The owner of Ten Tables in Jamaica Plain tweets she is taking over the closed Bon Savor to build a burger place called GrassFed. Opening is planned for Feb. 1.
Wild Willy's offers both and charges $2 extra for grass fed beef, and offers both more or less without commentary.
The name "Grass Fed" (and Ten Tables track record for manifesto with their food) on the other hand reeks of the worst kind of foodie moralizing of luxury items.
Have you tried Real Deal? I'm not a burger fan, but my BF loves them.
Burgers aside, JP does have plenty of inexpensive take-out. That stretch of Centre happens to have more mid-range & higher full service places than cheap take-out, but even so there's Sami's, Same Old Place, the unfortunately named Charlie Chan's, and I'm missing some others between Robinwood and the Monument. And the rest of JP is chock full of cheap Dominican and Cuban food.
and the food made me sick both times, so I won't be going back there ever again. Do you like hair in your food? Try the burritos at Purple Cactus.
But I love the sandwiches at City Feed, and Sami's is amazing. Slice O'Pie down the road a bit in Hyde Square has some really tasty food, too.
to match your weak argument. Real Deal is damned tasty and it's never made me sick.
I don't know about hair at Purple Cactus, but it's definitely a mislabeled business. It's a wrap shack poorly disguised as a taqueria.
Sami's is great for people who've never actually had falafel or shwarma before and don't know what a packed pita looks like (go to Rami's in Brookline instead) and City Feed is great for folks who've A) Never had a good sandwich before and B) Have no problem paying $9 for a mediocre one.
Slice O Pie is easily the best addition to the neighborhood in years. Closest to New York pizza you're going to get in steak tip land.
Not saying SOP can hang with the Best NY/NJ/Conn. places (Frank Pepe's, DiFara's, Una Pizza Napoletana... I'm a Joe's guy myself), but it's definitely on par with the places you'd call for a Friday night pie. In this town, that's saying a lot.
Also, Slice O Pie does Sicilian slices. They're doughy and enormous, but definitely a rarity in Boston. I pick up a corner every time they have it out.
The First Family of JP pizza is just great at its job. When competitors fry up gross Greek pizza in pans, the Ciampas just say no thank you. When certain brick oven bars beyond the overpass waste their kitchen centerpiece on glorified English muffin pies and veggies on flatbread, the Ciampas just shrug it off. When the neighborhood realizes that another place's pizza just really isn't above par without the bowling, the Ciampas just take over the square their inferior competitor left behind.
There's plenty of business to go around for everyone, but I'm just glad the Ciampas are getting more of it. The less JP rewards bad pizza, the better off we'll all be.
P.S. I love hearing new JPers call SOP a "townie place." Funny how "townie places" like SOP and the Galway are just about the best the neighborhood has to offer in each category. Keep shunning them, flannelbeard, more room for me.
I love hearing new JPers call SOP a "townie place." Funny how "townie places" like SOP and the Galway are just about the best the neighborhood has to offer in each category. Keep shunning them, flannelbeard, more room for me.
I find that funny also. Along with Costellos, these are great long-time businesses in JP.
and therefore using that abbreviation for both 'Same Old Place' and "Slice O' Pie' can only lead to the exact sort of confusion shown by this discussion thread.
People have been calling Same Old Place SOP for years. Slice O' Pie is just Slice O' Pie. I realize that's one of the more provincial lines of reasoning one can offer in this discussion, but it's the case.
Same Old Place is the one and only "original" SOP! The "other" is merely the result of a scorned family member (Son) trying, to,but not very well) rest on the laurels of his dad, who actually put in thirty-five plus years of real blood sweat and tears into his craft. Opening a business down the street was (what he thought) a jab at his dad, However the last laugh is on him, as his pizza, service, and quality no where near as good as SOP. I give them a another year tops! The Real Deal, is Same Old Place, period!
You're really going to keep pursuing this line of critique? Really?
Considering the Real Deal is packed with customers on a daily basis and does a brisk business around the dinner hour, let's be charitable and say your incidents are two in roughly 36,000 (figuring 100 orders a night). That's not taking into account any medical conditions you may have (lactose intolerance, Celiac disease, gastric bypass, lap banding, etc.) and accepting that it's completely plausible for a poor sap like yourself to get sick not once, but twice at an establishment that's up to code and processes hundreds of orders a week.
Even with that charitable scenario in mind, I like those odds and like my Jimmy The Gent enough to keep ordering. I guess it's up to the consumer to take this information and decide for his or herself, but a clean, successful establishment with online ordering and regular additions to the menu weighs pretty heavily against one person's lack of a sturdy constitution. Might I suggest ordering ginger ale and saltines next time to soothe that delicate tummy?
