2010 Jersey Shore Food Preview

BEACH HAVEN

BURGERS + FRIES  Those of us who grew up summering in LBI return year after year to the porch of Dom’s Drive In for the juicy burgers and skin-on fries — and to feel like we’re 10 again. 3705 Long Beach Boulevard, 609-494-3333.

FAMILY DINNER  The aptly named BYOB Beach House offers the exact kind of meals you’d make in your own beach house, if you didn’t need to spend every last minute affixed to your beach chair: filler-less crabcakes, garden salads to share, chicken fingers, homemade brownie -sundaes — and your favorite chardonnay (since you’ve brought it yourself). 13015 Long Beach Boulevard, 609-492-1997.

POST-JOE POP’S REFUELING  If you haven’t dug into a six-egg “ultimate” omelet between the hours of two and five a.m. at the Chegg, then you really haven’t partied on LBI. (And if you haven’t gotten help polishing off your omelet from that cute Bud-drinker you met at the bar a few hours earlier, then you probably haven’t gotten lucky on LBI, either.) The Chicken or the Egg, 207 North Bay Avenue, 609-492-3695, 492fowl.com.

SUMMER SEND-OFF  Chowderfest, a bustling, bittersweet tribute to a summer gone by and cooler weather to come — and a fierce competition among the island’s chefs — is the biggest and best last hurrah around. (Just don’t refer to the star of the show as “soup.”) October 2nd-3rd. Taylor Avenue Ball Field, 609-494-7211, visitlbiregion.com.