From Boston: Boston's SeafoodWhere Clambakes and Shore Dinners are Weekend Ritualsby John Mariani
Ever the
enthusiastic gourmand and entrepreneur, Captain John
Smith sent a dispatch from New England back to Queen
Elizabeth in 1606 with the giddy announcement that
every "man, woman and childe, with a small hooke and
line, by angling, may take divers sorts of excellent
fish, at their pleasures. And is it not a pretty
sport, to pull up two pence, six pence, and twelve
pence, as fast as you can haule and were a
line?"
The sea is
inextricably tied to the gastronomy of New England,
where clambakes and shore dinners are weekend
rituals. From the lobster shacks on the coast to the
fine dining restaurants throughout the region, New
England menus specialize in seafood of every
imaginable form. Boston not only pulls in the best of
the catch but also exports much of it.
A year after
the
Union Oyster House opened, along came
Durgin-Park in Faneuil Hall, a true
eating house with communal tables that is famous for
its cadre of carefully coached, brusque waitresses
who are part of the fun. The food after all these
years is basic and flawless old New England favorites
like hot cornbread, succulent baked scrod, steaming
Indian pudding and some of the last surviving Boston
baked beans in a city once called "Beantown."
Touristy, yes, but locals know to come up in through
the downstairs bar to avoid the lines out the front
door.
Right around
the corner is the charming
No. 9 Park, whose windows overlook the
Common. New England ingredients underpin everything
on Boston-born chef-owner Barbara Lynch’s "European
bistro" menu.
I’ve admired
chef Daniel Bruce at the Boston Harbor
Hotel, and now he has his dream restaurant,
Meritage, where his menus are match-ups
with wines based on flavor components. Dishes,
available in small or large plates (priced at $15 and
$29 respectively), are designed, according to Bruce—a
native New Englander and head chef for the annual
Boston Wine Festival—to be "flavorful but subtle, not
allowing any flavor to overwhelm the wines." That
philosophy is evident in his black and white shrimp
cannelloni with saffron cream and sautéed spinach;
his wood-grilled Atlantic swordfish in a spiced
Riesling, with orange and coconut essence; and his
grilled sea scallops with morels and sugar snap peas,
class acts all around.
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