Lou Petrucci takes Nestor on a tour of the award-winning The Local in Fallston and gets a crab cake at the hands of the Restaurant Association of Maryland “Chef Of The Year” in Harford County.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
oysters, people, menu, crab cake, year, local, chicken sandwich, scranton, love, tour, place, bar, baltimore, waffle house, egg rolls, wife, montage, cheesesteak, lunch, feels
SPEAKERS
Lou Petrucci, Nestor Aparicio
Nestor Aparicio 00:00
W and S T TAS Baltimore and Baltimore positive we are positively no longer Baltimore County or Baltimore City. We just crossed the border and I from where I live. It was 19 minutes through some backroads. Beautiful back roads Baltimore County up to fallston. I remember we didn’t have restaurants your chain restaurants now. It’s like it’s an eaters delight right behind the Waffle House and the Dunkin Donuts you will find the local elevated comfort food. I was made comfortable with a chicken sandwich at lunch. We’re going to be having the crab cake here just barely crab cake tour, all presented by our friends at the Maryland lottery 50th anniversary. I think we’re in focus in this segment actually $10,000 up for grabs so people at the bar were saying can you really win 10 grand I’m like these a fake lottery tickets were given out here. It’s the real thing. It’s the 50th anniversary it’s Maryland crab cake tour and winter they should eight 690 nation if you aren’t hearing this, it’s couple of days left. Still in the month of May until the end of the month. It’s still 0% financing. You buy two you get 23866 90 nation loop cerchi has been waiting patiently behind like my legendary running in my tighty whities through Baltimore story with a lamb and then of course, fancy plants. He has it who came up here, Clancy and he’s another card he the 50 year card. I got the 45 year card here and drinking beer. Man I walk in here it says the local and I don’t know why I should be shocked that you would have independent inverted like I looked up your branch. Well Beth from Inverness was hitting me the independent pen that was hitting me on Facebook, she may have come over she had kidstuff angels over here we’re gonna she’s gonna have me doing the berry I’m an adult or pronouncing I’m gonna be Ballard pop are my kids names ba RR y so I don’t know how to pronounce with the E and I’m from Thunder. You’re from Scranton. And you have a local place here. But you’ve been here a long, long time. And this neighborhoods Chad the people would just be shocked at you haven’t been up here at what it was versus what it is at this point. Right. Right.
8
Lou Petrucci 02:02
Well, I’ve lived in Boston for 32 years so it’s changed a lot since what did you find when you got here? Oh, a lot of farmland was mostly no traffic. Well, I’m
Nestor Aparicio 02:10
looking at these townhouses out in the front of you and I don’t know was did the tornado not hit within 100 yards here might knock
Lou Petrucci 02:19
him right up that back street right there. When I think of this part above
Nestor Aparicio 02:23
8the Volkswagen dealership, and I did an event there with Owen Daniels when my wife was battling cancer for there goes my hero which is also a Bel Air you know Eric and the whole foundation is based in Abington, Maryland. But the tornado everything about him was seen on the news that night How long ago was that bench? It
Lou Petrucci 02:40
must be five or six years Yeah, like and I
Nestor Aparicio 02:43
I was thinking to myself when this property popped up because the Waffle House is clearly new because you had to go to the lander to get to Waffle House now you go to fallston and the dunk in it like but I thought maybe this was part of that destruction.