Did eating at real deal give you diarrhea of the keyboard? All I did was state the facts: on 2 separate occasions, after I ate at real deal I became ill. I did not trash the place. I'm glad that real deal is doing so well, and I hope it continues to do so; it would suck for you to have to look for another job if they went under. You on the other hand decided to trash two other local eateries just because they do not satisfy your highly sophisticated palate.
And remember: McDonald's is also "a clean successful establishment" but the food is still shit.
If I did, they'd have better mozzarella sticks and would have made that roast pork with broccoli rabe sandwich I'd suggested to them a few months back. Just a customer with their online menu among my bookmarks.
I also just stated the facts: Hundreds of people who aren't you didn't get sick from eating at Real Deal. Yours seems to be an isolated case. Just like that hair someone found at Purple Cactus is likely an anomaly.
As for the "trashing" of other eateries, Sami's is well aware that it's not traditional or even very good falafel and shwarma. It's Sami's Wrap N' Roll for a reason: Because its original store was little more than a lunch counter for hungry doctors in the Longview food court and its JP location has carried that minimalist theme over. Rami's use of actual pita, big cuts of shwarma and fully cooked chick peas makes it better.
As for City Feed, their sandwiches are both overpriced in the $8 to $9 range and mediocre. They rely heavily on their artisan bread for substance and use inferior and insubstantial cuts of meat and cheese. For the product, the price and the wait, they're an absolute disappointment.
It is my right as a customer to critique the service and products of any establishment seeking my dollar. Just because I don't indiscriminately cram any lump of garbage down my throat and willingly fork over the cash for the mere fact that it's "local" doesn't make my palate overly discriminating. If I'm going to pay for food made by another person, however, it should be made well. The fried chicken at the Galway, the sticky toffee pudding at the Haven, the pizza at Same Old Place and Slice O Pie and the Vinny Gorgeous and Real Deal fit that bill. The wraps at Sami's, the sandwiches at City Feed and the pan-fried Greek pizza at half the dives in this neighborhood don't.
Your grumpy old man posts are starting to fall into that latter list.
He's still worked up over the fact that someone dared, dared to question a JP resident's god-given right to set out space savers on Rosemary Street with nary a flake of snow on the ground.
I'm in total agreeance with everything JPFree has crtiqued on this board. I'm not sure how someone can bash Real Deal. City Feed has decent food but the prices are incredibly overpriced. The only two places I've been to in JP that I can strongly tell people never to go to are Sami's and Charlie Chans.
What is “Whose Foods” stance on the “GrassFed Burger Bar”?
Surely the former customers of the Hi-Lo Supermarket will find the $20 burgers beyond their budget.
Will the new restaurant accept EBT or WIC?
i haven't heard that--i live about 300 feet from the building and i've always gotten the sense the the flower guys and the ten tables have a really great and supportive relationship of each others' businesses....
Yes, JP continues to gentrify, commercial rents are still going up, it's harder to open a new restaurant in the cheap-eats category along Centre Street these days. But would you rather have the old Bon Savor space sit idle? At least the Ten Tables folks deliver a lot of value for money -- I think it's one of the better bistros of its type in the city -- and it's not hard to imagine they'll do the same again at Grass Fed.
This is a scam, except instead of scamming the average joe, its scamming people who think they are doing the right thing. Its just another way for businesses just to separate people from their money.
I don't care what your argument is, its a scam. Unless you're on the farm itself 24/7/365, watching them graze and making sure they aren't being fed grains.. you don't know. You're putting your faith in a restaurant stating its meat is from grass fed cows? So you'll believe a sign.. I have a bridge to sell ya too.
If you believe that, next up McDonald's will put out signs that say that their cows are grass fed too. Would you believe that and would you eat there? Im sure you wouldn't, but yet another place does the same thing and you will. Sorry... pure sheep attitude. Yeah you may think you're doing the right thing based on what they tell you, but in reality you're not.
Comments
Finally JP residents will
Finally JP residents will have a place to pay $20 for a hamburger.
$20 burgers
It's great to live in JP, where you can get grass fed burgers. No place else has such an option!
But...
Wild Willy's in Watertown Square has been selling delicious grass fed burgers there since they opened.
Seriously, why's JP so far behind on this trend?
And Wild Willy's is only one of many examples.
Wild Willy's offers both and
Wild Willy's offers both and charges $2 extra for grass fed beef, and offers both more or less without commentary.
The name "Grass Fed" (and Ten Tables track record for manifesto with their food) on the other hand reeks of the worst kind of foodie moralizing of luxury items.
Christopher's in Porter Square
I can't remember a time when they didn't serve grass-fed beef burgers. That may just be the effects of the extensive tap list, however.
I'm going to set the
I'm going to set the over/under on the number of comments containing random unwarranted JP hate on this entirely innocuous story at 12.
