With new owners, this Meridian bar and grill aimed to be ‘home’ for locals. Now it closed

One of the Boise area’s most obnoxiously awesome bloody marys is no more.

After dazzling the Treasure Valley with its Mega Mary for years, Homestead Bar & Grill, 6275 N. Linder Road, has bled its last drop.

The strip-mall watering hole in Meridian is closed, according to a handwritten sign on the door. No other information was immediately available. It changed ownership — and direction — last year.

Opened in 2016, Homestead positioned itself as a locally owned, traditional neighborhood hangout: 40 beers on tap, lots of burgers and sandwiches, fish tacos and other pub food. And, of course, sports on TVs.

But the buzz creator — in more ways than one — was the Mega Mary. A monstrosity served in a 25-ounce glass (at least originally), it didn’t include just a celery stick, green olive, cocktail onion and a tall, gnaw-worthy piece of bacon. (And, yes, those were all there.) This edible sculpture also was topped with a cheeseburger slider, a soft pretzel, even a chicken wing roosting above it. Hanging from the side of the massive mug were shot glasses: one filled with beer, the other offering chili sprinkled with shredded cheese.

Essentially, it was a titanic bloody mary with a bar-food sampler impaled on it. The year after Homestead opened, I crushed one and got a ride back to the newsroom. I needed a moment to get my head straight enough to write about it.

When different owners took the reins in 2023, Homestead got a fresh look. The menu was overhauled. (Perhaps the Mega Mary recipe was tweaked? No clue.) On social media , Homestead marketed itself as a “new family-friendly gastropub and grill.”

The vision was “chef-inspired food with elevated cocktails,” its owners said in a video posted on YouTube . Homestead would strive to serve locals, “making them feel at ‘home’ as soon as they walk in our doors,” the website still says.

Growth at the intersection of Linder Road and Chinden Boulevard soon transformed the area’s pub battleground. A jalapeño popper’s toss away, two formidable players recently emerged in the Orchard Park development near WinCo. If you stand in the Homestead parking lot and peer across Linder, you now see Giggy D’s, a sports bar and restaurant, and Biscuit & Hogs, an alcohol-slinging hangout beckoning Idahoans to “release your inner pig.” Both brands have more than one location.

Whether increased competition played a role in Homestead’s demise is anyone’s guess. The restaurant business is tough right now.

Either way, that ridiculous Mega Mary I remember will be missed.

Sign Up for the Idaho Way