Lou Petrucci 02:56
No no, this was an empty lot at one time and then it just hit back here and on some of these auto repair places and body shops but when you sit back here you literally literally behind our bill that’s why
8Nestor Aparicio 03:07
I thought this may have been cleared in some way in that thing when I came up here because I’ve been hearing about you I ran into Zach somewhere. I literally had his card in my pocket when I came up. And I guess I met him at a tasting event or at a best of Baltimore event. And then I did the show it Pappas they’ve been a longtime sponsor mine they moved to Harford County did the show. And Natalie came by and she’s like, Hey, if you don’t show too long to get Bobby Angel, they this is their place and they love it and they have the best food they want an award. And you know I’ve been sponsored by Restaurant Association in Maryland the last few years and the grab gate tour in the summer and you guys want chef of the year and I’m like
Lou Petrucci 03:45
as that one chef of the year it is high time that I get here and figure this out. I’ve been here we’ve been here a year and nine months
Nestor Aparicio 03:51
Okay, so I’m a little late to the party but everybody I know that’s up here so it’s hard to get a table up here
Lou Petrucci 03:56
8and we were weekend’s we’re we’re pretty tight you know we make we make do but we’re pretty tight on Friday and Saturday a beautiful
Nestor Aparicio 04:03
bar I mean the first thing I said to my wife I walked in I said certainly cute space and I didn’t use that word very often. But I think it’s it reminds me of like I’m from the city right it reminds me of when the meat cheese or like a downtown local bricks been in hundreds and hundreds of years it
Lou Petrucci 04:23
really three sections to the restaurant we have a patio which is enclosed if we need it to be or open if we want it to be and it’s heated and we heated in winter. And we also have a dining room which is white tablecloth, you know you didn’t even you didn’t even go back and check. And then there’s the lounge in the bar. That’s not cute back though. That’s
Nestor Aparicio 04:43
elegant. That’s cute. That’s
8Lou Petrucci 04:44
right. And this is more you know, a bar bar atmosphere.
Nestor Aparicio 04:48
Well, I mean, this sign here, there’s no doubt what it is. But it is the lead right? I mean, you’re trying to do a local concept, right? It’s a
Lou Petrucci 04:55
Lloyd’s local, we buy local everything all the food comes from local from within 100 miles and We support local farms, we support local breweries, we support everything’s up here, we support everything local,
Nestor Aparicio 05:07
8conceptually and where you are in your life, and and where this plot of land How does something like this happen because it feels very scratch, it does not feel like a chain.
Lou Petrucci 05:19
Well, Zach had this concept in mind for a long time. And he was looking at putting it in different places, including taking it to Delaware, where he’s originally from Wilmington, okay, and, but he’s lived down here now for nine or 10 years and really wanted to do something here. And this property came up as an option, and just seemed perfect. And as the property developed, you know, first was just a lounge and a patio. And then the space next door opened up, and we and we opened that a little over a year, year and a half ago. And so the whole so really began, it’s like a sort of Bar and Grill, it began as like a smaller space than it is with the intention of having that eventually, and then we did get it, it was just not took a little longer to get the current Deus Ex
Nestor Aparicio 06:00
Back. He’s so busy, he’s in the kitchen cooking, we’re gonna try to get him out here and deliver a crab cake. But the place is getting a little bit active here, which I was a little afraid of it for five o’clock, because I know you’re a busy place on reputation and owning and being a part of something new. I think especially when you come to a place like Bel Air and I hear the smaller Bel Air vendors me, Tim and Pappas at this. Every middle come out and try wants to wait in line, there’s always a line for new places, my friends owned, open lips grill recently as well, sure, there’s always that but boy, that first experience, it’s so important, right? And the first time you come in, is going to sell the second, third fourth for getting every customer for life. In a neighborhood like this. Yeah,
Lou Petrucci 06:42
we believe that you have to deliver on every experience, you could have someone that you can have a regular guest that’s coming in here five or six times you still got to deliver on the seventh time. Sure. And that’s our goal is to deliver every time a consistent quality offering. So that’s what we do. Well, I
8Nestor Aparicio 06:57
mean, I came in, and I didn’t even look at the menu because I Googled, I looked at the menu online. My wife and I are doing a hot yoga class, you know, I’m sore as hell right now. So I’m going to take something light home. So I looked at the menu. Everybody’s like, you gotta get the cheese steak egg rolls. And I’m like, that’s a little heavy before yogurt for me. Yeah, I was looking at the salad. I’m like, I’m not coming. I wanted a salad. But I’m like, I’m not gonna get a salad. And then I pull up rural farms has been my chicken sponsor for a billion years. And I said, Am I really going to like pull across street from rural farms order a chicken sandwich? And yes, I did. I got the buttermilk chicken sandwich, because it’s award winning. And I said to you, I mean, I’m gonna get what I should get when I come in here. And I’m already getting the crab cake because it’s crab cake tour. Right? This thing was delicious. I still got the slaw going on in here. But that’s great. So I’m just gonna say this to you. I don’t know much about you this Zach other than their awards and when I did, but like it was exactly what I expect expected this really great homemade brined something from the Food Network, something that God forbid, he would come in here and say, this has some complexity about it. Right? It’s not just that it’s this. It’s something special.
