Pantego Bay

The Stuff shrimp is great!!!! They are larger size than I normally get at other places. The customer service is great as well. Definitely going back to this place to try more of their menu.

Give this place another chance; I think you'll find great food, reasonable price, excellent margaritas, all of which can be enjoyed on the party porch!! A great place to meet family and friends.

I had bookmarked this place quite a while back and we never visited until tonight. My hubby stopped in for lunch one day a few weeks back and he really liked it. He is by far the more foodie of the two of us. We were greeted immediately and shown to a booth. The right side is the bar section which had dim lighting, booths and tables. We didn 't venture inside but I suspect there is a bar too! The left side is more the dining area, with fishing stuff everywhere, bright lights, booths and tables. Our server was Hope and she was a gem! Hubby started with 1/2 dozen oysters on the half-shell and proclaimed them good ! One of my sides with my dinner was a salad, which Hope presented to me early so I could eat with hubby. The salad is served in a bowl and Hope served that on a Plate, which kept me from having to struggle to keep the salad confined to the bowl.....great added touch. 1000 Island Dressing (aka Padre Island here) tasted like Kraft.....I was hoping for homemade but it was still ok. Hubby ordered fried catfish, with roasted red potatoes and corn on the cob. Lucky me took the veggies home because he was full! I orders the chicken fried chicken, at the suggestion of Hope, and found it to be huge.....took up over 1/2 the plate.....hot, freshly cooked, flaky batter that held on to the crispy of it.....all blankets in the very smooth, velvety white gravy. Onion rings tasted frozen, non-exciting but passable. Hope was polite, professional, welcoming and quick. We thoroughly enjoyed our visit and will be back.....next time, I am trying the burgers!

Hushpuppies were great. Gumbo isn't traditional gumbo; more roux with meat and rice and too damn hot. No okra or tomatoes or any vegetables. The Beaumont gumbo is a very heavy dark roux with shrimp, crab, crawfish, and fish, according to menu, BUT I couldn't tell what was in there. Was very spicy soup but not gumbo. My friend had the Rockport gumbo with chicken and sausage, and was hot beyond belief. The waitress said it was Cajun so that was why all was spicy. TRUE Cajun isn't this spicy. We ate about half and gave up on it. Thank goodness for hushpuppies.

The old Pantego Braum 's has moved down the street. With a new paint job, a sailboat out front, and a patio added to the front, we have the new Pantego Bay Gulf Coast Cafe. It 's run by a local artist who draws all the goofy Texas themed stuff that you 'd see in car wash lobbies in decades past. I 've been waiting for these guys to open for ever. On baited breath. Seriously. Anxious. And it finally happened. The location is great. There 's no sign that it was a Braum 's. It 's colorful, fun, and reminiscent of a 1980 's Chilis/Fridays. The patio is a little crowded, but very nice with the shutters open. Actually, that 's kinda how the whole thing is. The main dining area and the bar are both very nice, but a little cramped. Still, it 's a great vibe. Well, it was first week jitters, I guess. They opened on a Monday and we were in on Friday. They admitted it 's still soft opening and that they 're working out the kinks. This is understandable. We were there for over two hours. Silverware didn 't come until well after the meal (a problem every table had). Food was cold. Orders were wrong. Drinks were slow. Bartender and staff have no idea what they 're serving in the bar. I ordered a Deep Ellum IPA. They were out and offered me a Lakewood Temptress Imperial Stout because they 're pretty much the same . Took forever to get to go boxes. Took forever to pay. Similar to what others have said just about everything went wrong. On the other hand, they sure tried to win us over despite everything imaginable blowing up in their faces. We got extra rolls. We got porkchops, fried okra, and green beans. When my order was wrong, it was apologized for with onion rings. I mean, really. Instead of the usual lame offer to comp a drink or something, they just kept stuffing me full of food. It worked. The seafood sampler was pretty good. As were the sandwiches. The porkchops, other than being cold, were actually very good. The bar is full of quality Texan beers and liquors. The only disappointment of the night was my Big Roy. A chicken fried steak wrapped in bacon and made into a sandwich sounded incredible. It wasn 't. They admitted to messing it up, but I have no idea what went wrong. It just wasn 't very good at all. I was stuffed with other goodies, though. I 'm gonna give it a few weeks. Their grand opening is in the not too distant future and we 'll see how they recover from this opening week nightmare. Hopefully a glowing re rate is in the works.