– by Kate Lynn Schirmer

As a relative newcomer to Baltimore, I have done my best to patronize “local” spots to get a true sense of my new home, steering clear of the tourist traps – which means, for the most part, abstaining from large percentage of everything in the Inner Harbor.  Phillips’ Seafood, that familiar bastion of all things crab, fell within this category.  That is, until dining there on a recent weeknight, within the beautifully bright and spacious glass-walled dining room overlooking their equally pleasant outdoor patio and fantastic views of the water.  This is a whole new land of crab, my friends, and it’s one I want to visit again and again.

The force behind this new tide is Executive Chef Arturo Paz, who has found his way to Baltimore after cooking in such hot locales as the Clevelander in South Beach, Baleen restaurant in Miami, and Republic restaurant in Los Angeles. Chef Paz brings a fresh, sophisticated flair to the Phillips kitchen, having developed a reputation for turning out hip innovations of traditional comfort foods.  Yet while Paz is excited to infuse Phillips’ menu with his creative imaginings, certain long-standing items on the menu are too good to mess with.  Brice and Shirley Phillips’s crab cake recipe – which they first began to sell out of a beachfront shack in Ocean City back in the 1950s – didn’t start an empire for nothing, after all. 

To accompany our impending seafood feast, we selected a bottle of MonteVina Pinto Grigio from California, which paired very nicely with its crisp, clean finish and peach and citrus flavors.

We began our meal with a true gem of architectural gastronomy: the Chilled Plateau, a pyramid piled high with ocean offerings.  We delved into two tiers of Long Island Bluepoint oysters and middle neck clams on the half shell, jumbo shrimp cocktail, king crab legs, glistening hunks of lump crab meat, and Maine lobster tails, all served on ice with trio of sauces (drawn butter, cocktail sauce, and mignonette).  All of the choices were extremely fresh and tasty, especially the lump crab and the oysters, which were sweet and flavorful, not to mention large.  The assortment was plentiful enough to serve as a full meal, but we were only just beginning . . .

Next came individual ramekins of truffle-infused macaroni and cheese studded with more of that delicious lump crabmeat.  Luxuriously decadent as the dish was, the depth of flavor made it quite easy to put down.  I really enjoyed the textures within my little crock, with its crunchy breadcrumb topping and perfectly broiled crust; likewise, the pasta – appropriately-themed shells rather than the typical elbow variety – was toothsome and the cheese sauce not overly gooey. Each bite brought the satisfying combination of crunchy exterior and slightly runny, warm interior, and as just as your mouth thought it couldn’t get much happier, your fork would find a huge hunk of sleek crab meat strewn like a precious jewel, the earthy essence of truffles lingering on the back of your tongue.

The next culinary adventure came in the finger-food form of lobster corndogs. While I was tentative at the thought of a greasy carnival throwback, these were a whole new breaded-meat-on-a-stick experience. The first bite was a surprising hit –so fluffy and light!  An enormous morsel of lobster threaded onto a stick, its golden encasement did not taste not overly “fried” but actually quite flavorful. This might be due to the inclusion of real cornmeal in the batter, which gave it just the right amount of gritty crunch to contrast beautifully with the sweet density of the lobster meat.  Dipped in the accompanying grainy mustard sauce, this is one dog that I would adopt and ta