Radio personality Steve Rouse may have some explaining to do. I’m making crab meltaways tonight for a holiday party, and I thought of a reader’s comments about Steve’s broiled crab puff recipe that we featured in our July issue.

At the time, Dale Doeller of Towson wrote, “While I’m not exactly questioning Steve’s ‘invention,’ I have a similar recipe that I got from a friend some 40 years ago.”

The irony is that I have the same recipe that Dale has. Evidently, a lot of us do. If you google “crab meltaways,” you get 120,000 responses.

What I like about this recipe is that it can be made ahead of time and then frozen. When you’re ready to serve the appetizer, you pop the crab triangles onto a cookie sheet and broil them for a few minutes until they’re bubbly. They’re always a hit.

But you decide. Here’s Dale’s recipe along with Steve Rouse’s. There’s not much difference. Enjoy both!

Broiled Crab Meltaways

Cook’s notes: I usually use butter instead of margarine and always double the recipe. I freeze them on cookie sheets, covered with foil, and then put them in zip bags. That way you can take out as many out as you like and broil them. These really are great!

1 package (six) English muffins
½ pound crabmeat
1 stick margarine
1 (6 ounce) jar Old English sharp cheddar cheese
2 tablespoons mayonnaise
½ teaspoon seasoned salt
½ teaspoon garlic salt
 
Slice English muffins in half, then cut each half into fourths, and arrange on two cookie sheets. Mix remaining ingredients well on medium speed of mixer. Spread the mixture on the English muffin quarters. Freeze them at least 30 minutes even if you plan to use them that night. They may be kept frozen for weeks. Broil until they puff up and are bubbly and slightly golden. They take just a few minutes. Serve hot.

—From Dale Doeller

Broiled Crab Puffs

Cook’s notes: “These are the most delicious things on the face of the earth," says Steve Rouse, who can also be found on his six-acre farm in Fallston when he’s not on the radio. “You have a bite-sized or two-bite-sized piece of heaven.”

1 pound jumbo lump crabmeat
1 (five-ounce) jar Kraft Old English sharp cheddar
4 tablespoons Hellmann's mayonnaise
1/8 teaspoon ground red pepper
4 tablespoons melted butter
2 teaspoons French's regular mustard
1/2 teaspoon garlic salt
10 saltine crackers, crushed
6 English muffins

Set broiler to high. Pick over the crabmeat to remove shells. Heat the jar of cheese in the microwave until softened. Combine all ingredients except the crab and muffins, and mix well. Gently stir in the crabmeat, and spread the mix over each muffin half.

Cut each half into quarters and then place on a cookie sheet. Place the cookie sheet about six inches from the broiler, five to 10 minutes, until the tops are golden and the mixture is bubbly. Watch to make sure they don't burn (if they get too brown, they are too close to the broiler).

—From Steve Rouse

Check out other local celebrity crab-dip recipes.

Photo courtesy of tastebook.com

A Food Network truck and Chris Ford, executive pastry chef at Wit & Wisdom in the new Four Seasons, will be at the Whole Foods Market in Harbor East from 4-8 p.m. today, collecting customer donations to benefit the Maryland Food Bank.

The chef, pictured, will also be shopping for nutritious pantry items and fresh foods during the event. These products are needed to help fill a shortage among Food Bank donations.

The initiative is part of a joint project involving the Food Network, Share Our Strength, and Whole Foods for a food drive in Baltimore to help alleviate childhood hunger. Food Network and Whole Foods are partners in Share Our Strength’s No Kid Hungry campaign.

The Food Network is also donating thousands of items to the Maryland Food Bank, including cans of vegetables, tuna, and soup. But there’s always a need for more.

Photo courtesy of starchefs.com

You get one more chance this year to shop and nosh at the Baltimore Farmers’ Market under the JFX. The popular outdoor shopping venue ends its season on Sunday.

The market—with local produce, other foods, concessions, and crafts—opens at 7 a.m. and closes around noon. Some stands shut down earlier if they sell out of items.

Like a harbinger of spring, it will reopen in early April 2012.

Photo by Mark Dennis, courtesy of the Baltimore Office of Promotions and The Arts

Werner’s, a longtime downtown restaurant that closed in April, will be reopening in March under new ownership, according to the Baltimore Business Journal. The popular lunchroom on East Redwood Street will be operated by John Smoudianis, manager of Never on Sunday in Mt. Vernon.

Smoudianis will continue to offer some of the restaurant’s favorite comfort food dishes like hot plates of turkey and roast beef, but he will also have paninis, salads, and grilled salmon on the menu, the BBJ reported today.

