmers markets and food festivals, to lobster pounds and clam shacks, to fine dining.

Here are some recommendations from author Brooke Dojny - winner of the James Beard Award and a former prep chef for Martha Stewart - for sampling Maine seafood and other regional specialties.

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* Enjoy fried seafood at clam shacks by the side of the road, or order up your fresh-caught lobster at a lobster shack on a working pier. Place your order at a window, get a number, and pick up your food on a plastic tray with paper plates. The best places have long lines, but they're worth the wait.

"It is just one of those quintessential Maine experiences," Dojny said.

Try chowder, typically "made with steamer clams and milky and buttery and brothy," she said. If you're not up for a whole lobster, try a lobster roll, made from chopped lobster, mayo and a little lemon juice, heaped in a butter-grilled, top-split hot dog roll.

Dojny's favorite seafood places include Two Lights Lobster Shack in Cape Elizabeth, near Portland on what Dojny describes as "a beautiful dramatic headland, the entrance to Portland Harbor, marked by two lighthouses. On a foggy day, it's quite an experience sitting there with the foghorns booming."

Another favorite is Harraseeket Lunch and Lobster, a quiet and unspoiled place "a world away" - but just a short drive - from L.L. Bean's bustling retail store in downtown Freeport.

* Look for signs on local roads for baked bean suppers "put on by local churches or civic organizations as fundraisers," said Dojny. Pay a few bucks and share whatever the community has cooked up - pies, casseroles, coleslaw and of course baked beans, "all homemade and almost invariably just delicious," Dojny said. Maine baked beans are typically simmered for hours with molasses, onions, salt pork, and mustard, "until they absorb all that sweetness and get rich and dark and syrupy."

* Look for strawberry shortcake at country fairs, food festivals and in diners. Dojny notes that in Maine, strawberry shortcake is not a layer cake; it's a warm biscuit topped with a little butter, sweetened sliced berries and whipped cream.

* Try tiny Maine blueberries, utterly different from the fat blueberries found in supermarkets. These grow on barrens in the eastern part of the state, and are harvested with a rake. Look for pies, muffins and pancakes at diners and B&Bs.

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