It is one of the most beautiful and elegant new spaces in Baltimore and we were thrilled to be the first the broadcast from our new seat at The Fishmonger’s Daughter in Catonsville for a meal and a lot of history and touring the new kitchen with proprietor Damye Hahn, whose Faidley’s family has a new Baltimore County arm for its future. She shares her grand vision of creating a high-end dining experience with a focus on local Chesapeake Bay cuisine, including fresh seafood and seasonal ingredients. You know this one will be tasty!

Nestor Aparicio and Damye Hahn discuss the grand opening of The Fishmonger’s Daughter in Catonsville, highlighting its history as a grocery store and wallpaper store. Damye shares her vision of creating a high-end dining experience with a focus on local Chesapeake Bay cuisine, including fresh seafood and seasonal ingredients. The restaurant features a 5,000 sq. ft. event space called the Plymouth Room, named after the previous wallpaper company. Damye emphasizes the importance of preserving the building’s history while offering a refined dining experience. The restaurant is currently reservation-only, with plans to expand to lunch service and additional events.

• [ ] @Nestor Aparicio – Schedule and arrange for executive chef Scott Bacon to appear on Nestor’s show to talk about the restaurant’s food
• [ ] Give Nestor a tour of the upstairs Plymouth Room/event space by taking him up there as promised
• [ ] Train the evening service team first and then train the lunch service team to staff the new Fishmonger’s Daughter location
• [ ] Begin accepting event reservations and phone inquiries for the Plymouth Room, patio and upstairs event spaces as soon as possible

Tour of The Fishmonger’s Daughter

• Nestor Aparicio introduces the show, mentioning the Maryland Lottery and the location of The Fishmonger’s Daughter in Catonsville.
• Damye Hahn and Nestor discuss the history of the building, which was originally a grocery store and later a wallpaper store.
• Damye explains the significance of the Plymouth Room, a 5000 square foot event space on the second floor.
• Nestor and Damye talk about the building’s history, including its time as a grocery store and the Heidelbach family’s involvement.

Vision and Transformation

• Damye shares her vision for The Fishmonger’s Daughter, which has been a lifelong dream.
• Nestor and Damye discuss the challenges of renovating the building and the impact of the construction on the community.
• Damye describes the nautical and Eastern Shore-inspired decor, including the exposed brick and nautical ropes.
• The conversation touches on the importance of preserving the building’s history while creating a modern dining experience.

Catering and Event Space

• Damye talks about the family’s history of catering and the desire to have a space for events in Baltimore.
• Nestor and Damye discuss the importance of having a full-service restaurant to accommodate tourists and locals alike.
• Damye explains the decision to open a restaurant in Catonsville, close to the airport, to cater to both locals and travelers.
• The conversation highlights the potential for the Plymouth Room to host weddings and other events.

Menu and Culinary Vision

• Damye discusses the menu, which includes local Chesapeake Bay seafood and other regional ingredients.
• Nestor and Damye talk about the importance of highlighting local cuisine and the role of the new executive chef, Scott Bacon.
• Damye explains the use of fresh, local ingredients and the emphasis on seasonal changes in the menu.
• The conversation includes details about specific menu items, such as the jumbo doormat flounder and the black sea bass.

Challenges and Achievements

• Nestor and Damye discuss the challenges of opening the restaurant, including the renovation process and the impact of the pandemic.
• Damye shares her determination to make the restaurant a success despite the obstacles.
• The conversation touches on the importance of family support and the role of Damye’s parents in the business.
• Nestor and Damye reflect on the significance of the building’s history and its connection to the Hahn family’s legacy.

Community and Future Plans

• Damye talks about the community’s response to the restaurant and the positive feedback from locals and visitors.
• Nestor and Damye discuss future plans for the restaurant, including the addition of lunch service and more events in the Plymouth Room.
• The conversation includes details about the restaurant’s location in the heart of Catonsville and its potential to become a local landmark.
• Nestor and Damye express their excitement for the future and the potential for The Fishmonger’s Daughter to become a beloved destination in Baltimore.

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

Fishmonger’s Daughter, Catonsville, Maryland Lottery, Chincoteague ponies, Lexington Market, Chesapeake Bay, crab cakes, Plymouth Room, event space, local cuisine, executive chef, Maryland crab, restaurant vision, historic building, reservations only.

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SPEAKERS

Nestor Aparicio, Damye Hahn

Nestor Aparicio  00:00

Here, welcome home. We are W N S T A M 1570 Towson, Baltimore. We are Baltimore positive, positively here for the very first time at the Fishmonger’s Daughter. We had Damian on last week with her mom. Mom is home resting comfortably because everybody’s getting worn out at here at the Fishmonger’s Daughter. We’re in Cadenceville. It’s all brought to you by our friends at the Maryland Lottery. They give me strips of these fantastic Maryland treasures, treasures to give away. Davey’s gonna get either a horse,

Damye Hahn  00:30

Chincoteague ponies, Chincoteague

Nestor Aparicio  00:32

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pony, not Chicotic, acetyl the Maryland lottery.

