DOOFY CHEF CHOWS DOWN AT THREE RESTAURANTS IN THE BALTIMORE-WASHINGTON, D.C. METRO AREA

Hi folks, Chef G. here once again.  Thank you for that enthusiastic applause but, gosh, I don't deserve it.  I'm just a regular guy like you.  The only difference is that I just happen to be world famous for my highly dubious food knowledge and questionable cooking skills.  That's all. 

Nevertheless, you have every right to be excited about today's food topic.  I am going to take you on a culinary trip from the comfort and safety of the Mid-west to the dangerously hip East Coast.  Specifically, I'm talking about the Chesapeake Bay area.

My brother and I had the good fortune to accompany my septuagenarian dad to a business convention in Washington D.C. seven years ago.  We had a blast.  We visited all the cool government buildings, museums, monuments and other tourist attractions.  We learned and rode the subway system.  And we checked out a couple of interesting restaurants.

I was not yet a famous food blogger at that time but, thanks to a few pictures and my Blogspot journal of the trip, I will be able to tell you a little bit about those restaurants.  

As if that isn't exciting enough, I made another trip to that area two years ago.  By then, my dad was an octogenarian and I drove him to Baltimore so that he could attend a memorial service.  We had a great father/son trip.  We told each other stories and did some serious bonding.  My dad's ultimate goal, though, was to pay last respects to his best friend since childhood.  My main goal was to taste a hugely popular Chesapeake Bay specialty for the first time in my life.

WASHINGTON, DC -- 2014 

Yeah, there was the White House and our nation's Capitol building and the Supreme Court and the Smithsonian and the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial and the National Spy Museum and the Arlington National Cemetery and the Kennedy Center for the Arts.  They were all well and good, but my brother and I escaped all that for the chance to visit BEN'S CHILI BOWL.

While my dad was in one of his meetings, we aimed ourselves to that iconic Washington D.C. eatery.  It took three subway changes, but we eventually found our way to this little diner located in an African American district that had seen some pretty challenging times.

Such famous people as Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald, Nat King Cole, Redd Foxx, Martin Luther King and Barak Obama have eaten here.  Damn, that's a pretty talented list of clientele.  How could we possibly resist going to such a well-respected restaurant?

On the day we visited, it was chaos in there.  I suspect it is chaos every day.  The place was incredibly busy and overcrowded.  The line of customers extended well beyond the front door.  Customer orders were written up on little pieces of paper at the counter.  About ten workers were flying around behind the counter putting together orders and, as far as I could see, there was only one cash register.

And here's the thing:  it is NOT a fancy restaurant.  No, it's more like a fast food joint that serves nothing but chili, hot dogs, chili dogs and French fries.  That's it.  That's the entire menu.  And there were a hundred people in front of us waiting for it.

This is a stock photo of the place.  When I was there, it was so busy that I forgot to take a picture.  

This internet photo of the chili looks exactly as I remember it, and it was awesome.

There wasn't a single seat available inside, so my brother and I took our chili outside.  We parked our asses on the curb in front of the restaurant and shoveled the tasty stuff into our mouths.  I had the chili con carne, my brother, being a vegetarian, had the vegetarian version.  I found my chili to be a welcome departure from the tomato-ey stuff one finds almost everywhere else.  Not that I dislike tomato-based chili, but Ben's Chili was thick and rich and, somehow, more exotic.  Plus, I think our curbside seating arrangement enhanced the deliciousness.

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Ben's Chili was a great dining experience, but it wasn't the only one I had that day.  I got hungry again six hours later.  Alone, I ventured a block or two from our hotel on the north side of the city to a Cajun restaurant that looked pretty interesting.  Days earlier I had seen people eating in the patio area in front of a place called "Hot and Juicy Crawfish."  No kidding, that was the name.

Hot and Juicy Crawfish served shrimp, crab, crawfish, lobster, clams, etc. by the pound.  They cooked it in hot sauce (YOU choose just how hot you want it) and they serve it in a big plastic bag.

At first I ordered crawfish, but when the server said crawfish were out of season and they only had frozen crawfish, I changed my mind.  I ordered FRESH shrimp instead.

Several minutes later she returned with a big plastic bag of shrimp along with a bib, a piece of corn-on-the cob, a Cajun beer, a roll of paper towels, and a bucket.  The shrimp were whole shrimps--heads, shells and all.  They were stupendous!  By the time I was done eating, the bucket was loaded with shrimp shells, wet-wipes, a bare corn cob, and a whole lotta paper towels.

