The old Jasper's was one of my all-time Boston favorites, so it pains me to agree with Alice that the Summer Shack is one of the worst seafood places around and is exactly as she described it. It also looks like the furniture and much of the decor hasn't been changed since it was the old Aku-Aku! The various Legal Seafood locations have become all-too-predictable and a bit formulaic for locals, but for visitors they really can't be beat.

Ms. Fischer,
Do not be dissuaded from the Barking Crab! I was there last weekend and it was quite good. It has recently gotten a clean bill of health from inspectors, so it is fine! It is a really fun, unique Boston experience, because it is on the wharf, by the water, and casual. The other places people listed are extremely expensive (at least Kingfish Hall and Summer Shack are--Legal Seafoods is more affordable and defintely a worthwile dining experience). The Barking Crab is great!

My parents ate at Legal Seafood last year and I checked out ther web sight and I did not like what I saw. Also Legal Seafood is not a Boston based restaurant like I thought it was. I want to eat at a restaurant that is indigenous to the area. I am sure this is where I want to eat, it seems like my kinda place! Feff

OK, Feff. You obviously want someone to ask, so I'll help you out. (1) What is it about the Legal Seafood web site that you saw and didn't like?, and (2) What makes you think that they're not a Boston-based restaurant? And for extra credit: (3) Why in the world would that be important to you anyway?

Legal Sea Foods began in Cambridge in Inman Sq. in the 1960s. It was a hole in the wall, with picnic tables covered in brown paper on one side and the fish display case on the other. You picked out your fish either to take home or they cooked it for you to eat there with your choice of cole slaw and fries or cole slaw and fries. Swordfish was $1.25 a pound. I ate there often, had lots of swordfish, and often saw Julie Child buying her fish there.

It expanded into a chain, got rid of the brown paper (and the Inman Sq. store), started to charge higher prices but until the huge internal spat that sent one part of the owner-family off into the woods, it had great food. However, several of the recipes went off with the departing former owners, as did some of the commitment to quality. I wouldn't be surprised if ownership were now registered to someone far from Boston.

I'm sure there are other Bostonians who can fill in more of the details (or correct some of mine) of what happened once Legal S.F. got too big for itself.

I think that Roger Berkowitz and his family would be very surprised to hear that Legal Seafood was not originated in Massachusetts. I remember when the restaurants started (it had been a take out place for so long). Anyway, when it first started as a restaurant, you still had to pay before you were served (a take off from when it was a take out place) and they didn't accept credit cards. Also at the time, everything was served on paperplates. Things have come along way since then, including the liquor license.

You might also want to try Skip Jack's. Turner Seafood, which is also good is closed for the summer, as the restaurant is being remodeled.

I also like the No Name, and can remember when it was a dive -- it used to be a BYOB place, and you had to stand on line outside the building -- it was very popular then. Although the prices have risen, it still has reasonable prices, and serves one of the best fish chowders in Boston. Fried plates are enormous, but I prefer the broiled salmon or swordfish.

Pris, your history is essentially correct, though I guess some may disagree about the decline in quality. One of my friends was a cook at the Inman Sq. location when I was a college student in Boston in the 60s, so the comment about them not being a "Boston" based chain (yeah, I know Cambridge isn't Boston, but that's cutting things a bit fine) was curious to me. I saw Roger Berkowitz very recently on one of the local restaurant shows and I believe he's still the owner - at least he represents himself as such. And their web site lists their corporate headquarters as Allston, which as you know is part of Boston.

Thanks, Dick,

After I wrote, I checked the website -- does seem to be all sweetness among the Berkowitzes, but that wasn't what I heard the last time I was there and visiting someone who kept up with the restaurant business "scene."

If you, too, were in college in the 60s and considered Boston a home, maybe you are having one of the days, as I am, when you really miss the pre-Gap, pre-chain Legal Seafoods, pre-Abercrombie& Fitch in Harvard Sq., pre-$2000/month real estate, pre-big-dig Boston.

On a slushy day, did you ever slip on the wooden escalator coming up to the kiosk at the Harvard Sq. "MTA", which was then the end of the red line? Have wretched coffee at The Bick? Attend the summer arts and jazz festival in the Public Garden?

Pris,

If you remember the 60's, you missed 'em...8^)

Pris - yes, all of the above, including seeing Janis Joplin (I was about 20 feet in front of the stage) for free at the Harvard Colosseum! Gee, I'll bet all those people I used to know then are starting to look old now.