Damye Hahn  00:36

I know, honey, but they, they swim from acetate to chink a tig from Chincoteague to acetate. That’s that’s the swim,

Nestor Aparicio  00:41

so somehow I’ve been talking about these, these horses, and they keep showing up my Facebook that there’s a group down in acetate that’s like a social media page that video the horses when they run wild, and they all have names, the horses, they’ve named the horses, and one of them had a baby, so there’s a little foal running around on the sand and nursing with mom, so this is all now that I’ve talked all nice, it’ll show up on my Facebook again, but

Damye Hahn  01:07

boy, you’ve been adorable, you may have been so busy.

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Nestor Aparicio  01:10

All right, so last week we talked about fade leaves, and we talked about the vision for this and being open. I’m here at lunchtime, it’s quiet, you’re gonna open at lunch at some point. Yes, you’re literally ramping up. You’ve been a business under 50 years your whole life. You’ve been serving. You’ve been the fishmonger’s daughter your whole life.

Damye Hahn  01:29

Yes, this

Nestor Aparicio  01:29

is a vision you’ve had for a long time. And I walked in the second time I’ve been here, I saw all the crepe paper out in front and all the construction, and I knew you were going through hell. And every time I would come out and see Evan, or go eat at Beaumont, I would think of you. Sometimes I’d take a wacky picture in front of your building when the sign went up, but I don’t know where I want to say stole, because I know you only borrowed the ideas that were here. But what is this reminds me of an it as an Eastern Shore kind of kitchen open vibe, you’ve got the nautical ropes and the browns in the woods, you’ve brought this giant fish here, a lot of your Fadely’s mementos that have been sort of memorialized, not in that old black and white newspaper, but like almost gallery-looking artwork here on the walls, and all of this exposed brick of this former wall paper store. Right, basically right

Damye Hahn  02:31

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wallpaper and former grocery store was a grocery store first.

Nestor Aparicio  02:34

Okay,

Damye Hahn  02:35

yeah. For the first 60 years of his life, it was a grocery store. It was built by John Heidelbach as a grocery store, a High Line grocery store, kind of like a Dean and DeLuca style. It was a very nice grocery store.

Nestor Aparicio  02:46

Was it a soda shop type store? No,

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Damye Hahn  02:48

no, no. They had, they had butchers, they had, they had, you know, of course, you know, cannon jarred goods. It was a full grocer, and they had, they had a bakery, and there they baked bread upstairs. That’s why we have the big oven up there, and the whole upstairs. It’s now the event space up

Nestor Aparicio  03:05

there yet. She hasn’t taken me. Is

Damye Hahn  03:06

is you didn’t go up there? I’ll take you up there, but it is a gorgeous 5000 square foot event,

Nestor Aparicio  03:14

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the Plymouth Room. The

Damye Hahn  03:15

Plymouth Room.

Nestor Aparicio  03:16

Yes,

Damye Hahn  03:16

yeah. I didn’t think anybody would want to actually have an event at the Fishmonger’s daughter,

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Nestor Aparicio  03:21

especially a wedding. Was it named that before?

Damye Hahn  03:23

No, the Plymouth, Plymouth wallpaper came in after the Heidelbox. So we’re really the third person to take over the building. The building was built in 1925 by by the Heidelbach brothers, and then after that the Singer Swimmer family with Plymouth Wallpaper owned it all the way from, I think, 1969 was the year that they, they became Plymouth, and then they, they had it until 2017 so they were

Nestor Aparicio  03:53

here, this was a wallpaper,

Damye Hahn  03:55

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so they were here for,

Nestor Aparicio  03:55

and I didn’t notice it

Damye Hahn  03:56

for something 560 years. Okay, so, so, yeah, so this was it was Plymouth, and a lot of people now know it as the Plymouth Wallpaper Building. That’s why we called the upstairs Plymouth as a tribute to Plymouth, but older people, like my parents’ age, know it as the Heidelbach Building before it was Plymouth Wallpaper and the Heidelbach grocery store.

Nestor Aparicio  04:19

So, your mom got a grocery here back when she was young.

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Damye Hahn  04:22

Yes, yes.

Nestor Aparicio  04:23

And your family’s Catonsville, Ellicott City, through and through. This is this is a dream of your mom and dad at the end of their lives to see their business move to their hometown, right? Your dad’s hometown. I wore the Kansas belt buckle,

Damye Hahn  04:39

the Kansas guy, but I’m, you know, what I think. I don’t think that my parents ever really wanted to be in full service restaurant, you know. My, they were catering, that was mine and my son’s. Yes, that was

Nestor Aparicio  04:53

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this happen. I mean, I’ve known you a long time, but, and you’ve talked about, feels like you were dreaming this up in 19. Me too, but when did this vision happen that you were going to open a location somewhere suburban that it wasn’t talk, because your dad had been offered

Damye Hahn  05:12

1000 times, they were offered.

Nestor Aparicio  05:14

I’m sure when the Hunt Valley Mall opened 40 years ago, they were like, ‘Hey, do you want to have a place in our mall? Exactly right,

Damye Hahn  05:20

and then, of course, you know every stadium. Hey, do you want to put a place in the stadium? You want to airport airport? Yes, yes. And of course, we’re going to do the little market in the airport for Lexington, but every time we turned around, there was somebody asking us to go somewhere, mainly for quick serve, and I had started looking, probably into the restaurant, full-service restaurant, probably about 20 years ago, but I just.. why is

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Nestor Aparicio  05:44

it important to have a restaurant?