This is great news, especially coming on the heels of the reopening last week of the dining space at the Woman’s Industrial Exchange. I was there today for one of its retro lunches: chicken salad, tomato aspic, and a deviled egg ($9).

Irene Smith, pictured, who runs the restaurant now called Woman’s Industrial Kitchen, was milling around in her colorful smock apron, greeting customers and waiting on tables. The place was packed.

The room is dedicated to famous and unknown Maryland women who made a difference. I sat at a table honoring Emily Post, who was born in Baltimore. It was fun looking at the laminated photos and passages on the tabletop. The rest of the décor is also interesting and meaningful.

Irene told me that 19 family members of one of the former waitresses, Marguerite Schertle, will be dining at the restaurant on Saturday. I’m sure they’ll enjoy the walk down memory lane.

After all, the chicken salad is named after Marguerite. 

Photo by me

Snakehead will be on the menu at the next Fresh Thoughts Dining Series dinner, along with crab, blue catfish, and more. Chad Wells, the executive chef at Alewife Baltimore and an avid angler, will be giving a cooking demo at the four-course dinner on Jan. 24 at the National Aquarium.

The menu also includes Maryland blue crab in the first course, snakehead in the Frankenfish tacos, a deconstructed paella with smoked Chesapeake gold oyster and squid-ink rice cake, seared blue catfish in chipotle aioli, and a Crispin cider doughnut.

Guests will also enjoy a cocktail reception, dinner paired with regional wine, a stroll through the Aquarium, and receive recipes and information about where to purchase sustainable seafood locally. 

Tickets for the 6:30-9 p.m. event are $79 for Aquarium members, $89 for non-members. For information, visit the Fresh Thoughts website.

Photo of chef Chad Wells, left, with a snakehead at Alewife. The other man is unidentified.

Riptide by the Bay in Fells Point has hired a new chef, updated the menu, and will be introducing fine dining in a refurbished second-floor dining room in the spring.

"It was always a long-term goal," said general manager Meredith Rippel, whose husband Roger is a co-owner of the restaurant. "It took some time. The first step was getting our foot in the door."

When the Rippels opened Riptide four years ago, they were the "new kid on the block," Meredith said. "It wasn't easy."

But their bar food, combining West Coast and Baltimore flavors, and steamed crabs eventually drew a crowd to the outdoor breezeway and cozy first-floor dining room and bar.

They still want to attract those customers, Meredith said, but are hoping to bring in new diners with upscale cuisine in the upstairs room—which has great views of the water—when it's complete. There also will be an upper-level outdoor deck.

In the meantime, new chef Cyrus Keefer has been making changes to the current menu, adding entrees for the first time and creating "small bites." The new offerings should be available next week.

The main dishes include pan-seared scallops with cauliflower puree, seafood cioppino, braised beef short rib, and pan-roasted cod. The appetizers sound amazing, too: cheese-steak spring rolls, wild mushroom & Gruyére pot stickers, and chicken nuggets with bacon, white-cheddar dipping sauce, waffles, and maple butter ($11). Yum.

Cyrus—who trained at Philadelphia's Walnut Hill College Restaurant School—is no stranger to Baltimore kitchens. He was previously at Maisy's and, this summer, won the People's Choice award at the annual Crab Bash at B&O American Brasserie for his "Blue Crab and White Corn Raviolini."

He also headed the kitchen at the short-lived Brasserie 10 South on South Calvert Street, which received 3 ½ stars from The Sun's previous reviewer Elizabeth Large in 2009.

But Cyrus, pictured right with sous chef Adam Scanlon, is happy to be at Riptide with the Rippels. "I have a vision. They have a vision," he said. "We're going to go somewhere special."

Photo by me 

And their next challenge is to open a bakery in Cockeysville. Now that Flavor Cupcakery won last night's episode of Food Network's Cupcake Wars, owner Shelley Stannard is eyeing a second location in Baltimore County in 2012, according to a press release.

The bakery's lead pastry chef is Jason Hisley, pictured. As soon as I found out Jason's last name, I realized that I knew him. I had talked to him in August 2010 when he was the pastry chef at Roland Park Bagel Co.

At the time, Jason told me he was a graduate of Johnson & Wales in Rhode Island, where he graduated with a bachelor's degree in baking and pastry. He had worked at Panera Bread and a catering company in Bethesda before landing at the bagel shop and now Flavor Cupcakery.

For the TV competition, Jason had to bake cupcakes pegged to "The Nutcracker" ballet.

The bakery's winning episode will air again at 8 p.m. Tuesday if you missed it. A viewing party was held last night at the Dark Horse Saloon in Bel Air. Check out photos from the party on Flavor Cupcakery's Facebook page.

Photo by me, taken in 2010