Savin Bar & Kitchen

On a recommendation from a friend, we headed over to try out Savin Bar & Kitchen, conveniently located right across from the Savin Hill T-stop in Dorchester. SBK has a nice neighborhood feel to it. It's clean and airy (they had the long windows slid open for a bit) with a modern urban decor. You can sit at the bar to watch a game or head over to a high-top table or a regular table towards the back. We started our meal with some pumpkin beer from shipyard (16 oz for $5) and a Mayflower IPA. The menu is not huge but has a good selection of appetizers, sandwiches/burgers, and entrees. Most of the food is comfort food and sounds good. I decided on the smoked chicken pot pie (pulled smoked chicken breast, peas, carrots, celery, creamed chicken broth, potato pasta, flaky sweet potato crust) while B chose the mac & cheese with fried chicken (bacon, cavattapi, ritz cracker).

The pot pie had a thin but excellent dough crust made of sweet potato (it didn't taste like sweet potato though), it reminded me a bit of pizza crust. Inside there was a creamy very flavorful broth with bits of peas, chicken, and carrots. The potato pasta (gnocchi?) seemed more like mashed potatoes to me but maybe the pasta loses it's shape while it cooks? I didn't mind although I was curious to how gnocchi would taste in a pot pie (I assume delicious). It was a good pot pie, although I wish the inside was a bit chunkier or filled a bit more with items besides broth but I guess it was fine because it definitely filled me up. The best part was the crust on the rim of the bowl. It was salty and nice and crunchy.

B's mac & cheese was good as well. He was happy that the fried chicken tasted like actual fried chicken pieces and not just something out of a frozen food bag. He loved the addition of the huge chunks of bacon and enjoyed the Ritz crackers on top which gave everything a suprising salty crunchiness. Both of our entrees were a good size and left us feeling full with some left over on the mac & cheese dish to bring home.

For dessert, I had to try the ice cream sandwich on the menu. It's made across the street at Savin Scoop and it definitely was worth trying. I ordered a whole one for seven bucks. Comprised of a huge amount of ice cream wedged between two huge chocolate chip cookies, rimmed with sprinkles and sprayed with whipped cream, the sandwich was definitely delicious and definitely more than enough for two people. Next time, I'd order half and share it.

Overall, we enjoyed Savin Bar & Kitchen. It's a great neighborhood restaurant with enough interesting things on the menu to set it apart from a standard local pub. If you head there before 6pm they also have dollar oysters which is worth the trip itself.