Damye Hahn  05:46

It’s the number of people who call us every day, and I’ve told you this before. A lot of our business downtown in Lexington Market is tourism. We are one of the number one tourist attractions in Baltimore, still always have been, still are, and the number of people that come in from out of town and say, Can I get a reservation? My response has always been, it’s standing room only, sorry, but no reservations. So, but you

Nestor Aparicio  06:17

also never turn anybody away.

Damye Hahn  06:19

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No, but

Nestor Aparicio  06:19

literally, you know, literally, you can come to your place and get a crab cake anytime within 10 or 15 minutes. The lines, I mean, I remember coming over in the old market, and you get there 1230 in the afternoon on the wrong day when the Yankees are in town, or whatever,

Damye Hahn  06:32

or there’s a convention, and

Nestor Aparicio  06:36

wait a half an hour for a crab cake, but you could make everyone happy, you correct what you were never sold out,

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Damye Hahn  06:42

never sold out. No, no, no, no, no, never sold out. But, but what we did, we, we, you know, we’re cut off at 530 6o’clock so we missed dinner.

Nestor Aparicio  06:51

Dinner, of course, you

Damye Hahn  06:52

missed the dinner.

Nestor Aparicio  06:53

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I never thought about, so,

Damye Hahn  06:54

so not having the dinner was something that I always thought was the natural progression,

Nestor Aparicio  06:59

not to mention somebody comes to town on Saturday and leaves on a Monday, Saturday night, Sunday, right? I mean, I’ve often said to people, like, working to get a great crab cake, and they’re in town on a Saturday night, and we’re closed, the Costa’s or Coco’s on a Saturday night, because you’re not open, right? Literally,

Damye Hahn  07:14

Saturday night or Sunday, yes. So it makes it, you know, and it hasn’t been bad for us, but there’s so many people that you know were disappointed that they had to miss it, so I wanted to make sure that we actually not only did that, but for years and years and years my family catered, so we would do, you know, different types of events, you know, you’ve talked to my parents about them taking the crabs and the crab cakes to Europe, ambassador being ambassadors in the Chesapeake, and being part of the group that brought the international airport to BWI when it was Friendship, and they, you know, wanted to become international, the

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Nestor Aparicio  07:57

greatest name ever for an airport,

Damye Hahn  07:59

Friendship Air Force, Friendship here, and then having, and actually bringing the Chesapeake to London, or Frankfurt, or you know, Reykjavik, or wherever it was that we were trying to bring another airline in from, and they did that for years and years, and it, I always thought it would be great to have a space to be able to do that here in Baltimore, and you’re doing that. This is

Nestor Aparicio  08:24

going to be really cool for

Damye Hahn  08:26

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you. We’re really close to the airport, so that was one of the reasons that we love this location. We were, you know, a five minute Uber drive from the airport, which is, which is fantastic. So we’re hoping that this this fills out what our Lexington market didn’t have, and we still have that quick server, that wonderful market feeling in Lexington and downtown, but this is the natural progression of a little bit more high-lined evening dinner with also the event space. Now we’re eventually going to add the lunch to this and have the served lunch as soon as I get enough people here to work, but we’re training our evening team first. Then we’ll train our lunch team, and then we’ll move on

Nestor Aparicio  09:09

to the I want to have happy hour, your happy bar back there. My wife and I sat at the bar when we came in the first time we were here, it was still sort of wallpapered up in the front. I had seen the light in here, yeah, beautiful light here. Yes, I mean, just every part of the way you’ve appointed this, and for people out there, I’m sure you’re going to be touring WBAL and local people, and they’ll carry their camera around, and I could do that with you or for you at some point, but people should come out and experience for themselves. We’re at the Fishmonger’s Daughter. We are in Catonsville, in the heart of Frederick Road, right in the middle of Musick City, USA. Damie Hans, our guest here. She is proprietor, along with her family, Nancy and Bill, down at Fate Lease of Lexington Market. Now moving the business out. Here, what was the most important thing? I mean, obviously

Damye Hahn  09:54

Adam, the business not moving.

Nestor Aparicio  09:56

At that, I said moving. I’m sorry,

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Damye Hahn  09:58

we’re not moving,

Nestor Aparicio  09:58

not moving. You’re adding, so. Sorry,

Damye Hahn  10:00

we’re still down.

Nestor Aparicio  10:01

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Sorry, time that out. Not moving.

Damye Hahn  10:02

Yes, yes, yes. This is an additive.

Nestor Aparicio  10:06

My wife had a burger here three weeks ago. I had a lobster roll. You didn’t have crab cakes on that night. I got one anyway. I had your crab cake,

Damye Hahn  10:15

and you know why. You know why? Because I needed to train the team. We already know how to make a great crab, I needed to train the treat team to make the things that I did not have on the on the on the menu before that we didn’t already, that we didn’t already sell. So, what was

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Nestor Aparicio  10:32

important to have on the menu here? Besides, I mean, you knew you were gonna have a crab cake, you knew you wanted to have a steak and a chicken and a fish, and you know, like all, but but I keep thinking to myself, and it’s what I thought. First night, you stolen or borrowed a lot of ideas from a lot of places you’ve been, places you’ve eaten, things you’ve seen on menu. I mean, even the menu items, I looked at this, and it felt because I know you like you’ve collected this dream all-star team. You’ve been keeping little crib notes for years. When I open my full serve restaurant, we’re gonna have that cocktail on the menu, we’re gonna have that side dish. I just felt that way, and I have only ordered two or three things. I got raw oysters, no, not raw, I got the oysters that were, we got funny names for them, one’s a cheese,

Damye Hahn  11:18

one’s the Plymouth, and the other one’s the Nancy.

