Meet the tide to table team
Eat against the current in Ocean City
That’s the idea. Not reckless, not complicated, just a quiet push to choose curiosity over habit.
At Tide To Table, the thing you didn’t plan to order often becomes the reason you come back. The menu moves. The lucky catch shows up and disappears. What’s fresh leads, not what’s familiar. There's confidence in that approach, and it changes how you experience the room.
Behind it all is a crew of distinct personalities who somehow make it feel seamless. Different backgrounds, different styles, one shared instinct for what works. They know their way around a kitchen, a boat, and a bar, but more importantly, they know how to read a table. Nothing feels scripted. Conversations happen and recommendations land. You’re not being served, you’re being guided against the current.
Because food here is more than a meal. It’s memory, risk, and story all at once. The belief is simple: what we eat is tied to who we are, and it should challenge us a little. That’s what makes Tide To Table different. You walk in, curious, maybe a little unsure. You leave with a new favorite and a different way of thinking about what’s on your plate, and that’s why you’ll come back, to go against the current and see what the tide brings in next.
BOBBY BASSETT
chef/owner
Some people learn business in boardrooms. Bobby learned it by getting thrown off skateboards.
Long before he was opening restaurants, he was learning how to take a hit, get back up, and try again. It turns out that skill transfers pretty well to the hospitality business. Over the last several years he's opened multiple restaurants, survived the chaos that comes with them, and discovered that great restaurants have very little to do with restaurants.
They're about people.
Bobby has never had much patience for corporate culture, committee meetings, or anything that feels manufactured. He believes restaurants should have scars, stories, personality, and a point of view. Buy the best ingredients you can find. Hire people you'd trust with your house keys. Create a place worth talking about. Repeat.
If Tide To Table has a captain, it's Bobby. Not because he wants the title, but because he's usually the first one willing to sail into rough water.
Tim Elliott
Executive Chef
Every ship needs someone obsessed with keeping it afloat.
That's Tim.
While the rest of the crew is telling stories and chasing the next adventure, Tim is checking the ropes, sharpening the knives, inspecting the cargo, and making sure nobody cuts corners. He's spent decades crossing the country, working kitchens, refining techniques, and developing an almost unnatural ability to spot things that aren't quite right.
To Tim, cooking isn't magic. It's discipline.
The fish doesn't care about your excuses. The guests don't care about your intentions. Every plate either earns its place or it doesn't.
Behind every great service is somebody quietly refusing to accept "good enough." Around here, that's Tim. The steady hand at the helm making sure the ship arrives exactly where it's supposed to.
Pat Pugh
Bartender/Hospitality Ambassador
Every pirate ship needs a storyteller.
Pat is ours.
He's spent years behind some of Ocean City's busiest bars collecting stories, making friends, and turning complete strangers into regulars before they finished their second drink. Then he stepped away to raise his twin daughters. Now that they're off charting their own course, he's back where he belongs.
Pat understands something most people forget: nobody remembers a perfect cocktail. They remember how they felt drinking it.
He's equal parts bartender, comedian, therapist, local historian, and professional instigator. Sit at his bar long enough and you'll probably laugh, learn something, meet someone new, or all three.
While others focus on recipes and operations, Pat focuses on the thing that matters most: making sure every person who walks through the door feels like they belong on the voyage.
