Italian and more: What's trending on Boston's food scene?
The Social Register | Photo: Mei L./Yelp
Curious where Boston's in-the-know crowd is eating and drinking? It's easy to spot lines out the door, but some underlying trends are harder to see.
We took a data-driven look at the question, using Yelp to uncover which local businesses have been seeing especially high review volumes this month.
To find out who made the list, we looked at Boston businesses on Yelp by category and counted how many reviews each received. Rather than compare them based on number of reviews alone, we calculated a percentage increase in reviews over the past month, and tracked businesses that consistently increased their volume of reviews to identify statistically significant outliers compared to past performance.
Read on to see which spots are riding a trend this summer.
The Social Register
Open since 2017, this New American spot, which offers tapas, seafood and more, is trending compared to other businesses categorized as "Seafood" on Yelp.
Citywide, seafood spots saw a median 1.2 percent increase in new reviews over the past month, but The Social Register saw a 16.9 percent increase, maintaining a strong four-star rating throughout. Moreover, on a month-to-month basis The Social Register's review count increased by more than 250 percent.
It's not the only trending outlier in the seafood category: Bootleg Special has seen a 9.8 percent increase in reviews, and Eventide - Fenway and Lobstah On A Roll have seen 6.4 and 6.2 percent increases, respectively.
Located at 401 D St. (between Fargo and Claflin streets) in South Boston, The Social Register offers brunch, grilled flatbreads, sandwiches, seafood and more.
The Westland
Whether or not you've been hearing buzz about Fenway's The Westland, the bar and New American spot is a hot topic according to Yelp review data.
While businesses categorized as "Bars" on Yelp saw a median 1.9 percent increase in new reviews over the past month, The Westland bagged a 20.8 percent increase in new reviews within that timeframe, with a slight downward trend from a four-star rating a month ago to its current 3.5 stars. It significantly outperformed the previous month by gaining 2.5 times more reviews than expected based on its past performance.
Open at 10 Westland Ave. (between St. Stephen Street and Massachusetts Avenue) since 2018, The Westland offers a raw bar, sharable plates, grilled pizza and more.
Tiki Rock
Downtown Boston's Tiki Rock is also making waves. Open since 2018 at 2 Broad St., the tiki bar and cocktail bar has seen a 7 percent bump in new reviews over the last month, compared to a median review increase of 1.7 percent for all businesses tagged "Cocktail Bars" on Yelp. Moreover, on a month-to-month basis Tiki Rock's review count increased by more than 200 percent.
There's more than one hot spot trending in Boston's cocktail bar category: Milkweed has seen a 6.4 percent increase in reviews.
Tiki Rock offers menu items like spicy tuna tartare, steak skewers, a luau burger, sushi and more. Over the past month, it's maintained a mixed 3.5-star rating among Yelpers.
Rigoletto Ristorante
North End's Rigoletto Ristorante is the city's buzziest Italian spot by the numbers.
The popular bar and Italian spot, which opened at 115 Salem St. (between Jerusalem and Baldwin places) in 2015, increased its new review count by 4.3 percent over the past month, an outlier when compared to the median new review count of 1.4 percent for the Yelp category "Italian." It outperformed the previous month by gaining 2.8 times more reviews than expected based on past performance.
Rigoletto Ristorante offers a variety of antipasti, pasta dishes, flatbreads and more.
This story was created automatically using local business data, then reviewed and augmented by an editor. Click here for more about what we're doing. Got thoughts? Go here to share your feedback.
