Restaurant Reviews

Boston's Best Food and Drink 2009

Keeping it all back home

By BOSTON PHOENIX STAFF | April 19, 2009

Photo by Joel Veak

The danger of doing an annual Best issue is that readers could well screw up the whole thing, especially when it comes to eating out. It would suck if they voted for the too-familiar national-chain eateries. Best Hamburger: McDonalds?!

We don’t have this problem with the Phoenix Best Readers’ Poll. In fact, with one excusable exception, all of our readers’ picks for superlative comestibles and potables are native-born; even the winner in the Best Coffee Shop — National category.

So get the message, diners and guzzlers: in these awful economic times, eat local, drink local, and generally stick around. That way, Boston’s food scene will only get better.

Boston's Best City Life 2009
There’s so much to love about Boston, it’s hard sometimes to know where to start. Traffic? Obnoxious Sox fans? Irritating students? Norway rats? Inflated rents? An inferiority complex unlike any on the Eastern seaboard?
Boston's Best Arts and Entertainment 2009
We are a culture-rich city — a veritable cauldron of talent and fun, and have been so since Anne Bradstreet inscribed the gates of Harvard. In Boston, the arts never stand still.
Boston bartenders bust up the Big Easy
There was a wedding, a funeral (for the Long Island Iced Tea), fried alligator, mechanical bulls, and Ron Jeremy on harmonica. Boston bartenders, who were there in full force, can attest to all of it.
Review: Our Idiot Brother
Homeless and bounced from one sister's house to the next, will Ned and his simplicity serve as a touchstone of truth for these miserable women?
A friend in need
For the last 15 years, Aliza Shapiro has been the heart and brains of Truth Serum Productions, the rabble-rousing outfit behind the irreverent TraniWreck cabaret.
Review: Posto
Some places, no matter how good, manage to fly under the radar. And the recent trend of restaurateurs opening a pizza place, establishing a reputation as a lower-priced, "On the Cheap" joint, and then upscaling into a full-tilt sit-down spot (see: Nebo), has made things even trickier.
A study in anarchy
Named after a family of birds that is markedly playful and diverse, Corvid is a benevolent underground anarchist institute fostering eclectic inter-disciplinary thought.
From the bedroom to beyond with Craft Spells
There's been an enormous wave of musicians gaining notoriety for creating work where they sleep, and subsequently seeing their star rise as blogs have picked up on the results.
Heavy burden
In 2012, collections on homes, buildings, and private infrastructure will feed more than 65 percent of Boston's $2.4 billion budget.
Party supplies
Original Plumbing, the New York–based quarterly lifestyle magazine and Web site for trans men and their friends, returns to the Midway this Friday for a queer/trans dance party featuring go-go boys, a photo booth, DJs D'hana and Justincredible, and a midnight performance by New England electropop act Nicky Click.
Graduate programs in visual design teach more than just software skills
For me it was important to go back to school because while I had a BA in communication arts, I did not have the design history and foundation necessary to create designs that communicate effectively.
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