At this point I’ve been to the Bonefish Grill on three separate occassions. The BFG is not particularly inexpensive.  Considering how stingy I can be, that speaks volumes for the Bonefish.  Each experience has been fairly pleasant; the waitstaff are courteous and quick with your food.  Each time it looked like they were over-staffed but considering the level of service we received on each trip it makes sense that they have 50 people to be at the server station at all times.  This would be the perfect time to include a picture of the server station stuffed to the gills (har har har), but me being ‘Johnny-come-lately’ I didn’t think of it at the time.

(I don’t know why, but in low-light I manage to take even worse pictures than usual.)

The atmosphere of the dining room is a very ‘polished’ casual dining feel.  You will see folks in button-downs and sports jackets, but you will also see folks like me… just wearing a t-shirt and shorts.  I do like the layout of this particular restaurant.  The design lends itself to a degree of spaciousness but the lighting and tables help provide a warm and cozy feeling without being cramped.

The occasion that I took all of these pictures was the night before Sia’s sister flew back to Michigan.  This was our first visit to the restaurant and we were worried that they wouldn’t be open when we arrived (the county I lived in felt like it went Amish after 9pm on a ‘weeknight’, lights-out son! Grow them beards!)  As this was our first trip to the Bonefish, we were unsure of what to order.  Being the bright-bulbs we are, 2 of us ordered red-meat dishes.  Now, don’t get me wrong, the food we ordered was perfectly fine but it wasn’t stellar.  A word from the wise, if a restaurant denotes what it’s serving in it’s name you may want to stick to that; for instance, don’t go to a Steak House and order the Vegan platter… why do that?  This being a ‘fish’ joint, we should’ve ordered a fish-dish.

To kick off the meal we ordered Edamame (edamame is a recurring theme for appetizers.  My old lady loves it, at this point I don’t know how many times in my future edamame will be the appetizer of choice, I’m guessing 1,794 with an over/under of 300.  It’s alright though, I enjoy edamame).

On this trip I ordered the “American Style Kobe Beef Burger.”  The burger was satisfying, but it was a generic burger that you could pretty much get anywhere that cooks burgers (fast-food aside); it’s like ordering Chicken Fingers, there are no surprises when the food shows up.   The Burger was juicy but despite being ordered medium it showed up as well-done. They also served the burger with these in-store-made chips that have been seasoned with salt.  The chips were alright, but I didn’t eat all of them.  If someone drags you to the Bonefish Grill and you absolutely hate seafood then you’ll have something to order.

One of the ladies ordered a side-salad.  What’s strange is that the salad came with a whole cheese-stick… like the kind you buy from the store to pack in your kids’ lunches.  Other than that, the components of the salad looked delicious:

The other poor lout of the group ordered a Steak.  The knife and fork look a little gross, but she was cutting the steak and I asked to get a shot before the plate got butchered. Thus, the dirty fork and knife.

Sia ordered the reason to come back.  The dish she ordered was called “Huge Wild Shrimp Pad Thai.”  The food showed up with its own little carrier of spicy-oils, red pepper flakes, and other accoutrements to spice and garnish to your own eye-watering delight.

The shrimp were quite large but didn’t lack any flavor considering the size.  We all ended up having a bite of her dish and became surprisingly and unfortunately aware that our dishes sucked in comparison.  I mean, they sucked HARD, like Dyson vacuum suction.  Sia would later go on to order this dish one more time on a subsequent trip, and it was stellar that time as well.  On subsequent trips we ordered the Ceviche (my first experience with ceviche and it was great), received free appetizers (One time the manager just gave my old lady a free-appetizer-card after she ranted that her food was the best thing she had all week.  I did a survey over the phone to get a free appetizer, pretty-girls have it easy), and ordered moderately priced drinks.

At the end of our first trip, I asked for a picture of our server and she obliged but with a quizzical look.  The girls didn’t help make the situation any less awkward as they proposed that I was some kind of sexual deviant.  Either way, this was our server on my first visit but I don’t recall her name.  Thanks nameless girl for letting me take your picture and showing up with our food and drinks in a timely manner:

(her eyes have been blanked out to protect the innocent)

Atmoshphere: Rating: 4 out of 5 stars (it’s a little too polished, I like being in a dive)
Service: Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
Food: Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
Overall: Rating: 5 out of 5 stars (I’d give it a 4.8, but rounded up for the sake of the rating system)

On the whole, the Bonefish Grill has been a good experience.  I would highly recommend it to anyone looking for a place to eat with a nice atmosphere, great food, and good service.

