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Archive for the 'restaurants' Category

Where are the restaurants going?

If you visit this blog or my web site with any regularity, you know that I like restaurants — a lot. So when a new restaurant comes to town, it’s big news to me. Unfortunately, the opposite is also true — when a restaurant packs up and leaves, that’s news to me, as well.

Lately, it seems that we have been losing more restaurants than we have been gaining, and I’m not sure why.

The latest news is that Sam Seltzer’s Steak House on US19 north of Alderman Road has been closed. That restaurant has been open for about a year and a half, and we’ve eaten there a number of times. Honestly, we didn’t like it as much as the Sam Seltzer’s further south on US19, down south of Gulf-to-Bay Boulevard in Clearwater (there’s a review of that restaurant on my Restaurant Review page).

Sam Seltzer’s management says that the company felt that the Palm Harbor restaurant was taking business away from the Clearwater restaurant as well as the location up in Port Richey.

Another big surprise is that the Hooter’s restaurant, which was also on US19 north of Alderman, has closed down as well. No word from Hooter’s on what happened, but there is some speculation that it had to do with a rent increase. Hooter’s puts out a pretty good burger, but honestly it has never been one of my favorites and we almost never go there.

Not too long ago, the Fred Fleming’s barbecue restaurant on US19 at Nebraska closed. We miss that place, because we used to like to take our two granddaughters there. Another fairly recent closure was the Palm Harbor Ale House, on US19 just north of Tampa Road. That was a place for a fairly young crowd, kind of a sports bar atmosphere, and we didn’t go there very much either.

But not all the recent restaurant news has been negative. Dagwood Deli recently opened, and Wild Fish has been open on US19 south of Curlew for a number of months now. We haven’t tried Dagwood, but we’ve been to Wild Fish a couple of times. I’ll try to get a review of Wild Fish up on the web site in the near future.

Tags: North Pinellas County, restaurants

Hooray for Florida stone crabs!

If you like seafood, and you live in Florida (or at least visit on a regular basis), this may be one of your favorite times of the year — stone crab season. Between Oct. 15 and May 15, it is legal to harvest stone crabs from Florida’s waters, and they sure are good.

Actually, to be more accurate, it is legal to take stone crab CLAWS — it is not legal to keep the whole stone crab. You can trap the stone crab, pop off the claws if they are of legal size (”pop off” sounds a whole lot better than “tear off”, doesn’t it?) and then return the crab to the water. Stone crabs can regenerate their claws, and many do so four or five times over the span of their lives.

You can’t take females with eggs, and the claws have to be at least 2 3/4 inches across. It is legal to take both claws if they are of legal size, but many experts believe it is better to take just one, since the crab’s chances for survival are much better if one of the claws remains.

Every year at this time, Frenchy’s restaurants on Clearweater Beach (there are four of them) host a big stone crab festival. Frenchy’s Saltwater Cafe and Rockaway Grill (two of the four Frenchy’s restaurants) will have tents set up outside, and the live music will be throbbing and the beer will be flowing.

This will be Frenchy’s 22nd annual Stone Crab Weekend. It runs between 11 a.m. and 11 p.m. today through Sunday. You can learn more at their website, www.frenchysonline.com.

We don’t have a review of any of the Frenchy’s restaurants on our website yet, but I think the stone crab festival will be a good excuse to do one.

Tags: pinellas county, stond crabs

Boston Cooker restaurant

By the time we got over to the Boston Cooker stand, they were running out of food, but they still had some fine lobster bisque and some shrimp in a light batter that we enjoyed. Boston Cooker is located on the corner of Tampa Road and Forest Lakes in Oldsmar, directly behind Chili’s in the Forest Lakes Plaza. They fly in seafood every day from Boston — the food is fresh and very good.

Tags: restaurants

Snapper’s Bar and Grille

Another of the restaurants taking part in the Taste of Palm Harbor was Snapper’s Bar & Grill. I had some spicy chicken wings and some great french fries.

Tags: Palm Harbor, restaurants

J.J. Gandy’s pies

J.J. Gandy’s Pies was on hand, offering up samples of their famous Key Lime pie and other flavors. We tried the chocolate cheesecake pie, and it was great. We’ve written on the website before about J.J. Gandy’s — they are a Palm Harbor company that makes some of the best Key Lime pie anywhere. Many of the best restaurants in the area don’t even try to match J.J. Gandy’s quality — they just buy their pies from J.J. Gandy’s and sell them to their own patrons. You can also buy pies over-the-counter from the J.J. Gandy’s location at 3725 Alt. 19, Palm Harbor. Look for more about J.J. Gandy’s in the “Local Partners” section of my website at www.bethfrederick.com

Tags: j.j. gandy's pies, key lime pie, Palm Harbor

The Melting Pot

Here’s the crew from The Melting Pot — a happy and very helpful bunch. If you’ve never tried The Melting Pot, you definitely should. They offer meat and cheese fondue dishes, as well as out-of-this-world chocolate fondue dessert specialties, to name just a few. The company operates 85 restaurants around the country, but the one that should interest you is at 25822 US19N, on the west side of the road just south of Enterprise.

Counters

Tags: Palm Harbor, restaurants

Taste of Palm Harbor

I mentioned a day or two ago that the annual Taste of Palm Harbor event would be held today (Sunday). Bill and I stopped by, walked around, and sampled some of the food that was made available by a number of local participating restaurants. We had a great time and enjoyed the food.

The above picture looks up Florida Avenue, which usually gets blocked off to traffic whenever events are held in Old Palm Harbor.

Tags: Palm Harbor, restaurants