The owner of longtime Five Points-based Batter’d & Fried Boston Seafood House has updated its interior and exterior spaces and streamlined its menu, with the business now called Boston Commons.
The rebranding of the East Nashville eatery continues, as exterior signs will soon be installed and other upgrades unfold. It comes after restaurateur Matthew Charette bought the property in which his business resides, located at 1008 Woodland St., in July (read here).
Charette says the changes were dictated by various factors, including the need to have a more manageable menu, the desire for creativity with certain dishes and the chance to improve awareness to an increasing percentage of tourists the restaurant now attracts. However, the menu will remain focused on New England cuisine.
“This is a chance to create some efficiencies,” says Charette, who is not disclosing the cost to rebrand. “We tried to be all things to all people with Batter’d & Fried, so we never got the opportunity to specialize. We want to reel it back in a bit.”
Batter’d & Fried, which opened in early 2006, has long been a meeting place of note for fans of Boston-area professional sports team. It will remain such as Boston Commons.
“So many of today's restaurants put just as much emphasis on their brand and atmosphere as they do on their food [in an effort] to differentiate themselves,” says Charette, who lives with his family in East Nashville and is one of the city’s food and beverage industry veterans. “And in our ever-growing Nashville market (which added about 140 restaurants in 2018), this adjustment is very important to our continued success.”
Batter’d & Fried offered about 160 menu items. In contrast, Boston Commons features about 60.
“We have a large, loyal following in this neighborhood, and I do not want to disappoint any of our customers by changing something they love,” says Charette, who is originally from Massachusetts. “We have a lot of quality dishes that we are keeping on the menu, from our extremely popular chef's fish-and-chips to our traditional and distinctive sushi rolls.”
Charette offers a significant business and personal history in Five Points. He bought the Boston Commons property from friend David Knoble, a long-ime East Nashville real estate investor. The site is also home to the building from which Charette operates his Drifter’s Tennessee Bar-B-Que Joint.
Similarly, Charette opened his nearby Beyond the Edge in 2003, leasing from Knoble. In June 2018, Charette bought that property, which has an address of 112 S. 11th St.
“I continue to be very blessed to be a small part of East Nashville,” he says. “I love this community. This is where I live and work, and where my kids go to school.
“The last thing I want to do is let my community down,” he adds.
