Boston, MA
Boston Chef Valentine Howell Jr. to Compete on ‘Top Chef’ This Year
The contestant lineup for the latest season of Top Chef is here, and there’s a familiar face among the crowd: Valentine Howell Jr., the former executive chef at Greek hot spot Krasi, the owner of taco pop-up Black Cat, and a finalist for the James Beard Award for Best Chef: Northeast in 2023, will be competing on Top Chef: Wisconsin. He joins a pool of 14 other candidates vying for a $250,000 grand prize this year. There’s another Boston name on the other side of the judges’ table, too. Kristen Kish, who formerly worked within Barbara Lynch’s restaurant empire and competed and won Top Chef in 2012, joined the cast after longtime host Padma Lakshmi left the show last year. The newest season premieres on Wednesday, March 20 at 9 p.m. on Bravo, with next-day streaming on Peacock.
The North End’s first Black female bartender reflects on her career
Marsha Lindsey, a hospitality veteran who is currently the principal bartender at Italian restaurant SRV in the South End, reflected in an interview with the Boston Globe about her years spent building her bartending career in Boston — including being the first Black woman to bartend in the North End — and what Boston’s restaurant industry could do better. “I think Boston’s really good at opening up spaces for people to eat, to come to convene, to enjoy each other, to catch a vibe. I think that Boston’s not so good at inclusivity,” Lindsey tells the Globe. “I think that there’s way more room to grow when it comes to having people of color in the front of the house.”
Seafood mainstay Saltie Girl reopens with a new look
After a month-long partial closure, chic seafood restaurant Saltie Girl in Back Bay has reopened with some dining room updates — and new menu items — to show off. The restaurant, which is housed in a townhouse at the corner of Newbury Street and Dartmouth Street, now boasts a swanky, yacht-themed captain’s room to dine in, among other interior upgrades. The menu, helmed by chef Kyle McClelland, now includes new dishes like a yellowtail crudo with citrus fruits, pickled ramps, and trout roe, a tuna carpaccio with pistachios and fried capers, and a dover sole, plus one old favorite from the vault: torched salmon belly with a miso glaze served over rice.
…and over in the Seaport, Committee debuts some changes, too
Greek bar and restaurant Committee has welcomed back Luis Figueroa, a chef on the restaurant’s opening team back in 2015, as the spot’s new executive chef. Figueroa has already been at work revamping the menu, which now includes new dinner plates like lamb frites and shrimp saganaki, with shrimp bathed in tomato sauce, garlic, lemon, and feta, as well as a weekday lunch from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. with build-your-own salads on the menu.
Boston, MA
Red Sox Icon David Ortiz Urges Boston To ‘Make It Rain’ For Free-Agent Slugger
The Boston Red Sox hive mind doesn’t always come to a perfect agreement on what they want the team to do. That is, of course, unless David Ortiz is asking for it.
A three-time World Series champion, Hall of Famer, and one of the most clutch players of all time, Ortiz is unquestionably on the Red Sox’s all-time Mount Rushmore. Even though he retired in 2016, he’s still closely woven into the fabric of the organization.
Ortiz sees what we all do: this Red Sox team is close to being ready to contend for the playoffs, but there’s one key ingredient missing. He made his feelings known about what he hopes the front office does between now and Opening Day to address that issue.
On Saturday, Ortiz relayed a simple message to the Red Sox: spend whatever it takes to get one more big bat.
“There’s still some guys out there that we can still go for, and I think we have a really good front office,” Ortiz said in an appearance on NESN. “To put a good lineup together nowadays is not that difficult. What you got to do is just make it rain, and you can go pick a few guys. Now pitching, on the other hand, is the toughest thing to put together.
“We got pitching. Pitching can always stop good offenses. The playoff is a playoff pitching (staff) we got right now. We line up a couple of thunders in the lineup to help (Rafael Devers) and the rest of them boys — one good bat would do.”
Ortiz and NESN host Tom Caron both strongly hinted at the end of the interview who that big bat could be: former Houston Astros All-Star Alex Bregman. Manager Alex Cora also signaled earlier in the day that Bregman would be a great fit in Boston.
Bregman isn’t quite Ortiz, but he does have one thing on him: the career record for OPS at Fenway Park. He has a wild 1.245 mark in 98 plate appearances in Boston throughout his career.
When David Ortiz asks for something, the Red Sox would usually be wise to follow through. And it seems he wants Bregman. Will that move the needle in the suites at Fenway?
More MLB: Red Sox Predicted To Land Ex-Padres $28 Million Gold Glover In Free Agency Surprise
Boston, MA
Greater Boston enjoys a light snow, travel not significantly impacted – The Boston Globe
The snow showers come from a weakening system approaching from the Great Lakes that tapped into some of the moisture from a strong storm passing south of New England.
The region was spared the worst precipitation of the storm thanks to persistent sub-freezing temperatures earlier this week, which pushed it south toward its current location off the coast of North Carolina, Nocera said. New England’s light snowfall is on the northern fringes of the storm.
Nocera added that this weekend’s “decorative snow” will not significantly impact ground travel.
The Massachusetts Port Authority issued a travel advisory for flight delays at Boston Logan International Airport. According to the flight tracking website Flight Aware, as of around 1:00 p.m. 212 flights were delayed at Boston Logan and another 15 were cancelled.
Margo Griffin, a teaching associate at the University of Cambridge in England, was initially worried about driving through the snow on her way to get coffee in Cambridge, but said the view from the Charles River was worth the trek.
“I thought it might be a problem, but I just decided to go ahead with the plan, and I’m enjoying walking through the snow,” Griffin said.
Other Boston-area residents who spoke to the Globe Saturday morning were happy to wake up to the winter scene on Saturday.
“I am feeling wonderful about the snow. I haven’t seen it in a long time,” said Barbara Delollis, a communications lead at Harvard Business School.
Delollis already made snow day plans.
“We want to go out and have some fun in the snow, and take a lot of pictures and just remember this moment, because we don’t know how much more snowfall we’re going to see in the Boston area anymore with climate change,” Delollis said.
Talia, a Cambridge resident, said that the snow had no effect on her plans to attend synagogue with her two-year-old son Saturday morning.
“It feels nice and seasonal, which is cool because climate change is terrifying,” she said.
Snowstorms can still occur, despite warming temperatures from climate change, Nocera said. Although Saturday’s snowfall cannot guarantee heavy snow this winter, there is a slightly higher chance of snow towards the end of the month as cold temperatures ease.
Materials from previous Globe stories were used in this report.
Boston, MA
Boston College drops Hockey East contest to Merrimack
The second-ranked Boston College men’s hockey team suffered its first home loss of the season, falling to Merrimack by a score of 5-2 in Hockey East action on Friday night at Kelley Rink. The Eagles jumped out to a 2-0 lead early in the second, but the Warriors scored the next five. BC falls to 12-4-1 overall and 6-3-1 in Hockey East, while Merrimack improves to 8-10-1 overall and 4-5-1 in league play. The Eagles opened the scoring midway through the first period when Oskar Jellvik one-timed the rebound off an Aram Minnetian shot that was saved by the Merrimack goaltender. Minnetian’s shot fell right into the path of Jellvik for the quick shot into the open net to put the Eagles in front. BC added to its lead shortly into the second period when Brady Berard scored a short-handed goal. Merrimack responded 32 seconds later with a power-play goal to get on the board, before scoring the game-tying goal less than one minute after that. The Warriors took the lead nearly three minutes later when Merrimack scored its third goal of the period. The Warriors scored twice in the third period to push their lead to three. Jacob Fowler made 23 saves while Nils Wallstrom had 27 stops for Merrimack.
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