Anyone who lives in South Florida—and most people who've visited—knows Joe's Stone Crab as nothing short of an institution. It's a hallowed Miami Beach spot for birthday celebrations and anniversaries, where locals and tourists, celebrities and politicians, families and friends gather over a common love for the fresh-cracked crustaceans, festive ambiance and inimitable service.
But there's a lot more to Joe's than even all of that: history, legacy, kooky stories and a meticulous production footprint that extends far beyond the restaurant's walls. In honor of 112 seasons at Joe's Stone Crab, we sat down with Stephen Sawitz from the family that started it all to explore their journey and score some insider tips and tricks. Thousands of claws later and we're still hungry for more. Ready to dive in?
Time Out: Is Joe's the oldest restaurant on Miami Beach?
Stephen Sawitz: I believe Joe's is the oldest restaurant on Miami.
Can you trace your lineage for us back to when Joe started?
My great grandfather and grandmother and their son, Jesse—so it was Joe, Jenny and Jesse—moved down here in the early 1900s, around 1913. Shortly after he got down here and worked a little bit as a server in a hotel restaurant, he opened up his own little seafood shack here, where Joe Stone crab stands. It was called Joe's Seafood back then. Later on, it became Joe’s Stone crab because stone crabs were discovered and then placed on the menu.
What makes Joe's an institution in your eyes?
In my eyes, I think, consistency, longevity. The commitment that we have to this location, the families, the multi-generational aspect of Joe's. My family's been here since 1913. The fact that really no other restaurant has has survived the world wars, the depressions and Covid, etc.
What is your earliest memory at Joe's?
My earliest memory would be sitting at the family table with my sister, my dad, my mom on it like a Sunday, that kind of thing. And my grandparents. And we would have a Sunday dinner. That's when I was very little.
We're not sitting we're at station 11 right now, but the family station is over there. It's where Joe Hoover used to sit. And Margaret would sit there and, Sandra Day O'Connor has sat there. Yeah. It's kind of interesting to sit across from where two presidents sat—not sitting presidents, but almost presidents. And then they became presidents.
What is at Joe's hack that people might not know about?
Coming for lunch is definitely—it doesn't sound like a hack, but it's a great hack. The other thing is if someone calls and lets us know that it's an anniversary or a birthday or something, you know, really important to them, we try to go out of our way to get them seated a little expeditiously. And if they have a favorite server, then it's a priority because you want them to have that server.
Any tips on how to snag a table and avoid long wait times?
Certainly lunch is one way. Getting here early for dinner is another thing. Between 5 and 5:30 is definitely one of the best ways to get a table. I would go to the takeaway, certainly. But if you're a regular customer, that's the best hack, and that's the best way to get a table. If you're a regular, you tend to get seated a little bit quicker just because, you know, they have their favorite server, they know what they want.
Tell us about your maître d's. What is the longest tenure?
Well, wow. I would have to say Roy Garret was the longest tenured maître d'. He worked from about the early early ’70s till about 1996. That was about 26 years. Let me tell you, a few years will age you a lot. He just had he had stamina. But Dennis did a great job and Ed's doing a great job.
What is the most popular starter?
This is going to sound crazy, but one of the most important starters: the fried chicken. That's one of the most important starters, or the popular starters. And then oysters are traditional, oysters or shrimp.
What's the most popular side?
Hash browns. That's an easy one. I would get them crispy, you know, a little extra crispy, possibly Lyonnaise style, with the caramelized onions.
Give us a couple of your best stone crab fun facts.
Well, stone crabs are caught primarily in the Gulf of Mexico. The season runs from October 15th to May 1st. Stone crabs can regenerate their claws, which I think is really neat. It's against the law to land a stone crab. So you can't bring one on land on the land. People don't know that, they can live without both claws, but they have to be taken off properly. Their natural predator, there are two that I know of. One is the octopus, and the other one is a conch.
Explain how the stone crabs are sourced, the time and labor involved.
There's a lot of labor involved in sourcing stone crabs. A typical fisherman with his boat and crew—there'll be three other people working besides that. They work all summer long getting their traps ready. There's a lot of work that goes into that off season.
When the season starts, ten days before the 15th, on the fifth, they're allowed to put their traps baited into the water, thousands of them. So they make many, many trips. It's labor going out to the sea, out to the Gulf of Mexico, coming back backwards and forwards. Hurricanes can delay that, which they have a little bit.
