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My husband and I decided to try Kelly's Fishhouse based on all the excellent reviews from Trip Advisor. I wish we had decided to try and find mre reviews. It was our last night in Florida and we really wanted to eat some fresh fish and try the stone crabs before we left. We had been to Handsome Harry's earlier that day for lunch, (which was absolutely fabulous - 2 lunches and a cocktail came to 50.00 including a 17% tip). We were told earlier by some locals to go to Trulucks, but as the evening approached we both felt like not dressing up, but decided to remain casual. So, we googled seafood and Naples and reviews, and it appeared as though this may be a moderately priced casual dress restaurant with excellent reviews, so off we went with high hopes.
It was difficult to find, but we managed to figure out how to get there. We got there about 8:00 p.m. on a Monday night, and our water was brought immediately, pretty much the minute we sat down. The service was friendly, but not outstanding, I will say the waitress had a strong personality. Also, I think I realize why they don't post their prices on their website. I opened the menu and was surprised at the expense. It's sort of the classic overpriced restaurant trap, where you walk into a place you think is inexpensive but don't have any idea exactly what things cost until you open the menu, but then it's hard to get up and leave. Hmm. Maybe that's why they bring the water so fast...
Anyway, we are in Florida and you'd think that fish would be less expensive than it is in the Pacific Northwest, but it's not at Kellys. The appetizers range from 8.00 to 13.50, the dinners are 19.95 to 50.00 something. Desserts are 6.00. In my mind, that's moderately expensive to expensive for a casual dining experience where the candles are electric fluorescent and the waitress is a strong charactered pushy person. But - since we were already there and seated, we decided to order rather than leaving. We ordered the conch fritters, but our waitress talked us into the calamari instead. When it arrived, the order seemed rather small, but the calamari was beautifully done, delicately flavored and the batter was cooked perfectly. We thought okay, we probably made the right choice. Pete ordered the broiled seafood platter for 28.95, and I ordered the stone crab. These come with choice of potato, salad, and hushpuppies. Again, the waitress talked me into the larger size, which was 5 large claws for 44.95, when I had originally asked for 21.95 worth of crabs. The hushpuppies were delivered while we were waiting, although she forgot to ask if we wanted any catsup, and my husband had to forage off a nearby cart. The hushpuppies were okay. They were basic hushpuppies, slightly sweet but not sizzling hot when they came to the table - more like warm. I think hushpuppies should be so hot when delivered that if you split them open, they steam. We asked for sweet tea, and after I was finished with mine, she asked if she could top off my tea with plain tea rather than sweet tea, "and there is sugar on the table". That was really odd to me, but later realized that she was from up North, and so maybe not used to the sweet tea vs regular tea plus sugar idealogy. Our salads were delivered next. Pete had ordered the caesar salad with anchovies, and I had ordered the cole slaw. They were on the smallish side again, but they appeared fresh, and the cole slaw came with a homemade dressing that was tasty. However, when our entrees came, we were sadly disappointed. The broiled platter comes with shrimp and scallop scampi, a half lobster, broiled grouper with a lime sauce and oysters rockefeller. The shrimp and scallops were edible, not well flavored, more like someone dumped some garlic with butter and threw it in with the scallops and shrimp. The lobster was so overcooked that one little claw was burned, and the oysters rockefeller were close to burned. The lobster was tough and the grouper did not taste as good as other grouper I have had. The stone crabs were very good, came precracked with melted butter, but since we haven't had any before, we can't judge what they taste like. We eat lots of Dungeness crab in the Pacific Northwest; this was meatier and slightly sweeter than that, if that's any kind of comparison. We had two beers in addition to our meal. After dinner we ordered the key lime pie. The pie was good, but was not authentic key lime pie, which was the main reason we went to this place, because of the key lime pie reviews. I'm a native Floridian transplant to the Pacific Northwest, and was looking forward to real key lime pie! It was a key lime flavored cheesecake basically, with key lime flavored whipped cream topping, so if you are expecting real key lime pie with meringue, this is not it. It was very delicious, but again, not key lime pie. I wish I had only ordered one piece, but again, at the behest of the waitress, we ordered two. Well, thinking I was getting real key lime pie, I didn't want to share, really. I'm too trusting.
Altogether, for one appetizer, two beers, two sweet teas, 5 large crab claws, one broiled platter, and two desserts, our tab came to a little under 98.00, with tip, 111.00. If the quality had been good, we would have been happy to pay that price, but we felt that our experience was substandard compared to the other reviews we read, and wanted to share what our experience was. I almost feel like I would have a better seafood meal if I'd gone to Winn-Dixie and ordered catfish from the deli! (which by the way, Winn-Dixie has great catfish). We felt the meal was worth closer to half what we paid, but wrote it down to experience.
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