From fish camps to seafood shacks, here's a look at coastal NC's evolving dining scene

Turn onto River Road from Beach Drive in Brunswick County and you’re visiting a bit of North Carolina’s coastal heritage. You might see families waiting outside for a table at Beck’s Restaurant, as they’ve done since it opened in 1940, or notice a line of people waiting for fried fish at the window of Calabash Seafood Hut.

Continue along the half-mile road until it meets the Calabash River and you’ll pass more restaurants until you get to the water and fishing boats that helped start it all. The cluster of eateries established this community as the Seafood Capital of the World decades ago.

And while Calabash gets a lot of culinary attention, it’s also a part of the larger historical food scene that tied residents to the sustenance found in local waters -- a landscape of seafood markets, fish camps, and shrimp shacks that have been the hallmark of many vacations and relaxed family meals.

If you ask some curmudgeonly old-timers, it's a style of dining that is disappearing. Anecdotally, it does seem there are fewer of these classic restaurants that famously serve this style of seafood.

“It’s lightly battered, deep fried and served in big portions,” said Raymond Coleman, one of three generations currently working at the Calabash Seafood Hut. “There used to be 30 restaurants here. All seafood and all of the menus were pretty much the same. Now, there are four or five of us left. That’s been a big change.”

Coleman is referring to a Calabash heyday, when the town of 180 residents was the subject of write-ups in big-time newspapers like the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times in the1980s, which marveled over the quaint fishing village. Many of those restaurants have since closed.

“One is now a medical center, one is a smoke shop, I think. And another is now a consignment shop,” said Kurt Hardee, who owns Ella's of Calabash and Beck’s Restaurant with his sister.

Elsewhere in Brunswick County, a former Calabash-style seafood spot is now a Dollar General. The former Fish House is now the Lonerider brewery and Jones’ Seafood House changed hands and re-opened as the fine dining Salt64 in Oak Island. There was once a Jones' Seafood in Ogden, too. And Wilmington residents still reminisce about Faircloth's in Wrightsville Beach and The Fergus Ark boat/restaurant moored on the Cape Fear River.

Now, even though the population of Calabash has grown to more than 2,000 people, there are only 28 restaurants, according to county inspection records. The number is close to the same, but the diversity now includes sushi, brunch, Peruvian, Mediterranean and a tearoom.

More: Try these 7 restaurants if you want Calabash-style seafood in the Wilmington area

A riverside beginning

The first Calabash restaurants weren’t really restaurants, Coleman said.

“Our family, my great grandmother, opened Coleman’s Original Restaurant in 1938,” he said. “It was really more of a fish house on the water, and they would serve what came in that day under a big canopy.”

If it sounds like the fish camps you could find around North Carolina, and elsewhere in the South, it’s true.

“That’s exactly how it started,” Coleman said.

Traditionalists may say that fish camps tend to serve more catfish, trout and other inland fish. But there’s also a lot of crossover on menus with local oysters, deviled crabs and ubiquitous shrimp.

Locals may be most familiar with fish camps through Holland's Shelter Creek Fish Camp in Pender County. Steve Holland started to grow the restaurant beginning in 1981 and continued serving local fish and fried frog legs until that location on N.C. 53 was flooded and destroyed in 2018 during Hurricane Florence. (He’s since opened a new restaurant and sports bar, with many elements of the former menu, in Holly Ridge with partners Mike and Annette Barnes.)

Wilmington chef Keith Rhodes remembers seafood markets being gathering places where everyone would buy their local fish. Some of them expanded to offering cooked seafood. Ronnie's Crab Shack at Zora’s in downtown Wilmington and Pelican’s Seafood in Oak Island are a couple of examples.

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Growing up, Rhodes said his grandmother took him to a Wrightsville Beach market to bring home whole fish wrapped in newspaper. They also went to a restaurant in the Seabreeze community for clam fritters. He remembers going to Ocean City Beach, another local destination for Black vacationers, with his grandfather and having a shrimp sandwich on the pier.

“It’s a vivid memory,” he said. “And we went to Calabash, too. Ella’s, especially, when the spots were running.”

Hardee remembers Ella’s, too. That’s where he rode his bike in the parking lot, ate his dinner and did his homework.

