The Root Cellar at 89 Birch St. in Lewiston has opened Common Grounds Cafe, offering coffee, whoopie pies and cheese sandwiches Saturdays from 9 a.m. to noon. Staff, from left, are Vicky Crouse, Root Cellar program coordinator Damon Crouse, and employees Klein Dozolo, Nevaeh Warner and Telise Murchinson. Each of the four teen employees is assigned to a station for the day, from running the register and welcoming guests to brewing the coffee. Not pictured is employee is Mucyo Rayira. Submitted photo

This week, the Buzz is hot eats and hot sales.

First up: The new Common Grounds Cafe at 89 Birch St. in Lewiston, the home of The Root Cellar.

Created by Damon Crouse, program coordinator at The Root Cellar, the idea is to give teens there work experience. It opened last month to very limited hours, Saturdays from 9 a.m. to noon, and a very high bar for employment.

“We started with four opening positions for the cafe in which the teens needed to write an essay on why we should hire them,” Crouse said.

The Root Cellar at 89 Birch St. in Lewiston has opened Common Grounds Cafe, offering coffee, whoopie pies and cheese sandwiches. It’s open Saturdays from 9 a.m. to noon. Russ Dillingham/Sun Journal

From there it was developing a business plan, with the teens crafting a mission statement: “To provide a safe and comfortable cafe experience where we get to serve the community of Lewiston. Here, everyone is welcome to have a coffee, a bite to eat and build relationships with those around them.”

Prices on the menu range from $1 for a small drip coffee to $2.50 for a whoopie pie or cheese sandwich.

The teenage employees, who are part of The Root Cellar’s after-school program called LewCrew, receive a stipend for their work and share proceeds from a tip jar.

“At the very least, my hope for the teens in their experience in the cafe is to gain the skills necessary to acquire and maintain a job for themselves,” Crouse said. “But the sky is the limit — if they can be a part of a small coffee shop that they see has the potential to make money, and provide a wonderful service to a community they care about and that inspires them to look for other businesses to start themselves, I think that’s a real possibility.”

The Root Cellar is an ever expanding group of neighbors, volunteers, staff and donors dedicated to building neighborhoods where all are welcome, valued and experience true peace, according to its website.

AND WHILE WE’RE TALKING FOOD

Maine has the third-highest percent of certified organic farmland — a measure of total farmed acres versus certified organic acres — in the country, according to a new study by Commodity.com using U.S. Department of Agriculture stats.

Maine had 456 organic farms working 55,261 acres, or 4.25% of all acres farmed here, as of the USDA’s 2019 survey.

Vermont ranked No. 1 with 203,002 organic acres, or 16.9% of all acres farmed there.

HOT SALES, HOT FUN FACTS

Maine Life Real Estate came out with its annual list of Maine’s Hottest Towns of 2021 and sitting at No. 6, up four spots from the previous year: Lisbon.

The town saw 150 home sales in 2021 compared to 131 in 2020, for an increase of 14.5%, according to figures on the Maine Real Estate Information Services Inc.

The median sales price there also rose 12.4% to $213,500.

Included in Maine Life’s news release: “Originally named Thompsonborough, the town’s name was changed to Lisbon (named after the city in Portugal) in 1802 after residents expressed their frustration with the long name.”

Quick hits about business comings, goings and happenings. Have a Buzzable tip? Contact staff writer Kathryn Skelton at 689-2844 or kskelton@sunjournal.com.