Leading up to our annual Best of Dallas® issue, we're counting down the 50 most interesting restaurants in Dallas. These spots bring something unique or compelling to the city's dining scene, feeding both your appetite and soul. Find more interesting places on our all-new Best Of app for iTunes or Android.
There are plenty of seafood restaurants that fish much of their menu from the depths of bubbling oil, but none of them serves a bowl of ramen. Marc Cassel's soups and other specials served alongside simple, beer-battered seafood, challenge the common convention of the New England fish shack.
Most fish shacks serve up clam chowder and 20 Feet is no different, but not many offer the occasional coconut soup with shiitake mushrooms. Mussels flavored with ginger and lemongrass, and that aforementioned ramen loaded with thickly sliced pork belly point to a casual seafood restaurant with worldly aspirations.
The lobster roll is the most honest version you can get in Dallas. Packed with freshly picked lobster meat, which is cooked on-site, the sandwich uses little in the way of mayonnaise or other unnecessary distractions. Instead, the house-backed bun is the perfect delivery system for shuttling a simple celebration of perfectly cooked lobster meat directly to your face.
Other sandwiches, like they oyster po'boy and a pork belly banh mi, are all good, but the heart of this place is encased in a crunchy layer of golden brown. The fish and chips, served with herb flecked fries and a simple house-made tartar and cocktail sauce, are as good as it gets. Just remember 20 Feet is BYOB, so you need to bring your own ale, or maybe a bottle of bubbles to eat with those Blue Point oysters.