-Matt in Tampa

2328 Sunset Point Rd
Clearwater, FL 33765-1427
(727) 723-2346

Well, how to describe the Sunset Grill?  Home of the Crypt Keeper with a full bar?  An old-folks-home Cafeteria?  All I know is that the decor puts you in mind of being at someone’s alcoholic-Grandmother’s home.  Before you enter you’re assaulted by a faux-StripClub lighting scheme:

Upon entering the realm of the elderly you get a view of the full bar.  When I first entered I was a bit taken aback by the full bar.  The Sunset Grill vibe lends itself to more of a “family friendly” kind of theme like a Perkins or Bill Knapps (if those are even around anymore). Close seconds for relating to this vibe are Ram’s Horn restaurants and half of the Coney Islands in the Detroit area.  The most astounding part of the full bar was that someone was actually sitting at the bar and imbibing.

The next two shots really let you soak in the wrinkles.  There’s nothing wrong with old-folks, but an older crowd generally signifies milk-toast flavors.  If I ever hit 80 years old, I don’t know that I’ll want to chow down on something that really explodes in my mouth as it’s liable to make a forcible exit later.  So, the patronage and fake pussy-willow stalks filled me with a sense of foreboding.  Mediocrity may pervade.

In the vein of fulfilling your alcoholic-Grandparent’s desires, there is a ledge that rings the entire dining room of the restaurant.  This ledge is littered with random beer steins.  Now, in another setting this might play to the establishment’s favor but these beer steins are collecting dust.  Instead of doing something interesting like letting patrons pick a stein from the wall to drink from they are merely ceremonial vestments to remind you that Grandma and Grandpa used to throw a couple back in their day.  This reminds me of my own Grandmother’s house where she has random trinkets and figurines lining the kitchen walls that are collecting just as much dust.  Who decided that this would be a good idea?  This is willfully presenting your junk to the world like it’s something to be proud of.  If it’s never going to be touched put it in a box and throw it in the basement or attic.  Enough of my kvetching, onto the Menu:

This actually isn’t the full-menu.  This is the placemat/specials menu. Unfortunately my phone couldn’t take a legible photo, but most of the items are classic American cuisine (Beef Tips with Noodles kind of shit).  The bonus to this joint is that everything is under $15.   I decided to order the ‘All You Can Eat Fried Fish’ for $9.95. Typically I steer clear of all-you-can-eat specials/items as I rarely get my money’s worth of food or the food is so god-awful that it becomes more of a “All-You-Can-Stomach” challenge.  That challenge is essentially a vain attempt to recoup my wasted dollars, unfortunately it’s a battle I always lose.  I ended up with the Fish-Challenge because it didn’t look like their were any other takers in this Land of Sagging Flesh and Liver Spots so I was hoping I wouldn’t get fried fish that had over-baked in the kitchen’s heat lamps.  One nice thing about The Sunset Grill is that with most meals you get soup/salad and bread.  I opened with Cream of Broccoli (it could’ve used far more broccoli).

As you can see, it’s all suitable diner fare.  The cream of broccoli was actually quite decent and served hot.  If you’ve visited a diner, you may have had an occasion where you received tepid soup, and I find that quite unpleasant.  Unless I’m being served Gazpacho or something similar, I want my soup so hot that it could blister my mouth and will burn my hands if I get a little too grabby with it.  This gives you more time to dip bread into the soup while waiting for it to cool.

The nice thing about the fried fish is that it wasn’t fish parts reconstituted into a triangle or square or some other non-fish shape… I actually received a fillet.  The fish tasted like it was hand battered and then deep fried, my only beef (or lack thereof, har har har) was that one of the pieces wasn’t scaled well enough and ended up getting chewy at one end.   I ended up ordered another batch of fish, as I did get the ‘All You Can Eat Fish.”  Doing so was a mistake as I could only muscle down half of a fillet of the 3 brought.  The Sunset Grill also gets a little stingy and won’t let you take home the remains of the ‘All You Can Eat Fish,’ which in retrospect is fine as the fish wasn’t anything to call home about.

Above are the still remains of a fish uneaten.  Sorry fish for not fulfilling your purpose in this world and consuming you.

In the end, the atmosphere warrants a Rating: 3 out of 5 stars.  Aside from feeling like I was eating at a retirement home, the ambiance wasn’t awful.

The food pulled a solid Rating: 3 out of 5 stars.  I suspect that they make a killer-something here but I certainly didn’t order it today.  If you have a large appetite for fish, you could do worse than order the ‘All You Can Eat Fried Fish’ special at The Sunset Grill, but if you want to be wowed I would steer clear.

