the story behind our name

it all comes back to corn.

Maize (or Corn) has been the backbone of America’s food culture for centuries—before colonists even landed in New England. Puritan settlers, while assumably straight-laced teetotalers, still enjoyed their hooch and imbibed often. Corn, introduced to them by Native Americans, became the most readily-available fermentable grain.

The namesake for the joint, 8-Row Flint Corn is likely believed (although undocumented) to be the variety of corn that was first ground into a meal, then mashed, fermented and distilled into American whiskey. Dent corn, grown in the South, is now the industry standard for making bourbon.

In the late 1800s, 8-Row Flint was taken to Italy, where it became known as Otto File. There, Otto File became polenta—kind of a big-deal Italian foodway. Despite its unmatched flavor, terribly low yields caused 8-Row Flint to become extinct in America until Glenn Roberts at Anson Mills re-introduced it to New England farmers, with the help of the Italians. It is still widely grown in Italy and preferred because of the massive amount of flavor, protein and starch it packs.

Naturally, we opened a bar named after the source of two of our favorite things: whiskey and tacos.