News/notes – Globe South Dish

South Shore Dish: News & Notes- June, 2011

Joan Wilder — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 17:33:00 +0000

Being a café lover of the first order (there’s not much I enjoy more than hanging at a great café), I am thrilled out of my mind that Hingham resident Bob Weeks, of Redeye Roasters, is planning to open a café in the Bare Cove Marina building, across from Stars Restaurant, on Hingham Harbor.
You may know Weeks from the hand-roasted coffee he sells at several local shops or from the great coffee he serves from his colorful coffee truck at the Hingham Farmers Market. The new café-to-be — Redeye Roasters Coffee and Espresso Lounge — will occupy 1,000 square feet of the side of the marina building toward the Hingham Bathing Beach, while the other side will serve as storage for marine activities. [See the view below] “We’re putting windows on the water side, so very soon you’ll be able to have a coffee and look at the boats and water,” said Weeks, who hopes to open by late August or early September.
Weeks, who launched Redeye Roasters after leaving his advertising job in 2006, plans to offer all types of coffee drinks, teas, pastries, gelato, and affogato. (He may be in the market for a local baker to supply the shop, so if you’re that person, check him out.)

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In Plymouth, the historic building where the wonderful Martha’s Stone Soup restaurant (cq) used to be is set to open on June 23 as a restaurant serving classic American fare.
Rye Tavern is the newest baby of partners Christopher Tocchio andKristian Deyesso, owners of Plymouth’s Union Fish Seafood & Raw Bar; Boston’s Church Restaurant & Nightclub; and The Regal Beagle in Brookline.
The owners have gutted the building, known as the Wright Tavern, built in 1792, and created seating for about 50, which includes some patio dining, said Brandon Babiarz, executive chef of Union Fish. The menu will be small and have a farm-to-table, seasonal focus inspired by the garden on the property.
It’s great that these guys are renovating and restoring this special, remote venue at the intersection of Old Tavern Trail and Old Sandwich Road in Pinehills. The restaurant will be open at 5 p.m. daily for dinner.

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The former Cafe Ona (and before that Cafe Calabria) at 443 Nantasket Ave. in Hull is now Lynda’s Restaurant – a breakfast and lunch place owned by Joe DiVito, who owns Weinberg’s Bakery just up the road. The restaurant, which is open daily from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m., serves breakfast all the time as well as lunch from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Among the many standard American breakfast and lunch dishes are some Italian favorites. Lynda’s also serves espresso drinks, Hornstra dairy’s local milk and chocolate milk, and soymilk. Daily specials are posted on the restaurant’s Facebook page.
DiVito has been able to secure customer parking in the Knights of Columbus lot across the street from the restaurant, something the site’s former incarnations didn’t have.

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Chef Paul Wahlberg and company are planning to open a casual burger, hot dog, and frappe type restaurant adjacent to the chef’s fine dining restaurant, Alma Nove, at the Hingham Shipyard late this summer, according to Wahlberg’s publicist, Mindy Valone, at Boston’s CM Communications.
Although Wahlberg spoke at length to a local paper last month about his plans and inspiration for the new place, he’s now unavailable for comment, so we’ve been unable to confirm anything more than the basics.
Wahlberg opened Alma Nove last summer with partners that include brothers Mark (movie guy) and Donnie (music and movie guy).

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A new burger place, Wild Willy’s Burgers, is planning to open later this month at 588 Washington St., not far from the Fore River Bridge. The restaurant is part of a small chain – there are six others spread among Massachusetts, Maine, and New Hampshire.
The new place is owned by husband and wife Paul and Ruth Bennett.According to the restaurant’s Facebook page, Wild Willy’s will be open daily from 11 a.m. (noon on Sundays) until 9 p.m. (8 p.m. on Sundays). For info about possible employment, call 617- 472-9453, or stop by the restaurant.

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The Quincy Farmers Market, which opens on June 24, will be selling Massachusetts wines for the first time this season.
According to Janet Little, market manager, state legislation was passed last year that allows the sale of Commonwealth farm wines at farmers markets. The city of Quincy this month licensed the farmers market to hold wine tastings and sales.
The market, which is open from 11:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. on Fridays, will feature wines from one of four Commonwealth wineries each week. The participating wineries are Coastal Vineyards of South Dartmouth; Westport Rivers of Westport; Zoll Cellars of Shrewsbury, and Turtle Creek of Lincoln.

South Shore restaurant news and notes

Joan Wilder — Thu, 20 May 2010 13:05:00 +0000

Restaurants everywhere come and go, and some just have facelifts. Cooks, too, do a lot of moving around as a way to move up the ladder and learn from other chefs in a business that sees more action than most.

