Chef Lydia Shire is now culinary director at Bar Enza, the Harvard Square restaurant said Thursday. She takes over for chef Tony Susi, who has been leading Bar Enza in the Charles Hotel for the past two years.
Shire previously worked in Harvard Square at Harvest in the 1970s – where she became friends with another culinary icon, Julia Child, as noted in a Bar Enza press release – and went on to become the first female executive chef of a Four Seasons Hotel, to win the James Beard Award and to own Boston’s formerly male-only dining institution, Locke-Ober.
Also named “One of America’s Top Ten Chefs” by Food & Wine Magazine, Shire is now chef and co-owner at Scampo in Boston. She will stay on there, according to Vinny Lombardi, senior vice president of the Lyons Group, which oversees Scampo and Bar Enza, a collaboration with the Charles Hotel. Some two dozen other restaurants and hospitality venues around the state are also under the Lyons Group umbrella, including Summer Shack in Cambridge and Sonsie and Rochambeau in Boston.
Coming to Bar Enza in Harvard Square will be “a sort of homecoming” for Shire, considering her time at Harvest, Lombardi said.
Bar Enza opened four years ago under Belmont native and Michelin-starred chef Mark Ladner. When Ladner moved to the business side, Susi took over after serving at Todd English’s Olives and at Geppetto, another fine Italian spot in Cambridge Crossing. Susi’s Bar Enza role was always meant to be short term and he is leaving as expected to pursue his own opportunity, Lombardi said. Susi was to debut Little Sage, at 352 Hanover St. in Boston’s North End, on Tuesday with partner Jen Matarazzo – replacing Matarazzo’s restaurant Locale, in the same location.
“Shire will continue to elevate the Bar Enza experience and oversee the menu additions and puts her signature cooking techniques on it when she steps into her new role,” Lombardi said in a press release.
The restaurant is open for dinner Monday through Saturday.
Bar Enza, 1 Bennett St., inside The Charles Hotel, Harvard Square, Cambridge
This post was updated March 11, 2025, with news of Tony Susi opening a restaurant in Boston that day.
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