Portland restaurateurs must come to grips with global warming and accept the fact that summers in Portland city proper are hot.

The air conditioning systems in almost all of our restaurants are grossly inadequate. Fore Street is the only place in town that offers a cool dining room no matter the outside conditions. And that’s a pretty incredible feat when you consider the effect of their enormous open kitchen spewing hot air into the dining spaces.

Some eateries still have an AC unit through a sleeve in the wall as though it were a bedroom that was being cooled off.

I for one am not a fan of spending a lot of money to dine out only to be uncomfortable in hot-house dining rooms. The other night I was at one of our better eateries to find that all the doors and windows were open because the AC just wasn’t up to snuff.

That great dining and great design are not always in sync, it's surely a wonder that Portland has become a dining Mecca at all, brandishing so few elements of style whatsoever.

As I've pointed out many times before, we're inundated by small, quaint, often painstakingly funky establishments where the food can be fine yet served in such humdrum, rough and ready surroudnings that you sometimes wonder why it still costs upwards of $100 for two. Truly, if I find myself in another new outcropping of these I'll run to the nearest falafel stand instead.

If you’re tired of the tried and true, then head over to Natasha’s, a Portland eatery that I’ve never cared about, though I know it has its many fans.

The new chef at the helm used to be at one of my favorite restaurants in Maine, Havana in Bar Harbor.

I thought he had taken over the range at Mim’s, which we went to first last night. I happened to mention to our waitress that we were excited about dining there because of their new chef in residence, only to find out that he was at the sister establishment, Natahsa’s.

Perhaps it was a bit rude, but we left and walked over to the other place. And I’m glad we did because we had a really fine meal.