The firmness of it, the juiciness of it, that is the way fish is respected, hey everyone hope, you're having an amazing day. It's mark wiens, i'm in durham, north carolina and today we're gon na go eat at salt box, seafood joint and we're going to meet up with chef ricky. He has an amazing personality. He has a great story.

This is the steak fish of north carolina. He serves some of the best seafood in durham. It's going to be exciting, it's going to be fresh and i'm going to share all of the seafood with you now. Oh, i love love this place already.

It's. It looks so laid back so friendly. This is where you come to eat the best quality, the most delicious seafood when you're in durham. Let me introduce you to chef, ricky greetings.

Everyone on the planet. Oh my goodness good to see you everybody. I am so flattered to be on this social platform with the king of international eats mark wmw. Thank you so much for having me thank you.

Oh man, um and chef ricky's gon na well we're gon na get ready to start uh, preparing and cooking, but really quickly. Chef wants to explain a little bit about the the building and the decorations in here. Yes, you're right, so so, basically um. I wanted to share with everybody that um this restaurant has been around always been a restaurant since 1969, when i was born.

Okay and the original concept was called the shrimp boat and so um. I bought it five years ago and uh at my original location. I used to drive past here a lot of times and i said wow that would be an appropriate transition to my original location, and so it came to pass so i came in here and did some interesting work but uh the bottom line. Is it had roots it had a spirit already it had bones that i could work with.

So as we walk around the dining room, i wanted to kind of showcase a couple of things uh. As you look at the inside here of the building, you get this apex frame, it's a very art, deco, sort of structure, so people don't build like this anymore, so also, i was blessed to be able to acquire this building this little phone to order. Pickup, only sign has been outside since 1969.. This anchor here is a a heritage item that down in um down east north carolina, which is beyond the north river.

For those who know that this is from a community um called cedar island. This right here is the local species in our region, and i like to sort of indirectly um, share and coach, my consumers on what they're eating locally wow and a lot of these these fish. Here on this poster, we do serve okay when they're in season. We support north carolina fisher, folk men and women, north carolina, oyster folk men and women, so we'll be very clear about that.

A lot of the seafood or all the seafood that you serve is local, absolutely is supporting local, absolute fishers. That's right! It's supporting the local economy uh down at the coast, okay, and it's really important and that's how this restaurant was built upon fantastic. That's the origin, significant to me: that's my home town, oh okay, my hometown of newburgh, i've, known chef ricky. Now, for about five minutes, and already i'm just loving his positivity, his energy, his passion, his dedication, i love how genuine he is and then just how everything has a meaning and a purpose and a story behind it.

King mackerel, all right: king mackerel: this is the king mackerel. Just came in yesterday, beautiful from the coast. All right, everybody knows the characteristics here: okay, all right, nice, clear eyes: okay, smells of the sea right through the mass; it smells of the sea; yeah; okay, nice and firm, beautiful fish all right. So this is a lame snapper.

Oh okay, firm flesh! Okay! This is the state fish of north carolina drum. It's called a red drum red drum all right. You can go and look on the on the north carolina fishing poster and you can see this is the this. Is the uh north carolina state fish we're gon na butcher fish now cool? This is our menu today.

Okay, so i got ta get it cut all right. We open up at 11., so i always wait till almost the last hour to cut the fish. That's okay! I just enjoy that okay, you know, i love the work that you know. Sometimes i spend a lot of time running the business, but i just feel very much in love with the work.

You know me and mark share a lot. You know i spent a lot of time traveling as well, and the one thing i truly miss is just the sheer art of good eating and the craftsmanship of each cook from from whence any place. I've ever seen, um well, my favorite place to eat on the planet is singapore. I want to say: oh there you go shout out to singapore.

This is how we need to have it yeah, good people, all right right as clean as possible. Close to the bone. You know this part right here. You know that's right, yeah! This is the collar okay or the throat you're gon na go right and you're gon na hear a little sound of your tip of your knife hitting those bones yeah when you got that and you're doing something good.

Okay in the same process trim up here in the fillet and fold that line this pride in the idea of cleaning fish little details extremely organized love that you're so passionate about the way you slice the fish and the pride of slicing the fish because it starts. That's what it starts with. You know your you know your product and you know how to respect it right. That's the first thing.

