Comfort Kitchen team will open 180-seat restaurant in Allston hotel

Biplaw Rai and Nyacko Pearl Perry, co-owners of Comfort Kitchen, will bring an Afrodiasporic, global menu to their new restaurant Ama, opening in January. (Left) Lamb Biryani Arancin, (Below) Vegetable Momo

The team behind the award-winning Dorchester restaurant Comfort Kitchen is embarking on an ambitious new project, creating two major restaurants and managing all of the food and beverage program at The Atlas, a hotel opening in Allston in January.

The anchor of the project will be Ama, a 180-seat restaurant on the ground floor of the hotel serving breakfast, lunch and dinner plus room service, catering and a robust bar program that will spill out into the hotel’s lobby. Later, the team will develop and run a rooftop bar concept for the hotel. This is a significant leap from Comfort Kitchen, a 30-seat restaurant very much rooted in its Dorchester neighborhood.

Nyacko Pearl Perry, co-founder of the group with Biplaw Rai, says it’s a rare and exciting opportunity for a small restaurant group like Pearl & Law Hospitality to be able to expand at such a pace.

“If Comfort Kitchen proved the concept, then Ama will show we can scale, and do so intentionally and equitably,” Perry said.

Similar to Comfort Kitchen, the menu will fuse Afro-diasporic dishes with global flavors for unique, layered dishes. Culinary director Shelley Nason will lean into ingredients like okra, cassava and lentils as well as dishes like smoked guajillo beef, berbere spiced fried chicken and lamb kofta. Many of Nason’s new creations will take the stage, but a few Comfort Kitchen fan favorites like jerk duck will be available at Ama.

Visual art is as important to the team as culinary artistry. To ground the design, Rai and Perry commissioned pieces by local artists including Hazen Hill Flowers, Nina Bhattacharya, (“Radio Rani”), Ifé Franklin, Payal Kumar and Stephen Hamilton.

That cultural fusion is reflected in the restaurant branding as well. Rai created the logo with multidisciplinary cultural worker Payal Kumar. The bold linework is a reference to the Napalese Mithila or Madhubani folk art style and the intricate designs within each “A” allude to African hair threading patterns and sweetgrass basket braiding techniques.

Ama or , is the Nepali word for mother and it’s mothers and caretakers who will be reflected in the menu and the concept. Ama’s tagline is “Let it linger.” They hope to create the kind of comfortable, at-ease environment that you might find dining at the safety of your mother’s table.

“At Ama at The Atlas, we honor those who nurtured and fed us,” said Rai, “reclaiming the skills and techniques passed down over generations.”