But even by industry standards, the South Shore restaurant scene is busy right now. To give you a taste:

Alma Nove, the much-anticipated new restaurant from area chef Paul Wahlberg and brothers Mark (movie guy) and Donnie Wahlberg (music and movie guy), should open by Memorial Day or the first week of June at the Launch at Hingham Shipyard.

The chef has snagged old friend Jim Caputo to be his sous chef. “This is the third restaurant we’ve opened together,” said Wahlberg, who worked with Caputo at Bridgeman’s and Tosca. Caputo moved back east from California to take the job, said Wahlberg, who has managed to fit in personal cheffing for three of Mark’s movies, including “The Lovely Bones.”

The restaurant, named after the brothers’ mother, Alma, and the Italian word for the number of children she had, nine (nove), will have 119 indoor seats and 20 to 25 on the waterfront patio [shown above]. “I’m blown away by how beautiful it’s coming out,” said Wahlberg.

I’m totally thrilled that Boston-area natives Jon Olinto and Anthony Ackil are opening their seventh amazing b.good burgers and real food/fast food place at the Derby Street Shoppes sometime in late June.
B.good is unique in the world of fast food: The partners use only all natural beef that they grind daily, and are passionate about raising awareness about humanely raised, local beef and other foods. A sign in each store identifies the farm where the day’s beef was raised.

B.good serves veggie burgers, chicken burgers, and lots of other good simple food, too. “The b.good we opened last fall at Legacy Place is going good, so we’re ready for Derby Street,” said Olinto. The restaurant will have 60 seats, and the partners are currently hiring. (More on these guys and their work with food in schools later.)

The beautiful old Sun Tavern in Duxbury reopened on April 27 after having been closed since 2008. Duxbury resident Larry Friedman bought the 148-seat, four-acre property last November – for the second time. Friedman first bought the restaurant in 1996, ran it for five years, and sold it in 2001.

Friedman’s renovated the space — opening the kitchen and updating a 50-seat private function room – and put together an eclectic menu with the help of Chef Ken Wisneski, whom Friedman snatched away from Pembroke’s future former Winery on 53. Let me explain.

The Winery on 53 opened nearly two years ago at the site of the former long-running and well-loved Bobby Hackett’s Restaurant. Although Winery on 53 did well enough to survive, its main customers were the old Bobby Hackett crowd who would jam into its large bar to eat, but rarely its new dining room.

So, rather than buck the tide, management closed on May 9 to turn the place into one big tavern, said manager Doug Kazorek. They’re also changing the menu and the name: Winery on 53, they’ve heard, conveys an upscale vibe that is off-putting to a crowd that seems to want the place to be more like Bobby Hackett’s.

It will reopen as Brimstone Tavern on May 26 or 27, with tavern and comfort food and Gil Baretto stepping in as chef to replace Wisneski. Among Barreto’s previous experience was a stint at Cohasset’s Red Lion Inn.

After a great run of 12 years, chef-owner Bernie O’Neil has closed his popular downtown Cohasset restaurant, Bernard’s. In April, Annette and Vincent Agostino, a husband and wife team, bought the building and will open their first restaurant, Ava Cucina, on June 13, with Annette running front of house and Vincent cooking.

Annette has spent the last eight years working at Cohasset’s Red Lion Inn. Vincent worked for years in his father’s Hull restaurant, Mezzo Mare. The Agostino’s are making several renovations to the space – including a rebuilding of the restroom so customers don’t have to go through the kitchen to get to it.

Scituate native Robin King has opened his first restaurant, Oro, in a renovated space in the Welsh Building that used to be the Flounder Inn – that odd place that served both breakfast and Chinese food. Chef King and his wife, Jill, have worked back and front of house, respectively, at many restaurants in Colorado, California, and Boston, including Kevin Costner’s restaurant, Epiphany, in Santa Barbara. The 62-seat Oro is a gorgeous little spot. (See Boston Globe South this Sunday for more.)

Boston restaurateurs Frank DePasquale and Nick Varano have put more than $500,000 into renovating the Marina Bay Beach Club (formerly Waterworks) and plan to open their new Ocean Club at Marina Bay on Memorial Day. The outdoor nightclub is considered the largest venue of its kind in the region. (See Sunday’s Boston Globe South for a story on the club.)

Meanwhile, in chronological order, here’s what all’s up for eats (aside from Alma Nove) at the Launch at the Hingham Shipyard: Panera has been open for a few months and seems busy every time I pass or stop in.

