Christopher’s Restaurant and Bar
1920 Massachusetts Ave.
Christopher’s in Porter Square is a casual Cambridge restaurant with good food and a great beer selection, and is open for lunch, dinner, and Sunday brunch. It is located in Porter Square just steps away from the MBTA Red Line.
Christopher’s offers a wide-ranging menu that boasts organic ingredients with no hormones or preservatives. If you are looking for quality food in Cambridge, Christopher’s is the place to go. Most nights it’s normal to see its two floors filled with patrons yet luckily there seems to be no shortage of seating—unusual for such a popular Cambridge spot. Outside, a few tables line the wide sidewalk and large planters separate diners from busy Massachusetts Ave.
The management also runs the bar Toad (adjacent to the restaurant), Cambridge Common, Lizard Lounge, and West Side Lounge.
On a recent Friday night, a flat screen TV hung above the bar and faint music played softly to keep conversations manageable. The space has exposed brick walls, wide plank wood floors, exposed beam ceilings, and a fireplace. Original art adorns the wall in the bar downstairs, while upstairs is more of a traditional restaurant. The crowd is a range of young professionals, college students (Tufts, Lesley, and Harvard are all nearby), and families.
The over 25-year-old restaurant has specials which change frequently, and on my visit included a tropical fruit soup appetizer and a Cajun-seasoned grilled snapper entree served with mango-lime coulis, Spanish rice, plantains, and seared greens. All in all, entrees range in price from a $6.95 basic burger to $14.95 for the steak frites, albeit that doesn’t include seasonal specials.
My guest and I ordered the mussels as our appetizer, which were served in a lemon and garlic white wine broth, with roasted tomato, leeks, and capers. They were plump and fresh and without the usual sand. Toasted French bread came on the side for dipping in the broth.
For my meal I ordered the salad with steak tips. The steak was well seasoned and the salad had a light and crisp vinaigrette on it.
My friend couldn’t resist the burger because many say they make the trip for the burgers alone. He opted for the Spicy Pepperjack Burger, with Cajun spices, chipotle mayonnaise, and melted pepperjack cheese. Beef burgers are made with 100 percent Angus beef and served on a French or multi-grain roll (you can also request an English muffin, and if you haven’t tried one on a burger before, it comes highly recommended). Toppings vary and range widely from blue cheese, to chipotle barbecue sauce, to roasted red peppers, to a spicy cranberry sauce.
And yet vegetarians won’t feel left out. The Improper Bostonian named Christopher’s the best vegetarian restaurant in Boston and the Chucks Veggie Burgah has been featured in the Boston Globe and on WCVB’s Chronicle.
And if that’s not enough, they have 24 brews on tap with plenty of local beers from the Cambridge Brewing Company, Pretty Things, and Samuel Adams. Their cocktail menu is inventive, with drinks like 5 Flowers Sweet Tea, which is sweet ginger iced tea and lemonade with 4 Roses Bourbon, Theia Organic Jasmine Liqueur, or the house made sangria.
