The Front Room should fit nicely into Portland’s roster of restaurants. In fact, it seems that every new restaurant that opens is hitting it right. Take Caiola’s, for example. Headed by chef Abby Harmon who made her mark for years at Street & Co, the establishment offers inventive fare in a wholly convivial atmosphere. It’s both a bustling neighborhood restaurant to a vastly loyal group of West Enders and a destination for others eager for new dining venues.

This seems to be the case at the Front Room. Its grand plan though is different from the competition. For one it‘s open for three meals a day, serving breakfast through dinner. This in itself is a great idea. It’s in the right neighborhood, the menu is well priced and the food is very well prepared.

Oowned by chef Harding Smith who made his mark at such venerable local names as Back Bay Grill and Mim’s, the kitchen is in good hands.

The prices, by standards, are very reasonable. Entrees at dinner tend to be no higher than $15 to $17. And the menu is devised around a world of comfort food, a much overused phrase at times, here a tasty repertoire of home cooking with a twist.

As soon as you walk into the Back Bay Grill you see the open kitchen, the staff in white chef’s jackets and the promise of something wonderful for dinner because the scents and cooking aromas coming from the kitchen are brilliantly satisfying and soothing.

On the other side of town, Hugo’s, perhaps Portland’s most press worthy restaurant after Fore Street, one gets a different first impression altogether. For one, there’s no open kitchen. In fact that part of the dining experience remains securely behind closed doors.

These two restaurants, worlds apart, co-exist happily in the fabric of our city’s diverse dining scene. I had the opportunity last week to go to both on successive evenings, a feat in itself.

Back Bay offers classic American bistro fare—rich, satisfying, easily enjoyed as a full panoply of culinary contentment.

Hugo’s is an experience unto itself, the rapture of floating in billows of culinary invention that are world class.

So be it that the world is a small place and Portland a large one. Or so it would seem as the city looms tethered to an abundance of high caliber eateries co-mingling so closely in such a tiny locale one would almost think we lived in Metropolis.

Indeed, there’s no lack of variety among Portland restaurants--ensuring even the most peripatetic a sense of place. And that’s how it should be. After all, this is a city, such as it is, and diversity is key.

In larger communities new restaurants seem to pop up all the time. Here, of course, the rate is much slower. Ciaola’s is one example of the new kid in town to enter on all fours as an instant success. It’s not a hard formula. Offer good food and friendly service in nice surroundings and you can’t go wrong. Five Fifty-Five came in with a bang and continues flawlessly.

Do I dare, then, in the realm of the end of the year compilations offer my list of the best and the worst?

During Thanksgiving week I found that shopping for plain or fancy ingredients or common or hard-to-find provisions in Greater Portland was mostly a successful endeavor, an undertaking that sometimes proves futile or frustrating even in larger cities.

An essential ingredient for my stuffing recipe was chestnuts. I was looking for whole chestnuts packed in water, which are vacuumed packed and canned. The brand that’s most often around is a French import with a label name of Clement Faugier.

I’ve found it before in town but not always easily. In the past, Browne Trading and the old Portland Greengrocer had a good supply of the Faugier brand.

This year I was surprised to find it at Wild Oats. There were three left on the shelf and I bought them. AT $8 per can it’s an expensive item. Area stores that did not have them but thought I meant water chestnuts when I inquired were Hannaford’s, Micucci’s and the Whole Grocer. There were fresh varieties around, but they’re a pain to prepare.