Holly Nunn/The Gazette Toucan Taco owner Ginger Reeves ladles queso dip for Susan Railey of Laurel, who said she's already a big fan of the restaurant.

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Holly Nunn/The Gazette Laurel Historical Society volunteer Abram Fox serves up chicken tikka from Sapphire Restaurant and Lounge, and Indian and Thai restaurant in Laurel.
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Holly Nunn/The Gazette Nuzback's Bar served up wings and wraps at Taste of Laurel at the Laurel Municipal Swimming Pool meeting room.

Holly Nunn/The Gazette Toucan Taco owner Ginger Reeves ladles queso dip for Susan Railey of Laurel, who said she's already a big fan of the restaurant.

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Laurel restaurateurs came to show off their culinary best Sunday at Laurel Historical Society’s Taste of Laurel event.

“Independent restaurants are the key to our revitalization, and the more help we can give them, the better,” said Jhanna Levin, president of the Laurel Historical Society.

The event, a chance for local restaurants to attract new customers with free tastings, is in its fourth year and sponsored by Main Street Pharmacy. More than 250 people showed up to sample the offerings of 14 restaurants.

“This is really so that we can showcase the independent restaurant,” Levin said. “People might say, ‘Oh, I’ve driven past that place a million times,’ and this gives them a chance to it. Plus, who doesn’t like free food?”

Tia Nna and Kahlil Johnson, who brought their nine-month-old twins to the Laurel Museum for the event, said it was a perfect way to advertise the local restaurants.

“We haven’t gone to a lot of the mom-and-pop places around here,” said Nna. “But we’re definitely going to go to Sapphire [Indian and Thai restaurant], and we’ll buy the twins’ first birthday cake from Copy Cat Cakes.”

Nna and other visitors tried several different cultural cuisines, from traditional American fare such as wings, barbecue pulled pork and sweet potato pie to Ethiopian sambusas, pastries filled with lentils, and kinche, a cracked wheat dish.

The owner of Soretti’s Ethiopian Cuisine in Burtonsville, Genet Gonfa, said that even with Ethiopian food’s popularity in Washington, D.C., few people in the Laurel area have tried it.

”We’re introducing people to something totally new to them,” said Gonfa, who opened her restaurant two years ago.

One of Laurel’s newest restaurants, Salute Ristorante Italiano, also used the event to expose more people to the business and its eggplant parmesan, which they have been serving on Main Street for seven months.

“Local customers are proud of having an Italian restaurant on Main Street,” said Meriem Kass, whose family owns the restaurant. “It takes time to build business, but it’s picking up.”

Other restaurants at the event have been in Laurel for years, such as Toucan Taco on Gorman Avenue.

Ginger Reeves’ parents opened the Tex-Mex restaurant in 1972. When they were ready to retire in 2008, Reeves said keeping it in the family was important.

“This is comfort food to a lot of people in Laurel,” Reeves said as she ladled queso dip over chips. “It felt right for me to buy it. A stranger would have changed things.”

Although she bought the business from her parents just as the economy plunged into recession in 2008, Reeves said business has always been good.

“We have a lot of really great, loyal customers here in Laurel.”

hnunn@gazette.net