Nestor Aparicio  11:20

The Nancy, right?

Damye Hahn  11:21

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Yes,

Nestor Aparicio  11:22

I like

Damye Hahn  11:22

that. That’s the Nancy has the Smithfield ham, ham

Nestor Aparicio  11:25

on it. That’s what I liked.

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Damye Hahn  11:26

Yes.

Nestor Aparicio  11:26

Okay, so you had.. so I.. they were gourmet, or they weren’t raw oysters, but I think, like, the things.. why the Nancy, and why the ham on that? And

Damye Hahn  11:40

everything has a meaning, every, you know, every every piece of art, every everything that we’ve restored here, because, of course, this is kind of like a little museum to history here, and we have, you know, recycled or refurbished all the old floors, the walls, the plaster, the old finishes that the tables are made from the wood that I had to take off the roof. So this is all heart pine from the building. The large tables,

Nestor Aparicio  12:11

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oh, tables were the roof.

Damye Hahn  12:13

Yes, yes, these were the tables. These tables were the roof

Nestor Aparicio  12:17

back. She, I like that. So I was with you the day that the plate people were trying to sell you the plates and picking out the, and you have a lot of glass going on. Yes, here you’re not

Damye Hahn  12:27

a glass,

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Nestor Aparicio  12:27

but I mean, you know, it is its place is elegant. It

Damye Hahn  12:32

is,

Nestor Aparicio  12:32

it’s elegant as a word, but

Damye Hahn  12:34

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approachable, elegant but approachable. So I wanted to make sure that there’s something on the menu for everybody, you know, if you, if you want a handheld, you can get a handheld. If you want a great entree, we’re going to be serving the best and the finest of what we can find in the Chesapeake Bay. So, in other words, tonight I have jumbo doormat flounder, which is rare to find anymore, but the jumbo doormat flounder in season, you know, through the spring, and they’re the great big large ones, and it’s fileted and pan seared, and it’s served with asparagus, and I have fresh corn from Florida, and that has a Maryland lump hollandaise sauce on top, and then I have a black sea bass from the Chesapeake, you don’t

Nestor Aparicio  13:20

serve any hollandaise sauce at Faith Lee’s ever, right?

Damye Hahn  13:24

Well, we actually have different things, usually on a lobster,

Nestor Aparicio  13:28

just to do you, yes, like knowing me a little bit when you and your husband are out traveling, living the world, you’re going to restaurants, you eat these, you like refined things, and now I just feel like you’ve put this all-star team together, of like me, of all the things I’ve ever eaten. If I were a restaurant tour and I could put them all under one roof and bring them into an all-star team, it feels to me like that’s you’ve been waiting your whole life to do this.

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Damye Hahn  13:53

I have, you know, you know, I’ve at Failies, we always like to highlight the local in the Chesapeake, sure. So it’s, it’s going to be a lot of local Chesapeake, like my fish of the day, the black bass that’s in season now, and that, you know, that’s all local black bass. We have, you know, we’ve got a lot of, you know, local oysters, we’ve got Maryland crab, you know, me and the Maryland crab, but we, we also have this wonderful beverage manager, and, and, and cocktail curator that’s making all the syrups here that she’s making in all of the cocktails that is she just made a cocktail for the next summer menu which will come out in a few weeks that’s with this watermelon syrup that is absolutely that watermelon the tomatoes the corn the the blueberries all the flavors that you, that you know from Maryland is what I want to have on the menu, and highlight the different seasons, as Maryland has a little bit of everything, we’ve got apples, we’ve got peaches, we’ve got, you know, the all the stuff on the shore, the green. Is every there’s so much here that a lot of states don’t have, and I want to highlight that. So, you find a lot of that on the menu here that I can’t do downtown in a quick serve.

Nestor Aparicio  15:11

You gonna fight with me about okra in the crab soup, or no? You gonna put okra in there?

Damye Hahn  15:14

No, we don’t have okra, but you will get lima beans,

Nestor Aparicio  15:17

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not a girl, that’s what

Damye Hahn  15:19

lima beans.

Nestor Aparicio  15:19

Jamie, honest here, she is proprietor of the Fishmonger’s daughter, along with her family at Fade Lee’s. They have not moved their business, they have shipped their crab cakes out here to Catonsville, along with a whole lot more. I mean, I think a lot of folks may have thought, well, she’s going to do something like Fadely’s out here, and they’re going to have their, they’re going to be able to sell their crab cakes in Catonsville. I think your vision was so much bigger than that. Yes, it was. It’s very obvious, if you wanted to just serve your crab cakes out here, you could have been doing that a long time.

Damye Hahn  15:45

Yes, and a much smaller way too, right? But this, this, the restoration of this historic building, and, and you know, getting this, this, this is a behemoth restored to where we have, you know, this is a

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Nestor Aparicio  16:00

small thing. What I mean, you dream this is a big dream.

