Meet Hello Betty, Bethesda’s New Color-Soaked Seafood Spot With Crabs Galore | Eater DC

"Docked on the second level of Canopy by Hilton (940 Rose Avenue, Bethesda), I found Hello Betty to be a bohemian-styled, 3,000-square-foot seafood hangout that opened its Pike & Rose outpost on April 8 as the East Coast offshoot of Sage Restaurant Concepts’ chic Oceanside original. The 138-seat dining room leans into Baja-themed decor — lights dangling from ropes, sunset murals, leafy palms, turquoise tabletops, woven chairs, beach blankets, and vintage boom boxes — while a sprawling patio seats 167 alfresco diners and a 40-foot retired boat on the patio will transform into a full-service bar this summer with room for 23 imbibers. The menu mixes local staples and beach-bar cooking: mumbo sauce, rockfish, and Chesapeake blue crab appear throughout, with seasonal blue crab showing up in a chorizo-and-queso dip with corn tortillas, a seafood roll, crab cakes, and she-crab soup. A smoky, fire-roasted bucket of blue crabs tossed in Old Bay vinegar with potatoes and corn feeds up to eight and riffs on crab boils and beach barbecues; the “Beach Bonfire” section also roasts oysters and whole trout over an open flame for a charred finish. Fish and chips and peel-and-eat shrimp carry over from the Oceanside location, and the kitchen also offers tinned mussels and octopus as a popular drinking snack. Group tacos are assembled tableside with protein choices like asado chicken, pork belly carnitas, rockfish, carne asada, Scottish salmon filet, and shrimp. On the drinks side, six-packs of Baltimore’s Natty Boh arrive on ice in Igloo coolers, the restaurant’s take on an Eastern Shore orange crush uses citrus-infused Wheatley vodka, and there are frose, sangria pitchers, and spritzes. Hello Betty is open Monday–Thursday 5–10 p.m. and Friday–Sunday 5 p.m.–midnight, with weekend brunch service to follow." - Tierney Plumb