Meson opens in Carroll Gardens

A new corner bar channeling the Basque region joins Cafe Spaghetti on Union Street

Mason Grassfield and Ian Martinez, childhood friends from Williamsburg, have opened Meson (pronounced Mason) in the former Flying Lobster space on the corner of Union and Hicks, just up the block from Cafe Spaghetti in Carroll Gardens.

The 30-seat corner bar and restaurant has an inviting vibe; the long rectangular room has wide windows overlooking the sidewalks of Brooklyn. A long sweep of bar towards the back of the dining room is framed by exposed brick; the dining room is wrapped in linen-colored wallpaper so the space has a mix of elegance and rusticity. At dusk, the room glows gold in the warmth of mid-century wall sconces and schoolhouse fixtures.

Grassfield and Martinez, who’ve known each other since boyhood, have collaborated on the Basque menu, combining their varied culinary experience. Mason started out in back of house at Morimoto but then moved onto recipe development at Food Network. Most recently he worked in vertical farming at Square Roots and in product development at a robotic strawberry farm called Zordi. Ian has cooked at Houseman, Little Neck and Lincoln.

Their menu, inspired by a love of Spanish eating and drinking culture, channels the flavors and spirit of the Basque region, dishes you’d expect on the salty seaside in San Sebastian. There’s a tortilla, a bikini sandwich, a garlicky tomato toast, mussels with romesco, octopus with white beans, saffron, and garlic alioli, grilled sardines with lemon olive oil and rafts of crusty bread. They’re doing a dry-aged burger topped with Mahon cheese with bravas fries, an iberico pork confit with piquillo peppers, a 40 ounce Txuleton for two with piquillo peppers and fries.

They’re also doing a tribute to the old Flying Lobster space, with a riff on a Lobster Roll dressed with pimenton butter and paprika. If you’re wondering, the restaurant was named for an incident involving a lobster, a customer and owner Neil Ganic. The story goes that a woman sent her lobster back at Petite Crevette, his beloved seafood restaurant next door on Hicks Street. She said it was undercooked. He explained to her that it was not undercooked, that he knew how to cook a lobster and that she was wrong. She disagreed and insisted he cook her a new one. You know where this story is going; he took the lobster and did not recook it; he threw it across the room at her. When he opened his second restaurant next door, the name immortalized the incident. Yeah. Gotta love Brooklyn.

Now, back to Méson. At the bar, there is a long list of house cocktails — a Peppercorn Paloma with grapefruit, mezcal and black pepper, a “Blood and Sand” made from Scotch, Vermouth, sour cherry and blood orange, and two frozen drinks – a Water Lily with a gin base, creme d’violette and lemon, and a mezcal frozen called the Janier Wallbanger, with sour orange and tangerine and Galliano foam. The wine list is almost exclusively Spanish natural wines curated by the folks at the natural wine bar Skin Contact. 

While the weather is nice, Latin Jazz bands play out on the sidwalk — check it out!

Méson is located at 144 Union Street, corner of Hicks.