Damye Hahn  16:03

This is a bit, and

Nestor Aparicio  16:03

this was a big audacious project to tackle for you. And I mean, I’ve known you a long time. I don’t know anybody that’s ever had as much trouble opening a business as you have had with it. I hope to never meet anyone that struggles as much as you’ve struggled with the building, and you having a vision and a dream that would have been a lot easier had you just taken a failed restaurant down the road and gone in and fixed the

Damye Hahn  16:28

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kitchen, correct?

Nestor Aparicio  16:29

You, there’s a lot of things you could have done, maybe even in retrospect, that would have been a lot easier for you.

Damye Hahn  16:34

It would have been a lot easier. It would have been a lot easier. It wouldn’t have been this,

Nestor Aparicio  16:38

right?

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Damye Hahn  16:39

Certainly wouldn’t have been this,

Nestor Aparicio  16:40

because the bones of the building is what attracted you, and the location in the middle of,

Damye Hahn  16:45

yeah,

Nestor Aparicio  16:45

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the heart, you know, you can only get a business in the heart of Catonsville, right, in an art of Caytonsville,

Damye Hahn  16:49

the age and the history, and the history that the history of this building, that’s so parallel to the history of my family’s business. So,

Nestor Aparicio  16:58

your dad loved it too. You told me that story last week, your dad walked in and said, “This is this is the place, right?

Damye Hahn  17:03

Yes, yes, he did. He does love it. He does love it. He, and there’s a lot of him, you know, is his oyster can collect

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Nestor Aparicio  17:10

from Costa sends his love to you. I had dinner at Costa Centremonium last night, and it’s the only other business I could think of that I’m in now, and all the crab cake people, even you know, even Marcella’s mother was the crab, and she’s got dementia now, and is struggling. Pete lost his dad, he said he did this thing, this television show with you. Yes, he said, “You tell Damian, Damian had so much trouble getting that place open. He’s like, “And I know what she went through, I’m at the racetrack right now, you know, right? So seeing all of you who are my age, who you know, your parents are still here, and I don’t have mine. My wife has her, but just seeing these visions of family, and you know, I think of Pete out there, and I’m thinking, the only reason you’re at the tracks, your dad loved horses, and he walked in, and it was his idea, and now his son stuck with his dad’s idea, right? Right, and I think it’s the same thing for you, is like this was part your dad walked in here, and when you and your mom talked about it last week, you’re like, well, Bill walked in and looked at it, and we lit up, and then we just knew it was the right place, right? There is something really neat about that.

Damye Hahn  18:11

Oh, it is, it is,

Nestor Aparicio  18:12

and I saw his name, it’s, it’s Bill Devine Way here, right?

Damye Hahn  18:15

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Yes, yes. So we have a little road around the building, and and the county did allow me to name my road, and of course I named it after my dad, Bill Divine Way. There’s only one way, and it’s divine way, and it’s a one way to

Nestor Aparicio  18:28

such a great name, though. I mean, as a maiden name, it’s a divine, it’s divine, it’s

Damye Hahn  18:34

a great.. now I know my well, I’m not going to tell you what my husband thought he was married, but

Nestor Aparicio  18:39

I have a friend of mine, who’s divorced, and she knows she is. She married a guy named Pretty, his last name was Pretty, huh? And her last name is Pretty, and she’s single now, and she’s like, well, if you marry someone and their name’s Pretty, you don’t get rid of the name, that’s

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Damye Hahn  18:52

true,

Nestor Aparicio  18:53

that’s true. I thought the vines, you know, I mean, I’m stuck with aparicio, for better or worse, but for your dad, now he’s been in here,

Damye Hahn  19:00

yes, yes, he’s been in here several times. Absolutely, he likes the back corner table. Oh, he’s got a cushion on the seat,

Nestor Aparicio  19:08

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so from your.. I thought about this a little bit too. And I should ask, when your mom was on last week, but your mom is the most like down-home country, Eastern Shore Merlin woman I know, and she has these recipes for,

Damye Hahn  19:23

yeah,

Nestor Aparicio  19:24

you know, and like all of that, but I thought the side dishes and some of the cuisine here would not necessarily come from some state table you stole from in Charleston, but from your mother, that there’s a probably there are the recipes on the menu here,

Damye Hahn  19:38

the classics are her crab soups on the menu, the crab cake is on the menu, her crab imperials on the menu, the crab

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Nestor Aparicio  19:46

I’ve never had your crab imperial, and anybody that knows me knows I like crab imperial more than I like crab cakes.

Damye Hahn  19:52

Yes, yes, I’m

Nestor Aparicio  19:53

about to have some of your crab

Damye Hahn  19:54

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here. We have crab imperial, and then, but, but we. You know, we have a fabulous new chef.

Nestor Aparicio  20:03

Tell me about your new

Damye Hahn  20:04

chef. So, we have, we have a fantastic team. We have our new executive chef is Scott Bacon. Do you know who Scott is?

Nestor Aparicio  20:13

No.

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Damye Hahn  20:13

Okay, Scott is fabulous. He’s a fabulous young. He has worked at the Ivy, most recently Ivy Hotel, very his sense of flavor and his sense of actually Maryland. He is, he is a heart for Maryland in the Chesapeake, like I do.

