Beloved Mexican Restaurant Citrus & Salt Relocates to Boston’s Seaport District

Jason Santos's beloved coastal Mexican restaurant relocates, bringing crab empanadas and strawberry shortcake tacos to Fort Point. And yes, of course, there’s tequila.

By Nathan Tavares· 5/3/2024, 2:51 p.m.

Photo by Mike Diskin

Late last year, chef-owner Jason Santos got word from the owner of the Pledge of Allegiance building, where his popular Back Bay spot Citrus & Salt had operated since 2017, that the restaurant’s lease wouldn’t be renewed. (The building was becoming a healthcare facility.) While that might’ve seemed like a grim prognosis, Santos knew there was no way he was shuttering his beloved coastal Mexican spot, thanks to its consistently booked-solid dinners and buzzy brunches. Instead, Citrus & Salt relocated to a new sprawling Seaport space with a riot of colors and textures, a Mexican street food menu with a focus on fresh seafood, and all the margaritas you can drink on a giant patio. “It’s much bigger and better,” says Santos, a Hell’s Kitchen and Bar Rescue regular who also owns Buttermilk & Bourbon and Nash Bar & Stage. “Sort of like Citrus & Salt 2.0.”

Citrus & Salt 2.0, as we’ll call it, opens this Saturday in a 4,515 square-foot, 180-seat space that once was home to Oak + Rowan in Fort Point. New digs, yes. But thankfully, the menu feels comfortingly familiar. There’s the signature grilled street corn with smoked mayonnaise, the grilled octopus with spicy citrus relish, the house-made guac with the perfect cilantro zing. Call it a greatest hits menu rather than a complete reinvention of the wheel—because, hey, that wheel was made of cotija cheese and smothered in mole poblano, and everyone loved it, anyway.

Photo by Mike Diskin

“As cliché as it is, these are all my favorite dishes from over seven years,” Santos says. Designing the menu wasn’t just about his preferred plates; he wanted to make sure diners following the restaurant to Southie found their favorite bites on the opening menu, too. “We sat down with the staff, and went through seven years of menus and we picked: ‘What’s the best taco?’ ‘What’s the best this, what’s the best that?’ And we just picked it all.”

The menu is split up into five sections: raw offerings; the main menu; a selection of a few tacos and one mini quesadilla; a handful of sides; and desserts. Santos’s favorite blue crab empanadas—served with elote corn salad and lemon crema—thankfully enjoy a starring role. As do Buttermilk’s Nashville hot chicken tacos, once a special that flew off the menu.

While the focus is Mexican street food, Santos isn’t afraid to take large creative leaps. “I like to take things that are approachable and make them a little funkier, a little bit more original,” he says. Take the grilled street corn, which is soaked in butter and milk before it hits the grill. Then it’s rolled in smoked mayo and ground Flamin’ Hot Cheetos before it’s doused in cotija cheese. The result is a crunchy, creamy, red-flecked mashup that Santos says hits you in the face with flavor.

Four ears of corn are slathered in bright-red dust and crumbled cheese.

Citrus & Salt’s grilled street corn with Flamin’ Hot Cheetos crumbs, smoked mayonnaise, and cotija. / Courtesy photo

Photo by Emily Burke

While the South Boston Citrus & Salt menu celebrates the familiar, it wisely leaves room for the new, too. There literally wasn’t enough room in the Back Bay location to store fresh oysters, so larger digs mean letting loose with a raw bar, where Tecate-poached shrimp come with a cocktail sauce that’s spiked with Valentina hot sauce. Two ceviche options swing slightly tropical, too: Mango lifts a salmon ceviche, while pickled pineapple and a passion fruit vinaigrette lend a sweet zip to the tuna.

Speaking of sweet, Citrus & Salt does Disney World’s best-selling Dole Whip one better—finely dicing fresh pineapple with vanilla bean and making it into a pineapple sorbet. (Best enjoyed with a glug of rum, naturally.) The made-to-order churros still hit the spot, but the dessert offerings feature a new MVP. “I’m not a pastry chef at all. In fact, it scares the hell out of me even to bake cookies,” Santos says. “But I just thought this place is so cool, how can we do something that’s fun?” Enter strawberry shortcake tacos. Yes, really. Santos’s confection sees fried tortillas tossed in a freeze-dried strawberry and sugar powder, then the shell is piped with a cream-cheese mousse and served with strawberry jam and fresh strawberries. The dessert is topped with some nostalgia: Santos’s version of the pink crumble that coated the strawberry shortcake pops peddled from everyone’s childhood ice cream truck. “Obviously not fucking authentic,” he quips with a laugh, “but I just think it’s killer.”

Photo by Mike Diskin

Photo by Mike Diskin

Go for the food and beverages—margaritas, sangria pitchers, and pithily named cocktails like “I Didn’t Text You, Tequila Did” to sip on the patio—but good luck tearing your eyes off the space itself. Assembly Design Studio carved out a slice of coastal Baja bliss, circa 1970. Everywhere, textures like weathered white-washed wood, warm brick, and velvet overflow in the bright and airy space. And it wouldn’t be a restaurant opening in 2024 without vignettes designed for social feeds, like over-the-top flower installations and hand-painted sugar skulls and flamingoes. Plus, the 16-seat private dining room that’s dubbed the Patrón room features about 30,000 jewels hand-glued to bottles. Or as Santos simply sums it up, “The place is fucking stunning. I mean honestly, I’m very humble when it comes to my own restaurants, but it’s like one of the most beautiful restaurants like I’ve ever seen.”

Head there this weekend yourself for proof that that’s not just the tequila talking.

319 A St., Boston, 617-424-6711, citrusandsaltboston.com; Sunday to Thursday, 5 p.m. to 10 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 5 p.m. to 11 p.m.; bar stays open later. Brunch to come shortly.