Mussels

Here we are again at 500 HarborView Drive, now J. Leonard's Waterside, formerly Pier 500.I was here as a reviewer only two years ago; but now the place has a new name, a new owner (a partnership led by J. Leonard Schleider, owner of Cameo Caterers) and a new upscale American menu. There's even a new motto: "Fine Dining in a Casual Way." That means you can stop in after the ballgame for tournedos Atlantis with Madeira demi-glace.I'm not unhappy about being here again, because this is a wonderful setting for a restaurant.

When we drew up to the gravel parking lot of Crew's Quarters, which was filled with pickup trucks, my friends looked at me in astonishment. I had told them we were going to a Spanish restaurant in Essex. The rambling structure with the "Crab House" sign on it did not look promising.But the chef, Jose Villanueva, is Spanish; and while there is something for everyone on the menu, including steamed crabs in season, his forte is food like shrimp in garlic sauce and paella.If Crew's Quarters doesn't look like a Spanish restaurant from the parking lot, it looks even less like one once you're inside the dining room.

Pollution levels have fallen at more than 100 sites along the nation's coastline, including Hog Point on the Chesapeake Bay, according to a federal program that closely monitors contaminant levels in mussels and oysters.But coastal pollution is still a major problem in many areas of the United States, with numerous shores closed to swimming and shellfishing, and some undergoing expensive cleanup programs.The study monitored 14 elements and compounds. The elements under study were arsenic, cadmium, copper, mercury, nickel, lead, selenium and zinc, all of which can be harmful to humans and sea life in high concentrations.

Long before Fells Point was known as a trendy place to go for great crab cakes and mussels -- or before it was known as weekend party central -- it was a working man's port with a lofty history."

Inspiration for today's menu comes from George Goins, the spa chef at the Doral Spa in Miami. The recipes are light in fat and calories yet delicious enough to serve for company.The salad features slices of fresh tomatoes and oranges fanned over a bed of romaine lettuce. For a dressing, you need only combine some raspberry vinegar with a drop of olive oil and drizzle over all.The dessert can be easily concocted by mixing 1 tablespoon fresh lime juice and 2/3 cup powdered sugar with 8 ounces of softened reduced-fat cream cheese.

It's a great marketing ploy. You print up a bunch of bumper stickers that say "Eat Bertha's Mussels," and you actually get people to put them on their cars. Not relatives of the owners. Random people.Note that the bumper stickers don't say "Bertha's Mussels Are Good." They simply tell you to eat them. And people do. Suddenly Bertha's Dining Room, a Fells Point bar, is known for its mussels all over the city, maybe the state. People flock to Bertha's for its mussels.Bertha's serves the specialty of the house with eight different sauces, ranging from melted butter to an anchovy, tomato and garlic butter.

The live aquatic bait ban in effect at Baltimore City's three reservoirs will be modified to allow the use of state-certified, zebra mussel-free bait, Mayor Kurt. L. Schmoke announced yesterday.Live bait had been banned to protect the reservoirs from accidental introduction of zebra mussels, which can attach to live bait. The inch-long shellfish multiplies rapidly and has clogged large water intake structures.Now if you use live aquatic bait, you must have a receipt from a state-certified bait shop in your possession, dated no more than 48 hours from purchase.

In the current issue of Ducks Unlimited Canada Conservator is an article about the zebra mussel, the tiny striped clam whose presence within a few hundred miles of Prettyboy, Liberty and Loch Raven caused the Baltimore Department of Public Works to restrict fishing boats on the city's reservoirs.City officials feared that anglers would bring the mussel into the reservoirs where it could block water piping systems as it has in the Great Lakes.Officials thought that the clam has no natural predators in this hemisphere.

Baltimore officials aren't taking any chances on keeping a thumbnail-sized mollusk at bay.Worried by the spread of zebra mussels, the fast-breeding bivalves that have infested the Great Lakes, the city is preparing to spend from $2 million to $6 million to protect its public water supply.The Board of Estimates approved hiring a consulting firm yesterday to complete plans to prevent the black-and-white striped mollusk from clogging water intakes at three reservoirs and 67 miles of water tunnels leading to filtration plants.