Barkada coming to Old Port Square with lease arranged by East Brown Cow

 

 

 

 

Portland, ME East Brown Cow has helped Barkada acquire a lease at 425 Fore St. in Old Port Square. The 1,592 s/f space will be the home of the city’s first Filipino restaurant when it opens in the spring of 2026.

“It’s a pleasure to welcome Barkada to Old Port Square,” said Tim Soley, president of East Brown Cow. “We’re always looking for innovative restaurateurs to further add to Portland’s status as a foodie city and Barkada has been wowing people all summer with its food truck. We’re excited to see their concept expand in this space.”

Barkada means “a group of friends” in Tagalog and refers to the two couples behind the restaurant: chefs Nicole and Ben Bowers and their business partners Margaret and Luka Dow. They’re offering an innovative, fast-casual style of Filipino food — where customers can build bowls based on some of the country’s most beloved dishes such as adobo, a tangy stew. Filipino food is known for its balance of sweet, sour, and salty flavors and its diverse influences from Chinese, Spanish and American traditions — and it isn’t widely known to many Americans.

Barkada is scheduled to open its doors in the spring of 2026. 

“Our concept is almost like Filipino fast food,” said Nicole Bowers. “You line up and you pick your base and then you go from there. The goal is to spread Filipino culture and food to the community — so we’re making it easy for people. If you go to the Philippines and hang out with families, often you will find a giant table full of different kinds of food, and people will just eat it all together. It’s that kind of concept, but in a bowl.”

Nicole originally comes from the Philippines where she was raised in a family that owns two restaurants. She moved to New York City to study at The Institute of Culinary Education where she met her husband-to-be, Ben Bowers. The couple moved back to the Philippines for a year where Ben was trained to cook authentic Filipino fare in her family’s restaurants. The couple then became private chefs in Florida before teaming up with their friends Margaret and Luka Dow. Margaret had worked for lululemon and Luka spent time in the Boston food supply industry before they noticed that Filipino food was unrepresented in Portland — and they decided to build a brand.

They launched the Barkada food truck in the city this summer. “It was to establish our menu and get our name out there,” said Nicole. “The feedback has been amazing. We’ve had many return customers, we would see the same people coming by, and they would start bringing their friends.”

Barkada will be the latest addition to Old Port Square, which reimagines a four-acre site as a new urban heart for Portland featuring residences, retail, restaurants, hotels, offices, parking, and inviting public spaces. It will be located within the Fore Street Garage, a space which has gone through extensive façade renovations in recent years by firm Safdie Architects. In addition to parking and solar panels on the upper floors, the lower front level hosts several retail tenants including Bar Futo and Gelato Fiasco. It features patio seating, which offers an active urban presence in the heart of the Old Port.

Photos courtesy of Justine Johnson Photography