Dune Brothers New Market, Restaurant and Takeout Window Are Open
The popular seafood shack just doubled down on local seafood with a permanent, year-round restaurant, fish market and takeout window in Providence's Fox Point.
Dune Brothers is now open in Fox Point. Photos courtesy of Dune Brothers.
Dune Brothers fans can now enjoy the freshest local seafood with a roof over their heads. The Providence staple is doubling down on sustainable seafood with a new fish market, sit down restaurant and takeout window that just opened before the holidays in Fox Point. It will continue to run its successful seasonal seafood shacks in Providence’s Jewelry District and Riverside in East Providence, plus it will launch the business as a food stall tenant inside the new Track 15 food hall in Providence, scheduled to open at the end of February. Call it the quadruple bypass; they’re easing into it this winter to prepare for the seasons when all four outposts will be up and running at the same time.
Owners Nick and Monica Gillespie sat down with production manager Jose Morales to describe the future of Dune Brothers. The new market and restaurant is open year-round at 170 Ives Street, while the seasonal shacks will continue running from early spring through late fall. The Dune Brothers mission is to expose guests to underutilized varieties of fish that they market at the downtown shack, except now people can purchase the seafood directly from them and cook it on their own.
“Our fish market will sell exclusively locally caught seafood. We are working with all small boat fishermen, and we brought Jose on to manage the fish market and wholesale side of things,” says owner Nick Gillespie. “We have an eighteen-seat restaurant inside, as well as a takeout window and thirty seats outside.” They also hired Luke Mersfelder as the resident fishmonger, and he brings in vast experience working in various fine dining restaurants that spotlight local seafood.
Nick bills the new restaurant as a sexier version of the Shack.
Dune Brothers’ swordfish chop with black lentils, winter squash and preserved lemon purée, roasted carrots and curry. Photo courtesy of Dune Brothers.
Morales has been Dune Brothers’ longtime connection to local fishermen since the very beginning of the shack, seven years ago. He started out working in the seafood business unloading fishing boats in New Bedford when he was sixteen, as a summer job, and then moved into production and sales management, until he was hired by Dune Brothers.
“He was a critical link in connecting us with local fishermen,” Nick says. Morales purchases fish directly from the boats in Point Judith, Sakonnet Point and other ports, effectively cutting out the middleman. Now they hope to share that connection with other local restaurants by becoming a seafood wholesaler.
“We are looking to work with local chefs and supermarkets to carry local, underutilized species, like whole cleaned squid, whole scup, scup filets, redfish, sea robins, rock crab and butterfish,” says Morales – who is affectionately known as “the squid king of Rhode Island” for his efficiency at processing whole squid. He even has a tattoo to prove it. “And by avoiding the middleman, we get to pay our fishermen a little more, too,” he says.
Local fish species on sale at Dune Brothers.
Dune Brothers purchased its own van for deliveries and the storefront has a HACCP-certified processing room. You won’t find any salmon on their menu, it’s all about creative approaches to underutilized species. They hope to expose its deliciousness to an ever-growing audience.
Monica Gillespie has a background in community development, and she hopes to work with food insecure populations to educate and expose them to underutilized fish species. “I think people can be so intimidated by seafood in general, like if it’s something they don’t recognize or they don’t know how to prepare it. We’re focusing a lot of energy into education and accessibility,” she says.
They are always finding ways to appeal to a broader audience, like using dogfish and pollock in place of haddock for flaky fish and chips. “It’s really easy to make something popular. You just have to make it taste good,” she says. “That’s where Nick and our team come in.”
Lesser known species are also less expensive.
“Something that is important to us is some of these species like scup and rock crab are very affordable,” Nick adds. “ If you’re low income, you can go out and buy rock crabs, corn and sausage and have a great afternoon with your family. That’s a cool thing.”
The interior dining room at Dune Brothers.
The new Dune Brothers location serves its popular menu items including fish and chips made with dogfish or pollock, clam cakes and chowder, and lobster rolls (drizzled with French butter sauce and lemon with a sprinkling of Old Bay and swipe of mayo on a buttered brioche bun), and they will also reinvent species like scup, butterfish and black bass to create more creative weekly specials. Past plates have included whole fried black sea bass with seasonal farm vegetables, and roasted scup with black eyed peas, linguica and pir piri sauce. The restaurant also serves wine and beer, as well as cocktails. They are working with neighbor Captain Seaweed’s (also their landlord) to make the food menu available to bar guests.
They have other plans to expand even further. Dune Brothers hopes to offer a late night takeout window at the new spot, serving fish and chips and other items, in addition to launching a calamari cart to circulate and serve patrons in the park surrounding the Pedestrian Bridge, especially during WaterFire and other festivals. The cart will sell fried calamari – European-style in a cone – with dipping sauce. Across all projects, the unified mission is always to help spread the word about lesser known and underutilized seafood species.
“We are very interested in making sure these underutilized species get put into practice on a larger scale,” Monica says.
Maybe one day they’ll be marketing a fancier version of fish sticks using scup at local schools?
Don’t put it past them.
“We started Dune Brothers, and we were able to sell this product. I wasn’t going to do it unless it was local, underutilized species and we were able to create a market for it,” Nick says. “Now people want to know where they can buy this stuff. Now they are going to have a place to buy it.”
Dune Brothers has proven the world is their oyster.
Dune Brothers clam cakes and chowder. Photo by Angel Tucker.
