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Local restaurants spice things up with their own product lines
BY RUTH TOBIAS
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Move over, Emeril and Bobby Flay — or at least make some room on the pantry shelf. TV chefs aren’t the only ones turning signature items into brand-name products these days. Even local restaurateurs are peddling merchandise ranging from condiments to clothing. In some cases, distribution stops at the front register; in others, an entire marketing team promotes coast-to-coast availability. Legal Sea Foods has its own mail-order catalogue, of course, and East Coast Grill’s Chris Schlesinger struck gold years ago with his line of Inner Beauty hot sauces (which he’s since sold). Here are a few other must-haves (or at least why-not-haves) for Beantown foodies. • Oleana’s Spice Collection ($15). Chef-owner Ana Sortun’s Eastern Mediterranean repertoire gains much of its distinction from the exotic spices she uses; with this collection, she makes those ingredients accessible to the home cook. Packaged in a cylinder like the kind used for fishing tackle, it contains Egyptian dukkah (a nut-studded spice mix eaten with bread and olive oil); an Armenian wild-herb rub for fish; mild ground Aleppo chilies; the black-pepper-and-allspice-based baharat; and Lebanese zahtar, which combines summer savory and sesame seeds. Available at the restaurant, it’s also sold at the Copley Square Farmers’ Market. • Argana’s Moroccan seasonings. This North African haven in Cambridge has a small store that sells three-ounce jars of chef Younes Rouzky’s own spice rubs, including one for chicken with ginger, black pepper, turmeric, saffron, nutmeg, mace, coriander, and cardamom; a similar rub for red meat; and one for fish that turns up the heat with chili, paprika, and cumin ($5.95 each). There’s also the staple rub known as ras el hanout ($7.95). Applied to grilled meats, the mixture can vary widely; Argana’s boasts such ingredients as cinnamon, cloves, fennel, anise, sesame seeds, and cayenne and white pepper. (Bonus: each rub is accompanied by a recipe.) • Monica’s tomato sauce ($3.95/16 ounces.; $6.95/32 ounces). Where would the North End be without its red sauce? Well, sure, it would still be right there, but it wouldn’t be as much fun. Monica’s has found a way to bottle that feeling: chef George Mendoza seals his trademark sauce in Mason jars the old-fashioned way. Sold at Monica’s Mercato, located down the street from the restaurant, the sauce may soon be joined by a line of homemade pastas ready for shipping, including ziti regati and pappardelle. • Sundries from Sel de la Terre. The small boulangerie in the foyer of this waterfront French restaurant sells its share of baguettes and pâtés, but it also stocks a variety of condiments packaged prettily in stoppered bottles and jelly jars bearing Sel’s label. Preserves ($2.50) may be as straightforward as blueberry or as striking as apricot with calaminth (a type of mint); Champagne vinegar ($5.95) gets a subtle boost from thyme or a kick from tarragon and orange rind. Herb-infused oils are available as well. • Wearable kitsch from Jasper White’s Summer Shack. As his seafood emporium morphs into a chain, White is becoming an entrepreneur of souvenirs as well. Logo T-shirts ($10–$12) sport mottos like shuck this! and save a cow — eat a fish, but the big seller here is the lobster-head beanie, complete with claw antennae ($15). Where to find it: • Argana, 1287 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, (617) 868-1247; www.arganarestaurant.com. • Copley Square Farmers’ Market, Copley Square, Boston; www.massfarmersmarkets.org/MemberMarkets/COPLEY_SQUARE/overview.htm. • East Coast Grill, 1271 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, (617) 491-6568; www.eastcoastgrill.net. • Jasper White’s Summer Shack, 50 Dalton Street, Boston, (617) 867-9955; 149 Alewife Brook Parkway, Cambridge, (617) 520-9500. • Legal Sea Foods, various locations; www.legalseafoods.com. • Monica’s Mercato, 130 Salem Street, Boston, (617) 742-4101; www.monicasfoods.com. • Oleana, 134 Hampshire Street, Cambridge, (617) 661-0505. • Sel de la Terre, 255 State Street, Boston, (617) 720-1300.
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