Extraordinary Stories From An Ordinary Guy: The "Crabs are King at Woody's" Story

It was an ordinary day. Heading home from Northeast, Maryland after eating a bowl of crab bisque, a crab cake sandwich with chips, coleslaw and a pink lemonade. One of my all-time favorite sandwiches since I found Woody's Crab House on the main street in Northeast. We had no wait today to get our seats, being the weather is still cool, but a few years ago during the summer we walked away after being told it was over 2 hours to wait. This year Woody's is celebrating their 20th year in business after selling over 2 million crab cakes. The owner of the restaurant, Peter Wood, bought a small bar on Main Street back in 1993. Really small and needed some repairs. At the time he had every intention of flipping the bar, but after making the repairs he found out that he couldn't sell it. He had to do something with it or he would lose the liquor license. That's when he decided to open Woody's and operate it until it sold. He also thought he would add a few menu items and since he was close to the Chesapeake Bay, he offered seafood. After a full year of operation he realized how successful he was and decided to expand the business to the south of the bar by adding a restaurant. Woods' Crab House was born and the rest is history as the saying goes. The popularity of Woody's Crab House began to grow. It was about this time that I was starting to take my altered Polaroid photos to Northeast to sell at a photo gallery. Carol and I got hooked on Woody's crab cake sandwiches. Every time we would make a trip to drop off photos we would eat at Woody's. Then, we started to take trips to Northeast just to eat at Woody's with an occasional stop in a store or two to look at the merchandise. The key to his business is the quality and value that he offers. And, for me his smoke free practice in the dining room, even back in the mid-90s was phenomenal. Very few places had that policy, but Peter realized that the smoke can ruin the flavor of the product so he banned it in his restaurant. After a while it was evident he would have to expand so he bought a property and it's driveway to the north and added the lower level that you notice when you enter the main door. Eventually added an outdoor Tiki Bar in the rear of that property. As I was sitting in a nearby shop waiting for my wife I got to talking to the shop owner's husband who told me that Peter now plans to expand the original place to the rear alley that is behind his property. The fellow also told me that Peter is semi-retired, has moved to Florida, but returns every few weeks to make sure that the crab cakes are still made using his mother's recipe just the same as he made them. His daughter and son-in-law now attend to the daily operations of the restaurant, but Peter is checking to make sure they don't use any filler in the crab cakes and that the bisque is loaded with crab meat. Crabs are king at Woody's as you can guess by now and today our waitress told us they would make well over 300 crab cakes before the doors closed today, but when the summer arrives that could very well double. More crab meat is needed to go with the crab imperial, crab and artichoke dip, Jumbo lump crab salad, Crab Au Gratin, Woody crab melt, and the Crab Sampler which has a crab cake, crab au gratin, crab imperial ... all broiled in a casserole dish and served with vegetables. Oh, the last item was $26.99. My bill for the two of us today was under $30. On the front of Woody's menu it says: The Chesapeake Bay is the World's largest producer of Blue Crabs. Crabs are monogamous, mating only once in their lifetimes. Crabs can regenerate limbs that have dropped off. A tagged blue crab was recorded swimming 35 miles n 48 hours. he female crab can produce two million eggs in her single reproductive cycle. Only one egg per million grows to adult size. A crab's shell lacks growth cells and must be periodically shed so that the crab may grow larger. For Carol and I, just keep 'em coming! It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.

The original bar that Peter Wood purchased.

This shows the door you still enter and the restaurant addition on the left.

Interior of the restaurant. Nothing fancy with brown paper on the table, an open roof with buckets that hang from the ceiling, and peanuts shells strewn on the floor under the patrons tables.