Tag: Worcester Foodies LIII: The Boynton Restaurant

For their 53rd event, Worcester Foodies found themselves on one of Highland Street’s most known restaurants, The Boynton.

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The Boynton’s Chicken Bomber

The Boynton's Chicken Bomber

The Boynton's Chicken Bomber

Every time I have ever frequented the Boynton, the atmosphere has always been frenetic. However, amongst the constant chaos, there always seems to be something systematic and controlled about the wait staff buzzing around, trays of food being brought out of the kitchen. While the atmosphere is more or less like many of the bars in Worcester, there is something comforting about your surroundings…run of the mill enough to feel like you have been there before, while still with an edge that only the City of Worcester can provide.

When reviewing the menu, I found that it was very overwhelming. The menu is massive, spanning several pages. However, it was filled with a lot of comfort food classics, as well as a wide variety of pastas and seafood to satisfy anything that you might be in the mood for in a given night. When all was said and done, we decided to start with fried pickles ($5.99). This is always a dish I gravitate towards whenever I see them on the menu. The combination of the tanginess of the pickle and the crunchiness of the batter is a great way to activate the taste buds. When these are paired with their spicy Russian dipping sauce, you cannot go wrong. When it came to picking a meal, I wanted to go off the beaten path a bit. I find myself usually drawn towards burgers, or seafood, so I didn’t want to be a victim of my own menu choices. I decided to order the Boynton Chicken Bomber ($7.99), after it came highly recommended by another Foodie. This sandwich is shaved chicken steak is grilled and sautéed onions then topped with American cheese and mayo, served on a toasted Italian loaf with a side of French fried potato wedges. The flavors that this sandwich presented me with were great. The shaved chicken reminded me of a great cheesesteak, and the sautéed onions provided a nice sweetness to the sandwich. The bread was a great vessel for the sandwich, being light and fluffy on the interior but having a nice crunchy exterior. The only downside was that I would like to have a better ratio of bread to meat. The bread engulfed the filling to the point where I had trouble finding the meat with each bite. There can always be worse problems to have than that though.

The waitress that was assigned to us for the evening seemed to be very attentive to all of our needs. For a Tuesday night, the restaurant seemed unusually busy (although I’m told that the Boynton is busy like that almost every day). I would have like to have seen the waitress around a few more times over the course of the night, but I know the hospitality business is a hectic one. When she was around, she did a fantastic job. Her absence did not detract from my overall experience for the night.

The Boynton on Highland Street is an institution within the city of Worcester. It is nice to see how they have built it up and grown over the years into an establishment that is synonymous with great food, a large bar selection, good atmosphere and who could forget those “Boynton Buckets”. Whether you are looking for a night out on the town with your friends or a nice sit-down meal filled with a wide array of options, you would have a tough time finding a better place to satisfy your culinary wishes than the Boynton.

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Tugboat from The Boynton

Tugboat from The Boynton on Highland Street in Worcester, MA

Tugboat from The Boynton on Highland Street in Worcester, MA
The Boynton is probably one of the most well known places in Worcester for friends and families to gather for food and spirits. For me, The Boynton has been a staple of so many fun nights out in Worcester. The restaurant is huge and can accommodate a number of people, however, it is always packed and the popular restaurant does not take reservations.

The décor is what you would expect in a pub, and the atmosphere is boisterous and energetic, full of people laughing and having a good time. Located on Highland St. in Worcester, the prime location has become a stomping grounds for the college student and Worcester professional population for the last 8 decades.

The Tugboat sandwich was delicious! I chose this roast beef sandwich for dinner because I had heard really great things about it. Also, I am a fan of anything with bread and cheese- especially mozzarella. And the au jus dipping sauce was just incredible! The beef was tender, but maybe a little too overcooked for what I would normally expect from roast beef. The caramelized onions and the peppercorn spread provided a nice sweet and tangy cut that was very nice with the beef and mozzarella. While the au jus was perfectly warm and salty, flavoring the meat and soaking in the bread for each bite! I would say the bread was a little big, and though I normally would love a grilled Italian loaf, I may have preferred thinner bread to get a crispier, Panini crunch.

The service was good-neither totally impressive, but not horrible either. Our waitress was friendly and attentive, and given the large size of our party (15 people), she handled herself quite well. I give the wait staff a lot of credit, because they must be constantly busy. There is also a very large menu that must be quite a challenge to become familiar with.

The Boynton for me has always been an enjoyable experience. The food is good and the drinks are good. Every time I have dinner there, it is always a nice time. If I was to make one recommendation, it would be that they may want to minimize their menu a bit. It was quite large, with a number of selections for everything from Italian, to seafood, to sandwiches, and pizza. I think that if they were able to pick a couple signature dishes and maybe do a rotation of specials it would be better for them, and would allow them to perfect everything on the menu. The menu is also very overwhelming as a consumer, I think it was about 6 pages, which was a lot! Normally I usually just go and pick something off the appetizers or because it was a recommendation from someone else because it is just so much to look at. I would also say that they should start taking renovations, but clearly they are doing something right! For a restaurant to succeed for the amount of time that it has without any wavering of the customer numbers, they certainly know how to keep the people coming in every night of the week.