Pizzapalooza opened on May 15, with 60 seats and an outdoor patio. The restaurant is the second from owners Stephen and Elyse Yanoff, who opened their first in Newton 10 years ago. Their large menu features both Sicilian (a thicker style) and Neapolitan-style pizza. “We also have a 100 percent whole wheat pie,” said Yanoff.

Danny Phan plans to have a soft opening of his 195-seat Typhoon Asian Bistro & Lounge in June “if construction goes according to schedule.” Phan has owned Typhoon Asian Bistro on Boylston Street in Boston’s Back Bay since 2000. He has two partners in this new Hingham venture – college friends from MIT. The menu will be similar to the Boston restaurant, he said, with dishes from Japan, Thailand, Vietnam, and China. It will also have chefs cooking on hibachis tableside, a patio, and a full liquor license.

Joe Slesar is scheduled to open Hingham Beer Works at the shipyard sometime in late summer. This will be Slesar’s fifth brew pub, according to Finni McWilliam, manager of the first Boston Beer Works, near Fenway Park, which Slesar opened in 1992. The new brew pub will be 9,000 square feet and employ about 75 people. The pub will serve wine and its own beer.
Please drop us a line with any newsy bits, opinions, or comments on anything food related. In the meantime – enjoy!

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Restaurant News & Notes

Joan Wilder — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 14:16:00 +0000

Chef Paul Wahlberg’s new restaurant, Alma Nove, , is slated to open mid- to late-April at the Hingham Shipyard on Route 3A. Rumors about its demise were, in fact, only a change of plans: a first location at the shipyard fell through and a second was found. Which may end up being a good thing since the new location sounds great — right on the water, behind the new Patriot Cinemas complex.
The building, which has an octagonal cupola on top, will have 119 seats inside and 20-25 on the waterfront patio. Building permits for fitting out the interior were filed last week, so Wahlberg’s hoping that work can begin sometime late this month or early February.
The Alma in Alma Nove is Wahlberg’s mother’s name, and Nove the Italian word for the number of children she had: nine. Three were girls and six were boys – including Paul’s movie star brother, Mark.
When I asked Paul if he minded people bringing up his famous brother (which happened frequently when their resemblance was easy to spot in Bridgeman’s open kitchen, where Paul was the chef for nearly eight years) he answered immediately:

“No. I couldn’t be prouder,” he said, adding that he’s worked as Mark’s personal chef on three movies over the years, including “The Lovely Bones,” which opened this month.
Alma Nove is being designed by Boston-based designer Stephen Souza and will have a large bar, stonework, millwork, a wood-fired oven, and a regular, not open, kitchen. Wahlberg describes the restaurant as Italian with Mediterranean influences – Greek, Spanish, Portuguese, French.
Among the other restaurants rumored to be opening at the Shipyard are Boston Beer Works, Pizzapalooza (signs are up, but there’s no activity inside), andPanera. No info on any of them yet.
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Jay Cole’s new pizza place, Riva Pizzeria in Scituate’s Gannett Corner, is up and running. I haven’t been yet, but I’m looking forward to it. According to Cole, his restaurant (Riva’s on Front Street) and the new pizzeria feed each other, so to speak.
Some of the restaurant’s signature dishes have been turned into pizzas (like the braised short ribs with parmesan and herb scented goat cheese pizza) and the pizzeria makes rolls that are served at the restaurant. The rolls are also available for purchase by the general public.
With Riva’s former Chef Brett Williams having moved to Bia Bistro in Cohasset in the fall, Brian Lauzon has taken over as Riva’s head chef after three years as its sous chef. The menu of the pizzeria, which also offers salads and slices, can be found at www.rivarestaurant.net
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A family run restaurant should be opening in the Walsh Building in Scituate Harbor sometime this spring. Oro is the brainchild of Scituate High School graduate Robin King. After earning a degree at New Hampshire College Culinary Institute and working in restaurants and/or cheffing in Colorado, California, and Boston, King has come home to open his first place. King’s father, Robert, will manage front of house while King cooks.

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And, lastly: Restaurants come and restaurants go, but few come and go as quickly as Littlenecks Bar & Grill in Weymouth. The 200-seat restaurant opened in October and closed on New Years’ eve after the Board of Selectmen failed to renew its food and liquor licenses due to unanswered questions about its ownership and investor status. I haven’t been able to get much information on what happened, but even the website has disappeared (they often linger in cyberspacelessness for ages.)
Please drop us a line with any newsy bits, opinions, or comments on anything food related and meanwhile, enjoy.