We were staying in Ocean Isle Beach, NC, which is part of a cool chain of little island communities stretching from North Myrtle Beach, SC to Wilmington, NC and beyond. They're great for a geezer like meself because there is very little of the tiki-taki jumble of commercial development and condos that the bigger beach cities seem to be full of. Our island had a beach store, three restaurants, a bar, and an ABC (liquor) store, and that was big compared to the island part of nearby Sunset Beach, which has only a tiny beach store and an ice cream shack!
Calabash, NC is somewhat different: It is a tiny town on an inlet, not the ocean, and it has a fleet of fishing boats and tens of seafood restaurants even though the town's population is only a little over 1300. Ever since I was a first-grader in Myrtle Beach with my parents, I've heard and seen advertisements for "Calabash-style" seafood, but danged if anyone I asked really knew what that meant. After a little research I'm proud to report that it is basically just large portions of lightly-battered, lightly fried seafood, and in Calabash itself it means really FRESH seafood right off the nearby boats, and that is hard to duplicate anywhere else that's not right next to a fishing port.
We stopped in Calabash's American Legion post, and the local vets (almost all of whom were folks originally from other places who decided to settle there) recommended Ella's Seafood, right on the east-west main drag street that runs right down to the inlet. We had a raw oyster appetizer plate that I thought was THE BOMB, that is until I got my combination platter which included mounds of shrimp and some roasted oysters that just BLEW me AWAY! All the seafood was unbelievably delicious. Ella's is neat, nautical, and nothing fancy, but I can't see how they could be beat for taste, portion size, and price (which is saying something if you know what a cheapskate the Barfly is!) Some of the reviews I'd read complained that the cut corn tasted like it came from a can. Geeze! That's like saying the Mona Lisa is a terrible painting because it's not in a very pretty frame. You want CORN, come back with me to Indiana, sourpusses! Our fried corn will have your lips smacking, but the just-flown-in-last-week seafood in Indy will leave you depressed after you've had Ella's. Arrrrr!
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