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Main Street Tower
Part of the original 42 lots of Bel Air, the Main Street Tower's location has been many things over the past two centuries. A hotel, another restaurant, a barber shop, a stationary store, and a pool hall, amongst other things. But since 2002, it has been Main Street's family-oriented Italian restaurant and lounge owned and operated by the Buontempo family (who also own a pizzeria on the same block). Despite being mainly Italian, they do offer one of the region's favorited delicacies -- crab cakes! Read on to see how they were!
Crab cakes are available as a single or double entree, broiled or fried, and served with two sides. For dinner, the Steak & Cake pairs a filet with a crab cake. A crab cake sandwich is available on the lunch menu. And on both menus is the Crab Toast, which is a crab cake inside of a grilled swiss cheese sandwich. Cocktail and tartar are available by request. Crab cakes are market price, with the exception of the Crab Toast and the Steak & Cake.
The Tower's crab cake is fairly large, which appears to be between 6 and 8 oz. Inside there are a few large lumps of crab, but mostly broken up pieces, and breading. The binder is a bread and mayo base, with there being more bread than sauce (i.e. leaning more towards Maryland style). In addition to the spices mixed into the binder, there are also bits of red pepper and parsley for color. Being of a larger size, the outer parts of the crab cake were drier than the inside, but the moisture amounts were not bad throughout. If anything, the dead center of the cake was a bit too moist, and the outer crust was dry, but acceptable.
The few large lumps of crab meat that we had were meaty in texture and had a tiny bit of flavor, but not much. The rest of the broken up pieces gets engulfed with the breading, which there seems to be a bit more of than needs to be. The binder flavor is mostly bread and salt. The two flavors compete for attention, and the crab meat, which doesn't have much flavor to begin with, gets lost in the shuffle.
Overall, we weren't impressed with the Tower's efforts. The bread and salt flavors overpower everything, and after a while, that single note gets tiring. We couldn't really taste much of the crab meat, but we're not sure if that is because the crab lacked flavor, or if the binder was just too assertive. We'd recommend cutting back on the amount of bread and seasoning in the mix, or possibly using seasonings that allow for more of a complex flavor profile. More flavorful crab would always be a win, but at least let what flavor there is come through first, and have the other flavors accentuate second.
Additional Info
- Restaurant Name: Main Street Tower
- Address: 29 S. Main St. Bel Air, MD 21014
- Neighborhood: Bel Air
- Restaurant Type: Local
- Website: http://www.mainstreettower.com/
- Review Date: 12/23/2013 7:56pm
- Atmosphere: Not Busy
- Item(s) Ordered: Crab Cake Dinner
- Cooking Style: Broiled
- Other Styles Available: No
- Available by mail order?: No
- Price: 16.95
- Order Type: Single Platter
- Crab Content: Jumbo Lump
- Filler: Average
- Spice: Average
- Overall Impression: Mediocre
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Rating (out of 5 crabs):