Nestor Aparicio  20:39

All right, next time I do the show here, a month or two, we get organized. I’m gonna bring him on. We’re gonna talk about food,

Damye Hahn  20:44

absolutely, because I want to do that. He and I, he and I are visions about what cuisine should be in this area and how to highlight the local cuisine are like, like this. So, having him on board, I’m just so excited

Nestor Aparicio  21:01

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because he’s fabulous, that really have leaned into the Chesapeake thing in such Gertrude. Yeah, cousin John Shields.

Damye Hahn  21:08

Yes,

Nestor Aparicio  21:09

you know he’s my cousin. Did you know this?

Damye Hahn  21:11

I didn’t know you used your cousin, but I’ve

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Nestor Aparicio  21:13

known him for years. Know it. I went to do the show there three years ago because Rodricks was doing his show at the BMA, and Odette Ramos had always said that they were the only ones in town that had a vegan crab cake. Now there is the House of Kush has a vegan crab cake as well, but he does a zucchini kind of vegan crab cake there, and the first time I went there to do the show, his last name is Shields, my son’s wife’s mother’s maiden name is Shields, they’re cousins.

Damye Hahn  21:44

Oh, okay.

Nestor Aparicio  21:45

My son married into his family.

Damye Hahn  21:47

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Okay, my

Nestor Aparicio  21:47

son married his

Damye Hahn  21:48

cousin,

Nestor Aparicio  21:49

so we’re family.

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Damye Hahn  21:50

Okay,

Nestor Aparicio  21:50

but when I go to his place, he’s got the Chesapeake

Damye Hahn  21:54

thing

Nestor Aparicio  21:55

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at the front of what he does, but I can’t name five other places. I mean, not even places like in Canton Arrows or Ocean City or Eastern Shore, they serve a crab cake, or they’ll serve crab soup, or they’ll have corn, or they’ll have these, but to like take on Chesapeake Bay cuisine as,

Damye Hahn  22:12

as a style,

Nestor Aparicio  22:12

as a style, maybe Phillips was thought of as being that 50 years, I don’t know, but that’s when you built this, I thought, oh man, Nancy’s got some special succotash recipe things you gonna come up with. I just felt like there would be some of your mom in that part of the Eastern Shore thing, you know what I mean.

Damye Hahn  22:33

And there, there will be, because it’s going to be a really our menu will be have a lot of specials and fast-paced movie, you know, because we’re going to change with the seasons, so there’ll be a lot of things like I had – I’ve been open for a soft opening, not even three weeks, and I have – I’ve had three whole different whole fish on the menu in three weeks, so it’s going to move that quickly, where there’s going to be

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Nestor Aparicio  23:02

different daughter. If I can’t get a fresh piece,

Damye Hahn  23:04

I know that’s what I’m saying. I got to have the.. I’ve got

Nestor Aparicio  23:08

some.. that’s a Chesapeake Bay Creek

Damye Hahn  23:11

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Flounder. Yes, the flounder. The.. and we did have when we started, we had Carolina Snapper, but then we had.. so it’ll be anything.

Nestor Aparicio  23:19

Yeah, that ugly Maryland catfish on here, right?

Damye Hahn  23:22

We always have the catfish on here. Catfish is on here every day. We got to get rid of that,

Nestor Aparicio  23:25

and you got that slider going on, the one you won the award.

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Damye Hahn  23:29

That’s the, that’s the catfish, that’s

Nestor Aparicio  23:30

catfish with some hot honey and some cold slaw,

Damye Hahn  23:35

hot honey, bourbon,

Nestor Aparicio  23:36

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bourbon slaw

Damye Hahn  23:38

on a brioche bun.

Nestor Aparicio  23:40

Perfect.

Damye Hahn  23:41

Now that’s the other thing we’re doing here is we actually have in-house pastry chefs, so we are baking all of our own rolls.

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Nestor Aparicio  23:48

I didn’t even get any of those when I was here last time. We got our own baker.

Damye Hahn  23:52

Yes, well, you got it on the burger. It’s all a homemade brioche roll, and all our craft tips are with the lobster roll that was on a that was on a homemade

Nestor Aparicio  24:00

roll, so I’ve eaten your bread, and

Damye Hahn  24:02

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then we have, but the desserts are to die for, because our pastry chef, the desserts are fabulous. I hate

Nestor Aparicio  24:10

so much freaking food here the night I was here. They almost had the rolling on Frederick Road. I mean, I swear to God, like we just kept ordering food, because we had the Nancy’s and we had the Plymouth’s and I had a lobster roll, she had a burger, and then we got, we had two drinks, because they were really good, they were

Damye Hahn  24:28

drinks are amazing,

Nestor Aparicio  24:29

I don’t know what it was, it was some, it was tequila, but

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Damye Hahn  24:34

oh, you had the lupines, I

Nestor Aparicio  24:36

had the lupine, that’s exactly what I had, which wasn’t that, it was some, I know,

Damye Hahn  24:41

and what

Nestor Aparicio  24:42

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you’re seeing,

Damye Hahn  24:43

what are what our pastry and beverage managers doing is she’s she’s actually making these, cooking down these fruit syrups and dehydrating them and making them into little papers, and you had the paper, yes, of the the ginger and the fruit on the on the side of the glass as a. Almost like a condiment in your cock,

Nestor Aparicio  25:02

it was elevated,

Damye Hahn  25:03

they’re very elevated,

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Nestor Aparicio  25:04

it was elevated,

Damye Hahn  25:05

and we’re doing everything from scratch. I mean, the berries and everything are coming in, and they’re cooking them down, and they’re making these compotes, and when that gets, you know, put on this brie cheesecake with their candying the walnuts and making the candied walnut crust, and they’re.. it’s just so delicious

Nestor Aparicio  25:18

operation back here.

