Chris Stauffer
Photography Editor
Ray Omar is the owner of Moby’s Fish and Chicken, located at 3356 S University Drive in Miramar, on the corner of University Drive and Miramar Parkway. Moby’s opened at this location in June of 2009.
At one time, Moby’s had five locations throughout Broward and Miami-Dade County. The one in Miramar, which opened in 2009, is the last one in the area.
Omar shared that his success is primarily due to management. “If you know how to take care of a restaurant, and you know what you are doing, you will be successful.”
Omar started working at another location with his brother, who owned the Pembroke Pines store.
Initially, the Miramar store was managed by someone with little experience so when he was offered the opportunity to manage the Miramar store, he jumped at the chance to make it the best Moby’s location.
Omar has created the menu and used all of his own recipes including the sauces for wings, using the employees as guinea pigs.
He has continued to update the menu and experiment with recipes, comparing the restaurant to his personal “lab.”
The most difficult part of being a business owner is dealing with employees. Finding good, reliable, and dependable staff can be difficult. The best part of being a business owner is being able to interact with the people who come into the store.
Omar’s five-year goal is to open more restaurants and manage them in the same way the Miramar location has become successful.
Considering Moby’s does not use much advertising, the business depends on positive reviews in the community and word of mouth.
Over the years, word of mouth has been very positive because Moby’s is known in the neighborhood as having some of the best take-out food. Though there is an open area with tables and chairs to eat in the restaurant, most orders are for take-out.
The most popular orders are conch, shrimp, and honey barbeque wings. Omar shared that his favorite meal would be the conch.
Moby’s offers several fish dinner options that include calamari, conch, catfish, tilapia, grouper, and red snapper. The shrimp dinner options include both regular and buffalo shrimp and are available in medium size or jumbo.
Chicken wings come half or whole with the choice of honey barbeque, sweet & spicy, mild or hot buffalo. Chicken wing meal orders can be as small as three pieces or 50 wings can be ordered for parties.
There are also larger family platters that incorporate many different options. The appetizer menu offers cheese sticks, crab cakes, conch salad, and conch fritters.
For something on the side, there are hush puppies, corn nuggets, onion rings, mushrooms, fries, and okra. Strawberry cheesecake and banana pudding are the dessert options.
Though I have tried quite a few things on the menu, my personal favorite has always been the honey barbeque chicken wings.
Sometimes, I will get six honey barbeque and six sweet & spicy wings, just to mix it up. Recently, I have been getting the honey barbeque chicken tenders. Reasonably priced meals with an ample amount of food make it quite attractive for return visits.
When I asked Omar what he would like to communicate to the college community about Moby’s he said, “Come and try it, one bite and you’re hooked!”