Salt Air
Located on Rehoboth’s restaurant royalty row, Salt Air is the Big Fish Restaurant Group’s prized concept, a muted and expansive seafood and farm focused coastal bistro. The menu changes almost daily, but certain staples are omnipresent, for instance, its famous shrimp fry, seafood stew, and blackened tuna, all long-time crowd favorites and worthy of acclaim. Some are intrigued by the delightful crab deviled eggs and its equally famous (and quite generous) cheese + charcuterie board, not typically a coastal order from a fish restaurant, but well worth the dairy leap. Land lovers also are in for a treat, as the brined chicken and beef filet are house favorites, especially if enjoyed with boardwalk fries, perhaps the best in Rehoboth from a place not named Thrashers. You may be stuffed or buzzed by the time the entrée arrives, however, because Salt Air opens every meal with baskets of impossible-to-resist butter/cheese and crackers, and its drink menu is similarly hard to resist from a hard-working and quality-delivering bar. Service does not lag at Salt Air, a restaurant that has achieved near institutional status in Rehoboth Beach, enjoying plenty of big-spending spill-over patrons from its Henlopen City Oyster House neighbor, whose impatient diners often test Salt Air’s walk-in availability on any given evening. Surprisingly, as part of a local seafood legend ownership group, the crab cake is chunky and sometimes bland, for many diners the failed litmus test of any Delmarva restaurant. But Salt Air stands out because it has a cool vibe, is not usually too crowded or bustling given its generous table spacing, and the food, while sometimes uneven, can be outstanding when chef is not being pressed by the masses. If not for so many local competing legends, Salt Air would present as a go-to higher-end destination restaurant in the Rehoboth Beach strip, but on most nights, it is a well-received second option, one that still warrants repeat visits. As Salt Air seizes upon the increasingly failed reputation of many former Rehoboth Beach culinary stars, many living off legend, it likely will ascend the reputational ladder, but needs another season or two of outstanding quality. While Salt Air has hung around three stars for years, it is tending to the top line, perhaps in 2025, the next time the Delmarva Foodie Elitist visits.