“I remember them going out fishing every day,” he said. “And I remember my mom and others sitting under the live oak, cleaning the fish and cutting up cabbage for slaw before we opened.”

Yes, there’s more to the tradition than just fish. There are also hush puppies and coleslaw and ramekins of cocktail and tartar sauces. Each aspect is seemingly simple but can easily be the subject of passionate conversations, and their own individual essays.

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The changing seafood shack

At the start, most Calabash seafood was fried in lard. Cost and health-conscious diners prompted a switch to lighter vegetable oil or peanut oil for most (but not all) of these restaurants.

They’ve also grown their menus to include grilled and blackened options and other regional seafood specialties like shrimp and grits and bisques and chowders. They also tend to have more non-seafood dishes. The hamburger steak is a popular choice at Beck’s, and the pork barbecue is a go-to at Captain Nance’s Seafood restaurant, which opened in 1975. Newer additions to River Road, like The Boundary House and Oyster Rock, serve Calabash-style seafood but it isn't the focus. The menus include more diversity, from salmon to charcuterie.

Most chefs and owners say the tradition of serving what comes in on local boats isn’t realistic now. Especially when it comes to the popular shrimp and flounder. Almost 90% of the shrimp consumed in the U.S. is imported, according to the N.C. Sea Grant. And flounder has been the subject of a sometimes intense and controversial conservation effort in North Carolina for years.

But it’s not all bad news. North Carolina is also experiencing something of a oyster renaissance, Rhodes said. He's an advocate for transparency from restaurants about where they get seafood, and savviness from customers who need to know what questions to ask. He compares it to another form of seafood, sushi. The kind available in grocery stores has it fans, and its place.

“But you know that is imported seafood,” he said. “Compare that to walking in and seeing Chef Lee (Grossman, of Wilmington’s The Bento Box) and he has a beautiful piece of tuna that he has right there, for you to see.”

More: 4 things you might not know about this classic Wilmington seafood restaurant

The future of the tradition

In some ways, seafood restaurants are thriving. Seabird's hyperlocal focus has received accolades from the James Beard Foundation. Salt 64 has a special section of their menu devoted to the Jones' legacy and local chefs like Carson Jewell at manna are also elevating local fare.

But restaurants face challenges that come in more forms than hurricanes, uncertain supply and healthy eaters. It can also be a difficult industry. For the restaurants to continue, the family has to want it to.

“You have to love it,” Hardee said.

Both he and Coleman, though, say their families want to keep the Calabash tradition alive for many years to come.

“The next generation has to step in,” Rhodes said. “Otherwise, it might just be a novelty.”

There may still be the occasional fundraising fish fry and annual events like Pender Countys' N.C. Spot Festival. But it needs more to sustain. He’s encouraged by chefs like James Beard award winner Ricky Moore, who owns Salt Box Seafood Joint in Durham, offering fried seafood through his own unique lens.

Rhodes wants to grow his Tacklebox Kitchen concept, which is now a food truck and on the campus of the University of North Carolina Wilmington. In the coming months, he plans to open one in the new food hub in the Cargo District.

“We are trying to keep that regional seafood identity present,” he said. “We want to have a menu with buttery shrimp, catfish, sea trout, spot, mullet. We want to celebrate the terroir of this area. And keep it at a price that’s accessible.”

That can be a tricky point for this concept. Traditionally, these seafood shacks have been a way to feed and entertain the entire family in a relatively inexpensive way. With increasing food costs, especially for quality ingredients, that can be difficult to maintain.

“But we want to keep the dream alive,” Rhodes said.

Last year, a fire destroyed Ella’s restaurant. For months, Hardee and his family have been waiting for the chance to rebuild. That happened in June. Workers started clearing away the debris and they've started planning for construction.

Hardee said they’d like to keep the feel and size the same. They’re working with the same people who helped rebuild Beck’s more than a decade ago. It’s likely still months away, but he’s already thinking about next year, and the crush that never really goes away these days, but does intensify come spring.

“Everybody should come try it, if they haven't already,” he said. “Have a hushpuppy with honey butter. Have some fried fish and shrimp.”

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Allison Ballard is the food and dining reporter at the StarNews. You can reach her at aballard@gannett.com

This article originally appeared on Wilmington StarNews: From fish camps to seafood shacks, here's a look at coastal NC's evolving dining scene