Here’s Your First Look at the Gita at Wink & Nod Menu
Gita Kantrow. / Photo by Michael Diskin
The sad news is that it’s time to say goodbye—for now—to chef Brendan Pelley’s excellent contemporary Greek cuisine at Pelekasis, which is wrapping up an eight-month residency at Wink & Nod after dinner service on Saturday, July 30. The good news is that chef Gita Kantrow is coming in hot with flavorful fare inspired by her native Nepal, and her New England upbringing.
Gita, the new pop-up concept at Boston Nightlife Ventures’ South End “incubator” and cocktail bar, is Kantrow’s first restaurant endeavor. The self-taught, personal chef previously staged at Trade, Rialto, and Journeyman. She emigrated to Lincoln, Mass., at age 9, and started cooking to maintain a connection to her homeland, where her parents still live.
“In many ways, it makes sense that I lean toward [Nepali cooking],” she previously told Boston. “I love spices, and the spices from home. At the same time, I’m mixing in what I grew up with here. It’s American food with traditional spices, that still has a familiar taste.”
That means addictive pork dumplings, or momo, with spicy roasted tomato chutney, wood-roasted chicken sekuwa, peppercorn-charred salmon with ginger stewed tomatoes, and cardamom cake with rum-infused pineapple. Check out the full menu below.
Gita is the restaurant incubator’s fifth pop-up. Alumni include chef Jeremy Kean and Philip Kruta, who debuted Brassica Kitchen in Jamaica Plain last month; Josh Lewin and Katrina Jazayeri, who opened Juliet in Union Square, Somerville, earlier this year; and Patrick Enage, whose Southeast Asian-inspired Akinto is opening next door to Wink & Nod later this year. The track record of Wink & Nod graduates opening their own restaurants should continue: Pelley has said he plans to translate Pelekasis into its own brick-and-mortar, and he’s hopeful for a 2017 debut.
Gita hits the South End on Monday, August 1. Mid-month, Kantrow will launch a bar menu, as well as late-night options, available Thursday-Saturday from 10 p.m.-midnight.
Gita at Wink & Nod, debuting early August at 3 Appleton St., Boston, 617-482-0117, winkandnod.com, kantrowcatering.com.
