Photography by Stephen Buchanan
Photography by Stephen Buchanan
It was a common thing during the pandemic: restaurants going out of business. So, imagine how hard it was to try opening a new establishment—especially at the beginning of it.
Elijah Ardison and his wife Corynne planned on opening Corah’s Corner on North Talbot Street in St. Michaels in March of 2020, but it got delayed until June of that year. Elijah made it his mission to make it work. You can call him a perfectionist.
Corynne, an Easton native, does her part, too. She hosts, waits tables, bartends, and manages the front-of-house employees.
All the hard work eventually paid off. Corah’s Corner—which is named after the couple’s 8-year-old daughter—is thriving. “Last year, we had a pretty good darn year,” Corynne says.
Corynne describes the restaurant as “casual, upscale.” The menu features local seafood and meats. Corah’s Corner offers an extensive cocktail menu, which features signature drinks, mules, bloodies, crushes, and margaritas. “We put fresh juices in the cocktails and that sets us apart,” Corynne says. They also offer bourbon, tequila and whiskey flights along with a large selection of beers and wines.
To learn more, we talked with the Ardisons recently.
Photography by Stephen Buchanan
Elijah, how would you describe your menu? We are lunch heavy. A lot of sandwiches, but a lot of fresh seafood. Our burgers are really popular. I grind brisket for those three or four days a week. We grind all of our own meat. Everything we do is from scratch. It’s definitely time consuming and labor intensive. The finished product really shows that.
Tell me about your restaurant background. My first job was at the Bistro St. Michael’s. I started there as a dishwasher at 14. I worked there until I was 22. I was the executive sous chef. After that, I was the executive sous chef at Sotto Sopra—a great Baltimore Italian restaurant. Then we moved to St. Thomas, where we spent 11 years. I worked down there in a couple of restaurants, and we also had a catering business. We would do weddings, corporate groups, and private dinners for families in the Virgin Islands. We moved back here in 2019. One day, I saw this place. When I was a kid, the building was the convenience store Highs. All the teenagers hung out there. It was vacant, so I said, “Why not take a shot?”
Corynne, what was it like opening a restaurant during the pandemic? And how is business these days? When we opened, it was kind of like survival mode, but we had a huge community of support. The first six months were just trying to find our footing. It was a huge struggle. It was a few years later that we found our niche. People are really taking to what we were putting out. People are coming in for the same menu items and we’re getting a lot of repeat customers. We are finally comfortable with who we are. We were named the best neighborhood restaurant!
Elijah, what is your most popular item? Our “Baum” burger. It’s a fresh ground brisket patty with jalapenos, garlic, spinach, and onions. The freshness of the burger really speaks for itself. I can’t take credit for it. My daughter’s gym teacher gave me the idea. He asked me for a burger one day and I told him I would do one better. I said, “What do you want on your burger?” I told him we will put it on the menu. For every burger we sell, we donate a dollar to the St. Michael’s High School Sports Boosters. In each of the last two years, we have given about a thousand dollars. I think people like getting that burger because it says on the menu we do give back.
What else do the customers really enjoy? Our tuna poke is very popular. It’s a take on the classic Hawaiian poke dish. It’s marinated tuna over a bed of soba noodles with some fresh vegetables. You have jalapenos, cucumbers, avocados, wasabi, tomatoes, pickled ginger, corn. It also has soy sauce, fish sauce, rice, wine, and vinegar. It’s really popular in the summer because it’s light and fresh. We also do it over zucchini noodles. The noodles are tossed in sesame oil to give it an Asian influence.
How do you keep the customers coming back? It’s all about quality. Everything we do is fresh. My goal when opening this restaurant was to have a family-friendly place that won’t break the bank. My entire background was in fine dining until I opened this place. This is more casual dining. But I still stick to the fine dining principles I have learned and done my entire career. So, the quality of the food is really high, and we keep the price point very affordable for families.
Photography by Stephen Buchanan
Tell me where you source a lot of your food, such as steaks and seafood. We use Fells Points Meats for our steaks. We get most of our seafood from Wittman Wharf. Also, Simmons’ Chesapeake Bay Seafood. I get wild diver oysters from them, which are hand-picked. We also get blue catfish from them. In the summer, he sources whole tuna for me from Ocean City. I get my crab meat and soft crabs from them as well. They have amazing products. I get live soft crabs twice a week when they are in season, and I get fresh, hand-picked crab meat a couple of times a week.
Talk about the philosophical difference between your restaurant and others about sourcing food? Since we opened our doors, we have never served a soft crab or a piece of crab meat that wasn’t from Maryland. I refuse to serve any crab that is not from these waters. I feel I would have to turn in my Eastern Shore card if I did (laughing). I have a lot of pride being from this area. There is such a value and beauty about the whole thing.
Corynne, how is your restaurant different from others? Everything is made fresh from scratch. We don’t microwave, we don’t cut corners, and everything is done with a true foodie in mind—tons of flavor, cooked to perfection, which is why on high volume days, these good things will take time. But as we always say, “It’ll be worth the wait.” With Chef Elijah’s fine dining background, his passion is to create good, affordable food in a casual environment. The customers get a true, fresh home-cooked experience every time.
Photography by Stephen Buchanan
Corah’s Poke Bowl
Serves 4
Ingredients
Soy Poke Marinade
1 1/4 cups soy sauce 1/4 cup rice wine vinegar 1 Tbsp sesame oil 1 tsp fish sauce 1 tsp chopped garlic 1 tsp chopped ginger 2 tsp siracha 1 pound fresh fish (tuna or salmon)
Soba noodles zucchini spirals, or noodles of your liking
For the avocado/wasabi crema
2 ripe avocados 1 cup sour cream 2 Tbsp wasabi paste 1 lime juiced
Place all ingredients into food processor and mix until smooth.
Directions
Dice tuna in 1/4” x 1/4” cubes and soak in marinade. While soaking, build your bowl starting with your noodles, then add grape tomatoes, pickled corn, cucumber, jalapenos, and pickled ginger. After tuna has been sitting for about 5 minutes, place it on top of the salad and drizzle the remaining marinade on top. Finish with avocado/wasabi crema and cilantro.
Corah’s Corner | 105 N. Talbot Street, St. Michaels; 410-745-8008; corahs.com
