'I Only Want to Give Things to People'
It’s a 29-seat diner tucked into a residential neighbourhood in Lowertown and while its comic book-meets-Lichtenstein logo creates a sense of fun at every turn in the corner diner, BAMM’s Snack Shack is actually all about creating community.
The partners at the helm are Ashley and Matt Atton and their children, Myles, Bowie and foster child Bradey — Matt’s nephew — round out the initials in the name.
BAMM’s opened in May 2023 after the Attons convinced the building’s owner to let them take over the space. He’d been running a Portuguese bar called Tugal’s, but closed during the pandemic.
“It was our kids’ bus stop, so we would sit on the step every day just wondering what was going on,” Matt says. “The blinds were always down, the same car out front. I was really unhappy with my job, so I [eventually] left a note on the car.’”
A few days later, the owner popped his head out while Mattwas waiting for his kids. They struck a deal in the fall of 2022, and soon after, Ashley and Matt left their military careers and became budding restaurant owners.
Newbies branch out
“I have no restaurant experience,” Ashley laughs. “I was in the military [from the age of] I was 16; I turned 34 last month.”
The two met on a ship while serving as marine engineer systems operators in Halifax and became friends. Then Matt decided to pursue a culinary career and moved home to Ottawa to study at Algonquin College. He then returned to the military in Halifax and met up with Ashley again. This time, they became a couple. Eventually, he wanted to return to cooking, so they moved to Ottawa together. He worked several jobs, often at the same time. He worked for Michael Blackie and John Morris at the National Arts Centre as well as at the Shaw Centre, the Wakefield Mill, Beer Brothers Bistro, the Delta Hotel, OCCO and the Shore Club. After burning out at the latter, he returned to the military and started working in the same human resources position as Ashley. But soon, both found the job painful and wanted to leave. Ashley remembers more than once having to tell colleagues that an accounting error had been made and that they owed the military several thousand dollars. “You lose sleep over that,” she says.
Matt had the same experience. “I never want to do that again,” he says. “I want to give things to people, not take things from them.”
Becoming restaurateurs
For BAMM’s, Matt knew burgers would be popular and started with that. They break down brisket, grind, season and freeze it, making their burgers a signature item.
“We’ll spend an entire day making 500 burgers,” he says, adding that it’s just the two of them working back and front of the house. “But the goal is to have people eat my specials.”
Specials range from pulled pork sandwiches on homemade Dorito buns to smoked meat sandwiches on house-made ryebread. Or how about lamb makhani (butter chicken sauce with lamb instead of chicken) with grilled naan?
The regular menu features a Dorito-crusted chicken breast on a bun. There’s soup, a Caesar salad with grilled-cheese croutons and mac ‘n’ cheese made with “popcorn cream,” aged cheddar and Dorito crust.
The Friday fish ‘n’ chips may soon join the menu. Beer-battered haddock goes into a salt-and-vinegar-chip dredge before frying.
“The chips keep it crispy and fluffy at the same time,” Matt says, whose ADHD causes imposter syndrome so his successes often surprise him. “Everybody who’s had it either says it’s the best they’ve had in Ottawa or the top three on the planet. It’s just bananas to me.”
Donuts are another draw. Served on Thursdays and Fridays, the flavours change, but there are always “Simpsons” donuts and Oreo donuts. The popcorn-flavoured donuts are also popular.
‘Community and opportunity’
“I don’t think we ever felt lonelier than when we opened this place,” Matt says.
“It was COVID, and we realized that we needed connection,” Ashley says. The other reason to open was opportunity. “Not everyone has an opportunity to have a place like this — it gives me the opportunity to be creative.”
Both Attons cook at the Snack Shack, but Ashley also flexes her creative muscles with art. She designed the logo on a napkin and painted walls throughout the diner. Matt, meanwhile, made some wall shelving from steel pipes. He likes making the specials he comes up with every day BAMM’s is open — Tuesday to Friday for now.
Both say it’s more about creating the community they lacked. Part of that involves using a back room to full advantage. For now, it serves as a space for children to gather. For example, on New Year’s Eve, they did a five-course fine-dining popup to which people brought their children. They hired a babysitter for anyone who needed one, and the children stayed in the backroom and had their own party.
They’ve held numerous community events, including Simpsons trivia nights, an Easter crafts-and-ice-cream afternoon and two community dinners with the Lowertown Community Resource Centre. The first began when the Attons wanted to purge some toys and proposed a toy drive to the resource centre before Christmas. Soon, the back room was overflowing with toys, and they were producing a community dinner, for which they served 300 portions of halal turkey stew and buns, rice and a vegetarian option. There was also apple cider they’d made from leftover apples the resource centre had.
In February, they cooked up a community lunch of 250 halal hotdogs donated by Dumouchel Meat and Deli in Vanier to toast winter. “It was all very much appreciated by the community,” Matt says, adding that the Snack Shack gives them an opportunity to do great things. He says he’s wanted to do this kind of thing before, but he wasn’t in charge, which restrained him.
“Now it feels like we have significantly more space to do things the way we want to.” It’s not about marketing, but he realizes that’s an inevitable side benefit. “Instead of spending money on advertising, I’d rather spend money on people for sure,” he says.
Bamm's Snack Shack
74 Cobourg St., Ottawa, Ont.
bammssnackshack.com | @bammssnackshack
