Carrol’s Creek Café | 410 Severn Avenue, Annapolis | 410-263-8102 | carrolscreek.com
Carrol’s Creek Café’s customers come away very satisfied and they spread the word. The Annapolis restaurant’s client reviews propelled it into the website OpenTable’s list of the 100 Best Al Fresco outdoor eateries in the country last summer. OpenTable compiles the list annually based on reader input.
Carrol’s Creek, known for its fine cuisine and outstanding view of Spa Creek and the Eastport Bridge, was the only restaurant in Maryland to earn the distinction. “It was such a great honor,” Carrol’s Creek Owner Jeff Jacobs says.
Carrol’s Creek also offers a nut-free dining experience, which sets it apart. Last year, the 52-year-old Jacobs excluded nuts as ingredients from everything on his menu because of his son’s severe allergy. The owner consulted with Kitchen with Confidence, a company that advises food service and process facilities about food-borne allergens, which ultimately certified the restaurant as nut-free.
“We opened a door for people who struggle with going out and feeling safe about not eating food with nuts as ingredients,” Jacobs says. “How would the restaurant’s food change being nut free? Our customers didn’t notice the change.”
We recently talked with Jacobs about customer’s favorites, his restaurant’s stunning water views, creating a nut-free zone, and what else makes Carrol’s Creek a standout.
Talk about the view of your place. It could be worth coming here for that alone?
The view is important. Sometimes, I take it for granted and don’t sit back and look at it enough. We have a really great view compared to other restaurants. There’s only two other restaurants downtown that that have a similar view. Overlooking the skyline of Annapolis gives people plenty of reason to come here. Some people come here because we are on the water.
What did going nut-free involve?
It took about a year’s worth of brain storming and working with an outside consulting firm. We were the first restaurant in the country that this firm worked with; they typically specialize in summer camps and universities.The easy part was not to order nuts. The hard part was finding out where the cross contamination in things are. Finding an ice cream that wasn’t made in a facility that handles any type of nuts. Finding a bread, too. We had to find products that met our standards. We had to change the chocolate we were using to make our cakes. We had to look at every single menu item we had in the restaurant and find replacements.
Is there anything else that sets you apart?
My number one thing is consistency. We have been here for 37 years. We have consistent staff. I stress to my staff that if something doesn’t look right and doesn’t look like you’ve seen it a thousand times before, then it’s not right. We figure out what’s wrong and we fix it. Because if something is a little different, it’s not acceptable. Consistency of the staff and food in my world covers everything. It’s what has kept our customers coming back. The taste of the food. If you have had our cream of crab, and you haven’t been to the restaurant for five years, it should be the exact same as you remember.
What is your top-selling item?
It’s our cream of crab soup. There are a lot cream of crabs out there and everybody puts their own spin on it. We’ve had the same recipe since we opened in 1983. It just happens to be a really good recipe. It has nice big lumps of crab meat. It’s the thing we get the most comments on. We have won in two categories, Judge’s Choice and People’s Choice, for it over the years at the Maryland Seafood Festival.
What other dishes are customer favorites?
It’s our crab cake. People say, “We love yours over someone else’s. Do you do anything different?” From an ingredient standpoint, we don’t put a lot of peppers in it like some people do. And it overpowers it. You want to let the crab meat, which is a very delicate taste, shine as much as you can. Our rockfish entrée is another big seller. We do a light herb breading to it, and bake it. Then put that over top of a sundried tomato risotto and we add a lemon butter sauce. We sauté spinach and lump crab meat over top of it.
Your happy hour runs later than other establishments. Does that make it different?
We concentrate on food because we know that’s our strong point. Some places concentrate on liquor. All of the appetizers from our dinner menu are half price. We do that at the lounge and bar. We do it Monday to Thursday four o’clock to close and Sunday to close.
Are you different than other places since you have a lot of long-time employees?
Yes. We blessed to have so many long-term employees. We don’t have much turnover in our staff. They do well here. We are not a stepping stone for someone getting into the restaurant business and that might go somewhere so that they can make more money. We find the consistency in our management has kept our other staff around. My general manager has been around for over 35 years. I have a hostess that has been here for 25 years. I have a waitress that has been here for over 35 years.
You’ve been through the highs and lows of the economy. What have you learned from the recession of 2008 and how did that apply this time around?
The thing that applied to me from 2008 to now is that feeling that we will get back to normal (business) at some point. Things crashed then and we modified our business. We had to cut back, look at our expenses, and trim stuff. It was a totally different scenario with the pandemic. We closed. But luckily, my partner in the business is my father. He is the calming voice. He says, “Things are bad. Things will get a little worse. Then things will get better.” He is in his 80s and he has seen recessions come and go. What is going on now is unprecedented. I understand there is going to be a portion of our cliental—until they come up with a vaccine— that they will not be coming to see us. We will figure out how to come out of this.
Maryland Cream of Crab Soup
Ingredients
- 1.5 lbs. jumbo lump crabmeat
- (pick clean of shells)
- 1/2 gallon milk
- 1 Cup heavy cream
- 1 yellow onion (sliced)
- 1/2 Cup sherry
- 1/2 Cup brandy
- 2 Tbsp. crab base
- (substituted for crab stock)
- 3 whole cloves
- 1 Tbsp. Old Bay Seasoning
- Pinch cayenne pepper
- 5 oz. melted butter
- 5 oz. flour
Directions
In a medium saucepan, whisk the butter and flour over low heat for 5 minutes. Set aside. In a large heavy gauge pot, combine all the other ingredients (except crabmeat) over low medium heat. When the soup is hot to the touch, turn heat to low and whisk in the butter/flour mixture (roux). Stir every few minutes until the desired thickness is reached. Be careful not to bring to a boil. Strain into another pot and stir in the crabmeat. Enjoy.
