Burger Bracket: Donna's Slays Dempsey's Brew Pub

Even with the power of its location (Oriole Park at Camden Yards) and the crowds of the Baltimore Orioles' home-opening weekend series, Dempsey's Brew Pub and restaurant was no match for Donna's Tavern and Restaurant of Dundalk.

The Pine Avenue's Crabby Patty defeated Dempsey's and its Dempsey Burger—described as a freshly ground chuck burger topped with sharp cheddar cheese, smoked bacon, red onions, lettuce and tomato—in the finals of the Fox 45-TV Burger Bracket contest to name Baltimore's Best Burger.

"I'm still amazed that we won," Heather Sekora, manager of Donna's, said in a phone interview Monday with Patch. "To win against Dempsey's on Opening Day is really something else."

Dempsey's is named for former Orioles catcher—and current Orioles broadcaster—Rick Dempsey. The eatery is a popular and crowded spot at the ball park.

Sekora, whose mother, Donna Sekora, owns the Dundalk tavern, said she's been shocked with the support for her entry ever since the first week of the contest.

"I thought we were gone the very first week when we went up against (the Charles Village Pub) of Towson," Sekora said. "They have all these young college students who take their laptops everywhere, and Dundalk is a blue-collar, hard-working community where many people don't even have computers."

But Donna's kept churning through the competition, including the Poncabird Pub and the Greene Turtle of Hunt Valley.

Donna Sekora on Monday said she was thrilled for the restaurant and the community, but equally thrilled for her daughter.

"This really was all Heather— she worked really hard on this," the proud mother said. "She organized it all, and had a lot of people behind her, helping to get the word out."

The restaurant has been attempting to publish a new menu, and the printing schedule kept getting put off as the restaurant progressed through the brackets, defeating one opponent after the next, according to the manager.

"Now we can get our new menu printed up, and we'll definitely tag the Crabby Patty in the menu as Baltimore's Best Burger," Heather Sekora said.

For the first time during the contest, Fox 45 released the voting results, she said. Donna's won by what she called a surprising margin of 165-65.

"It wasn't even close—that surprised me," she said.

While the restaurant will get bragging rights and some employees are scheduled to make an appearance on Fox 45, perhaps as early as Tuesday, Heather Sekora said she considers the win a victory for the entire community.

"We thank everybody for voting," she said. "The community really got behind this —the Patch and everybody."

Friends of the restaurant posted notices on their Facebook pages, forwarded emails to their friends and did everything they could to get out the vote, according to Sekora.

Details were not finalized as of Monday, but Heather Sekora said there will definitely be a Crabby Patty party in Donna's near future—probably next week.

"This is a busy week for us, but we're definitely going to do something to thank the community for its support," she said. "We're just still kind of shocked to have beaten Dempsey's."