Damye Hahn  25:19

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It is an operation, and I have three incredible kitchens. I have the everybody that’s coming to work for me, that’s working in the kitchen, has never seen a kitchen like this outside of a huge hotel. And I actually think I have more equipment in there that most hotels do, and they’re just, oh my god, I want to work here, you know, it’s wonderful. So

Nestor Aparicio  25:41

we’re at the Fishmonger’s daughter. Come on out, have dinner. Give everybody the details on, like, you don’t just want walk people walking in here tonight, right? Like,

Damye Hahn  25:47

no, no. So we are still reservations only.

Nestor Aparicio  25:50

How many seats are we? Just so I know,

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Damye Hahn  25:52

we’re at about 168 down here. All right, we can seat, we can seat 350 upstairs. We’ll be able to see the 100 on the deck. I’m waiting for the deck furniture, hoping to have that open by again.

Nestor Aparicio  26:03

This is going to be where I have my 60th birthday party upstairs. I think you will.

Damye Hahn  26:08

I think you will. It’s a big, it’s a beautiful room.

Nestor Aparicio  26:10

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Let this old jalopy up into the Plymouth rooms. What we’ll do, you know?

Damye Hahn  26:13

Yeah, yeah,

Nestor Aparicio  26:14

perfect weddings, parties, all

Damye Hahn  26:16

that parties

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Nestor Aparicio  26:17

available for the holidays. Like, you want those phone calls, right?

Damye Hahn  26:20

Absolutely, we want them as soon as possible.

Nestor Aparicio  26:22

All right,

Damye Hahn  26:23

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it’s, it’s, and that it, the floors are gorgeous. There’s 300 year old teak on my floors upstairs. It is absolutely gorgeous. It’s a gorgeous space, two beautiful new skylights. It’s just a fabulous.. and then the, the, the patio, the patio, a big blue stone patio with fireplace.

Nestor Aparicio  26:42

You have the outdoor, you have an outdoor place here,

Damye Hahn  26:45

right on the second floor. There’s an outdoor

Nestor Aparicio  26:46

pot. I did not notice that until I walked in earlier. I looked up and I saw, like, the Italian lights, and I’m like, “Oh, you could drink up there at night, right?

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Damye Hahn  26:56

Not drink at night, and I’m not. we’re gonna have curated events, like we’re lining

Nestor Aparicio  27:03

up. I thought that was an outdoor smoking deck or something. Like,

Damye Hahn  27:06

well, it could be. We might have, we might do a, but we’re gonna be doing like a gin and jazz night, or a meet the vintner, and a wine tasting, and or or a food and wine pairing.

Nestor Aparicio  27:17

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Gonna make the move to Catonsville, aren’t

Damye Hahn  27:19

you? That would be you, would you, would love it, you would love it. And then we’re also having

Nestor Aparicio  27:24

wanted us to move to Catonsville two years ago. She talked about it, she likes Catonsville.

Damye Hahn  27:27

We’ll also have, like, uh, brunch from 10 to two, when

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Nestor Aparicio  27:31

Saturday, Sunday,

Damye Hahn  27:32

Saturday, and Sunday, yeah,

Nestor Aparicio  27:33

but not yet. Right now, only now, what do we want? 5o’clock dinner, five, a reservation come out,

Damye Hahn  27:40

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yes, 5o’clock seven days a week, we’re open for dinner, reservations only. You know, we’ll pack this place tonight, and, but we got to keep it at reservation only, because we just, we’re still training, so hopefully by experience, yeah, that will have some lunch, and we’ll be able to accommodate some walk-ins,

Nestor Aparicio  28:01

so now you’ve done this. Would you ever want to do it again? Open your business.

Damye Hahn  28:05

Hell

Nestor Aparicio  28:06

no, hell no. This

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Damye Hahn  28:07

is it. Hell no. She’s here. I’m done.

Nestor Aparicio  28:09

Got her dad’s name on the street, 55

Damye Hahn  28:13

I got to keep this. I got to get this thing running.

Nestor Aparicio  28:15

8

I got to get Bill Cole in here. I think I’m not still hungover from Las Vegas, but I know some people who might be. That’s all I’m gonna say. Bill didn’t run all that hard this time, though. Bill was.. I tell your wife you were mainly a good boy on this trip. I was impeccable on this trip, you know. I.. I didn’t get drunk. I met a lot of people. I hung out, and then I got to see Springsteen in Pittsburgh on Tuesday night. I came home.

Damye Hahn  28:40

Oh, how

Nestor Aparicio  28:41

wide open here. So, Fishmonger’s daughters open. It will become your new favorite restaurant. It is elevated, beautiful, upscale, and here for you, right next to State Fair, right across Mel Guapo, Cross Remorse Burgers with a rock and roll, and Bill’s Music in the Music capital of Maryland, Tatonsville. Where life is great in the 21228 Go make some food, you know, I’m going to make a promise to you, and this is going to sound flippant. I will never, ever, ever order a crab cake here at Fishmonger’s Daughter, because there’s a million other things on the menu. I’m going to stick to the crab cakes that fade least

Damye Hahn  29:15

good

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Nestor Aparicio  29:15

when I’m out here. I’m going to expand my horizons,

Damye Hahn  29:19

right?

