Editor’s note: Starting this week, readers can get daily updates on South Portland by going to www.keepmecurrent.com and linking to reporter Linda Hersey’s blog, where she’ll post updates on unfolding news stories and interesting anecdotes and facts that don’t appear in the newspaper. The following is an excerpt from the blog:
The owner of Beale Street Barbeque insists it will be business as usual at the popular dining spot, when the bulldozers and jackhammers start clearing the restaurant site for construction of a four-story office building.
Michael Quigg says he and developer Andrew Ingalls have an arrangement that allows for the chicken-and-rib joint off Waterman Drive to stay open as site work is done this fall. The 50-seat restaurant serves lunch and dinner, specializing in Memphis-style, dry-rub barbecue.
“We are still looking for the right space,” Quigg wrote in an e-mail, about his search for a new Beale Street location in South Portland.
“We have a mutually beneficial agreement with our landlord which will allow them to begin work while we are still open and will give us a little more flexibility with our time frame.”
Ingalls said that he plans to start work in October on the site. Beale Street’s lease expires early next year. Meanwhile, Quigg is scouting several properties for a new location, among them the Broadway site where Newick’s seafood restaurant operated.
(For an e-mail exchange between Hersey and Quigg, in which he answers more questions about his restaurant, see Hersey’s blog.)
Burrito-Eating Championship Wraps Up
(Posted Sunday, Sept. 23)
It came down to a half-eaten burrito. OK, it was three-quarters of a burrito.
That is what separated champion Tim “Eater X” Janus from Sonya “The Black Widow” Thomas Saturday in the Costa Vida World Burrito Eating Championship in South Portland, which I previewed in a Current newspaper article last week.
The Mexican restaurant on Western Avenue was the site of a Major League Eating competition that featured 15 professional speed eaters, including Thomas, who set a Maine lobster eating record in 2005.
After 12 minutes of messy competition, Janus emerged as champion, polishing off 10 3/4 Mexican wraps filled with rice, beans, pork and cheese. Thomas devoured 10 of the 18-ounce wraps.
Not exactly a photo finish. But Janus was able to stuff enough in his mouth to squeeze by Thomas in the final seconds.
Janus received a $3,000 cash prize and his name in the record books. He also holds world records for tamales and tiramisu.
Saturday’s chomp was captured on amateur video by someone in the audience, who posted it on YouTube. Thomas was the only female competitor. Janus is wearing the face paint.
(For a link to an amateur video from the eating contest posted on YouTube, see Hersey’s blog.)
South Portland’s Rocking City Manager
(Posted Saturday, Sept. 22)
Many South Portland residents know James Gailey as the acting city manager, an all-around good guy who stepped in to run operations after Jeff Jordan retired in 2006 and Ted Jankowski quit without notice in 2007.
But most people probably don’t know that the quiet button-down manager also is a 1970s metal head. We’re not talking about the kind of metal you find in the public works yard. This metal is the eardrum-bursting retro sounds of Van Halen and Led Zeppelin.
Gailey disclosed to WBLM deejays last week that his top album of all time is Led Zeppelin IV, a vinyl that featured “Stairway to Heaven,” the all-time classic rock radio favorite.
Gailey’s top 10 albums also included two Van Halen records, one with the shaggy-haired singer David Lee Roth and the other with Sammy Hagar, who more recently marketed his own boutique-brand of tequilla called Cabo Wabo.
Perhaps Gailey can decipher for us the immortal Led Zeppelin line: “If there is a bustle in your hedgerow, don’t be alarmed now. It’s just a spring clean for the May Queen.”
Send questions/comments to the editors.