-Matt in Clearwater

(727) 210-1313

Twins reunite! Sia’s sister came to visit us and this meant it was a time for celebration.  In their case, a time to get crab-tastic!  What better way to enjoy some food than to have a sip and then head out?  Driving to “Irritable Bill’s” we had 2 Pac cranked to full blast.  We flipped to some classics like ‘Dear Momma’, ‘What’s your Phone Numba?’, and ‘Thug Passion.’  Thug Passion immediately incited a tirade on my part that this drink needed to be recreated at some point in the night.  What’s ‘Thug Passion’ you ask?  Why it’s 1-part Alize to 1-part Cristal (champagne), what better way to relive some 2 Pac than to drink some Thug Passion (unfortunately this is still an unrealized dream of mine)?  With the windows down we passed by street lights through downtown Dunedin on our way to Clearwater Beach.  The neon lights emitting a consistent glow on one side and on the other the dour face of the Scientologist building.  As we approached Irritable Bill’s you could taste the salt on the air and what better way to offset salt than with a cold beverage, say hello cheap beer!

A couple of Yeunglings later our food began to arrive.  The ladies ordered some salads to go with their crab. The side salads were the general fare you can expect for side salads, the components looked moderately fresh but nothing to call your grandmother about. I ordered Frog Legs (which I later found out came from North Carolina) and french fries.  I wanted to try something I have never had before, thus the froggies. The frog legs tasted as they had been described to me, fairly neutral and chicken-like.  It was like eating overpriced chicken wings.  The allure was to eat a meat I had never tried before, but to be frank… fried things generally taste the same as other fried things.

They were fairly good considering that you can find these guys in your front lawn, especially when drenched with hotsauce (Crabby Bill’s house brand, which tastes similar to a mix of ‘Louisiana Hot Sauce’ and ‘Frank’s Redhot’).  If anything, the frog legs didn’t have enough natural flavor.  They were missing something to make you go “WOW”, and they were a little over-cooked.   The downside to the frog legs are the price. For something that you can catch on the side of the road, you expect to pay less than a chicken wing.

The crab legs were prepared in a different manner since the last time we had visited (see the previous Crabby Bill’s entry).  They appeared to have been treated to some kind of bay spice, and now more of the crab body was served.  Unfortunately they didn’t serve the whole crab body, leaving you wanting for some of that delicious crab-roe.

A night of delicious crab, mediocre frog legs, and cheap drinks makes for a good time.  If you come visit the Tampa/Clearwater, Florida area I would add this to the intinerary.  I have yet to find a better joint to get some crab appendages.  I hope to eventually find a bit more ‘authentic’ of a restaurant experience… something where you can tell that the restaurant is purchasing their sea-food locally.  Until then, “Irritable Bill’s” will have to do.

The food gets a Rating: 3 out of 5 stars as the Frog Legs were expensive and far from my best meal.

The experience merited an overall: Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

-Matt in Clearwater Beach, FL.

Shiki is located in an unassuming location; tucked away in a strip mall. To Shiki’s right is a Dollar Tree, and to the left is… well I can’t remember but there is an Ace Hardware and a Publix on the same lot. In essence, there is a lot of generic strip mall bullshit. Before walking into the restaurant for the first time I had a crippling desire to spray-paint ‘da’ preceeding Shiki, it just felt so right. I put my desctructive tendencies on hold to see what this joint offered.

When I walked into Shiki, the first thing I noticed was the complete lack of goofy shit on the walls.  The place was austere and clean.  There were a minimum of wall hangings and statuettes.  You weren’t crushed under the swinging paws of 30 smiling cat statues or the gleeful gaze of 50 gilded buddhas peering over your shoulder at your food.

The sushi is made by two chefs who spit Nihongo (Japenese) back and forth in a quickfire.  The lead chef is an older guy who has a glint in his eye that says, “I can cut the shit outta some fish.”  Either that or a look of, “Sweet baby Ray my hands reek like a fish market! Yucky, Yucky, Yucky!”

After we sat down, menus were brought to us along with hot towels to wipe our hands (traditional practice prior to eating sushi/sashimi).  Along with the towels was a peculiar concoction that is essentially cold and sweet ramens.  The noodles were slightly al dente and delicious.

My old lady ordered edamame (baby soy bean sprouts).  They were warm and lightly covered in salt, absolutely wonderful.  Eating this edamame was like getting a fresh order of tender, hot, salty nuts at the ballpark.  I could just order a big bowl of edamame from Shiki and eat that for my meal (maybe with a cold beer on the side and a game on the tv).

With our entrees we received miso soup and a salad dressed with ginger dressing.

I find something decidedly wonderful about “Asian salad dressing” (ginger dressing).  It’s sweet, tangy, and always leaves me wanting more.  The bright ginger flavor brings a unique element to the standard salad from a restaurant.  The ginger flavor is complimented well by the miso.

