Drifter’s Raw Bar and Grill | |
| Phone: | (410) 727-1355 |
| Address: | 1024 S. Charles St. Baltimore, MD |
More on Drifter’s Raw Bar and Grill. | |
Omnivore’s recent fried-oyster orgy got us all whet for mollusk-in-the-raw, so we biked down on Sunday to Federal Hill for a splurge at the Cross Street Market raw bar—forgetting it was a Ravens home game day. Intimidated by the purple oyster cult three-deep at the market, we settled instead for Drifter’s Raw Bar and Grill down the street, recently reopened in the former Bandaloops space. Here was a sedate crowd of older football fans, gathered round the requisite plasma screen, but also bathed in natural light from the high skylights above the interior bar. Half a dozen Connecticut salty blue point oysters ($5.95) were mild and medium-sized, and slippery good with a dash of extra-tangy cocktail sauce. The Jamaican jerk chicken appetizer ($6.95), a holdover from Bandaloops, is an entrée’s worth of spice-encrusted chicken breast that’s juicier than any white meat has the right to be. Our nostrils burned with delight whenever we dunked the bird chunks into a bowl of hot honey-rum mustard. Less thrilling was the pedestrian turkey club sandwich ($6.95), which arrived without the requested mustard, and on half-toasted bread. Still, the bartender server was brisk and friendly, and the couple bellied up beside us couldn’t stop raving about their steamed shrimp ($8.95), which appeared plump—and disappeared quickly. Fuck the Jets.