Jerry's Place

I am participating in a super fun photo scavenger hunt with some friends. One of the photos I have to take is of a locally owned restaurant. It wasn't hard to decide which restaurant I wanted a photo of and it didn't take long to talk Rusty into eating there on Saturday.

Maryland is all about seafood, and especially crab. There are crab houses of all varieties dotted all over the state. Some are casual and some are upscale. They range from pricey to expensive. Most serve Old Bay steamed Maryland blue crabs and have heavy brown paper as a table cloth. They offer all kinds of utensils to aid in picking crabs. (Yes, we call the process of opening the crab, picking.) Anyway, some other places focus on crab cakes.

One such place that focuses on crab cakes, and consistenly rates as one of the best places to get a crab cake in the greater DC area (yes, there are contests), is Jerry's Place.

It's there on the left

Location: Located right beside a tire shop in a strip mall, it doesn't look like much, but the inside is nicely decorated. And the food is insanely good. It is small inside and gets croweded quickly. Rusty and I try to be there by 5:00 pm so we don't have to wait. If you do have to wait, however, the staff (including Jerry) will bring you drinks and samples. Not a bad way to wait, if you ask me.

Price: Spendy - about $40-60 per person

Crab cakes: No filler (bread crubs) at all. For you that don't know, that makes these crab cakes unusual. And they are crazy awesome. Jerry offers four sizes - regular, junior, senior, and grand-dad.

Yumminess!

The rest of the food: Jerry likes to mix things up and put twists on traditional items. I like that about him. It sets this place apart from most of the other crab houses. For instance:

• You will get a tasting of one of the specials - usually fish
• Soft shell crab served with General Tso's sauce - Rusty adores this!
• Cream of crab soup with curry, topped with a pile of lump crab - soooo creamy and good
• Maryland crab soup with sausage, topped with a pile of lump crab - spicy goodness
• Sides are great (espcially the greens) and you get free refills - this is really needless, because you will be stuffed

Rusty loves the soft shell crab

The staff is made up of family and close friends. They are friendly and attentive. Jerry is sure to stop by every table for a chat. You can ask for samples and for the fish to be prepared almost any way that you want. They are nothing if not accomodating.