Lou Petrucci 08:12
Right? And you loved it, right?
Nestor Aparicio 08:14
I loved it. What the problem was, I needed Asia to help me eat it because it was like this big. And it was a big brioche. And I love I took a picture of it. It’s actually branded that you brand your buns with the local logo on it. And there’s just something about it. I saw a guy and this was clearly a blue collar worker who was on his lunch hour, okay. And he sits down in the corner. I thought he was alone. I ordered my sandwich. And his girl came and sat down next to him number 130 from doing a show, and I thought to myself, they’re meeting for lunch here and I had already texted my wife and said to her I get a break. I didn’t know what had the food yet. I text my wife I’m like, you liked this place right? Like it’s a great lunch date place lunch, as I saw it in here. It’s it’s it’s become a neighborhood sort of an institution inside of two years, right? Yeah, I mean, everybody I know from fallston jumped on my page. Literally I can read it to you. Great place my favorite place. food’s great. You’re gonna love it. That’s what people told me before I walked in. So that’s kind of cool.
Lou Petrucci 09:15
8Yeah, that’s really cool. And we do have a good reputation but every day we work hard to keep and maintain that reputation.
Nestor Aparicio 09:21
I can read right from my line. Making this is sharp. And as you look over my shoulder for the HOLD ON YOUR Christina Calabrese I went to high school where she said it’s fabulous. Carla, Carla was the nurse for my wife at her bed. Both times she had leukemia. Carla special person order the cheesesteak egg roll, appetizer unbelievably delicious and melts in your mouth. Stephanie Markowitz also went to high school with this is one of my favorite ones. Cindy says awesome. Don’t forget Cindy 18 bootjack Gilda loves most of my people dawned on people you’re sweet get your Scranton background screen, but I grew up Dundalk. I think 62 75% of my high school graduating class eight plus 85 Dundalk. I’m 55. They live in Hartford Canada. So like, for me to say I’m in Fosston and to have half of my high school come out and say this is the place they come that that’s what you want to your nine. One thing, right I mean, it’s a menu together here that I really wanted to tuna, like I was looking at the tuna Toki that was gonna be me and the stroganoff is whatever.
Lou Petrucci 10:31
That’s one of our signature dishes. It’s very popular. It’s just top notch. People love
Nestor Aparicio 10:36
kitty cat right now I can’t eat all this crab cake because when I got tucked in the coalmine here was about the crab cake and a crab cake concept. What you guys are doing you do a crab cake sandwich. You’re
8Lou Petrucci 10:46
right. Oh, you do a crab cake sandwich as well as a crab cake platter. And it’s just you know, we have a recipe that Zach’s developed. That’s very mero
Nestor Aparicio 10:55
we’re at the local and we are with Luke Petrucci, we are waiting for you with this plot of land on the backside of the Waffle House and Duncan and finding this and having space can’t get bigger. Or now this is this is well there’ll be a second why the first thing I come in here I see something like this. I’m thinking, you know, downtown’s gonna want one of these, you know, Towson might
Lou Petrucci 11:16
never ever say never right? Never seen that you don’t build the fruit for thinking that way. Right now you build for just this location to put a menu together doesn’t mean there won’t be another and another after that. So we’re talking more at some point that it’s inevitable
Nestor Aparicio 11:28
8if I come in here, falls is going to be different. If I come in here,
Lou Petrucci 11:33
yes, the menu will be different menu changes three or four times five times a year. Seasonal, seasonal depends on what’s available, what what produce is available, what’s available from local farmers. And we develop the menu based around that.
