Whenever we travel to a new city, we make sure to set up a walking food tour to explore the city and Boston was no exception, even though we’ve visited plenty of times. Let’s explore Boston with Boston Foodie Tours today – follow along, take notes, and book a tour with Audrey from Boston Foodie Tours on your next trip!
If you know me, you know that walking food tours are the one thing I always recommend when visiting a new city. It’s the most productive and most delicious way to get to know the layout of a city. And even though Boston is a city we have explored countless times on our own, having a professional guide us is truly the best way. Five years ago, my husband and I experienced this very tour but I knew it was time to update that blog with a new experience and tour with the same company.
Established in 2011 by a Cambridge School of Culinary Arts certificate holder, Boston Foodie Tours features award-winning best eats, including those of James Beard Award winners, Best of Boston winners, food institutions, and the like. Their tours also include Boston’s rich history, as well as culinary education. In addition, they offer private tours, Dine Arounds, and on-site cooking classes with leading industry professionals. Boston Foodie Tours’ tour guides not only “love” food, they “know” food, having been employed in the industry, which makes them extremely knowledgable in the field of food.
For this visit, we decided to book the Boston Public Market and North End Tour. Whether or not you take the tour with this company, the Boston Public Market is a must for anyone visiting the city that loves food.
The Boston Public Market is a permanent, year-round, self-sustaining market featuring fresh, locally-sourced food brought directly to and from the diverse people in the surrounding New England/Boston area. An indoor, year round marketplace where residents and visitors can find fresh, seasonal food from 40 New England farmers, fishers, and food entrepreneurs. Dine-in or shop for produce, meat and poultry, eggs, dairy, fish, bread and baked goods, beverages, and speciality and prepared foods.
The best part of being on an official tour at the market is that you really get to meet the makers and producers of these artisanal products. Putting a face to the products always makes us, as humans, to connect with a brand even more so.
Whether you’re looking to meet New England artisan makers or stock up on foodie souvenirs, this is just the tour for you. Plus, you’re learning so much about the food landscape of the area! After you’ve walked around the market for almost an hour or so, tasting products and meeting new friends, our tour guide them walked us over to the second part of the tour, the North End, also known as Little Italy. But on the way there, we made a chowder stop at one of Boston’s most iconic and oldest restaurants – Union Oyster House. Here, we tried the popular clam chowder, and I loved tasting such a classic recipe! You can recreate the recipe at home: Ye Olde Union Oyster House Clam Chowder Recipe.
And then we were off to the North End, to explore Italian markets, shops, and bakeries galore! There, we visited two Best of Boston winners: a bread bakery, and an inconic pastry bakery. And then we enjoyed some just-made mozzarella in a well-hidden Old World salumeria that has been featured on Andrew Zimmern’s “Zimmern’s List” on the Travel Channel, and the Food Network’s “Best Thing That I Ever Ate”.
Some of the best bread I’ve ever had was at this tucked away bakery. Not only their bread, but they have some pastry cream filled donuts that are worth the price of admission to this tour. Seriously, the Italians know their baking and nothing proves is better than this second half of the tour.
And to end the tour, an Italian dessert which I’ve raved about before on this site. Cannoli – Italy’s gift to the world and when you find the perfect one, you dream about it until the next time you have that next bite. If you want to know which is my favorite North End Cannoli – make sure to read my entire post called “Discovering the Best Cannoli in Boston’s North End“.
Disclaimer: We were guests of Boston Foodie Tours, but opinions and photos are my own, and I only recommend businesses that I truly believe in.