Maine Tasting Center, 506 Old Bath Road, Wiscasset will host the 2nd annual Maine Needham Festival on Saturday, Sept. 28. This family-friendly event, free to attend, celebrates the cultural and culinary tradition of Maine Needhams with food, games, vendors, themed drink specials, Needham-making demonstrations and classes, and even a homemade Needham contest. Needhams, also known as “potato candy,” are a traditional Maine candy consisting of a coconut and potato filling covered in chocolate. With a history dating back over 150 years, Needhams have long been one of Maine’s favorite sweet treats.

Last year, Gov. Janet Mills signed a bill that designated the last Saturday of September as Maine Needham Day, an annual day of commemoration for this historic treat and the small businesses that have kept it going for well over a century. Motivated by this official recognition, Malaika and Gerard Picard, owners of Maine Needham Company in Saco, partnered with Sara Gross of Wiscasset’s Maine Tasting Center to plan the first festival to celebrate Maine Needham Day. This year, the planning committee has grown to include Kristen Fraizer of Wilbur’s of Maine in Freeport and Bob and Kate Gartland of Robin’s Confections in Biddeford.

The festival is intended to be a day of celebration for the culinary tradition of the Maine Needham, Maine potatoes and Maine itself. “There are many candymakers here in Maine that carry on the Needham tradition and we’re thrilled to have so many of them participating in the festival – as vendors, sponsors, and even as judges for our homemade Needham contest,” said festival coordinator and Maine Needham Company owner Malaika Picard. Wilbur’s of Maine and Robin’s Confections are two such candymakers, who will both be participating as vendors, judges and sponsors of the event.

Maine Tasting Center is proud to, once again, host the festival on its newly renovated campus. “Our entire purpose is to educate about and promote Maine’s food industries and producers, so participating in this event was an easy decision for us,” said General Manager Sara Gross. “We’re really excited to help bring this community celebration to life.” Amongst the festival’s many attractions will be Needham-making demonstrations led by Maine Tasting Center Culinary Director Liz Gross, and the debut of a specialty Needham-inspired brew by Blaze Brewing Company of Biddeford, in the campus Tasting Room. Other attractions include local artisans and vendors, live music by Isaac Boll and Jud Caswell, food trucks, and much more. Planning for the festival is well underway but additional support is needed to make it the best it can be. The committee continues to seek sponsors, vendors, volunteers and homemade Needham contest competitors. Interested in participating in one of these ways? Learn more and sign up at MENeedhamFest.com

Thanks to its generous sponsors, the 2nd Annual Maine Needham Festival will be free to attend! There will be a limited amount of parking available on-site as well as satellite parking at a nearby location with shuttle service to and from the event throughout the day.

Maddy Michaud, of Windham, gases up Thursday at Citgo in Westbrook, where prices matched the statewide average of $3.42 a gallon. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

Gas prices that typically spike in summer as vacationers hit the road are instead falling due to weak demand and strong global supplies. But not so much that motorists notice.

“Not really,” Maddy Michaud said Thursday when asked if she’s seen a drop in prices. The Windham resident, who was putting gas in her SUV – a $75 tab, she said, to fill it completely – said as far as she can tell, the price has hovered from $3 to $3.50 a gallon “for a while now.”

She doesn’t plan long trips this summer, using her vehicle to get to her job in Portland and allowing her to fill up just once a month.

At the Citgo station on Main Street in Westbrook where Michaud was making her purchase, gas was selling at $3.42 a gallon, which is the average price statewide.

That’s down from $3.52 on Memorial Day and $3.60 a gallon two weeks earlier, according to data from GasBuddy. In the same two-week period last year, gas prices in Portland rose to $3.53 a gallon from $3.44.

The price of gas peaked at $3.65 a gallon on April 30 and has been falling since, with Maine prices remaining close to national averages.

In 2022, three months after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine rattled global energy markets, gas prices reached $4.77 in Portland on Memorial Day, up from $4.63 two weeks earlier, according to numbers from GasBuddy.

The U.S. price on June 10 was $3.39 a gallon, down from $3.58 May 6, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. U.S. demand slipped to about 9 million barrels a day in early June, about 200,000 gallons less than the same time last year, the EIA said.

Industry analysts say the drop in prices at the pump is due not only to lackluster demand, but also to strong supply and relatively mild global oil prices.

Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, said reduced demand can be traced to a “COVID hangover” in many markets.

“With the reopening of the economy in 2022 everyone hit the road,” he said. “Those who didn’t pushed back to the following year when prices were down.”

Inflation also is a culprit, driving up the cost of restaurants and lodging, and giving vacationers second thoughts about summer driving plans, De Haan said.

Prices also typically rise in the spring because there’s less capacity as refineries are scheduled for maintenance, he said. Capacity is now 95% and prices are “drifting a little bit lower,” De Haan said.

Another factor helping push down prices is a burgeoning supply. The International Energy Agency reported recently that global oil production is “set to ramp up, easing market strains and pushing spare capacity toward levels unseen outside of the COVID (pandemic).”

Andy Price, president and chief executive officer of Competitive Energy Services, a Portland consulting group, said oil “has been struggling to maintain high prices” and seems to be “locked in” at $80 a barrel, plus or minus.”

“The consensus is the market is well supplied,” he said.

Lower gasoline prices could help President Biden in his bid for a second term. The U.S. Department of Energy has announced it will sell 1 million barrels of gasoline by June 30, ahead of the Independence Day holiday, “strategically timed and structured to maximize its impact on gasoline prices, helping to lower prices at the pump as Americans hit the road this summer.”

Observers say it’s too small to make much of a difference. The U.S. used about 9 million barrels of gasoline a day in 2023, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

“It sends a message he’s doing something,” Price said. “It’s more symbolic than anything, I’m sure.”

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Firstly, I need to thank the sweetheart of a human who is Julia Gagnon, the girly who had a more than impressive run on American Idol this 2024 season. Though her schedule is wildly busy from the runoff of the competition, she was still humble enough to make some time for her home state and come co-host Krissy in the Morning the other day. Julia finished the national competition in the top 7, which is unbelievable, and although she didn’t win American Idol, it sounds like that was her goal.

No, Julia didn’t win the title of “American Idol”, but her ambitions are way higher than stopping just at the title of that show. “It’s hard to beat the title that is American Idol, I mean where do you go from there? By losing the competition, it allows me to go home to Maine and focus on my own path”, said Julia on-air with me. You can listen to the full conversation we had on our podcast by clicking right here.

I’ll be honest, I love that she said this. I wrote a whole theory behind why I personally believe that it’s in her best interest to have lost American Idol. From everything I’ve witnessed in this industry, I think it’s best to gain the publicity, and then use it to branch off into what you truly want to do with your career. Nobody tells you what to do, say, or wear. Nobody can dictate your future the way they potentially could if you’re under the grip of a producer or manager you didn’t personally choose. There are still so many other beneficial reasons behind losing this competition and you can read more of them here.

Anyways girlfriend, I am rooting for you in more ways than one, and I believe in your vision to the highest extent. Go get the world girl, you’re talented enough to make your dreams happen and you’ve got all of Maine behind you!