Nestor Aparicio 11:46
I don’t think about it much but I think I like fall food the best. Like you know, the coffee, the comfort like it’s a harvest time and it’s like, like an elevated meatloaf on all like the fruit cold that
Lou Petrucci 11:56
we had. We had meatloaf on the menu for the last four months, but we took it off recently. It’s a heavy dish fruit. It’s summertime. It’s
8Nestor Aparicio 12:03
80 degrees. Yeah, exactly. That’s what I’m saying. I like those kinds of if I came here on a cold winter’s night to watch Oriole playoff baseball. Cold fall night I guess Vegas Sports Bar aspect of what everybody does. There’s definitely places that don’t put sports on. Certainly MMA and different things like that. This feels like a place that if the Orioles pick up some steam, this will be a place to come on a Wednesday night, sit, have a beer, sit and have a burger or chicken sandwich we stroganoff that the cheesesteak egg rolls, and I’m gonna get the next time I call for Shari. That’s next in line for me the cheesesteak egg rolls, I think. Yeah. Everybody’s raving about them. Yeah, we’ll take the best.
Lou Petrucci 12:41
Yeah, no, they’re they’re great. My favorite. I have a lot of favorite things. Even the beef carpaccio the burrata are delicious. Our pork bellies phenomenal. But I have a lot of different things that are that are that I like see.
Nestor Aparicio 12:55
And I got into this because you have oysters. I’m doing an oyster tour. For it’s my 25th anniversary August, I’m doing 25 oysters in 25 days in September. I did 30 crab cakes in 30 days Two years ago, 31 last year for my 31st overall anniversary. So this oyster thing is interesting to me because I almost never order oysters, right? Because I come into a place like this. And you’re the greatest. This is a smaller Cheesecake Factory menu. But there’s one of everything on here. There’s a lot of I can have beef, I can have Doc, I can have salmon, I can have cauliflower, I can have tacos, I can have bourbon, I can have any of this stuff. And all of this sits in front of like me thinking of getting oysters somehow, right? Like I’ve mentioned, egg rolls, I would get the pork belly for sure. I’ve already thought in my mind, I’m getting a seasonal berry salad. I looked at the Serbs. So I’m gonna have to get in here six or eight times before I think about really have to be in the mood for chargrilled oysters. And I think I’ve really cheated myself and I go to the same restaurants get the same thing. No offense to your chicken sandwich. It was phenomenal. But I feel like this is a place where I don’t want to have like one menu item. You know what I mean? I want to come in and try a different thing the next time right? Oysters are overlooked. They’re the thing that makes the crabs crabs in the bag. Right? And I love chargrilled oysters.
Lou Petrucci 14:17
8chargrilled oysters are one of the most popular items. And they’re, they’re incredible when people love them.
Nestor Aparicio 14:23
Alright, so look, I’m doing 25 oysters in 25 days. And I’m going to go one different place every every day. I’m going to do it a different way. Troll grilled oysters. Is this an updated main
Lou Petrucci 14:38
menu at the ledger watch menu.
Nestor Aparicio 14:40
I didn’t talk about soup willing to
8Lou Petrucci 14:41
so that’s what I wanted to talk about as the people willing to Okay, go ahead. Okay, so the beef Wellington is our signature dish. It’s people Wellington for two. And it’s an 18 ounce Creekstone farm Black Angus tenderloin, mushroom duxelle bordelaise served with whipped Yukon potato and steakhouse creamed corn. The cream corn we make from scratch every day with couple cases of corn that we every day we cook and cut off for the cream. I love corn. I’m not kidding. It’s not a candy corn. So it’s cream. It’s homemade cream corn. And that this is and it served it served tableside we bring it down on a cart and served tableside and it’s just fantastic. I
Nestor Aparicio 15:20
have never in my life or beef Wellington. It feels indulgent to me and it feels like an anniversary dish, right? It’s very,
Lou Petrucci 15:29
it’s very good. And people come here to celebrate and that’s what they’re gonna that’s what they get. And we also have it
Nestor Aparicio 15:34
8my wife’s birthday is next Wednesday. Our 20/20 anniversary is nine weeks from now.
