010: Snack Sunday, or baristas + bites
Since we started working on Pilot Lites, we’ve had it on our list to work with baristas + bites, a coffee shop located on Fore Street in the heart of Portland’s Old Port. It’s a favorite of Riley’s, and now Kelsea, too! In fact, between visiting for recording and writing this blog post, we’ve been back a few times each, once for a podcast meeting!
baristas + bites is the home of Love, Kupcakes and we’ll get to their amazing pastries, but they also do tons of fresh food, super fast! They offer from scratch breakfast and lunch options, including tons of vegan and gluten free options for those of you with dietary restrictions.
When we talked to Erika while picking out goodies, she told us that they source all their eggs, nitrate-free bacon, free-range chicken, and sausage from Maine Family Farms and they source all their produce from whichever local farms has what they need at the time, but that some of their faves are Snell Family Farm and Stonecipher Farm. On top of all that, their coffee is locally roasted by Coffee By Design (a Portland staple, TBH), which is all organic!
If you do decide to eat in-house, we highly suggest the sconewich. Om nom nom.
The day that we recorded, we didn’t have time to stay and eat in house, so Riley grabbed a few snacks and brought them back to Kelsea’s for us to try while we recorded.
We had Love, Kupkakes’ gluten-free chocolate cupcake with caramel & sea salt, a vegan, gluten free peanut butter cookie, a chocolate chip sea salt cookie, French puffs, and a hermit bar. Riley also grabbed her favorite drink from Rise Brewing Co - a Blood Orange flavored nitro cold brew coffee. Everything was delish, and for the gluten-free/vegan options, there was absolutely no way to tell! Those French puffs led to our favorite podcast moment so far, so you’ll definitely need to listen on Weed Wednesday to check that out! Just be careful with that coffee thing - it’s an acquired taste, which Riley loves, and Kelsea was just meh about .
Every time we go back, Kelsea gets one of those chocolate chip cookies to go along with her coffee, which is high praise, considering chocolate chip cookies are her favorite. The staff here is lovely and fun, armed with great recommendations if you can’t decide, and you should go check them out! Through the rest of March, if you mention the show, you’ll get 10% off your order, and we’re dropping some stickers at their counter, so go grab one!
