Apalachicola Eating!

Cooking on vacation is the last thing most people want to do, unless you’re my husband. Eric does a small amount when we’re traveling, hence one main reason for staying at apartments or AirBNBs.

However…………..food & local restaurants are a key part of most vacation experiences. We’re no exception. Let’s talk about some Apalach eating highlights on this trip.

A recent addition to our Panhandle restaurant list has been The (Red Pirate) Wheel House. Nope, didn’t get an actual picture of the red pirate, but they do have one right inside the entrance.

A good deal of the time we eat at the bar if that is an option. This day PLENTY of barstools were available. Yep, that’s a bar. Didn’t plan on taking a photo with the beer taps front and center, but there you have it. NO, we did not order a Bud Light. They had some local beers on tap but they were hard to read from this shot.

Naturally started with a dozen oysters – raw. Wish I could tell you where these were from. Eric asked each time he ordered some, but I didn’t keep track.

Add in some fried pickles for me while we waited for our meal. We’re picky about our fried pickles – they need to be sliced (not quartered), like what is seen below. These were some of the better ones we’ve ordered.

Fried flounder sandwich for myself and fried shrimp for Eric. No room for dessert.

One ‘can’t miss’ stop is Indian Pass Raw Bar. I’ve heard for years that it was a dive bar, driven past it years ago and truthfully, it didn’t look much. The restaurant was seriously damaged (flooded) during one of the many (recent) Florida hurricanes and they had no choice but to gut the inside and rebuild. Nothing pretentious, but a clean, open, inside & outside eating that serves primarily seafood. There are a few things on the menu for a meat/non-seafood lover.

Not pretentious at all. Your dozen oysters come out on a plastic cafeteria tray.

Throw in some smoked mullet fish dip and peel & eat shrimp and that’s plenty of food for the two of us.

This place operates on the honor system, which is seen with your ‘ticket’, given to you once you find a place to sit. Place a tic mark for each of the items and you’re golden. When done, take the ticket to the cash register, no questions asked. BTW, you even pour your own beer from a tap – seen behind Eric’s shoulder on the back wall.

There might have been a tiny bit of room for dessert such as their key lime pie. Last visit we l.o.v.e.d their key lime pie and asked about their pie-maker. It came from an industrial kitchen on their weekly order. No matter, it was tasty. We had to have it again and it did not disappoint.

One evening, we need a light meal and walked to The Station. No surprise, you’re going to see another dozen oysters from that visit. This time needed 6 more of the bi-valves before leaving the premises. Oh, and another piece of key lime pie. Sorry, no photo, we dug in before I thought of it.

One sunny afternoon we went back to the Half Shell Dockside Oyster Bar & Grill, which had been our first stop the day we arrived. They had a pirate!

They have an outside bar adjacent to their ‘normal’ restaurant with garage doors raised during fair weather. It was beautiful the day we visited.

Surprise! ha, ha. We started with oysters and smoked fish dip.

We both ordered more food to finish our meal.

There was a lot of FRIED food on this trip. 😦 I should have eaten some salad. 😦

Okay, so there was one morning when we walked to this hole in the wall Baked shop. They specialized in biscuits, plain or as a sandwich. That’s a pretty ‘focused’ menu – just saying. They opened at 6:30am – 11am or until the biscuits ran out.

Thought you were done with oysters. Nope. We had a dozen one evening at our rental.

Eric had got a name for farm-raised oysters – sold to the public – and got a tour of their aquatic oyster growing operation.

Dang, I missed out 😦

We brought 100 oysters home to continue enjoying the bounty from the bay.

Eight dozen oysters was the total for this trip. It took me awhile to get into eating them, but once I did, they were great with a bit of grated horseradish and a drop of cocktail sauce or crystal.

ginny