Posted by Michael Stern on November 26, 2009
Forget all the spongy, bready, fishy blobs that pass as crab cakes elsewhere. To know the paradigm, you must eat in Maryland, at Faidley's in particular. In this eat-in-the-rough market on one side of the boisterous, centuries-old food emporium known as the Lexington Market, a crab cake is a baseball-sized sphere of jumbo lump crab meat held together with minimal crushed-Saltine filler and a whisper of mayo and mustard that is just enough to be a foil for the marine sweetness of the meat.
While Faidley's offers "regular" crab cakes, made from shredded claw meat, and backfin crab cakes, made from slightly larger strips of body meat, the one you want is the "all lump crab cake." It is significantly more expensive than the others, but the silky weight of the big nuggets, which are the choicest meat picked from the hind leg area of the blue crab, is what makes these cakes one of the nation's most memorable local specialties.
Operated by the same family that started it in 1886 – and who still form each jumbo lump cake by hand – Faidley's offers minimal amenities. Stand up to order, then stand up to eat at chest-high tables provided. You can down raw oysters at the oyster bar, and in addition to crab cakes, the menu includes both Maryland crab soup (red) and cream of crab soup, as well as the unique Baltimore fish cake known as a coddie, composed of cod, mashed potato and onion. Whereas jumbo lump crab cakes are the top of the line on the menu at $12.95 each, a coddie costs $2.50.
Overall: Worth planning a day around
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Reviewers "Must Eats" List
Crab Cake
($13.00)
"Once you've had a top-tier Maryland crab cake, such as this one at Faidley's, all others seem pitifully inferior."
Michael Stern
"You get your choice of Maryland crab soup or creamy crab soup. The former, mildly spiced, holds big pieces of crab and is thick with vegetables."
Michael Stern
"No comfy tables and no waiter service at Faidley's. Once you get your food, you find a place at one of these counters to eat it."
Michael Stern
"Big lumps of delicious crab meat bust out of the sides of the crab cake."
buffetbuster
"The hopsy onion rings are obscenely rich. Soft ribbons of onion slither out unless you bite down hard to sever each mouthful."
Michael Stern
"Founded in 1886, Faidley's is still one of the best places in Baltimore for crab cakes."
buffetbuster
"If you are in the mood for lively conversation along with dozens of oysters, Faidley's oyster bar is the place to be."
Michael Stern
"A street view of Faidley's does little to convey the bustle of the Lexington Market inside."
Michael Stern
"It's hard to argue with the proclamation on this sign."
Michael Stern