Nestor Aparicio  29:20

I don’t even know what that was, but I’m having another one.

Damye Hahn  29:22

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Have a loop in, and I’m going to get your wife to eat fish, because that black bass with the with the bitter greens chimichurri last night was unbelievable. It was just unbelievable.

Nestor Aparicio  29:34

I had a somebody on my timeline, Maggie’s farm last night put a barramundi on special. My wife loves barrel mundi. She fell in love with in Australia. So, when you get like a nice white flaky sweet fish on the menu, she’ll eat it. She’s not..

Damye Hahn  29:49

you’re gonna

Nestor Aparicio  29:50

like.. she won’t eat a clam now, and she won’t eat a shrimp, but she will eat fish. She likes fish. She’s not.. but she’s not fishy, you know what I mean. But you don’t have to be fishy to come here. No, no, no. Absolutely not. You can eat the steak if you want. We came to invited us, and my wife sat here. I sat here. She ordered the lupin, and I were.. and a woman over here ordered a burger and was eating it as we were figuring out what the heck we were doing. And my wife said, “Hey, has a burger? And a woman was like, “It was like something right now. The Wendy’s commercial, she’s like, “It’s best burger I’ve ever eaten, that’s what she said to my wife. So, my wife’s like, “Alright, I’m gonna have the burger, and it was really, really good burger.

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Damye Hahn  30:26

It wasn’t really good burger,

Nestor Aparicio  30:27

but I know everything on the menu. I’ve only eaten a few of the things.

Damye Hahn  30:30

Yeah, and of course, we’re going local with all the meats, so it’s a, you know, truest meats down the street. They’re great prime burger, and it’s wonderful.

Nestor Aparicio  30:39

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Well, I’ve already had that. I had a bucket in that with my I feel like was Clara Peller was hot and juicy, remember?

Damye Hahn  30:44

Yeah, where’s the beef?

Nestor Aparicio  30:46

Right here at Fishmonger’s daughter, Damien is here. Had her mom on last week. If you want to hear her mom’s beautiful voice, you can find that out at Baltimore Positive. You can make a reservation here. So I brought you by Friends at the Maryland Lottery. You going with acety courses? I

Damye Hahn  30:59

am.

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Nestor Aparicio  30:59

You don’t want to like the crabs, you’ve seen enough crabs. Yeah, I like Blackwater and Ocean City, Maryland, where I’ll be in August. Bill Cole’s coming up next. He’s with Cole Roofing and Gordian Energy. He took me out to Vegas, which is why I still have the lampshade on my head and the bags under my eyes. It is all brought to you by our friends at Farnon and Derby. They’re the comfort guys, HVAC plumbing, and of course, when it gets really hot, that air condition breaks, call them before that happens. Also, GBMC, by the way, I got to tell you this, I gave blood, I had a real doctor’s appointment, Dr. Senussi, I love you, but I didn’t like the mail I got the next day, gave blood, I need to make a few lifestyle changes with fried foods

Damye Hahn  31:41

just, it

Nestor Aparicio  31:42

just popped up. I’m 57 I’m only telling you this so I don’t order French fries when I’m in here, and you smack me, because I went, I went to Fadely’s last week, and I avoided the French fries, which is really hard for me to do, because they’re my favorite. They’re the big fat westerns, but I’m trying to

Damye Hahn  31:58

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put you like the mac and cheese.

Nestor Aparicio  32:00

I’m mixing a salad in the mac and she’s got cheese in it, so

Damye Hahn  32:03

okay,

Nestor Aparicio  32:04

so I’m all right. I had the

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Damye Hahn  32:06

collard greens, the collard greens, I had the

Nestor Aparicio  32:08

mac and cheese. Just don’t tell my doctor I had

Damye Hahn  32:10

it. The collar,

Nestor Aparicio  32:12

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my wife, I’m giving blood, and I’m watching my A 1c I feel like a freaking commercial on a football.

Damye Hahn  32:17

I know, I know, I know,

Nestor Aparicio  32:19

I crab cake last night, and I’m gonna tell you, I did. So, there, I had a fried crab cake at your place last week. I’m just trying to cut down a little bit on the pizza, little bit on the cheese, little bit on the white bread and the white rug. I’m just

Damye Hahn  32:34

having tomatoes and collard greens with that crab cake. I love collard greens in a crab cake.

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Nestor Aparicio  32:39

I do too, but that’s not as much fun as French fries.

Damye Hahn  32:42

I know, but its flavors are great.

Nestor Aparicio  32:46

I’m looking at it as a temporary thing, where I’m just gonna like calm down a little bit on the fried foods. I mean, I don’t eat like a lot of eggs, or I’m not a cholesterol guy. You think I’m healthy, don’t you? Yes, I thought I was healthy. Turns out,

Damye Hahn  33:00

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from the inside out, getting

Nestor Aparicio  33:02

the damn tomatoes in a stew, whatever you’re giving me. We’re back for more. We’re Fishmonger’s daughter. You can order it all here. I’m going to order up Cole Roofing and the Maryland Party next from Catonsville. Stay with

Damye Hahn  33:12

us, you.