Chaptico Market and Deli, Chaptico, St. Mary’s County, Maryland

A while back, Eric Zabiegalski and I went to the Chaptico Market because we’d heard that it had the best fried chicken in Southern Maryland. You can see what we thought here.

I decided to go back because I had some outstanding fried chicken recently and wanted to go back to Chaptico Market to refresh my memory and recalibrate my fried chicken meter. While on my way I recalled that after eating the chicken from Chaptico Market Eric and I stopped in at Abell’s Diner where we had the most fun breakfast ever. Among other things, we heard a lot of bold claims about the excellence of the stuffed ham at the Chaptico Market. I decided to use this visit to kill two birds with one stone.

For those who haven’t been, Chaptico Market is similar to many country grocery stores that, faced by the competition of chain supermarkets, have given over space to cook and serve prepared foods in addition to the bread, snacks, beer, and other necessities of life in the area. Actually they have quite a collection, and also an ice cream store on the side of the building.

They have a buffet that attracted a steady stream of customers about 10:00 am

and a breathtaking selection of house-made desserts.

I had some trouble keeping to my plan of only ordering chicken and stuffed ham, but I ordered a fried chicken thigh and a stuffed ham egg roll. There was a wait while they cooked them up fresh, but they came and I took them over to the little park across the street and opened them up.

The thigh ran me $2.45, and it included the “oyster,” that little piece nestled onto the chicken’s back. This was some delicious fried chicken, a juicy as can be, tender, and bursting with flavor. The skin had a light crust that was especially well seasoned. This chicken is tough to beat.

I probably should pause to explain stuffed ham at this point. It starts with corned ham — corned as beef is corned — which gives it a special flavor — salty, juicy, and savory. The ham is deboned and stuffed with a mixture of kale and cabbage — I better pause again and say that stuffed ham is one of two reasons not to throw kale into the trash. (The other is this soup.) — onions, celery, mustard seeds, black pepper, red pepper, crushed red pepper, and whatever else strikes your fancy. This goes into the bone cavity and into various slashes in the pork, and then all around the ham, and it’s all cooked together.

The Chaptico Market stuffed ham egg roll costs $4.50.  

It was big, about twice the size of a standard egg roll. The crust had more elasticity than crispness, which may have been necessary to hold all the filling together. Inside, the ham was minced fine, as you can see, and thoroughly mixed with the kale and seasonings. It was delicious, rich and spicy leaning toward hot. Note that it did not include mustard. For stuffed ham with mustard you go to Chief’s, Your Neighborhood Bar inside WJ Dent, a major stuffed ham purveyor.

I liked the Chaptico Market stuffed ham, but I’ll need to go back to Chief’s before I decide which is better. I may be walking into a war over mustard or no mustard similar to the North Carolina barbecue sauce and beans in chili wars, but I knew the job was dangerous when I took it. Meanwhile, both are delicious, and I have no hesitation in urging you to go to both places and decide for yourself. And definitely get some fried chicken at the Chaptico Market (and rockfish at Chief’s.)

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