Swamp House Grill in Debary, FL

Swamp House Grill is located in the Highbanks Marina in Debary. The restaurant has both indoor and outdoor seating which provide scenic views of the Saint Johns River flowing past. They have a varied menu, serving seafood, steaks, salads, sandwiches, and more.

I had their crab cake sandwich on one visit to the Swamp House Grill. This consisted of two crab cakes with lettuce, tomato, and tartar sauce served on baguette style bread. The crab cakes were good and I was able to detect crab in them, unlike some other crab cakes I've had elsewhere where they seem to be all filler. Homemade potato chips were served on the side.

I had the grouper ruben on another visit. The ruben was served on marbled rye bread, filled with blackened grouper, coleslaw, swiss cheese, and thousand island dressing. This was a very tasty sandwich, although sauerkraut rather than coleslaw seems to be used on most of the rubens I've had in the past. The Swamp House was very generous with the amount of fish on the sandwich as well, which is always a good thing. Fried onion frazzles came as my side.

I enjoy Swamp House Grill. The food has been good on every one of my visits. The views of the river are nice. You get to watch alligators swim by as you eat. Certain menu items at the restaurant do seem steeply overpriced for what they are, but otherwise I have few complaints about Swamp House Grill.

RiverGrille on the Tomoka in Ormond Beach, FL

On July 4th, I ate dinner at the RiverGrille on the Tomoka while on my way to the beach to watch fireworks.

The restaurant is situated at the top of a steep hill overlooking the Tomoka River. With such a scenic location, we decided to sit outside on the patio.

If I remember correctly, I had the Atlantic Seafood Pasta (I tried double checking the name on their online menu, but the PDF file is so large it crashes my internet). This penne pasta was topped with shrimp, scallops, mussels, clams, sundried tomatoes, and artichoke hearts in a cream sauce. Garlic bread was served on the side. Unlike other seafood restaurants, RiverGrille did a really nice job with their pasta. I would order this again in a heartbeat, with my only complaint being that one of the mussels was served closed, thus inedible.

As I ate my pasta, I got to enjoy the view of the Tomoka. There was lots of alligators and big catfish swimming by...

Corky Bell's in East Palatka, FL

While in Palatka, I ate dinner at Corky Bell's Seafood & Steaks. The restaurant had a 10-15 minute wait when I arrived, so I filled the time by admiring the wonderful view of the St. Johns River.

Soon, the buzzer went off and it was time to be seated. My meal started out with a nice side-salad with oil & vinegar.

For my main course, I choose the two item seafood dinner. I went with the grilled shrimp and blackened fish. The type of fish wasn't identified on the menu, nor did I ask what type it was, but I was served a nice flaky white fish. The seafood came with a side of cheese grits and two hush puppies. Everything served with this meal was really tasty!

The service was a little strange at Corky Bell's, but the food was good and the restaurant's location on the river was great!

Riverwalk Pizza

I had a coupon for a free ten inch pizza from Riverwalk Pizza in Sanford, FL. I wasn't expecting much, especially for free, but the pizza was really good. It had a nice and thin crispy crust. I liked the sauce and it was well proportioned to the cheese. I think I'll definitely have to return to Riverwalk and get another pizza!

One thing I don't really get about the restaurant is it's building. The building is on the water in the middle of the Monroe Harbour Marina, and yet whoever designed the building made it so you don't have a view of the river from most of the restaurant's windows. Instead, you see the Senior Citizens Center across the street. I'm assuming the building was intended for restaurants when it was built (it originally opened with a Dalli's Pizza). People seem to like restaurants with views of water, so I don't really get why this building's architect choose not to make the St. Johns a focal point.

Limoncellos Waterfront Ristorante

A $5 off coupon brought me into Limoncellos Waterfront Restorante in the Sanford Marina along Lake Monroe.

Garlic bread was ordered as a appetizer. Rather than the normal Italian restaurant garlic bread, Limoncellos gave slices of bread with a bowl of roasted garlic in oil. It was unexpected, but was a nice surprise. I really like roasted garlic.

I was debating about whether to get gnocchi or a calzone, and finally ended up ordering the Calzone Primavera. The calzone was filled with red peppers, onions, eggplant, broccoli, ricotta, and mozzarella. I enjoyed it.

If you eat outside on the restaurant's patio, you get this wonderful view of the St. Johns River.

I liked Limoncellos. The view was great, the food was better than many other local Italian restaurants, and the prices weren't bad either.


UPDATE: I did like Limoncellos a whole lot on my first visit, which I wrote about above. Second visit, not so much. Horrible service, bad food, and the bottle of vinegar for my salad was filled with flies...