Twenty years ago, when longtime restaurateur Eddie Dopkin was getting ready to open Miss Shirley’s Cafe, the motivation was less about opening a breakfast spot and more about the chance to provide additional parking for his other properties across the street on Cold Spring Lane in Roland Park.
“He was like, ‘I can’t just pay for a parking lot,’” recalls his son, David, who joined Miss Shirley’s as a general manager in 2007, then took over after his father passed away in 2013.
Instead, he decided to open a 42-seat cafe that also happened to have a parking lot. It featured Southern fare that made use of seasonal, mid-Atlantic ingredients.
“I think my father was the first to do an upscale Southern breakfast in Baltimore,” says Dopkin. “He had recently traveled South—I have some family in Southern Georgia—and it just sort of clicked with him that he should doing this in Charm City. Right away, when we opened in the dead of winter, there were lines out the door.”
Miss Shirley’s, known for over-the-top dishes like shrimp and grits with fried green tomatoes and coconut cream-stuffed challah French toast, quickly became a favorite—especially for Ravens and Orioles players. When he’s in town, O’s shortstop Gunnar Henderson orders blueberry white chocolate chip pancakes on DoorDash several times a week. Pitcher Grayson Rodriguez (fittingly) orders the Cy Young egg white omelet, which is also a go-to for the best pitcher in Orioles history, Hall-of-Famer Jim Palmer.
But go on any given day and the clientele will run the gamut, from families with their dogs on the pet-friendly patio to power lunchers to brides celebrating their engagement.
Though the space—which moved across the street from its original location two years after its opening—now boasts some 300 seats (plus three additional cafes in the Inner Harbor, Annapolis, and at BWI), lines still spill out onto the sidewalk.
Miss Shirley’s celebrates its 20th anniversary this month. Though the exact date of its opening is up for debate, Dopkin says it’s safe to say it was sometime in the first week of May 2005. What is known is that, these days, the kitchen shells some 3,000 cage-free eggs and plates up around 275 orders of chicken and waffles at each location each week.
In honor of the anniversary, certain items such as the hot honey fried chicken deviled eggs, crabcake po’boy, and the so-called Shirley’s Affair with Oscar (flat-iron steak, jumbo lump crabmeat, Hollandaise, and asparagus atop fried green tomatoes and Old Bay grits—named best breakfast dish by The Food Network in Maryland in 2010) have been brought to the seasonal menu.
Interestingly, the management team is required to pitch three recipe ideas twice per year, including gluten-free, vegetarian, and vegan options.
“We were one of the first restaurants to have all those offerings and have a strict food allergy policy,” says Dopkin, noting that his daughter, Jordana, suffers from severe food allergies. “I wanted my daughter to feel like she could come into the restaurant and be comfortable.”
That spirit of inclusivity extends to things like the restaurant’s Braille menus and Pride rainbow pancakes to celebrate Pride Month, as well as Old Line State-themed items like specialty cocktails for Preakness.
“We are definitely proud Marylanders and want to show off to locals, tourists, and visitors alike,” says Dopkin. “My goal has always been to appeal to everyone.”
Dopkin’s family is a fourth-generation business. And the ties to Miss Shirley, the restaurant’s namesake, run deep. In the ‘70s, Dopkin’s grandparents, father, and his father’s sisters owned a deli called The Beef Inn, where Miss Shirley McDowell was a beloved prep and line cook. She and Eddie were close friends.
“My grandfather was the first to be able to sell lottery tickets in the whole state,” says Dopkin. “I think he had a relationship with the lottery director at the time. My father and Shirley would sit on milk crates in the back of the deli and scratch off all the lottery tickets. Of course, my grandfather would have a fit because he was like, ‘How can we make any money selling lottery tickets if my son and Shirley are scratching them off?”
That deli soon led to the opening of a second Beef Inn, and eventually a lot of requests for catering. By 1979, they closed the restaurants and opened a catering business, then known as The Catering People, now known as The Classic Catering People, and Shirley continued to work for the family.
“A few years before Miss Shirley’s opened, my father said, ‘I’d love to honor a former team member,’” Dopkin says. “A lot of people think that Shirley is in the kitchen cooking or the dishes are her recipes, but it’s none of that—it’s just to honor a wonderful human being who I grew up with.”
Eighteen years since joining the team, Dopkin, now 48, has owned the business longer than his dad. It’s a strange thought for him, but also a guiding light.
“My whole childhood, my parents were divorced, so I’d want to spend every weekend with him over my friends,” says Dopkin. “I’d be with him wherever he was, whether it was a cafe, the back of a catering truck, or in a bagel store in D.C.
“I always have known what my father would think or do in a certain situation because I spent so much time with him, but I am my own person and there have been plenty of times I’m sure he’d shake his head as he smiled down and that he would have done something differently. Still, there’s a big sense of comfort knowing how your mentor and your father, your boss, would have done things.”
We can say with certainty, he’d be proud.