Business of the Week: Bloomy Rind

Food lovers in Hingham may be spoiled for choice when it comes to restaurants but for those seeking to educate their palate in the comfort of their own home, then on Main Street may have all the answers they need.

Opened in May 2010 by Robert and Mary Gonsalves, this jewel in Hingham’s culinary crown is dedicated to the art of artisinal cheeses and the appreciation of food in all its myriad forms. 

Originally from North Attleborough, Gonsalves is a well-travelled Chef who has worked in some of the best kitchens in the world and cooked for countless celebrities. Having spent time in Hollywood, Manhattan and Las Vegas, he decided to bring his expertise to a more local audience after spending years at the side of Todd English.

Drawn by the synergy of Hingham Square, he jumped at the chance to bring his love of cheese to a new audience. A homeowner in the area for 12 years, it was the ideal location for him to get out the clamour of the celebrity kitchen. 

“There’s not a lot of Downtown areas like this anymore,” said Gonsalves. “Usually you see Gap or some other chain-thing. There’s nothing like that here. It’s nice, respectful and awesome.”

Enter the store and the first thing that you see is a single table in the center of the room. The cabinets are filled with cheese and cured meats, the shelves display locally sourced jams and jellies while the smell of fresh cooking hangs in the air.

Each day Gonsalves prepares fresh soups and sandwiches and everyday the menu changes depending on what has inspired him on his way to work. He uses seasonal ingredients and locally sourced produce and Bloomy Rind has become the lunchtime destination for many of the local businessmen. 

“We have a people eat in here for lunch everyday,” smiles Gonsalves. “That was our goal, to have people here everyday and not got bored.”

In some ways the store has become a culinary bodega, a sanctuary from the fast food nation and a chance to experiment on a willing audience. This explains the presence of the single wooden table. 

“I don’t want to segregate people, I want to bring people together,” explains Gonsalves. “That’s what food does, it brings people together and we seem to have lost that.”

A former real estate broker who decided that his future lay in the kitchen, Gonsalves is passionate about food and was trained at the Culinary Institute of America, the culinary equivalent of a “military academy”.

Always eager to expand his own palate, he even turned down the chance to go to the Wimbledon Tennis Championships when visiting England in favor of eating at the Fat Duck restaurant, a holder of three Michelin stars and run by experimental chef Heston Blumenthal.

“I think it’s nice to see different techniques. There are a lot of people pushing the envelope and trying to come up with different ways of thinking about food. That’s what I love. Even Gordon Ramsey had a such a great palate for different combinations, it was wonderful.”

Increased thinking about food is what Gonsalves is keen to explore. The store carries many of his personal favorites, collected after years of trial and error, and he is always eager to recommend a cheese or cured meat that may have passed the average punter by in their rush for convenience over flavor.

“I used to go over to my grandmother’s house, there would be all kinds of food there and it would be great,” recalls Gonsalves. “Somehow we took a detour from that, somehow it got lost in translation. Now I feel as though people are seeking it out again. Maybe they are understanding that cooking inspires you, not just in eating better but in sitting down to eat together.”

Mary, his wife of many years, agrees that people have become more educated about the food that they eat, especially when they get the chance to pick Gonsalves’ brain about what they should be eating.

“People are seekers, they want to know more, I really believe that,” she says. “They come in and they want the whole experience. They want to talk about it and if they can catch Robert’s ear, they want to talk about a recipe to get the chef’s take on it. That has been fun, to have your own chef on hand.”

Gonsalves believes that the appreciation of food has evolved in the area, even before he opened the store. Rather than opening a restaurant, he decided that the lack of any dedicated artisinal food shops on the South Shore was a chance to get back to basics.

In doing this, he found he could continue to spread his gospel of using American cheese and cured meats. On average, the store carries 50 different cheeses, with the majority of them being produced by diary farmers in the New England region. He is also in the rare position of being able to offer items like prosciutto from Iowa (as opposed to Italy), original fresh pastas from “a contact in New York” and takes his job of promoting local producers very seriously.

“Our job is to showcase carefully selected cheeses that we know and believe in, that we can educate people on and that they’re not going to find at any other place,” said Gonsalves. ”We don’t need to have piles and piles of cheese; we want to provide food that is clean, local and American. Quality that you can taste.”

One thing that he has introduced Hingham to is his seasonal pea guacamole. Only available for six to eight weeks in the spring due to Gonsalves’ reluctance to use frozen peas, it has become a cult classic.

“I can’t make it fast enough,” he laughs. “I could sell boxes of it. We’ll have a waiting list of people that once it’s made are expecting a call. They then come in and get their order, they know it’s only going to be here for a short time.”

Then there is the overwhelming popularity of the carrot hummus that sees schoolchildren making a special stop on the way home for this “addictive, light, fresh and different” Greek-inspired delicacy. Gonsalves believes that a growing awareness of health issues and the availability of fresh, local product is a way forward in evolving the appreciation of food. 

“People are looking for ways to eat healthier but not sacrifice flavor,” he says. “What we try and do here is show people that you can do great food seasonally that has a lot of flavor but that eliminates a lot of heavy sauces. I don’t make any stocks; I don’t fry anything unless it’s pan-fried. I don’t even have a fryer or a microwave in the store. This shop lives like someone at home, if I can do it here, if you put a little time into it, then you can see that what we do here everyday is different and maybe someone will be inspired to do it themselves.”

For the moment, Gonsalves is happy to be an oasis of culinary innovation in Hingham Square. Every day he comes in to work and doesn’t even know what he will be cooking until he gets there, something which sets him aside from other chefs that are tied to a more rigid prepared schedule.

“We’re not going to be have one thing that we’re committed to, it would hem us in. We’re still in the creating process. Maybe somewhere down the line we’ll have enough signature dishes that people are crazy about, maybe we’ll brand some things and make it easier for people but until that point, I think it’s fine the way it is- just fun."

Bloomy Rind can be found at 21 Main Street, Hingham. Chef Gonsalves and his team will be serving food from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. and will let people know what he will be serving that day on Twitter under the handle of @bloomyrind.