Special to the Times
It’s a match made in heaven for the sloppy eater crowd. Or at least that’s what Colin Daly thought when he realized his new store on Beacon Hill, The Hummus Shop, at 37A Charles Street, would be moving in next door to Anton’s Dry Cleaners. “It’s perfect,” he chuckled recently. “You eat one of our roll-ups, mistakenly drop some on your shirt, and leave it off the next day at Anton’s when you come back to us for more.”
The idea may not have been part of Daly’s original business plan but it’s one of many benefits he sees in landing in a coveted spot on the Hill. “Obviously Beacon Hill is really historic and just a great place to be. You get a lot of tourists and hospital workers. You get people coming through the park. And our food is very sharable, fast, easy to eat and it’s fun.” He adds with a wink: “When people are trying to decide between a hummus bowl or a pita sandwich, I say, do you want it on your shirt? If you don’t, get a bowl. It gives us that personality that I think a lot of casual restaurants are missing.”
Sloppy or not, hungry residents and visitors will soon find the Hummus Shop tucked behind Anton’s, down a short corridor off the same front door. Daly hopes to open in the next few weeks now that he has approval from the Beacon Hill Civic Association; one or two permits from the city remain outstanding.
“It’s kind of a speakeasy space,” he says, with only 700 square feet to accommodate retail, seating for six, and an efficiently laid out kitchen. “Compared to our food truck, though, it’s big – like three times the size. So, we’re excited.” The space is decorated with a whimsical Beacon Hill mural by well-known artist Ben Jundanian.
Daly will open with a short menu of well-tested Middle Eastern basics, including falafel and tahini dressing he has been refining since he returned to Boston from a teaching stint at Bedouin city of Rahat in Israel’s Negev Desert seven years ago. There will also be some unusual items like their vegetarian chicken schnitzel and “Sabich sandwich” which has a cult following among eggplant lovers. But hummus has been his passion from the start. “I started selling hummus at retail at farmer’s markets and did that for about three years,” he explains. Next came wholesale, where he landed an account with Whole Foods, before opening a food truck with a slightly wider variety of offerings.
What’s different about his hummus? “We actually don’t use any garlic,” he notes. “I don’t want to use sliced garlic because I don’t think it’s very good. Fresh garlic is sometimes inconsistent in flavor which makes it tougher to maintain manufacturing standards. Honestly, I think that garlic is a way to kind of hide flavor and we want the lemon and the chickpeas we use to come out.”
“It’s kind of like a living recipe,” Daly continues. “We try to keep it as consistent as we can, but you know, the lemons that we’re getting are different every time. And the chickpeas, depending on whether they are bigger or smaller, can make a difference too. [In small batch production] things like that are going to matter.”
Daly works with a handful of producers he has met over the years to ensure fresh, unadulterated – and distinctly flavorful – ingredients. “We work directly with a family in Turkey that produces our olive oil. The chickpeas come from a farmer in Washington state. And our hot sauce is really local – Craic Sauce.” [available at Boston area farmer markets] His chef is local as well – Tim Cole, who joins the Hummus Shop after cooking stints in Cambridge and beyond.
When he is not behind the counter at Charles Street, Daly will likely be soaking, stirring, and packaging products in the store’s Medford manufacturing facility. “We make about a thousand pounds of hummus in a day when we’re in production and about 400 pounds of falafel. And we get it out the next day for wholesale.” He may also be found snacking on some of his own product, too. “I probably eat like a pound of hummus, on average, a day. I mean, I eat it all the time. I think it’s a great snack. I can put down half a pound in a sitting very easily.”
Daly is especially looking forward to getting to know his Beacon Hill neighbors and taking suggestions for new flavors or products. “You know, I can’t afford to lose anyone, so, you we’re going to make the product right,” he vows. But he draws the line at delivery service. “When I was running the food truck, I felt like I wasn’t connecting to the customers the way I wanted to,” he explains. “I think sharing food is really important and I think a lot of people are kind of missing that human interaction. We can help change that.”