Author Archive
August 20th, 2006
Established: 2006 (1933)
Specialty: Cocktails
Prices: Moderate
Atmosphere: Gritty on the outside, cool on the inside. Restaurant workers hang out here on their night off — always a good sign — joining foodies, yuppies, and hipsters for consistently great food, top-notch bartending, and an unpretentious attitude. See Best Boston bars for address and contact info.
You might think that ranking a merely eight-month-old bar among Boston’s best is jumping the gun a bit, but this Central Square gem has so much going for it — not least of which is that history is on its side. Green Street operates under Cambridge’s oldest continuing liquor license, issued in 1933.
No matter how much you loved the former Green Street Grill, with its red vinyl seating and tongue-searing, Caribbean food, you have to root for the new Green Street (yes, just Green Street). The cooking, recently taken over by Pete Sueltenfuss (formerly of Eat and Eastern Standard), still rocks, and the vibe is still that of a hopping neighborhood bar. Most important, some of the best bartenders in greater Boston work here. They handle a crowd like experienced circus trainers while deftly executing an ever-rotating menu of vintage cocktails. Green Street’s complete, “A to Z,” drink menu features lots of rum-and-fresh-fruit-juice concoctions, as well as classics like the Iceberg (Plymouth gin, Ricard, mint, shaved ice) and the Phipp’s Fizz (Old Overholt rye, fresh lemon juice, Angostura bitters, ginger beer). Prices average $7-$8. Compare that to $10-$12 for far inferior, flavored vodka ‘tinis in most Boston bars.
Posted in Boston bars, Cocktails | 1 Comment »
August 9th, 2006
Bartender profile
Dylan Black was a Central Square ruffian who started busing tables on the other side of Cambridge, at Upstairs on the Square, when he was 17. He worked his way up the ranks in various restaurants to waiter, bartender, and, finally, bar manager before coming back to his old ‘hood and buying this beloved, old institution in January 2006. He has maintained the quality of food for which the former Green Street Grill was known. More importantly, he and his crack team of bartenders from among Boston’s best have improved the variety and quality of drinks.
Dylan is unabashedly excited to be running his own place, and his good vibe is infectuous as he greets everyone who walks in the door. But he’s casual and doesn’t overdo it. He’s like that cool kid in high school who threw the best parties by somehow attending to everyone’s liquid, musical, and social needs while being completely at ease and enjoying a few games of quarters.
If you catch Dylan during a lull in business, ask him to mix you a Daisy Black (Old Overholt rye, fresh lemon juice, honey syrup) — an homage to his great grandfather’s bartending nickname — and tell you about the history of the establishment. You’ll learn that Green Street has Cambridge’s oldest operating liquor license, issued in 1933, that the original proprietor saw fit to embed three bottles of Angostura Bitters in the brick outside the front door (see photo above), and that there is a “huge” old sign in the attic for Charlie’s Tap, which occupied this space in the 1940s. With a glint in his eye, Dylan muses over “what has been going on in this room before me.”
Hometown
Cambridge, MA.
Past bartending jobs
Redbones, B-Side Lounge, Chez Henri.
First drink you ever had
A Foster’s “oil can.”
Favorite bar in Boston other than your own
Reggie’s bar at the Blue Room.
The drink you most like to make
Negroni. A perfectly balanced cocktail full of flavor.
The drink you least like to make
White Russians in a pint glass.
What you drink at the end of your shift
Cold beer or the open wine from the shift.
If I weren’t a bartender, I’d be…
Making license plates for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
A bartender’s best friend is…
A great chef.
A bartender’s worst enemy is…
A drunk chef.
People drink too much…
Olive juice.
People don’t drink enough…
Water.
Drink for a hot summer day
Iceberg (1 1/2 oz Plymouth gin, 1/2 Ricard, shaved ice, sprig o’mint).
Drink for a cold winter night
Belle & B (1 1/2 oz brandy, 1/2 oz Belle de Brillet in a snifter).
The best thing about drinking in Boston
Drinking on the Charles. I love to drink along the River, on any of the benches, under any of the bridges, I don’t care, I love the River!
The worst thing about drinking in Boston
The cops may arrest you for drinking on the Charles.
Posted in Bartenders | 1 Comment »
August 4th, 2006
Bartender profile
With his custom-made Ray-Ban eyeglasses, artfully mussed hair, and vintage, “daddy-o” shirts, Max Toste (“toasty”) looks like a guy you’d as soon see on stage at T.T. the Bears as behind the bar. Like a fair number of bartenders in Boston, Max actually is a musician. But I’m glad he’s dedicated to his day job as co-owner of Deep Ellum, the only combination beer bar-cocktail lounge in Boston. Back when he tended bar at Bukowski Tavern-Cambridge, and now at Deep Ellum, Max treats me like the Lady of Beer Manor. He will proffer a beverage or two he thinks will interest me; he knows my taste is all over the map, so he might offer me a Moylan’s Hopsickle (ridiculously hoppy double IPA), a mellow stout, or a German lager that happens to come in a can. He knows I rarely come in with my beer order on the tip of my tongue, that I always peruse the specials blackboard, and that I like a little banter — call it beer foreplay — before I commit myself to a selection. I’m no bartender’s pet, though. Max waits on all the ladies — and the gents — with similar attention to their tastes and personalities.
