Stepping into
The Butcher Shop, on the corner of Tremont and Waltham streets in Boston's stylish South End, I notice the glass refrigerator cases lining the back wall. A whole duck catches my eye, then a multitude of plump sausages, and a shelf of deli-style meats: soppressata, hot copocolla, mortadella, applewood-smoked ham. The metallic swish of a blade being sharpened against steel turns my attention to a gentleman standing behind a five-foot square blonde-wood butcher's block. I watch as he trims the fat off a rack of lamb. I salivate. A keen meat-eater, I've hit carnivore pay dirt.
But something's off-kilter: Under his white apron, the butcher's wearing a pressed pinstripe dress shirt and patterned tie, looking more like a businessman and less like a blood-smeared meat man. In front of him, a low Plexiglas partition separates him and his raw meat from a display of fresh baguettes and flowers. In the refrigerator case, next to the requisite deli meats, are loaves of beef tongue terrine and duck liver mousse, $35 bottles of white truffle oil, and a large clay bowl overfull with a hearty cassoulet. Jazz plays softly overhead. At the front of the room a woman is polishing balloon wine glasses behind a black soapstone bar.
Where am I exactly?
The juxtaposition of the carnality of a butcher shop and the sophistication of a wine bar is startling, and yet, how could a meat-and-wine lover ask for more? Barbara Lynch, a James Beard award-winning chef, is the owner of The Butcher Shop--a space that blurs the lines between specialty food store, posh wine bar, and eponymous butcher shop. Whether you enter through the retail side on Waltham Street or the bar side on Tremont Street, doors make little difference. The 30-seat establishment is so small, customers in one half of the room can follow the goings-on in the other.
Although the retail side offers hard-to-say-no-to prepared foods and prime cuts, regulars know The Butcher Shop best as a chic, be-seen-at spot that fills to capacity most nights of the week. The wine bar doesn't take reservations, so smartly dressed couples gather around the butcher's block--cleared off for dinner service--with glasses of wine and plates of antipasti as they wait for a spot to sit. The wait is often so long that guests eat their entire meals standing up. Though there may be something
charmant about eating cured meats off a piece of torn brown butcher's paper picnic-style amid a buzzing nighttime scene, I prefer a meal that's a bit more relaxing.
The Butcher Shop is the quintessential solo-dining spot. It's best in the late afternoon, when the place just might be empty--an occasion that I've only come across twice. On weekday afternoons around 3 p.m., while the full lunch menu is still being served, I equip myself with a novel or that day's
New York Times and linger over a midday meal. My favorite consists of the Assiette de Charcuterie ($19), an assortment of three pates with white-port gelee and the red wine of the day. If I'm feeling particularly hungry I'll add a vegetable (the menu changes monthly). In March I've loved the Baby Iceberg Wedge with bacon and a tarragon-buttermilk dressing ($10).
After my meal, I always browse the meat case and am continually shocked by the reasonable prices. A
poulet en pain--a whole chicken wrapped inside a buttery pastry crust--with rosemary fingerling potatoes on the side could be dinner for two or three at a startlingly low $24, a family-sized chicken pot pie goes for $18, and a small meal of pillowy ricotta-filled dumplings,
gnudi (Italian for "nude"), is just $4.
Little else satisfies the way having an unhurried midweek lunch and taking home an $8 pork tenderloin does--except, maybe, the chance to do both to the strains of jazz playing overheard harmonizing with the sound of a butcher's saw cutting through a meaty lamb shank.
The Butcher Shop552 Tremont Street, Boston, MA 02118
(617) 423-4800
Labels: Boston, dining, Stephanie Shih, The Butcher Shop
Every so often, there comes along a seductive little recipe, something witty, smart, refreshing, and just that little bit cocky, that asks for a herb or spice you don't have. It's never much - half a teaspoon, maybe. A pinch. And it's always distressing to have to march down to the grocer's and reluctantly reach for it: a seasoning you use so little of, that you know full well will remain untouched for the rest of the year, gathering dust in a corner until the annual spring clean.
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