Before this day I had never envisioned eating jumbo shrimp out of a plastic bag.

 

The server kindly took this picture of me with my bib and my bag of shrimp.

BALTIMORE -- 2019

I had already been a celebrity chef for more than a year before my trip to Baltimore.  Surprisingly, I didn't write about this eating experience on my previous blog before I got kicked off of it.  That's OK, now is the time.

For a number of years I had been hearing about how great crab cakes are.  They are loved by foodies all over the United States, and it seems as though no crab cakes are as universally praised as Maryland crab cakes.  Apparently it's all about the quantity and quality of the Atlantic blue crabs that are harvested from Chesapeake Bay.

Personally, I could never understand the frenzy over a lump made of crab meat, bread, egg, mayo, Worcestershire sauce, mustard and seasonings.  I mean, all of those ingredients are fine individually, but I just couldn't get excited about all of them combined.  On the other hand, I like meatballs, so maybe I should think of a crab cake as a meatball from the sea.

I could not wait to try one.  But I didn't want to try just any old crab cake.  I wanted to find the very best crab cake in all of Baltimore, though I didn't really have a plan for doing so.  

That's where a woman I met at the memorial service comes into the story.  She had taken piano lessons from my dad's best friend at the Maryland School for the Blind several decades ago and had kept in touch with him all these years.  (My dad's best friend was also an accomplished concert pianist.)  I sat next to her at the church and we talked for a while before the service started.  When she learned my dad and I had driven all the way from the mid-west, she turned to me and said, "have you tried any of our crab cakes yet?"

"No," I replied, "but I WANT to.  Do you have any recommendations?"

She named two places.  One of them was in the inner city.  The other one, she apologized, "is way out by the airport in a nondescript building."

"Well, that works out fine for us," I replied, "because we just happen to be staying in a hotel near the airport."

I'd call that serendipity.  First, because I needed such crab cake advice.  Second, because we happened to meet a local who knew something about crab cakes.  Third, because the restaurant was so conveniently located.  And fourth, I presumed that since the woman was blind, her other senses were enhanced.  (I'm sure I've read about that phenomenon in the past.)  Therefore, I had extra confidence in her endorsement of G&M Restaurant. 

Indeed, I Googled "G&M Restaurant" and learned that it not only was about a mile from our hotel, but it was rated (by some polls) as Maryland's #1 place to go for crab cakes.  Heck, you can even order their crab cakes on-line and have them shipped to anyplace in the country.  I was convinced.  "Oh yes!  Gimme some," I thought as I drooled at my computer.

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"Gimme some," I repeated once we were seated at the G&M Restaurant and the server started telling us about their specialty dish--crab cakes.  My dad ordered the crab cake meal too, though he wasn't as enthusiastic about it as I was.

I enjoyed a locally brewed ale while waiting for the main course.  That's completely normal for me.  My dad ordered a cocktail, the name of which I can't remember, but that seemed very unusual for him.  I think I've only seen him have a glass of wine with dinner.  That's not the point of this paragraph though.  The point is that we couldn't wait for the crab cakes to arrive.

And it took quite a long time for them to arrive.  I calmed my impatience with the belief that the chefs were attending to every painstaking detail in order to send the very best possible crab cakes to our table.  I KNEW we were in for a real treat!

Oh man, look that that!  Beer, coleslaw, dinner roll, steamed broccoli, and a crab cake
the size and weight of a baseball.  GIMME SOME!

There's my dad preparing to dig into his meal.

I really WANTED to like the crab cakes, but I'm sorry to have to report that I did NOT like the crab cakes.

I did not like them with a beer,

I did not like them there or here,

I did not like them with rubbery slaw,

It's too hard on my tongue and jaw.

I do not mean to sound like a troll,

But I did not like them with a roll,

Even broccoli could not save them,

I don't think I'll ever crave them.

I did not like them near the airport,

I fear anyplace I ate them they'd fall short.

Perhaps my expectations were too high,

That is something I cannot deny.

If ever I am offered them again,

I'll likely toss them in a garbage bin,

I just don't like them Sam I Am,

For crab cakes, I don't give a damn.

Perhaps I was too hard on crab cakes in my Dr. Seuss-like poem.  I have little doubt G&M's crab cakes really are among the very best.  Crab cakes just aren't for me.  That's all I'm sayin'.  (I guess it's similar to when I build up Upper Peninsula pasties as some kind of unbelievably tasty regional food, only to have somebody tell me, "Meh, they're OK I guess, but nothing all THAT great.")  

Even so, I'm still glad I at least tried some authentic Maryland crab cakes.