Dalia brings wood-fired Spanish cuisine to South Boston

Restaurants

The menu includes tapas, paella and a Spanish wine list served within Assembly Design Studio’s luxurious space.

the Broadway Restaurant Group It’s at it again, bringing a new concept to its home of South Boston that puts as much detail into the menu as it does into the space.

Dahlia It opens on Thursday in a spacious space that feels the ocean beyond its southern doorstep. The Broadway Restaurant Group, known for neighborhood spots like Lincoln Tavern and Hunter’s, as well as highly decorated (and Italian) spaces like Prima and Capri, is making its first foray into Spanish cuisine with a new chef-driven concept.

And to make sure they’re good at it, they import large quantities from the rich culinary nation, from kitchen utensils to ingredients and wine.

“A lot of people have used it

The menu includes tapas, paella, and a Spanish wine list served inside a lavish space from Assembly Design Studio.

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“They feel like they’re being transported to Spain,” said Nick Dixon, executive chef at Dahlia and culinary director of Broadway Restaurant Group.

Boston is a crowded market when it comes to Spanish restaurants. They all have some sort of tapas program and offer a Spanish wine list. Pintxos are part of Boston’s restaurant lexicon, thanks to staples like Tasca and newcomers like Zorrito. We have paella, jamon, and of course croquetas.

Dalia will offer all the Spanish menu combinations, with some fun twists. But what Dixon said is that Dalia’s focus is wood-fired cooking, which is done in an open kitchen using Josper grills imported from Spain. Dixon added that it was not difficult to hire a team of chefs to cook Spanish food on high-quality Spanish grills.

“The wood-fired cooking pavilion in the middle of the restaurant, to me, looks like a Ferrari,” Dixon said.

There is a section of the menu dedicated to the culinary suite that includes shareable plates and entrees. One dish worth sharing is the wagyu prime rib ($22), thinly sliced, grilled on skewers and cooked on a robata grill, Dixon said. It is then served with sherry ponzu sauce and chimichurri.

Dalia tapas are also woodfire cured, taking ingredients such as calamari and cooking them in a grill basket. The noodle-like slices of calamari are prepared like dan dan noodles, and combined with a sauce made from Iberico pork and garlic soy sauce ($17).

Tapas, crudo and other shareable dishes range in price from $9 to $22. Larger entrees, such as Wagyu rib-eye filet with olive oil mashed potatoes or New Zealand lamb with smoked eggplant, range in price from $45 to $170.

There are also three types of paella available in two sizes, such as the Valencia, which brings chicken, chorizo ​​and clams together. Prices for these dishes range from $18 to $38.

Dixon also hopes that Dahlia’s wine list, created by wine director Dominic Trammelli, will bring wine drinking back. Exclusively Spanish and relatively affordable (up to $11), the bottle list is mostly Spanish, with some additions from Portugal, France, and the United States.

Its cocktail menu ($15), from beverage director Katie Kelly, also uses Spanish ingredients. Spanish red wine and red vermouth pair with Dr. Pepper and lemon in a Daliamotxo, while kiwi-infused fino sherry adds to the gin and vermouth in a freezer-chilled Porron Star Martini.

There are special sections for gin, tonics and sangria, as well as four mocktails available.

Guests can watch their meals being prepared at a row of multiple chairs lining an open window in the kitchen. Or they can sit at the red velvet banquette, grab a table in the Spanish-tiled dining room under a glass skylight, or sit at one of the restaurant’s three bars.

It was once again with Broadway Restaurant Group to design this space Assembly design studio.

“The space is fairly large, but our goal was to make it very cozy and intimate, so we created a lot of rooms within rooms,” said Erika Diskin, who owns Assembly with her husband, Michael Diskin.

Fairly large is correct. Erika Diskin of Assembly Designs said that the 226-seat Dahlia restaurant was designed to provide a different experience in each section of the restaurant. You can have a café by the fireplace, experience the chef’s table next to the kitchen, or dine “under the stars” thanks to that skylight, all in one restaurant.

This may lead to people coming back for great Saturday evenings, or for more casual meals after work with friends. In the coming months, the space will also serve as a café during the day, serving coffee, baked goods, breakfast and lunch, Dixon said.

Dahlia will officially open on Thursday, April 2. Currently, the restaurant is open for dinner service from 4pm to 1am daily.

Dahlia429 W. Broadway, South Boston