Any great chef like you, yes, sir, would would take into consideration. So that's yes, sir. Thank you very much. Absolutely awesome! Oh yeah! Okay! That's the yeah, the puppy's wrong, that's pretty cool, because it's the state fish! That's right! This is this is important.

That's like this is cool to see uh something different. Then, yes, there'll be definitely the steak fish right here. Uh-Huh got this spot right there. Ah, okay! Okay, i can describe this fish even further, very like grouper life, no problem.

This concept is built around that idea. Okay, it's tough, sometimes because sometimes a lot of fish ain't available, but i'm really interested in this idea. How good can i make a simple dish? Taste, what are the steps that i need to think about every time i do it to make a simple dish: taste delicious. This is my late summer, stew, artichokes fish, corn, yeah all right and pickled green beans that i pickled yeah, okay, real sturdy comforting.

It's all about seasonal, north carolina seafood or seasonal seafood; okay, i'm not a place where we're doing a whole bunch of different dishes. The showcase is the seafood when you come to the restaurant and read the chalkboard you're seeing what's in season. Okay, our sides are simple. Every now and again i will add something to it, but our size is simple: we do fried potatoes if potato chips and home fries had a baby.

This is what they are. Okay, we do a slaw that is non-mayonnaise-based, i'm not anti-mayonnaise. I just feel like i'd, rather have mine, light and bright to cut through the richness. Also, i just do a side vegetable every day, whether it be cauliflower or broccoli or brussels sprout right now, cauliflower, because i enjoy it cauliflower because i think everybody should enjoy it.

Cauliflower because it doesn't get enough credit, it's a humble ingredient. It never gives me credit. That's all 10 views a little bit so that we don't have to wait so long to do it all right. Those are the hush.

Hunting, hush honeys! That's right! You know what i mean: it's a lot of shrimp being cut there every day, wow grab some fresh, yes, fresh shrimp, that's right! Fresh shrimp has been cut every day. Everything mark everything, that's easy. Everything is seasoned man we season, everything which is everything. Seasoning is important period in the store you know and we season aggressively, not overland, but we season it so that stuff tastes good, serious yup.

That's all i'm about to eat, because this is my um, my signature, seafood breader, ah, and it's technically gluten free, okay, okay, but it's already seasoned everything is yep down here, ready to go all right. You also do what we call hush honey. It's the hybrid of your hush, puppy, okay, okay, and what we do is we took the idea of a hush puppy and a zeppelin from an italian standpoint and brought them together, okay and they get seasoned with a special seasoning and then glazed with honey money, shot Money shot, money, shot, honey money, that's right! It's going to be so good, see how those shrimp yeah they're, not they're, not all you know, curled up, you know they curled up nicely, though it's a nice curl yep, i'm saying they know exactly sort of okay. There.

You go. Thank you, your chef, that's that's the essence of salt. Okay, get some soup! Oh yeah! Oh thank you chef! Oh man. I just cannot wait to eat this meal, so much passion so much dedication, high quality, fresh local, north carolina seafood and then chef, ricky, he's so incredibly, genuine, so real, so down to earth and so talented at what he does gourmet next level: food in an environment With so much meaning, you can just tell that chef ricky.

This is his zone. In fact, i'm not even going to use a fork. I want to just pick up this fish. You can feel it the firmness of it, the juiciness of it cooked perfectly seasoned.

All around oh man, what a beautiful cooking process - oh wow, that is spectacular, it's smoky it's so juicy and moist, not overcooked, oh man, the freshness of it, the firmness of it. That's like everything i had imagined. While he was cooking it and more - and i mean we saw him slice this fish fresh wow - that's that is pure you're going to lick your fingers. Okay, let's try those those potatoes, they're thin slices of potatoes.

He said it's kind of like a cross between french fries and potato chips, seasoned there's, some onions, some caramelized, onions and green peppers in here as well. You can feel that they're kind of crispy on the edges and then kind of just soft and fried on the inside. Oh that seasoning a little bit peppery a little bit of just like a dust of curry powder. I think on there you've got that flavor.

