Allium Market To Bring A Specialty Grocer Back To Coolidge Corner

BROOKLINE, MA — If you read the signs, specialty grocery stores are in. A Specialty Grocery store called Allium Market just popped up a sign in the window in Coolidge Corner. Slated to open in October, it's moving into part of the space formerly occupied by the Walgreens in the old S.S Pierce grocery - the iconic building with the clock tower sitting at the corner of Beacon and Harvard.

The shop (pronounced Al E yum) markets itself as part market, part cheese shop, part cafe. And as with Foodie Asylum in Brookline Village, the owner is hoping folks who love food will venture over to buy those hard to find and traditionally produced pantry items, local produce, and special ingredients -anyone from the professional chef to the broke college student with no kitchen.

"The market is a great place to stock up on pantry staples, plan your next dinner party, find your new favorite treat or get the perfect gift for the foodie in your life. We are so excited to share our favorite finds with you," reads the website.

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Talia Glass and her husband moved to Brookline three years ago from Michigan, land of the cute quaint specialty stores and markets. In fact, Glass once worked at Zingerman's Delicatessen in Ann Arbor.

Shortly after the couple and their cattle dog Juan moved to Washington Square, they decided to go for a hike. Beforehand, they thought, we'll stop by and get some nice cheese and a baguette and head off. But then the two quickly realized they weren't in Michigan anymore and they didn't know of such a place to get what they wanted in town. It was something they could have gotten easily at Zingerman's or another shop in Ann Arbor. But it would take some legwork to get it in Brookline.
"My husband looked at me and jokingly said 'I guess you'll have to start the Zingerman's of Brookline'," remembers Glass.
That joke is slated to become a reality this fall with the help and support of some very generous family, says Glass who quit her managerial position at Whole Foods to throw herself into the dream of opening a little shop cafe in Washington Square where she was originally looking. That plan morphed when the space where Radio Shack once was was came on the market, but the Shack's bankruptcy process took a little longer than anyone anticipated. About ninth months ago, while she was waiting for Radio Shack, a space in the S.S. Pierce building became available.
"We jumped at the chance," said Glass, who knew the S.S. Pierce building was a type of grocer in the 1800s. "To bring it back to the roots."
Glass said she has experience on multiple sides of the food industry. From working at a farm, to small scale specialty to Zingerman's and even corporate Whole Foods, she says she'd ready. "It's my dream baby," she says.
She's in the process of a large build-out, she says, but things are on time for an October opening.
"We're really excited to be part of the Brookline community. We love the diversity and love that people are interested in food and we're just trying to bring an awesome food experience that cuts out the pretense of high quality food. That's one of our big big focuses," she said adding that the target market isn't really just for fancy foodies, but encompasses anyone who likes or is willing to try food.
"We want people to feel really welcome. And they don't need to know anything," she said.

Cheese, glorious cheese:
The shop will have a curated selection of cheeses staffed mongers. And the shop boasts that the cheese department will be the first "true cut to order fromagerie" in Brookline, and will have the largest selection of domestic and imported cheeses in the area.
But don't worry, says Glass, if you don't know anything about cheese. Her staff will work with you without being snooty about it.
Expect light bites at the cafe: Salads and mediterranean style tapas/dips and toasts or a cheese board made to order.
Did someone say baked goods?
The shop will host Executive Pastry chef Tania Peterson of Washington Square's Fireplace fame to bake daily, to go along with the coffee and range of espresso drinks, teas, and vinegar and shrub spritzers.
Peterson has also consults with local business to help them develop the pastry menus at places like Vee Vee in JP, Matt Murphy's Pub, Pomodoro, West Side Lounge, Tryst, Rockfish/38 State.
Look for classes and clubs and neighborhood potluck type things after the shop opens.
What's in a name?
For a while Glass was hoping to somehow name the shop after her grandfather, who she was close with and who was the original businessman in the family. But "Barney" anything was a hard sell with images of purple dinosaurs and fancy stores.
So she landed on Allium.
Not only does it have an organic food feeling, but the allium family of plants (think: garlic, onions and chives) grow on every continent except for Antarctica and are used in the base of nearly every cuisine across the globe.
"Alliums are this globally known flavoring and ingredients that just ties so many cuisines together," said Glass. And then there's how you spell it out phonetically: Al ee yum. "It's just too adorably fitting," she said.

And what about the grocer that was there before this was a Walgreen's?

Coolidge & Brother at the same location gave Coolidge Corner its name, says the Historical Society's Ken Liss. (Check out this old image of it via Liss) The store was there in the late 1880s.

It wasn't until about 1831, decades after Samuel Stillman Pierce and his partner, Eldad Worcester started a business wholesaling provisions to ships in the Boston Harbor and bartering with ship captains, exchanging provisions, that the grocer / wholesale opened shop in Brookline.

Allium Market, 1330 Beacon Street, right in Coolidge Corner. Its website will be at http://alliummarket.com/

Photo of the S.S. Pirece building by Jenna Fisher/Patch