I think you've overestimated
I think you've overestimated how many people will even care to comment on this story
But seriously I wish an affordable burger place would move in, I'm tired of having to order from roxbury anytime I want takeout I can afford
Have you tried Real Deal? I'm
Have you tried Real Deal? I'm not a burger fan, but my BF loves them.
Burgers aside, JP does have plenty of inexpensive take-out. That stretch of Centre happens to have more mid-range & higher full service places than cheap take-out, but even so there's Sami's, Same Old Place, the unfortunately named Charlie Chan's, and I'm missing some others between Robinwood and the Monument. And the rest of JP is chock full of cheap Dominican and Cuban food.
I ate at Real Deal twice
and the food made me sick both times, so I won't be going back there ever again. Do you like hair in your food? Try the burritos at Purple Cactus.
But I love the sandwiches at City Feed, and Sami's is amazing. Slice O'Pie down the road a bit in Hyde Square has some really tasty food, too.
Sorry...but those City Feed
Sorry...but those City Feed sandwiches are gnarsty.
You have a weak stomach...
to match your weak argument. Real Deal is damned tasty and it's never made me sick.
I don't know about hair at Purple Cactus, but it's definitely a mislabeled business. It's a wrap shack poorly disguised as a taqueria.
Sami's is great for people who've never actually had falafel or shwarma before and don't know what a packed pita looks like (go to Rami's in Brookline instead) and City Feed is great for folks who've A) Never had a good sandwich before and B) Have no problem paying $9 for a mediocre one.
Slice O Pie is easily the best addition to the neighborhood in years. Closest to New York pizza you're going to get in steak tip land.
Agreed. Except the slice o
Agreed. Except the slice o pie and same old are actually at least as good as tri state slices.
Have to agree
Not saying SOP can hang with the Best NY/NJ/Conn. places (Frank Pepe's, DiFara's, Una Pizza Napoletana... I'm a Joe's guy myself), but it's definitely on par with the places you'd call for a Friday night pie. In this town, that's saying a lot.
Also, Slice O Pie does Sicilian slices. They're doughy and enormous, but definitely a rarity in Boston. I pick up a corner every time they have it out.
Ciampa family values
The First Family of JP pizza is just great at its job. When competitors fry up gross Greek pizza in pans, the Ciampas just say no thank you. When certain brick oven bars beyond the overpass waste their kitchen centerpiece on glorified English muffin pies and veggies on flatbread, the Ciampas just shrug it off. When the neighborhood realizes that another place's pizza just really isn't above par without the bowling, the Ciampas just take over the square their inferior competitor left behind.
There's plenty of business to go around for everyone, but I'm just glad the Ciampas are getting more of it. The less JP rewards bad pizza, the better off we'll all be.
P.S. I love hearing new JPers call SOP a "townie place." Funny how "townie places" like SOP and the Galway are just about the best the neighborhood has to offer in each category. Keep shunning them, flannelbeard, more room for me.
I love hearing new JPers call
I find that funny also. Along with Costellos, these are great long-time businesses in JP.
Looks to me like there are two "SOP" businesses in JP
and therefore using that abbreviation for both 'Same Old Place' and "Slice O' Pie' can only lead to the exact sort of confusion shown by this discussion thread.
Who's confused
People have been calling Same Old Place SOP for years. Slice O' Pie is just Slice O' Pie. I realize that's one of the more provincial lines of reasoning one can offer in this discussion, but it's the case.
SOP
Same Old Place is the one and only "original" SOP! The "other" is merely the result of a scorned family member (Son) trying, to,but not very well) rest on the laurels of his dad, who actually put in thirty-five plus years of real blood sweat and tears into his craft. Opening a business down the street was (what he thought) a jab at his dad, However the last laugh is on him, as his pizza, service, and quality no where near as good as SOP. I give them a another year tops! The Real Deal, is Same Old Place, period!
Ok I stand corrected. If you
Ok I stand corrected. If you have a cast iron stomach, and don't mind food poisoning, then Real Deal is the place to go for real shitty food.
Really?
You're really going to keep pursuing this line of critique? Really?
Considering the Real Deal is packed with customers on a daily basis and does a brisk business around the dinner hour, let's be charitable and say your incidents are two in roughly 36,000 (figuring 100 orders a night). That's not taking into account any medical conditions you may have (lactose intolerance, Celiac disease, gastric bypass, lap banding, etc.) and accepting that it's completely plausible for a poor sap like yourself to get sick not once, but twice at an establishment that's up to code and processes hundreds of orders a week.
Even with that charitable scenario in mind, I like those odds and like my Jimmy The Gent enough to keep ordering. I guess it's up to the consumer to take this information and decide for his or herself, but a clean, successful establishment with online ordering and regular additions to the menu weighs pretty heavily against one person's lack of a sturdy constitution. Might I suggest ordering ginger ale and saltines next time to soothe that delicate tummy?
My but you do go on (and on and on...)
