Shy Bird (South Boston)

Shy Bird's South Boston location opened at 12 Old Colony Avenue as the second of Andrew Holden's three restaurants under the name, following the Kendall Square original and preceding the Fenway branch. It is the closest thing the group has to a neighborhood room: Andrew Square and the surrounding blocks of South Boston are residential, and the restaurant's hours reflect that, opening at 9am on weekdays for breakfast, running lunch from 11am, adding weekend brunch from 10am, and serving dinner until 9pm Sunday through Wednesday and 10pm Thursday through Saturday. The cooking is the same wood-fired rotisserie programme as the other two.

The non-alcoholic offering is the group's standard and it is a real one. The beverage menu prints a 'Zero Proof Cocktails' block of six drinks directly beside the twelve house cocktails, at $10 to $14 against $14 to $17. Cloud Nine is coconut, lime and club soda; Side Eye is hibiscus, orange and grapefruit; Strawberry Fields is strawberry, rhubarb, lime and ginger beer; the Tea-groni is built with Gnista wormwood, a non-alcoholic aperitif and black tea; the Tilden Lacewing is cucumber, basil, lychee and juniper berry; and the Tilden Tandem is American oak, lapsang, tart cherry and bitter orange. Tilden is a Massachusetts producer, so two of the six are locally made rather than imported non-alcoholic spirits. The packaged zero-proof list carries Ghia Le Spritz in rotating flavours at $11 and non-alcoholic Best Day Brewing in hazy IPA or electro lime lager at $8. For a neighborhood short on alcohol-free options outside coffee shops, a restaurant with six named zero-proof cocktails and a rotisserie is a straightforward answer for a group where not everyone is drinking. All three Shy Bird rooms print the identical zero-proof section, so a drink found here will also be pouring in Kendall Square and the Fenway. Holden previously managed Eastern Standard in Kenmore Square and also runs Branch Line in Watertown, and the Boston Globe has covered the group's zero-proof list twice, in May 2025 and March 2026.