Eating houses, like a lot of things born out of necessity, brought people together. In their earliest incarnations the small, simple, colonial eateries - often housed in train cars - offered up readily available ingredients for the community’s consumption. And as some of the 19th century’s first public dining spaces, eating houses likely fostered neighborly socialization. We’d like to think it was there that you could feel at ease clinking glasses and slurping broth, loosening a top button and enjoying the company of the other patrons.
So important is the existence of this welcoming place, that Brushland was practically founded on the idea that the house that provides the food should be as comforting as the dishes served inside of it.
The food needn’t be complicated, either. Brushland hopes to revisit the classics, the kinds of dishes that remain scribbled on recipe cards despite having seen centuries worth of culinary evolution. Dishes that will likely conjure memories of relatives or childhood, that favorite cast iron pan or the smell of a warm, bustling kitchen.The handful of ingredients that make a time-tested chicken soup so incredibly soul warming? Those will never change. Some things were meant to stand the test of time, and we intend to serve them.