Where are you buying the bottle? In Nutley, that question often has to be settled before the reservation. The newest restaurant in town doesn't pour. Neither do several of the established spots. Between them sit three licensed retail shops, and those shops are where many evenings actually begin.
Soj opened without a bar
Soj, at 11 High Street, is the permanent home of chef Taryn Clayton's Underground Supper Club. Patch reported the opening on October 22 and described it as a 16-seat communal dinner with a seasonal theme and a six-course tasting menu. The cooking is vegetable-forward and spirits are BYO. Patch also reported that the all-female kitchen staff can handle a wide range of dietary restrictions, gluten intolerances and allergies. As Patch put it, there's "only one sure thing" at Soj: "no two meals will be alike."
Soj serves on set dates, not nightly. Here are the dates still ahead as of this week, as posted on Soj's supper club page:
| Date | Time | What's on |
|---|---|---|
| Friday, Nov. 13 | 7 to 10 p.m. | "There & Back: España," six courses of Spanish-inspired tapas, the second of two nights |
| Friday, Dec. 4 | 7 to 10 p.m. | Holiday supper with a winter market featuring Melrose Pottery |
| Friday, Dec. 11 | 7 to 10 p.m. | Available for private booking |
| Saturday, Dec. 12 | 7 to 10 p.m. | "Fungi & Fir," a six-course mushroom-focused dinner |
On Soj's event pages, a seat costs $155 general admission plus a $3.88 ticket fee, and you buy tickets directly through each event page. Chef Clayton describes the España menu as "the food I ate, the people I met, and the stories that found me along the way." The page asks guests to dress to impress. With only 16 seats, Friday's menu is close to a private party. If one of the December dates fits your family's calendar, book it before you pick the wine.
Three counters to choose from
Wherever you're eating, the bottle comes from somewhere else. The state's April 2026 retail license report lists three active plenary retail distribution licenses in Nutley:
- Heller & Heller, 200 Franklin Ave.
- Nutley Wine Shop, 558 Franklin Ave.
- Nutley News & Liquors, 98 Centre St.
Two of the three are on Franklin Avenue, and so are two of the BYOB tables below. Your street address matters less than which stretch of Franklin you'll be on that night.
The tables that welcome your bottle
Soj is the newest, but it fits a pattern that was already in place. Each of the restaurants below says on its own site or reservation listing that guests can bring wine.
| Restaurant | Address | Cuisine | What the restaurant says |
|---|---|---|---|
| Trattoria Via Veneto | 144 Chestnut St. | Italian | Bring wine or spirits, no corkage charge |
| The Bosphorus | 226 Franklin Ave. | Mediterranean | Labeled B.Y.O.B. on its homepage |
| Cucina 355 | 355 Franklin Ave. | Contemporary Italian | Listed as BYO wine and BYO liquor on its 2026 OpenTable listing |
| Soj | 11 High St. | Seasonal tasting menu | Spirits are BYO |
Trattoria Via Veneto is the easiest choice for a group that likes a full bar's worth of options, since its own site invites wine or spirits and charges no corkage. It also takes part in town life. TAPinto Nutley promoted a Tuesday night there in October 2025 to support the Nutley Educational Foundation.
The Bosphorus has been serving since 2013 and lists seafood, kebabs and vegetarian dishes. Its homepage points out that it sits in a parking lot at 226 Franklin Ave. Its posted hours run 11 a.m. to 10:30 p.m. every day except Tuesday, when it's closed. That makes it the most flexible of the four for a weeknight dinner with visiting relatives. Heller & Heller, at 200 Franklin Ave., is 26 street numbers down the same avenue.
Cucina 355 sits farther along Franklin at No. 355, between the two Franklin Avenue shops.
Policies and holiday hours can change during the season, so call ahead before you show up with a bottle in hand.
Why so many Nutley tables are BYO
There's a structural reason the bottle comes from a shop. NJBIZ reported in February 2023 that New Jersey limits each municipality to one consumption license per 3,000 residents and one retail license per 7,500. The paper said that cap makes licenses coveted, with owners paying as much as $1 million for one. A 16-seat supper club or a family Mediterranean spot isn't built to absorb that cost, and BYO lets the kitchen open without it. The same scarcity helps explain why the retail side comes down to three counters.
In July 2026 the state opened a narrow side door. P.L. 2026, c.46, approved July 22, 2026, lets the holder of an inactive plenary retail consumption license apply to use it in another municipality in the same county or a neighboring one. The license can only be used as part of an economic redevelopment plan or within a designated redevelopment, improvement or revitalization area, and a license moved this way doesn't count toward the receiving town's population cap. A town that has already hit its cap can also issue a request for proposals to acquire an additional inactive license for redevelopment-area use. The law limits a receiving town to one license per calendar year under the transfer section.
The opening is small and limited to designated redevelopment areas. For the dinners on this season's calendar, the two-stop routine stays in place.
Planning the stop with the table
Here are a few pairings based on the addresses above:
- The Bosphorus, any night but Tuesday. Stop at Heller & Heller, 200 Franklin Ave., then head up the avenue to No. 226.
- Soj on Nov. 13. The menu is Spanish tapas, so the wine aisle has an easy theme to work with. Any of the three shops can supply it before a 7 p.m. seating at 11 High St.
- Soj's Dec. 4 holiday supper. Melrose Pottery's winter market is part of the evening, so you can finish some gift shopping at dinner.
- Via Veneto with a bigger group. No corkage means more than one bottle doesn't add to the check.
- Fungi & Fir on Dec. 12. Six mushroom-focused courses, and the same BYO rules as every other Soj night.
Every pairing on that list depends on the same few licenses, and that's something I think about professionally. Through my CCIM training and my development and lease-up work, I spend a lot of time on how redevelopment areas, approvals and licensing decide what can open on a block like Franklin Avenue. If you own property in Nutley and want to know how changes like these could affect its value, Donna Keena is happy to walk you through it over coffee or a glass of whatever you picked up on the way. Get your free home valuation.