Sia ordered the Chirashi Sushi Box.  It came loaded with Sushi rice as well as a slew of fish, pickled veggies, and a nori ‘salad’.  I can’t speak to how the dish tasted, but it looked delectable:

I ordered the Kaisendon.  This isn’t a dish that a person new to Sushi should try unless they absolutely fell in love after their first visit/experience.  Essentially it’s a bowl of sushi rice, raw fish, fresh vegetables (nori, ginger), pickled vegetables, and topped with sesame seeds.  The textures available were amazing; in the same bite you could have fresh salmon and then a bit of cabbage that’s been treated to cumin.  When you get the dish, you also receive a spicy sauce that you can add to to really marry all the flavors together. The sauce had sesame seed oil, wasabi, and chili powder.  It really carried some kick that accentuated the existing flavors in the dish.

Shiki has been my best restaurant experience thus far in Tampa.  They offer a wide variety of sushi rolls that start at $3.50 and can bump above $10.

Here are their sushi specials (there is another list of more generic sushi choices):

In the end, I was extremely pleased with the experience I had at Shiki on two occasions.  The sheer excellence of what I received made me forever curb my wanton desire to spray paint the joint, but in my heart this place will always be known as “Da-Shiki Sushi, home of Deliciousness.”

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars (An easy decision to rate this a 5 star experience)

-Matt

The girlfriend and I decided to go to Crabby Bill’s on a muggy summer evening. We had gone together once before, and we decided to come back because she loves crab-legs (on the last outing the Snow Crab legs were delicious, I snuck a taste). Immediately after crossing the Clearwater Memorial Causeway you’re assualted by the typical tourist-shit; surf shops, neon-lights, and families with backpacks and flip-flops dragging little Johnny along. By this time there are no girls in bikini’s, just loud music and motorcycles.

When you enter Crabby Bills, it’s a bit like walking into a beach-side CrAppleby’s. There’s the same goofy, campy shit on the walls, a tired server with listless eyes counting down the time left, and a bar. I’m fine with the bar. Going to Crabby Bill’s on a Thursday proves fruitful as a cup of anything on tap is about $2. The atmosphere is clearly a drag, but the menu looks alright. On my last visit I made the mistake of ordering the Fried Platter, which was fine for what it was but you are pretty much just eating overpriced batter and grease.

The appetizer comes out, we ordered the Seared Mahi-Mahi. The tuna is seared and then rolled in Basel and Parsely. We’re disappointed that it wasn’t rolled in pepper or something a little more suitable for seared tuna. Unfortunately the Mahi-Mahi is a bit on the warm side, it felt like it hung out under the lamp leaving the interior with a skin-temperature level of heat. The saving grace is that the flavor is spot-on. As you can see the side-salad is the average fare.

Our entrees come out, I ordered the Broiled Platter which comes with Scallops, Grouper, Shrimp, Conch Fritter, Southern-style Green Beans, and French Fries:

I first break into the scallops; they’ve been cleaned well and were broiled in butter. Pretty fucking delicious. They’ve been cleaned properly, so no sand to grate between your teeth. I next tear into the Conch Fritter, it tastest akin to a spicy crab cake. If you haven’t had one before, it’s like eating a bite of moist, spicy, corn bread. The shrimp and the grouper are on par with everything else. The fries are fries… fried, greasy, delciious. If you haven’t had Grouper, it’s very similar to cod or whitefish… very neutral not much ‘fish’ flavor. For the unitiated, Southern-style green beans are a combination of “No he just didn’t” and “Why didn’t I think of this?” Essentially, someone decided to dice some onions, cook some bacon and then marry it with green beans. If this won’t get your kid to eat vegetables, you’re raising a lost cause. Leave it at the next church you pass.

The girlfriend’s entrée is as follows:

I didn’t sample her entire plate, but I did have a bit of the crab. She has found that Snow Crab has more base-’Crab’ flavor than the King Crab and I heartily agree. After trying a bite the first-time-round, I had to have another taste to be convinced this wasn’t some trick (my previous experiences with Crab were in a Crab Rangoon, a poor decision to order All-You-Can-Eat-King-Crab-Legs at the ‘World Buffet’ [behind the Lansing mall in Lansing, MI... next to the Salvation Army.  Salvation Army and Buffet go hand-in-hand right?], and that synthetic stuff at a friend’s house). The texture of crab isn’t particularly remarkable, it’s like eating a bite of filet mignon… it’s tender. The part of this that intrigued me was that the crab itself tasted somewhat buttery yet wasn’t dipped in butter. If you’re a crab fan, I would highly suggest Snow Crab Legs.

In closing, this trip may have been “enhanced” by imbibing 3 or 4 Yuenglings. According to Chris (another contributor to the site, just not yet) Yuengling originated from PA, but there is a local brewery for them here in Tampa. It’s like a classier Budweiser. It’s smooth, with an almost milky back-end yet not as rich as a Blue-moon or an Oberon. The prices weren’t great (other than the beer), the décor was a turn off, but the food was delish.

CRUSTACEAN ATTACK ATTACK!

-Matt in Tampa
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars