By Lenny Strauss
Hometown Weekly Reporter
In this week’s local restaurant feature, we will be covering Dover Kitchen, a gourmet deli which opened up in August 2024 in the back of Dover Market, located in the center of Dover, MA. What starts out as an unassuming convenience store with readily available packaged items and beverages as you walk down the aisles, quickly opens into the kitchen of Andrew and Julia Fischel, the owners of Dover Kitchen, whose devotion to their make-from-scratch philosophy yields delicious foods that keep customers coming back for more. In our coverage of Dover Kitchen, I was given the opportunity to visit and meet Andrew and his head chef, Sergio. Andrew is an experienced restauranteur, having owned barbecue joints and restaurants in New York City, Las Vegas, and Colorado, before settling down in Dover. We spoke at length about his story as a restauranteur, passion behind the opening of Dover Kitchen, as well as his experience as a Dover resident, having moved to town with his wife, Julia, and their young daughter, Gigi in 2023.
LS: Where did your passion for this industry begin? What path led you to your ultimately starting Dover Kitchen?
AF: “I used to have a technology business, and I used to travel a lot. During that time, I got really into barbecue. I've always been into food, my family and I, and I consider myself a foodie. I traveled and dined all over the world, but a lot of my experience was in American food culture, [I visited] all over the South, everywhere in the country really. One day, someone else opened up barbecue when I was living in Manhattan and I thought, ‘oh, I can do this better.’ So, I went out, wrote a business plan and found my partner who was a 7 Time World Barbecue Champion and brought him to New York City and opened up a barbecue joint known as RUB BBQ. That’s how it happened.”
AF: “We remained open for over nine years. One day someone stole a Hummer, and after the police chased him through the city he crashed right into our restaurant and destroyed the place... Another barbecue restaurant I had was in the RIO Casino in Las Vegas, for a bunch of years. Had a restaurant out in Boulder Colorado as well.”
LS: Why switch to Massachusetts?
AF: “I had a child, and my wife is from Massachusetts. She wanted to come back here, and while we were looking for the best schools, we found Dover. One day when I was out, I stopped into Dover Market and saw this place sitting here empty, and my wife said, “time to go back to work!”
LS: So, when you came here, were you trying to do something different, because it isn't a traditional barbecue spot.
AF: “Well, I'm not doing barbecue yet, but we're talking about getting a barbecue pit in here and adding to it. As it is, we are a gourmet deli type of establishment, but with very broad food options. There's virtually everything; we make pizzas here, we make prepared food, burgers and so much more. I was definitely involved in the burger ascension back in the 2000s. I used to make burgers in my Barbeque restaurant in Manhattan, [these burgers were heralded amongst burger enthusiasts as one of the best in the city at the time] We capture American food culture. BBQ, Country, Italian, anything really!”
LS: How have you found this space, customers and environment different compared to your other experiences and what you’ve seen previously?
AF: “I mean, they are different situations, right? Of course, now being in a more suburban environment. My last restaurant was in the middle of New York City, so it was much higher volume. Also, when I was in Vegas, I had an 11,000 square foot restaurant! At the same time, there are so many more things going on here at Dover Kitchen. It’s not just one restaurant, it feels like there’s five going on. I make pizza, we make all of the prepared foods for our scratch kitchen. When it was just barbecue, we worked consistently with five items, [now we have much more variety] it just isn’t the same scale as before! Being that this is a small town, I know almost all the customers who come here, they know me, and that's just totally different than you know, in New York, you’d see six, seven hundred people a day, and it's thousands of people a week coming in, all different people.”
LS: How do you develop your recipes?
AF: “A few different chefs work with me. We come up with things together, we work through them, we taste them. My wife is also very involved in the process of deciding. We give out lots of samples to the customers to see what they think as well.”
AF: “You try to do things that you think are going to fit the situation and we cook everything from scratch here. They are all our recipes. Basically, you know, for example, we don’t buy potato salad, we make it. Most places bring it in by the bucket. We make sure we make everything we can from scratch. We make our own roast beef and make our turkey here. That is our distinction. I know a lot of places do make a lot of things from scratch, [but at the same time] a lot of them don't.”
(Virtually every menu item listed could be traced to their own recipes and being made daily, from scratch.)
LS: How has the post-covid landscape forced you to adapt within food service?
AF: “I didn’t operate a food business during COVID, (I was kind of retired), but it was definitely different before. In my experience now, having opened this gourmet deli, I see a lot of people interested in pre-prepared foods, those types of things. In this town, people are looking for just a place to eat that is simple and good quality. I see a lot of people are shying away from trendy items toward good, traditional food.”
AF: “Back when we did the barbecue in New York, we made many unique dishes and created recipes, serving food in ways no one else was doing at the time, some of which I’m hoping to bring into Dover Kitchen.”
LS: Having been in Dover since 2023, what do you enjoy the most as a resident?
AF: “This is a great town. We really enjoy it. You know, I have a child, and she is starting in schools nearby. Being in the town, I am very close to the people I’ve met here. I live half a mile away, and when I come in, it’s nice to [know the people around me]! While it is a shorter commute, this is a totally different business than my other ones. This is much more encompassing. The people are very friendly, and I really like that.”
LS: What in your mind, does it take to provide an excellent dining experience?
AF: “You have got to know your customers.”
At this point in our interview, a few customers Andrew had been attending came over to speak about their thoughts around Dover Kitchen. Many were regulars who Andrew knows from their constant interactions. In between their ordering, one asked Andrew about when he would be having chili available, to which he elaborated to me was award winning as it had won several cook-offs. One customer stated: “He scratch cooks, so I don’t have to!” before picking up several sandwiches to order and pre-made meals.
Sergio, who has worked alongside Andrew for several months, is a former chef at the well-known Umbria Steakhouse in Boston. He alongside with Andrew graciously prepared me several sandwiches to try: a juicy Italian sub, a caprese sandwich, falafel wrap, meatball sub, breakfast burrito, and a freshly baked blueberry muffin, all of which came highly recommended by themselves and the customers in line. The evidence of their dedication to quality is in the sandwiches themselves, and they were without a doubt some of the best of each. Andrew mentioned that they will continue to be adding new menu items as they grow, and I will definitely be back to try their made-from-scratch pizzas and smashburgers, their fresh ground coffee, prepared lasagna and chicken parmesan. One of his first ever customers, who has been coming since Dover Kitchen opened put it best when he said: “It’s a hidden gem that shouldn’t be hidden anymore.”
Come and visit Andrew, his wife Julia and Chef Sergio and taste the incredible food they are cooking up for yourself at Dover Kitchen on 14 Springdale Ave, in Dover MA! Their current hours are Tuesday to Friday from 9am to 6pm, and Saturdays from 9am to 2pm!
