I don’t find myself in Somers Point often.
But this Saturday, I was attending a matinee at Studio;Space, so I decided to take advantage of the sunny weather, make an afternoon of it, and grab lunch and a cocktail at The Crab Trap first.
To use a nautical term, this place is a mainstay of Somers Point. You rarely see a day where someone isn’t posting their combination platter on the wildly popular Atlantic County Eats Facebook page surrounded by smiling loved ones.
I have been there only a handful of times over the years. Once was in their outside seating area, open seasonally, called Crabby Jack’s. I enjoyed great water views and, although I don’t remember, I probably ordered something deep fried.
Another time I remember dropping in the main restaurant for dinner, I might have even caught the early bird special, given the age-range of the other guests. There was live music. Sitting at the bar, it was nothing less than joyful watching couples of a certain age trip the light fantastic to a bygone era of music.
When I arrived Saturday, I was shocked to see the parking lot practically full on an afternoon in the off season. Even though it was crowded, I was greeted right away and sent to another hostess desk. That was a new one for me. I was impressed with the overstaffing though. Is the first desk screening customers to see if they’re worthy of dining there? Haha.
Our server, Zack, was polite and knowledgeable. He helped us navigate a pretty big menu plus the sheet of daily specials with his personal selections. We both ordered one of the drink specials: Cranberry Margarita ($8). Although slightly too tart for me, it was a pleasure to have a freshly crafted, pink-tinted cocktail on a cold, February afternoon.
Fresh, warm rolls were brought to the table with our salads from a section of the lunch menu titled Smaller Side Salads. They were the perfect side if you are ordering other things.
Both selections were pretty as picture and tasted great. We went with the Tomato Mozzarella Salad ($7.50) and the Roasted Red Beet & Toasted Goat Cheese Salad ($8.95). The tomato salad was piled high with fresh greens, roasted red peppers and red onion as accoutrement to the usual suspects in this salad. The house roasted beets had great texture and played nicely against the two goat cheese medallions.
Next we tried a bowl of very rich Creamy Crab Bisque ($8.95) that had an extremely generous amount of crab laced through it. It was a bit too thick. I like soup to be soup. Others may like this consistency just as it is. It was delicious.
We opted for two more appetizers – the Tuna Nachos ($10.95) and the Fried Nantucket Clam Strips ($8.50). The tuna portion is three thick slices of seared, high-quality tuna served atop a marinated slaw with crispy wontons. I was happy with the presentation, the taste and the price.
The clam strips shocked me. For eight bucks, I thought for sure I was going to get a prepared product from the freezer. I like Red Lobster as well as the next guy. But no! These were huge, meaty, lightly breaded, perfectly cooked little strips of love. This is definitely something you should order a portion of “for the table” each and every time you visit. You can’t even get these at this price at a food truck festival in a parking lot, let alone a place with cloth napkins!
During our meal our server was attentive as well as the two or three bussers that cleared our table. Everyone was impeccably polite.
The real shocker was the bill. We ordered seven items and with tax, our bill totaled $63! I found that to be more than fair. As we have all gotten used to casino prices and inflation in this area.
Everything was great at this nautical place. The Crab Trap knows what it is. It’s a seafood restaurant. There are framed knots on the walls. The wait staff wears ties and vests. They’re not reinventing the wheel. They just are committed to making sure their wheels never fall flat.
Hi friends!
Thank you for the warm welcome to BreakingAC.
We received many positive comments on the first of hopefully many restaurant reviews last week.
We read comments like “Great article. Honest, transparency is what we need more of.” and “I just loved your very honest review!!!!”
Although this is part of the new entertainment section, it will be sticking with the same pillars of honesty, facts and fairness that you have grown to trust here at BreakingAC.
I’ll even let you know if we were invited into an establishment by the owners, if I was there because of a press event to do a profile or if I stopped in as a customer.
We hope you find these reads informative as well as entertaining.