The aroma of those caramelized onions in there - oh it's great, it - is the perfect accompaniment, it's different from eating potato chips or different from eating fries, which are so common he's up into the game. Okay, moving on to the soup, let's eat this, while it's still nice and hot saw this in the kitchen chef ricky made the soup of fish. I think he boiled down a lot of the bones as well. There's corn in here there's his homemade pickled green beans.

He said so aromatic you can see the richness of that fish broth. Oh wow! Oh that's delicious! You taste the richness of that fish, slight herbal flavor wow. That is a harmony of balance. That's extraordinary! That is insanely good.

Let's try these hot fresh, fried shrimp. You can see the way they cut them, deveined them and then just sort of stripped them a little bit so that they curl up in a nice way to eat the freshness, the texture, the sweetness of the shrimp they're deep, fried, but they've done it in a Way here where it's not overpowering, the deep frying doesn't cover up the flavor of the shrimp, and i like how it's just a very light. Batter it's a dust of batter. It's not a thick coating.

It like brings out the freshness and the lightness of the shrimp. There's a few different sauces i'll try this more tomato looking sauce than the other, like a cocktail sauce and moving on to one of the sides cauliflower, i love how it's cooked and then he dusts it in curry powder. The curry powder is not too strong. It's just a nice dusting and it just really complements the cauliflower.

I love what chef ricky also said in that cauliflower is such an underrated vegetable that more people should be eating totally agree with him. Okay, can i try that coleslaw? You can see. I love how light it is how refreshing it is. It's not mayonnaise-based.

You see the herbs in there. Maybe some uh parsley, possibly some dough, i'm not totally sure it's light. It's refreshing, it's citrusy, it has a balance of sweetness and the cabbage is so crisp. Okay and we got one more thing: chef, ricky's version of hush puppies, which are called hush, honeys, dusted in curry powder, deep, fried and then sprinkled in honey.

Oh that balance of sweet and savory plus the dusting of curry powder. Oh, it's delicious, not not too sweet. That's a fantastic idea: chef ricky goes along so well and gives you that kind of sweetness to balance the saltiness see the inside of it. So it's very yeah, crumbly corn fried crispy, so good, the gourmet quality freshness.

Yet in such a humble just welcoming atmosphere, i love this place. Salt box got ta move back over to that fish. For me, it's hard to beat fresh fish like this cooked perfect, especially when it's cooked perfectly like this as well. They have other fish on their menu and fish is seasonal, and so you might find other fish when you come here, but guaranteed it's going to be cooked.

Well, it's going to be cooked to perfection and it's going to be fresh, i'm going to try. This sauce looks like a little bit of a milky kind of tartar sauce with some dill in it. Now it's like a light tartar sauce, not clumpy or gooey, but more runny great flavor, eat more cauliflower, so good everything, everything so good. Okay, so we're sitting here finishing this amazing food and chef ricky was like.

Oh, you didn't try the tamale yet, which we saw in the kitchen got ta, try the fish tamales fresh out of the steamer, oh yeah, that is steaming hot, oh wow! I love tamales too fish tamales, oh yeah, immediately. You can smell it. Oh man, that is steaming. Oh, it almost has a like a smokey fish in the center with that masa, the hot freshness freshness of it.

Oh, it's so good wow. That is extraordinary. Oh, thank you very much. You read about me.

Thank you, chef ricky, oh, the tamales are great, so good. Go check out. Ricky's cookbook as well. Maybe a squeeze of lemon.

Oh yeah, salt box, seafood, joint, durham, north carolina they've also got this amazing front yard area. Seating, which would be great, especially probably in the evening that was an amazing meal to me. What stood out the most is the honesty and the genuineness of chef ricky and his entire restaurant here saltbox seafood joint. You don't get any more down to earth and honest than here.

That was a lot of fun that was delicious, and thank you for watching this. Video, please remember, to give it a thumbs up if you enjoyed it, leave a comment below i'd love to hear from you and if you're not already subscribed, click subscribe now and click the little bell icon and that way you'll immediately get notified of the next video That i publish thanks again for watching goodbye from durham north carolina, and i will see you on the next video.