Weekly reviews of crab cakes around the MD and DC area

Luminous

Luminous is the hotel bar/restaurant located at the Westin BWI.  Usually hotel restaurants can be hit or miss, but the Westin name sort of carries along some cred for being better quality than your average Courtyard.  And when you walk into the lobby, you certainly get that from the allure of the decor to the attention to detail.  And while perusing the menu trying to see if it shall be here that you dine, or the Bob Evans down the street, your eyes happen to notice the crab cakes.  You're probably here on business, which begs the question if you should get your crab cake fix here, or find somewhere else.  Well look no further!  Read on and see for yourself....

The dinner entree consists of two jumbo lump crab cakes drizzled with a lemon pepper aioli, served alongside a watercress salad and pickled beets.  There is a Maryland Crab Cake Burger on the lunch menu, although it's a bit iffy on if by "burger" they simply mean a crab cake sandwich.

While there are some lumps of crab meat in the cakes, the lumps are mostly broken up.   This is your normal style crab cake, so not much by way of breading, but the cakes at least have a good moisture to them.  Predominate spice is Old Bay until you get to the bits of chopped up onion.  Lemon pepper aioli adds a tiny bit of additional flavor, but next to the spicing, it really just ends up being more for decoration.

This crab cake had potential, but sort of fell flat.  The crab has a decent flavor to it, but the spicing just overpowers any of that sweet crab flavor that you were looking forward to.  Once you've gotten over the saltiness of the Old Bay, then you also have to content with the bits of crunchy onions, which also have an overpowering flavor.  Tone down the Old Bay and get rid of the onions, and this might turn out to be a decent cake after all. 

Luminous Menu, Reviews, Photos, Location and Info - Zomato

Additional Info

  • Restaurant Name: Luminous
  • Address: 1110 Old Elkridge Landing Rd Linthicum, MD 21090
  • Neighborhood: Linthicum
  • Restaurant Type: Local
  • Website: http://www.luminousbaltimore.com/
  • Review Date: 05/05/2012 8:54pm
  • Atmosphere: Not Busy
  • Item(s) Ordered: Jumbo Lump Crab Cakes
  • Cooking Style: Broiled
  • Other Styles Available: No
  • Available by mail order?: No
  • Price: 32.00
  • Order Type: Double Platter
  • Crab Content: Jumbo Lump
  • Filler: More Than Average
  • Spice: Minimal
  • Overall Impression: Average
  • Rating (out of 5 crabs):

    3-crab
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