Did eating at real deal give you diarrhea of the keyboard? All I did was state the facts: on 2 separate occasions, after I ate at real deal I became ill. I did not trash the place. I'm glad that real deal is doing so well, and I hope it continues to do so; it would suck for you to have to look for another job if they went under. You on the other hand decided to trash two other local eateries just because they do not satisfy your highly sophisticated palate.
And remember: McDonald's is also "a clean successful establishment" but the food is still shit.
I don't work for Real Deal
If I did, they'd have better mozzarella sticks and would have made that roast pork with broccoli rabe sandwich I'd suggested to them a few months back. Just a customer with their online menu among my bookmarks.
I also just stated the facts: Hundreds of people who aren't you didn't get sick from eating at Real Deal. Yours seems to be an isolated case. Just like that hair someone found at Purple Cactus is likely an anomaly.
As for the "trashing" of other eateries, Sami's is well aware that it's not traditional or even very good falafel and shwarma. It's Sami's Wrap N' Roll for a reason: Because its original store was little more than a lunch counter for hungry doctors in the Longview food court and its JP location has carried that minimalist theme over. Rami's use of actual pita, big cuts of shwarma and fully cooked chick peas makes it better.
As for City Feed, their sandwiches are both overpriced in the $8 to $9 range and mediocre. They rely heavily on their artisan bread for substance and use inferior and insubstantial cuts of meat and cheese. For the product, the price and the wait, they're an absolute disappointment.
It is my right as a customer to critique the service and products of any establishment seeking my dollar. Just because I don't indiscriminately cram any lump of garbage down my throat and willingly fork over the cash for the mere fact that it's "local" doesn't make my palate overly discriminating. If I'm going to pay for food made by another person, however, it should be made well. The fried chicken at the Galway, the sticky toffee pudding at the Haven, the pizza at Same Old Place and Slice O Pie and the Vinny Gorgeous and Real Deal fit that bill. The wraps at Sami's, the sandwiches at City Feed and the pan-fried Greek pizza at half the dives in this neighborhood don't.
Your grumpy old man posts are starting to fall into that latter list.
Don't mind tenfortyseven
He's still worked up over the fact that someone dared, dared to question a JP resident's god-given right to set out space savers on Rosemary Street with nary a flake of snow on the ground.
I'm in total agreeance with
I'm in total agreeance with everything JPFree has crtiqued on this board. I'm not sure how someone can bash Real Deal. City Feed has decent food but the prices are incredibly overpriced. The only two places I've been to in JP that I can strongly tell people never to go to are Sami's and Charlie Chans.
I'm only commenting because I
I'm only commenting because I took the over.
JP
JP is a great place to live. It could be made even greater with the addition of a Chic-fil-A.
oooooh the humanity
Something for whose foods to clamp onto for the new year!
Burger bar, music to the ears!
bacon, cheese, all the fixins!
Vouchers
What is “Whose Foods” stance on the “GrassFed Burger Bar”?
Surely the former customers of the Hi-Lo Supermarket will find the $20 burgers beyond their budget.
Will the new restaurant accept EBT or WIC?
Expansion plans???
So, has anyone heard what's going to happen to JP Comics and Flores? I heard they may be sacrificed in this arrangement & I'd hate to see them go.
i haven't heard that--i live
i haven't heard that--i live about 300 feet from the building and i've always gotten the sense the the flower guys and the ten tables have a really great and supportive relationship of each others' businesses....
Hard to imagine how anyone would object to this
Yes, JP continues to gentrify, commercial rents are still going up, it's harder to open a new restaurant in the cheap-eats category along Centre Street these days. But would you rather have the old Bon Savor space sit idle? At least the Ten Tables folks deliver a lot of value for money -- I think it's one of the better bistros of its type in the city -- and it's not hard to imagine they'll do the same again at Grass Fed.
Ten Tables food is good but
Ten Tables food is good but "value" is not one of the words I associate with it.
its a scam
This is a scam, except instead of scamming the average joe, its scamming people who think they are doing the right thing. Its just another way for businesses just to separate people from their money.
I don't care what your argument is, its a scam. Unless you're on the farm itself 24/7/365, watching them graze and making sure they aren't being fed grains.. you don't know. You're putting your faith in a restaurant stating its meat is from grass fed cows? So you'll believe a sign.. I have a bridge to sell ya too.
If you believe that, next up McDonald's will put out signs that say that their cows are grass fed too. Would you believe that and would you eat there? Im sure you wouldn't, but yet another place does the same thing and you will. Sorry... pure sheep attitude. Yeah you may think you're doing the right thing based on what they tell you, but in reality you're not.
wow how does one make it
wow how does one make it through the day with this kind of worldview?
There's not enough foil in the world...
for his haberdasher to keep up with demand.
Bring back Smithie's!
Bring back Smithie's!