Neptunes boston5/6/2023 ![]() It's not for the faint-hearted, but it's fantastic for those who, like me, love gutsy flavors.Ĭioppino, with a spicy and complex tomato-based broth, has the usual ingredients of fish and shellfish along with a scoop of saffron-scented rice. A sardine sandwich is a special one evening, the grilled sardines layered with hard-boiled egg, capers, salami, and mustard on crusty bread. An appetizer of lightly breaded and gently fried plump oysters top a celery salad that is mostly the frondy tips, which offer a delightful (and unexpected) taste of the vegetable, along with some heady bleu cheese dressing. ![]() Those notes of culinary creativity turn up in many dishes. Later, on the phone, Nevins explains that he partly cooks and then sautes arborio rice, the kind used in risotto, to create the intriguing crunchy element in the salad. My companion and I puzzle over it for a moment and then ask the bartender. ![]() But there's something else in there, too, crunchy with a nutty taste. I take a bite and the delicate flavor of the salmon caviar washes over my tongue, followed by the stronger taste of the smoked salmon and the pungent scallions. Chopped smoked salmon with celery and feathery mache is molded over a puddle of scallion cream, and over all this lie strips of raw salmon topped with beads of salmon caviar. If you've decided you've had it up to here with salmon, considered the chicken breast of the sea by many caterers, you should try his crudo of smoked and raw salmon. In addition to the raw bar selections, Nevins features a crudo, or raw special, each day. There are also plenty of non-seafood dishes, including a beef tenderloin with beef ragu, a variety of burgers, and roasted chicken breast with oyster stuffing. Although many of Nevins's dishes have an Italian slant, this cuisine is much more eclectic. He chose David Nevins, a graduate of Olives and Kingfish Hall, as his chef. After 12 years as beverage manager of Olives in Charlestown and a longtime resident of the North End, Nace says in a phone interview that he knew he wanted a restaurant with an Old World feel concentrating on New England seafood. Jeff Nace and his wife, Kelli, opened Neptune Oyster last November in a space that had been home to a series of restaurants. It's where I want to be on this wintry evening. A little stone nymph looks down on diners from the corner, seemingly bemused by the bustle. Waitresses hurry between the little kitchen at the rear and the dark wooden tables in the dining room. A bartender takes orders for wine, offering tastes first, if desired. A terracotta bust of Neptune, Roman god of the sea, crowns the mirrored wall where the oysters and other raw bar selections, such as littlenecks and shrimp cocktail, are listed. The first time we concentrated on the food: lovely oysters from Nova Scotia, Martha's Vineyard, and the West Coast a beautifully made mussel salad with julienned fennel and a light, tangy dressing studded with pistachios the red snapper entree, perfectly cooked, with big, cracked green olives and nuggets of roasted garlic. The room is packed, so I wait a few minutes until a couple leaves and I can snag a stool at the bar while I wait for a friend to join me. When I push into the restaurant, the murmur of voices along the bar and the hostess' greeting immediately warms me. A young woman in a long apron stands in the window shucking oysters. There is a wide and very interesting selection of wines, especially those by the glass.īut most of all, Neptune Oyster is just cool.Įven on a snowy February night, the place is beckoning. There is the look of the place, old but new with a marble-topped bar, tin ceilings, and a minimalist aesthetic. There are other dishes, too, like a great lobster roll and a delicious salmon filet with bits of crispy duck confit and pea tendrils. There are the oysters, of course, up to 12 varieties. Neptune Oyster, so tiny that diners along the 26 banquette seats and the 16 bar stools sit nearly literally cheek-to-cheek, is worth crowing about. After all, the narrow streets of one of Boston's oldest sections are crammed with eateries, one after another along Salem and Hanover streets. Another new restaurant in the North End hardly sounds like news.
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