Eating our way through Portsmouth, New Hampshire
We explored this small town to celebrate our anniversary for 4 days in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Oliver and I decided to take our anniversary trip to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, because we have traveled all along the East Coast and Portsmouth was one city that we have not yet visited so here is our experience and our recommendations of this beautiful town!
Weather: The best time to visit any town in New England would be from the month of May to late September. However we’ve visited this month in April and the temperature ranged from low 40s to high 50s.
Places to eat:
Breweries:
New England surprisingly has a pretty big craft beer scene. Notably known for its IPAs.
Personally, we aren’t huge IPA fans, but we did a brew hop here in town!
Loaded Question Brewing
a small brewery right out of town (but walkable from the city center) a nice list of different brews. We tried the coffee lager and it was nice. Not our favorite, but the atmosphere of the brewery was great! Oliver loved their merchandise wall!
Liars Bench Brewing
a little walk towards town and right next to a auto shop is Liars Bench Brewing. Also has great seating outside and offers hotdogs with various different toppings.
Portsmouth Brewing Company known as the best beer in town. We got a blonde ale and red ale on nitro. This was our 3rd brewery that we visited and decided this was the best beer that we have tried so far. until… we went to…
Eagle Earth Brewing Company ABSOLUTELY OUR FAVORITE BREWERY HERE. It was a two minute walk from the place we stayed at and it had a nice indoor and outdoor seating area with a separate gift/ merchandise shop as well.
The servers are super nice and cool! All the beer we tasted was fantastic. Notably the Snare Trap (Belgian tripel) was our favorite. We even went back the next day.
They also have a happy hour on Thursdays from 3-5pm! $2 off pints!
Others:
Tributary Brewing Company
Great Rhythm Brewing Company
Throwback Brewing Company
If you drive a little north into Kittery, Maine you will also be able to visit Definitive Brewing - which we loved visiting in Portland, Maine.
Cafés/ Coffee:
Caffe Kilim
Caffe Kilim is a Turkish coffee shop that also sells goods from Turkey! They Turkish coffee is a pleasant surprise! It is decorated with Turkish rugs and postcards from all over the world, and the coffee table books are travel related as well! Definitely travel atmosphere!
This coffee shop opens at 6:30 am. The other coffee shops here do not open till 7 or 8 am.
Wicked Mini Cafe - does have indoor and outdoor seating, but mainly just went for mini donuts. Very quick service and reasonable prices. If your into sweets, go for it. If not, skip. ✌🏻
The Green Room
All around Portsmouth you will see lots of smoothie and açaí bowl shops. (Surf vibes?) The Green Room serves fresh breakfast, smoothies, and bowls. Everything on the menu can be modified to be either gluten free or vegan.
We tried the breakfast burrito (called Bernie’s) and got an açaí bowl. It was enormous for the price we paid. We even had leftovers to eat for lunch!
Elephantine Bakery
Rated 5.0 stars (212 reviews) on Google. It is a artisan bakery serving breads, pastries, as well as breakfast and lunch. French with a twist of Mediterranean!
A beautiful bakery that makes you want to sit in there forever and enjoy the atmosphere. Coffee is great as well!
Restaurants:
Ohana Kitchen
Serving poké bowls and sushi burritos. Perfect for taking out some healthy food and heading to the coastline of New Hampshire. We both got the Spicy Crunchy Ahi bowl and loved it. Nothing super special about this place, but if your wanting to seat something fresh and clean, this is for you.
Pink Bamboo Cafe
The only restaurant in town that serves Chinese hot pot. We were craving Asian cuisine as right now we are traveling in small towns of Maine…
Pretty good hot pot and you have the option to do half spicy and half mild. We recommend the spicy broth with beef and chicken. The prices are super reasonable and the owners are super nice.
Botanica Restaurant and Gin Bar
A tasteful gin cocktail bar that serves French cuisine. They have old traditional gin cocktails as well as cocktails that have quite a twist (roses, cardamom, jalapeños, etc).
***Be sure to make a reservation! They tend to fill up fast.
Cava Tapas and Wine Bar
A super nice restaurant experience. We started with a bottle of wine. We got to choose four dishes from the spring menu set menu. We had a real good time celebrating our anniversary at this special place. The place is small, dim lit, and the servers are absolutely wonderful. Oliver and I would definitely come here.
Portsmouth is have a restaurant week and the participating restaurants all are serving three course meals from $25 or $45.
April 21st - 30th
**pricing is per person and does not include drinks or gratuity. Be sure to tip your servers! And be sure to make a reservation when you can, a space fills up quickly during this culinary event.
Come visit Portsmouth! We loved this little coast town.
