‘I’ve Never Become a Regular Somewhere so Fast.’
With iced Jonah crab claws, foil-wrapped ears of Jersey corn, thickets of golden french fries, and tureens of steamed clams, Hooked Up Seafood tests South Jersey loyalties
I Fucking Love This Restaurant features writers’ favorite places that have been feeding a community for years: They aren’t the new spots.
On a four-lane causeway linking Wildwood and mainland New Jersey, across from the salt-corroded carcass of a definitely haunted mini-golf course, the Bright family catches, butchers, and cooks outstanding seafood. Their restaurant, Hooked Up Seafood, consists of a kitchen trailer manned by matriarch Michelle; a row of picnic tables staffed by whichever of her kids are home from college; and a couple of docks, stretching like fingers into the brackish marshes of Richardson Channel, where her husband Bill’s boats, Defiance and Retriever, moor. Timed to summer migration of Philadelphians to the South Jersey Shore, Hooked Up opens in May and closes in September. During these brief, sweet months, I eat here as often as possible. I fucking love this restaurant.
Before I get into why, there’s something you have to understand: For many Philadelphia families, allegiance to your Shore town is absolutely…
