The House Of Fish: Seafood served with style

Danny Hayes, the proprietor of The House of Fish, is part P.T. Barnum, part Soul Train creator Don Cornelius, with a helping of the Piedmont and a dash of Harlem tossed in. His is a constant presence in the dining area where he charms customers – newcomers and long-timers alike – with ongoing patter about their families, the food and anything else that might spring up.

Hayes, 44, has made The House of Fish one of the most happening seafood restaurants in the state. People from all over the region and across the country visit the restaurant just off U.S. 1 South in East Aberdeen: blue-collar workers still in their uniforms, road and utility workers donning muddied work boots and orange vests, physicians, retirees, families and out-of-state vacationers who stop in to eat after playing a few holes at the nearby Pinehurst resort.

“We come every month, or every six weeks, because it’s the best fish around,” said Joan Yue, a retired physical therapist who moved from Minnesota to Pinehurst two years ago with her husband Alex, a retired anesthesiologist. The Yues were feasting on grilled red snapper and the striped bass with risotto.

Alex Yue said The House of Fish’s location was formerly a French restaurant. “We came out one day, and it was this. We’ve been coming ever since,” he said. “It’s like he’s right by the ocean.”

The restaurant is an airy, two-level affair that seats about 100. The inevitable pictures of seafood and the ocean share space on the walls with posters of Bob Marley, Jimi Hendrix and Billie Holiday. Food Network shows play throughout the day on a flat-screen TV behind the bar, while old-school music permeates the place: Teddy Pendergrass, Stevie Wonder, Al Green, the Four Tops, The O’Jays and Sam Cooke anchor the spot to a more genteel time in Southern culture.

By early evening, with more than 50 diners feasting or waiting to be served, The House of Fish takes on a high-octane energy. Hayes whips out his phone and calls up Facebook Live.

“All right, America! What’s up?” he says to his Facebook followers.

New Orleans style

Hayes walks into the dining room and announces to the audience, “I went out and caught a whole bunch of fish so ya’ll could eat good tonight!”

Regulars George Hilliard, a retired military officer, and his wife Stephanie live just north of Southern Pines.

“We go to New Orleans two or three times a year,” he said after finishing off the maple-glazed salmon and pineapple shrimp. “It reminds us of down there.”

The scallops, oysters and calamari are fried to perfection in butter. The crunchy slaw and creamy potato salad are made from scratch. Each day, the low-slung roadhouse offers up a healthy taste of New Orleans-style seafood, minus a gumbo and with jambalaya ably replaced with a mushroom risotto simmered in a fish bone broth and served alongside tender chunks of striped bass.

Other recent offerings included crab and shrimp served with a peppery red sauce, yellow fin tuna, and a meaty pineapple and habenero pepper jumbo shrimp that burst out of near gossamer-thin shells.

“Trucks come every day with fresh seafood,” Hayes said. “The fish comes right off the boat, and it’s at my door 24 to 48 hours out of the water.”

Patrons frequently come calling for the “Dougie,” a dish named after Doug Thomas, a native of Hamlet who played football at Clemson University before going on to a career as a wide receiver with the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks. Thomas was 49 when he died two years ago of a heart attack.

“It’s his recipe,” Hayes said. “It’s crayfish and crabmeat and a gravy that’s poured over yellow grits. We put a filet of fish on top of that and more gravy drizzled over that. I tweaked it.”

Early start

Hayes got his start in the seafood business at the age of 9, when he sold fish door-to-door for a man he knew only as Mr. Wilson, a fishmonger who owned a fish market in nearby Rockingham.

But his career took him to New York, where he was working as an accountant on Fifth Avenue. After work, Hayes would buy unusual seafood in Chinatown and prepare it at his Harlem apartment for friends.

“They used to tell me I should open a restaurant,” Hayes said. “But it would be late at night, we were drinking and I didn’t pay it much mind.”

In April 2008, his mother, Dot Bennett, called and told him she had been diagnosed with colon cancer. Days later, Hayes returned home and was by his mother’s side for surgery and chemotherapy treatments during a two-year battle with the illness.

In 2010, Hayes was thinking about opening a restaurant when one of his cousins took him to a seafood joint in McColl, S.C., run by two sisters.

“It was an old storefront building, with an old floor-model TV on the wall, picnic tables, and they served tea, french fries, trout and cake in downtown McColl,” he said.

The experience was an epiphany for Hayes. He told his cousin he was going to open up a seafood spot.

On April 20, 2010, The House of Fish opened its doors along U.S. Business 74 in Rockingham. Three years later, the restaurant moved to Aberdeen.

His mom’s sour cream, red velvet and chocolate chip pound cakes sit in cake dishes atop a counter just across from the bar.

“I am honestly now doing what I was born to do. I honestly feel like this is my natural craft,” Hayes said. “I want everyone to feel welcome at The House of Fish: the poor, the middle class, the rich, the wealthy. I want everybody to feel welcome at my place.”

This story was originally published June 29, 2017 at 11:09 AM with the headline "The House Of Fish: Seafood served with style."