I'm not sure what the deal is currently with the Berkowitz's, but I thought you were right the first time - they had a huge falling out and Roger was the one left standing. I don't think they ever really patched things up, but I also don't spend a lot of time keeping up with it either.

Hey, gc, there are all kinds of memory... "through rose-colored glasses," "misty, water-colored," etc. etc. etc. Besides, to be strictly accurate, all that substance-abuse "experimentation" really didn't get underway until rather late in the 1960s and really represent the first few years of the 70s at least as much. ;-D

My memories include hearing Joan Baez at the Cafe Yanna (or was it the Blue Parrot -- ROM memory problems...), and a few years later Tim Buckley at the Parrot. As for the Jazz Fest., heard Brubeck, MJQ, Getz, Miles Davis under the trees in the Public Garden. Then there was seeing Bobby Orr in the Gahden and Ted Williams at Fenway.

Yeah, it's my age, but I also miss what Boston looked like without all the plastic and chrome with large-graphic Euro-advertising. Even the appalling squeal of the MTA as it rounded the curve between Boylston and Park St.

In the 1980s, I went "home" (haven't lived there in a long time, though) for Christmas and was caught in a blizzard -- found myself on the platform at the Wonderland station as the snow drifted across the tracks and a crowd of increasingly PO'd passengers waited for a subway that might not ever come. But finally down the track came an old iron horse of a train left from perhaps the 40s, complete with plow on it. SUre enough, one "friendly, patient" Bostonian started in on the MTA personnel == "where the ^$&##!! have you been, there's something wrong with the MTA, etc. etc." and the MTA guy just gave it back, "yeah well there's somethin' wrong with YOU," etc.etc. One woman then said, "well, we're glad to see you anyway, thanks," and the MTA guy said, "yeah, good, never mind."

Okay Dick, I am not sure if you were trying to be nasty or helpful? I just did not like what I saw okay, I did not like the prices and the selection. I have the right to my own opinion. My parents loved the place and I wanted to check it out for my own self, but after seeing the websight I thought I would pass. My husband and I will only be in Boston for a day before driving to Cape Cod. I do not want to blow all of our vacation money on one meal in Boston, when we have three more days of meals to pay for, our budget is limited. I hope that you are not taking this as a critisim becasuse that is not my intent. I am very excited about visiting Boston for the first time and I truley believe that I will just fall in love and want to return in the future. I guess I should have put more thought when I said that it was not a Boston based restaurant. I should have said that it was not a local resturant to Boston because they have resturants up and down the east coast. The one in Boston is not the only restaurant. And why is it important to me? Why should it matter to you anyway? It is just something that I enjoy doing!

To address the original topic:

I've been to the Barking Crab before and after the incident which led to the monikers "Barking Cr@p" and "Barfing Crab". I'm happy to report that my meal after the re-opening was just as good as I'd remembered beforehand, and I suffered no food poisoning. I'd go there again. Just make sure your food is cooked if you're worried!

I'm certain that there have been no additional incidents with sanitary conditions at the Barking Crab, because if there were, the local news would be all over the story (you should have seen the stories when they temporarily shut down Todd English's "Olive's"!!)

The location is a short walk from South Station, right across Fort Point Channel from the Financial District

In the early years Legal Sea Foods was a really good restaurant, but with expansion it has gone way down hill. It is more like a cafeteria-very noisy, very hurry up and get attahea. I took my husband to the Peabody location for his birthday 3 years ago, and it was the last time for a Legal. The drinks were so expensive and the service was well below par. We would NEVER go back to any of their locations, and I've been to a few with no feeling og ever wanting to return.

Barking crab is fun with children
, Legal ios more for dults, and yes it did start in Inman square when students ran and didnt pay the bills so you had to pay in advance
. They still have the freshest seafood around and have their own microbiologist so never have to worry about getting sick whren you eat their shell fish.

A friend of mine got food poisoning at Legal.

BEEN THERE DONE THAT AND BOUGHT THE T SHIRT! I finaly got to the Barking Crab last Saturday and the only problem I had was a nice guest of wind blew my seafood sauce right onto my shirt! I loved the place everything was great. Thank you to everyone that gave me wonderful advice including you DICK wherever you are!