Lou Petrucci 15:41
That’s fantastic. So
Nestor Aparicio 15:42
now we know where you’re going. I have to have a spill on. Be willing to get me out. I’m sure we also
Lou Petrucci 15:46
have a three pound Tomahawk that we serve. Yeah, because me because you figured in your head. And do we serve we serve that tableside as well. I
8Nestor Aparicio 15:56
was ordering off the lunch menu you got chicken fried deviled eggs. So yeah, I would I wouldn’t order that. I mean there’s again so many things in my palette ahead of that, you know, it’s like I love carpaccio but I never order it because I’m too busy working the time muscles are working the egg rolls are and I don’t know for being skinny. I eat a lot. I really do. You know people say I guess everything’s in moderation but I mean your dinner menu as if you have shipped 48 hours short ribs, pork chops, scallops, shrimp and grits one of my favorite things in the world. I always think of that as a breakfast thing. Shrimp regret like a brunch, I
Lou Petrucci 16:29
think I think it has a wide range of you could have at a brunch. You could have it for dinner and
Nestor Aparicio 16:33
elite groups anytime while they’re still there. They’re good that you’re from originally from Scranton, Pennsylvania, right? Yes,
Lou Petrucci 16:37
8I am. moved down here 35 years ago to people other than
Nestor Aparicio 16:41
the television show. He didn’t know about straight out this awesome. It’s great. My dad’s from Scranton. One of my favorite people in life, a guy named Tom ie bright was a we own the Baltimore Skipjacks. He was from Scranton. So I think people like that I’ve met in life. Joe Biden’s restraint, right? Is experience. He really I believe he is no, I’m just kidding. Yes. Yes. So like, what is it about scrim that people should know?
Lou Petrucci 17:08
I mean, first of all, the office is a fictional show, so that’s not part of what they’re looking for. So they do have things and attractions or creating and things they do they’re
Nestor Aparicio 17:19
trying to capitalize the whole the whole mountain then yeah, I did montage mountain. I mean, there’s there’s things they talk about your community there.
8Lou Petrucci 17:26
Yeah, absolutely. I grew up a mile from montage mountain. And so um, Scranton is just it was it was a very growing up, it was a very, it was a hometown, it was very tight. People everyone knew each other. And it was very vibrant. You know, things things changed in cities all over the country. Rarely, but Scranton is changed a lot. But it’s a it’s a nice place to be from I haven’t been to Scranton
Nestor Aparicio 17:49
since rush opened the tour about 20 years ago montage mountain. They do that peach festival up there every year they do they do a peach festival montage. I wasn’t aware of the Black Crowes played that a couple times. I mean, the thing would get me to Scranton would be like a concert right I mean, for me the thing that would get me well the races were always bring people out
Lou Petrucci 18:09
right? Yeah, I go for the pizza. I was gonna say was pizza right? Yeah, the old old porridge pizzas phenomenal. It’s old Forge. It’s just a little little burrow. And it’s just really good. Really good pizzas. A little different square.
Nestor Aparicio 18:23
8Listen, your food’s good enough up here to local if you’re giving me a pizza recommendation Scranton I’m gonna take this good guy named Petrucci gives me pizza recommendation. I take Lupo churches here we’re at the low Gordon come back. I want to eat the the crab cake angel is going to be here as well. We’re gonna is it bah bah, bah or how do you say prepare? But see, I don’t know how to say and I’m gonna learn bar just bar. Like, like this is a bar right? Okay. You sure this Dundalk we’re saying I’m not sure if it has it or another or knee in it like Bari? Is the orange e salad bar. All right. I’m gonna go above the bar off the top rope. We’re coming back from the local it’s the Maryland crab cake tour. My thanks to Lou for stopping by Thank you hanging out talking straight and talking cheese steak egg rolls, as well as the Maryland crab cake tour moving on Maryland lottery. I got these to give away their 50th anniversary. Did anybody win? I didn’t hear anybody scream I want I want I won. I hope somebody went a smell is that the charcoal? trovo the oyster somebody?
Lou Petrucci 19:21
A smell smoked old fashioned. Smoked old fashioned.
Nestor Aparicio 19:24
I’ve never had one of those. I went into that two weeks ago. I’m not sure I’d like it. It’s very good. I get crabcakes Look at this. Hold on when when the show continues. I’m going to be eating this so brought to you by window nation. 866 90 nation. We’re at the local on Nesta. We are WNS da 1570 Tacit Baltimore. Stay with us back for more in fallston right after this
