Taste of the Treasure Coast
Treasure Coast restaurants are ready to serve you, your family and friends with dining, carry-out or delivery
As people settle into the new year, many are trying to be healthier versions of themselves. Some may incorporate a new exercise routine while others drop a serious television-watching habit. But one of the most popular things Americans are doing is to switch to vegetarian and vegan-based diets to lose weight, diminish chronic disease or lessen damage done to the environment.
When Amber Eichling was a teenager, she made...
As a food writer, I am regularly asked about restaurants, recipes and chefs. But the most oft-asked question has to be, “Whatever happened to Ian Greenwood?”
Chef extraordinaire and renowned owner of a dozen Florida restaurants, Greenwood raised the bar in dining excellence, drawing on flavors from around the globe for his inspiration. In 2010, he hung up his toque and headed to Mexico.
When the Dignity Food Truck rolls out of its home base, The Source in Vero Beach, it does so stocked with all the fundamental ingredients to cook-up the sweet and savory taste of success. The Source, a nonprofit, Christian outreach ministry, serves the poor and homeless population by inspiring hope and providing the necessary resources that offer recovery and promise. Thanks to a grant from Impact 100 of Indian River County,
The Source has been able to broaden its signature Dining With Dignity Program with the addition of a food truck.
Ask anyone who either grew up in or visited Fort Pierce in the 1950s through the late 1980s, and they will know of The Peanut Butter Pie. While there may be a couple of variations of it, the heart of this inimitable recipe remains the same. The delicious dessert has been circulating among local families for several decades, but many wonder where the recipe originated from.
“Rumor has it that Mrs. Simonsen’s Peanut Butter Pie recipe was come upon purely by accident,” says Nancy Bennett, a Fort Pierce native and director of the St. Lucie County Regional History Center. “She was trying to make her coconut custard pie but ran out of the coconut and replaced that with peanut butter instead.”
Using advanced technology, the 2nd Street Bistro in downtown Fort Pierce is one of the busiest and most modern restaurants on the Treasure Coast — serving more than 20,000 people a month.
Servers save as many as 2,000 steps a day using hand-held computers to transmit orders and cut down on unneeded trips to and from the restaurant’s three kitchens. With more than 75 employees, the 300-seat restaurant is open every day except Christmas.
Steeped in early Stuart history, Café Martier at the Post Office Arcade has been restored to its original grandeur and now boasts an eclectic fine dining menu with Prohibition-era cocktails served in the original speakeasy bar.
Thanksgiving is once again upon us — a time for family and friends to gather and give thanks for the many blessings throughout the year. And while many look forward to a Rockwellian event replete with mountains of scrumptious fare, most home chefs can attest to at least a few stories of Thanksgiving disasters.
In 2014, a popular fine dining establishment on Ocean Drive in Vero Beach closed its doors. Michael’s Table, the creation of chef /owner Michael Lander, was only open for two seasons yet Lander’s innovative menus and flawless dishes left fans clamoring for more.
You could say Gus Gutierrez is the quintessential mover and shaker. With homes in New York, Switzerland, London and Miami, his interests are as diverse as his travels. Yet lately, the property developer and former designer has set his sights on revitalizing downtown Fort Pierce — a place he recently chose to call home.
When Bobby Del Campo and Sean Tuohy met in college, they never dreamed that 24 years later their paths would intersect from across the state in Vero Beach and they would run a restaurant together.
In the Historic Arts District in Downtown Vero Beach restaurant-goers will find a restaurant devoted to southern cuisine and hospitality.
Southern Social Kitchen and Bar, which opened in 2016, draws a following that includes fans of craft cocktails and progressive twists given traditional southern recipes. The tables are positioned to allow conversation and there are no TV screens or live music. A pleasant mix of blues and light country wafts softly in the background.
It was the late ’70s and Fred Ayres found himself captivated by the laid-back Bahamian lifestyle. Things like conch, rum, and hermit crab racing were just a few of the things that created a wonderful vacation vibe. Originally from Indianapolis and having relocated to Delray Beach, he thought the combination would be a perfect fit for a restaurant back in South Florida. So in 1979, he opened Conchy Joe’s in downtown West Palm Beach.
“It became the place where people would come to try new things,” said Fritz Ayres, Fred’s son and president of the company. “He brought back things like conch and rum drinks and even got a little more adventurous by being one of the first to serve things like gator tail and frog legs.”
With the most oceanfront dining on the Treasure Coast, Cobalt Restaurant serves outside-the-box sizzling food and ice cold drinks inside or out — 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. — for visitors and Vero Beach locals alike.
Located in the posh Vero Beach Hotel and Spa on Ocean Drive, Cobalt offers sweeping views of the Atlantic Ocean and food prepared with “modern American flair.”
Ever since Peter Buchner bused the first table at his mother’s Austrian hillside restaurant as a 6 year old, he knew he would be a restaurateur.
Opened in 1999, Peter’s Steakhouse is referred to by his employees as “the best kept secret in Jensen Beach.” But the fact is, the 85-seat restaurant is known by steak aficionados from around the world and across the United States.
Making memories at Ocean Grill
The Ocean Grill is a rare entity in the restaurant world.
The Vero Beach landmark in Sexton Plaza is a monument to longevity in a business that is highly fickle. It is a touchstone for Vero Beach residents, who can count generations who have dined there. It brings back memories of prom dates, first jobs as relish cart servers, and even the first bite of exotic ingredients like frog legs, raw oysters and escargot. It has loyal employees who have worked there for decades.
Try as he might, Tony Carpentier just can’t stay away from his Shuckers restaurant on Hutchinson Island.
After he sold it late last year, Carpentier was asked to stay on as a consultant to oversee important projects at Shuckers and two other Florida restaurants owned by New York-based ARK Restaurants Inc.
For the past 35 years Bobby’s Restaurant and Lounge on Ocean Drive has been serving locals, tourists and sports celebrities with the same food and atmosphere, bringing them back again and again.
The walls of the lounge are adorned with autographed photos as kind of a shrine to sportsmen and women, coaches and umpires who have visited the restaurant. Owner Bobby McCarthy has history with every person on those walls and is happy to tell you the story.
If you want traditional French fare, made by a French chef, then look no further than Bistro Fourchette (little fork) in Old Downtown Vero Beach.
Formerly a chef at Windsor Country Club, Stephane Becht has transformed the old Melody Inn into a Paris bistro with gilded mirrors, etched smoked screens and white table cloths with red napkins.
In 2007, two teachers/coaches traded their textbooks for aprons to enter the chaotic culinary industry. Nearly 10 years after their head-first dive into restaurant ownership, the two have returned home to test their hard-earned skills by opening the highly popular Taco Dive Downtown Fort Pierce and the newly opened Tace Dive Downtown Vero Beach.
Spoto’s Oyster Bar a gem on the half-shell
Few restaurants on the Treasure Coast offer diners expansive water views, fresh seafood dishes, sushi, house-made desserts and signature cocktails at a reasonable price.
Located next to Stuart City Hall, Spoto’s Oyster Bar was remodeled and reopened in 2013 by John Spoto, who runs a second restaurant of the same name in Palm Beach Gardens. Once considered for demolition by the city to be replaced with a hotel, the building has been home to a half-dozen restaurants since the late 1970s, when it first opened as Lori’s Landing.