This piece was originally published by the Missoula Food Observer newsletter and republished here with permission.
In an unceremonious post with comments turned off, the one and only Burns St. Bistro announced they’re closing at the end of the month. I’m not privy as to why, but I can say that this sucks.
The first time I went out to Burns St. Bistro was because a friend or two had started working there and the place was hosting an Austin Lucas show after hours. I didn’t remember much about it before I looked up the old Missoula Punk News (remember that?!) article, but I do distinctly remember bursting in loud and drunk and being shushed. I would have been all of 22 years old.
Later, perhaps that same year, I crashed the Burns Street Christmas party—invited again by friends who worked there, probably Grant—and drank someone’s Cutty Sark scotch and thought all the loud-talking guys who ran the place seemed really cool and I should try to impress them. A couple I recognized from Total Combined Weight, which had done a Minor Threat cover set at the VFW (also documented on Missoula Punk News.) I went on to work with one of the owners, Jason McMackin, at the Missoula Independent and later took over his job as the events calendar editor.
One time, as an Independent staff writer, I decided to write about Burns Street’s sandwiches for an article for the Feast special edition, and biked out to the restaurant to interview Chef Walker Hunter. I mistyped his first name as “Walter” in the article, which apparently became his kitchen nickname for a bit. (I’m really good with details until I’m not.)
A distinct era of my mid-20s involved getting shitfaced on the weekends and then hauling my ass to meet my friends for brunch at Burns St. Bistro, ordering whatever was left on the menu by the time we got there, near to closing at 1 or 2 PM. We could usually see our other friends who’d been out partying, as well as the touring bands that had played in town the night before. One time, Jason brought out a “biscuit sampler” with 4 bowls of gravy for a couple of us. The Bistro also hosted some odd dinners back then, notably the “Dirtbag Dinner.” If you know, you know. I was too full of PBR to eat the duck-breast ramen. I look 12 years old in pictures from this time. Our special “dirtbag” outfits were just…. how we all typically dressed.
Still, the place was respectable enough that I brought my parents to the Bistro when they visited. We had my sister’s graduation celebration lunch there and they seated 9 on short notice. Two of my dearest friends had their wedding reception there before moving away from Missoula.
After crashing enough Bistro parties it came to pass that I started dating the third owner, Cameron. It was a 13-year-age-gap relationship and we didn’t live together. Burns St. Bistro was home to the best parts of it.
Through him, Burns St. supported my fledgling hot sauce business and put my sauce on the tables. He brought me to two Robert Burns dinners and we ate haggis and drank scotch. I’d meet him at the Bistro for lunch on weekdays. He was always in the best mood at Burns St., despite how much agony the restaurant’s fortunes were giving him otherwise. Even when he couldn’t offer me much care or attention, the kind staff and the Bistro space combined to feel like a home that could take care of me.
It’s weird to split up with the owner of the restaurant and still go there, I guess, but after we broke up in 2020, I would be damned if I gave it up. I went to brunch at the Bistro with friends and took comfort in the good food and increasingly esoteric decor; t-shirts displayed on Halloween skeletons, Christmas lights no matter the season, an array of houseplants along the bay windows where you can still imagine the FedEx trucks backing up when the building was a real warehouse.
Naively, I had not considered that the Bistro might not last forever, although the closure of their food cart should have been a warning.
I’m hopeful that Brasserie Porte Rouge, the second restaurant started by the Burns St. owners, can thrive and survive, although I can’t imagine it or any other current restaurant in Missoula serving as such a quirky community space to see and be seen.
Then again, how would I know? I’m tired and in my mid-30s. The Independent is shuttered so a lot of community happenings go undocumented. Most of my friends have moved away or settled down, and I’m not dating anybody in the restaurant business. I found a blue-eyed man from Vermont and we cook together at home often. He likes treating me to Brasserie Porte Rouge but feels weird going to Burns St. Bistro, understandably. I think the one of the last times I’ve been in Burns St. was to guest-judge a casserole contest on a sunny March afternoon. I had just been laid off from my job and was delighted to be invited by friends to get up to shenanigans in the Bistro once again. I slugged whiskey from a flask.
When I learned yesterday that the Bistro was closing, I surprised myself by crying at the news. Who cries over a brunch restaurant?