Believe it or not, this is only his second gig behind a bar. “Before Bukowski, I was not very interested in bartending. I worked in fancy places [e.g. Locke-Ober] where being table-side guiding people through wine lists was much more interesting than cranking out apple-tinis and Cosmos. I was terrified of being trapped behind a bar, stuck talking to some golf enthusiast.” But, he has found that his “customers, for the most part, are very receptive to trying new things and maybe hearing a story about what they’re drinking.”
And since he’s been at Deep Ellum, Max has developed an ambitious repertoire of classic cocktails, including four different Manhattans.
Hometown
Tiverton, Rhode Island, a very small rural coastal New England town. Lots of farmers and fishermen. My grandparents on both sides were farmers from Portuguese heritage. The love of food and drink is a big part of my family’s personality.
First drink you ever had
A glass of Seagrams VO whiskey my grandfather had stashed in the door of his MG. My second was stealing a Bud can from same grandfather’s garage fridge. He knew how to live! And I can thank him for my love of whiskey and beer.
Favorite bar in Boston other than your own
The DeLux. The other is the bar in my house.
The drink you most like to serve
I like to try to figure out just the right beer or drink for every customer at my bar. What I like doesn’t really matter. It’s their mood or taste at that moment that I try to cater to. I like turning people on to their new favorite thing.
The drink you least like to serve
Something people order because they think it makes them cool.
What you drink at the end of your shift
At the end of the night I like a whiskey and a cold beer.
If I weren’t a bartender I’d be…
A cook.
A bartender’s best friend is…
The customer who wants to have a good time. A bartender’s worst enemy is the other guy who doesn’t!
People drink too much…
Fucking diet soda. Have a beer with your lunch like a civilized person!
People don’t drink enough…
Local craft beer.
Drink for a hot summer day
Pacifico Clara or Smuttynose IPA out of the bottle.
Drink to ward off the cold
Unibroue Trois Pistoles [Quebecois strong ale], Sam Smith Imperial Stout, or three fingers of an Islay scotch.
The best thing about beer in Boston is…
The presence of more craft (and local craft) beers in your average bar and liquor stores every year.
The worst thing about beer in Boston is…
That drinking good beer is a status symbol, and not just natural!
Posted in Bartenders | 9 Comments »
August 1st, 2006
Established: 1992
Specialty: basic cocktails and beer
Prices: cheap
Atmosphere: A wide array of types who appreciate a good value — twentysomethings paying off student loans, families, musicians, guys in beige Dockers — congregate here for the good, cheap food and drink and that “cool bar” vibe that vintage album covers, a 1950s-era “exotic” nude painting, and a year ’round plastic Santa provide.
See Best Boston bars (Honorable mention) for address and contact info.
Google the DeLux Cafe in the South End, and your search results will yield dozens of reviews that describe the place as an inexpensive, crowded, kitschy, hip, laid-back, neighborhood dive with a kickass kitchen.
On a recent Thursday night, we showed up at DeLux at cocktail hour, around 5:30. The bartender, a slender, take-no-shit brunette named Jenna, was chatting sassily with a customer she obviously knew fairly well. He was wearing office clothes and drinking a tall can of beer. She approached us after the standard delay that relative strangers to a neighborhood bar are made to sit through. I had seen a couple of references to “good drinks” in the online reviews, so I went out on a limb and asked if there was a cocktail menu. No? OK, are there any drinks the place is known for? I ventured. Jenna eyed me warily. “What do you want? Anything I make is good. I’ve been bartending for nine years.” I could see the wheels of her mind turning: Where does this flibbertigibbet think she is? I came to my senses and ordered a Maker’s Mark Manhattan. My companion, relieved that I had ended the Difficult Woman routine, ordered a Schlitz tallboy.
The Manhattan was perfectly chilled and didn’t come in some ridiculous Big Gulp glass. It was a solid drink, and it was, like, $6.50. The Martini my companion ordered was equally well made. We ended up with a tab of two cocktails, three beers, and two steak-tip entrees for roughly $48. My god, we normally pay that much for just drinks anywhere else. I don’t know how DeLux manages to get away with those prices, particularly since it’s in the heart of the pricey South End, and I don’t care, as long as they don’t have eight-year-old slaves washing dishes or something.
The food menu changes regularly, the taps pour Guinness and a few microbrews, and the music is pretty near ideal — Elvis Presley, George Jones, Dusty Springfield, the Germs, and Blondie soundtracked our visit. So the service has a bit of attitude; that’s only if you ask for a cocktail menu.
Posted in Boston bars, Cocktails | 1 Comment »
July 28th, 2006
This is a vodka drink I can get behind. That’s because there’s gin in it. And because James Bond invented it. (OK, Ian Fleming invented it.) In Casino Royale, the terrific first 007 novel, Bond demonstrates that he is both a man of taste and a man who knows exactly what he wants with this drink order: “in a deep champagne goblet … Three measures of Gordon’s, one of vodka, half a measure of Kina Lillet. Shake it very well until it’s ice-cold, then add a large thin slice of lemon peel.” He names the drink after his gorgeous, dark-haired, enigmatic colleague, Vesper Lynd, whom he discovers is a double agent after she commits suicide in despair over their doomed love. Not surprisingly, Bond never re-visits the drink in subsequent novels. But that doesn’t mean that non-fictional drinkers the world over can’t enjoy it. It’s so Bondian: cool, subtle, hard-edged. The Independent in Somerville’s Union Square is, as far as I know, the only place in greater Boston that lists the drink on its cocktail menu. Naturally, the bartenders use English dry gin (Beefeater) and Bond-approved Russian vodka (Stoli).
Posted in Boston bars, Cocktails, Vodka | 1 Comment »