Now the other part is they catch the crabs and they break the claws off and they're alive and they break the claws up. They throw the body back into the water. They can't land them. Then they take the claws and they weigh them when they get to shore.
And then we cook them. We chill them real fast. And then we we grade them into different sizes. But it's all done very, very quickly. Now notice there's all these hands touching the stone crab. You've got three crew working, you've got someone offloading the crabs, you got somebody weighing the crabs and then cooking the crabs and then grading the crabs, and then chilling, putting them back into the boxes.
And then they have to refrigerate them and then send them back to us the very next morning, very early in the morning. Then the process is they got to offload the crabs, you know, with the forklift. They got to regrade the crabs. All these hands, all these instruments touching the crabs. And you got to do it quickly. And because time is of the essence, they're fresh. You don't want you don't want the liquid from the crab to lose it because you're losing weight. So there's a lot of hands. So it gets costly.
Settle the debate: mustard or butter sauce?
For me personally? Mustard. Joe's mustard: high grade mayonnaise, Colman's Dry English mustard, light cream, A1 sauce, worcestershire sauce and maybe a pinch of salt. That's it.
Does the size of the claw change its flavor at all?
I don't believe it does. I've had, you know, super colossal and mediums at the same exact time. The meat to me is tender in both of them. However, because mediums or selects are less than half the price, it could just seem like the mediums taste better because they cost so much less. That's the way I look at it. However, somebody's buying the big ones, right? There's some people that just want the really big ones anad they think that's the best.
I think it's just it depends on maybe where they're caught, when they're caugh, the temperature of the water. Because you could get a crab, a senior claw caught in cold water. Maybe it might stick a little bit to the shell. And at the same time, South Florida crabs don't stick to the shell. They seem to taste better. So it really depends.
Are the jumbo claws worth the price?
That's a tough gotcha! They're very expensive. They are. And you know, there's so many costs associated with it. I can tell you that it really is a function of supply and demand. Personally, I would probably myself go for Selects, just because I think that's the sweet spot in value.
Are are bibs for amateurs?
No. If you consider someone like Jeff Bezos, who dined here, an amateur. He was wearing a Joe's bib. I saw it with my own two eyes.
Do you wear a bib?
Yes, I will. But if I don't, I will drop something on my tie or on my shirt or jacket, for sure. It's guaranteed.
What is a retired menu item that should be revived?
Oh, gee. I loved our shrimp Creole. I would love to see that.
How many claws do you go through on an average day during the season?
Thousands of claws—3,000, 4,000? That's between shipping, that's takeaway and lunch and dinner. That doesn't include what we wholesale.
What happens if you eat stone crabs outside of season?
Well, let's say it was caught on May 1st out of season. Could be May 2nd. It could be perfect. But if you're really getting into the summer season, we call anything after May 1st summer. As long as they're frozen properly and they're frozen early in the process that I explained earlie, they're going to be fine till October.
And we serve them in the restaurant between May and September. And then we closed for a few weeks. Our sister restaurants in Chicago, Vegas, in D.C. also use off season stone crabs, which are perfect.
How are climate changes affecting the season?
Great question. I really don't know. I can tell you that this year the hurricanes that hit, which were Cat 4s and 5s—they've attributed some of the intensity of the intensity of hurricanes to climate change. I can tell you that, that it might disrupt the seabed. It could make force the crabs to move around. It might get it might help the stone crab. We don't know.
We don't know if warmer waters or hurricanes flush out the bad and bring in more oxygen, because it just stirs the water. We don't know that yet. But I’m very concerned the about red tide that occurs sometimes and sucks the oxygen out of the water. But you say, well, that's bad for the stone crab.
What really concerns me is all the plastics in the water. We did a beach cleanup on October the 1st, Joe’s did with the community. You wouldn't believe how much plastic—pounds of plastic. It was tragic. And that affects the marine life and that can affect the stone crab and that will eventually bite us you know where.
What's your favorite restaurant on the beach that’s not Joe’s?
Cafe Avanti. And Lucali.
Fill in the blanks: South beach can be _________, but it's always ________, and that's why we love it so much.
South beach can be insane. But it's always, well, it's always too beautiful. And that's why we love it.