Since 1991, 0n Hobson’s Wharf off Portland’s Commercial Street, Becky’s Diner has been dishing up utterly familiar, authentically home style fare. This is a diner than never disappoints — walk in the front door and you can really count on something, even if it’s just lunch. The regulars eschew fancy food phrases like “comfort food,” but at the same time that’s exactly what they come to enjoy. With a world rare on reliability, at this diner the only uncertainty is adequate parking. Guests depend on cheerful service to deliver precisely cooked griddle omelets with the cheese melted to perfection; they feed platters of pancakes to pajama-wearing children, while watching the couple in the next booth enjoy tonight’s special of haddock, macaroni and cheese or roast pork.
Becky Rand is about to fulfill a long-standing dream of making all her own cake and breads, with a completely new baking kitchen to be installed occupying considerable sizeable space on her new second floor. “Finally, we can roll our own pie crusts,” says Becky, her voice taking the same tone in which she speaks about her lemon lush, grapenut custard and bread pudding.
Another feature of this finally approved second-floor addition will be a meeting room large enough to accommodate groups up to 30. The regulars at Becky’s will find little changed; the footprint of the restaurant will simply be 900-square-feet larger, with an extension allowing her to move her kitchen out the back door. The stools and booths will still be red leather, but the cash register will find its logical right place at the front door of the diner.
When the place gets crowded, four tables near the front door have been moved to a different location, so people won’t find themselves waiting in the rain; and finally, Becky’s restrooms will be handicapped accessible.
However, if the heart and soul of every great diner is the camaraderie at its counter space, in this renovation the new counter will be a horseshoe capable of accommodating 30 people — now the capacity is 20.
“People love to sit at a counter,” Becky knows from great experience. “A person alone doesn’t feel comfortable taking up a big booth and at the counter you get to chat with a neighbor and watch your food cooked while chatting with the waitress.”
This sort of interaction inspires a sense of community, and Becky keeps track of about 20 regulars who eat dinner there almost every evening. If a regular doesn’t appear after a few days, she calls to make sure that everything’s all right. A popular source of regulars is retired fishermen, in the habit of rising at 4 a.m. So there they are, every morning, having breakfast with friends at 5 a.m.
Meanwhile, parking at the diner will remain the same hodgepodge of good-natured communication. “If you’re blocking another customer’s car, you just need to talk to each other to keep out of trouble here,” laughs Becky.
It took considerable talk, in fact, to get approval for her second-floor addition, often at what the politely might be termed “a persistently clear volume.”
“There’s been an unbelievable quagmire to get anything done this season,” complains Becky, in reference to her recently approved appeal to rezone her property to allow the expansion.
Becky’s first contract zone didn’t qualify — the diner was deemed a non-conforming use of waterfront space. A July 2004 amendment allowed another waterfront restaurant, Sapporo, to begin selling sushi, but stopped short at Commercial Street’s Fish Pier. “I argued that that fishermen and waterfront workers need to eat, too,” said Becky. “But [the City Council] informed me that I wasn’t a water-dependent, fishing related business.
“They said they needed a task force and so I waited again, missing building season after season — hey, in January 2006 they voted five-to-four promising to be in a hurry,” smiled Becky, not one to find much use in staying annoyed for long.
Becky knows that when patience meets determination, the result can be indomitable. Having grown up on Chebeague taught her a few sustaining life lessons. And it takes an islander’s stamina to run a business open from 4 a.m. to 9 p.m. every day of the year except Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Now she’s building a second-floor porch, overlooking the backyard, to handle the crush of summer tourists. The estimated pricetag on this entire expansion project is steep enough that Becky requests it not be published. “I don’t want people to think we’re getting above ourselves.”