Did Ya’ Hear?
By Mary Craft
Drive & Dive Eats will be opening in the old Sonic and will serve fresh fried seafood, a variety of gourmet hotdogs like Baja style and fresh homemade, never frozen, burgers with homemade fries. It will have a full liquor bar with specialty cocktails, frozen drinks and they say their old fashioned will be the best around. There will be a small bar inside the 1406 sq. ft. building and the outside front area up to the sign will be enclosed with a bar. They will be open for lunch and dinner daily and may stay open to serve food on weekends until 3 am. All the permitting has been done and they are hoping to open by spring break. The final decision on the name may incorporate “Calypso” in it.
The Winter Country & Czech Music Fest will be at the Moravian Hall at 5601 Kostoryz on Saturday, February 17th noon – 6 pm. The Majek Orchestra and The Red Ravens will provide the entertainment. There will be food, drinks and kolaches for purchase. Admission is $15 and kids 12 and under are free.
Brooklyn Pie specials for your Super Bowl Party are five large cheese pies $55, five large specialty pies $75, 50 wings $50 and two large one topping pies $22.
The Marker 37 Marina fishing pier has reopened and hours are 5:30am-4:30pm daily. The charge is $5/person and $2/pole. They also have onsite fish cleaning and they can cook your catch at The Pearl next door. No outside food or drinks are allowed.
The cut-through of water to the neighborhood canals is expected by the end of the month.
Island Joe’s Coffee parking lot is now being worked on so it should be available soon.
Port Aransas Community Theater presents “The Play that goes Wrong” Thursday – Saturday until February 23rd. It’s a hybrid of Monty Python and Sherlock Holmes that’s guaranteed to make you laugh. Tickets are $22.
The Commodores bridgework has begun so the detour through the Whitecap development is now being use.
Valentine’s Day Island restaurant options:
Black Sheep Bistro for starter is serving a glass of house wine and soup or salad. Appetizer choices are smoked brisket and pork nachos, smoked steelhead, little devils or spicy mini pork tacos. Entree choices shrimp and scallops Alfredo pasta, 6 oz beef tenderloin with a crab and lobster cake atop mashed potatoes and sautéed vegetables, apple bourbon glazed pork chop or poblano chicken breast with garlic mashed potatoes and vegetables. Dessert choices are tiramisu, bread pudding with caramel or bread pudding with peanut butter and chocolate. The dinner is $120/couple.
Merida’s Tapas & Cantina will be serving a four course dinner for $75/person. For starter choose tartar de Atur or truffle mushroom arancini. Next creamy onion, potato, leek soup and side salad. Entrees are garlic parsley crusted halibut, Jamon y quest stuffed chicken breast or filet mignon. Dessert is chocolate tres leches or cream puff trio. Stevie Start will provide the romantic croons. The first seating will be at 5 pm.
Hardknocks Sports Grill will be serving the Big Papa with four Alaskan snow crab clusters, 16 jumbo shrimp, corn and potatoes with two draft beers. It will be sold for $55 and is normally $76.
The Angry Marlin appetizer choices are lobster & shrimp quesadilla, spinach & artichoke dip or calamari. Entree choices are 12 oz prime rib, NY strip or pork Osso Bucco with garlic mashed potatoes and green beans. Blackened redfish with cajun cream sauce, sesame crusted tuna with lemon beurre blanc sauce or panko crusted flounder served with rice and green beans. Dessert choices are vanilla creme brûlée, peach cobbler, gluten free brownie bottom pie or bread pudding with caramel. It’s $100/couple.
The Pearl will start the meal with a colossal shrimp cocktail and beets and goat cheese salad. Entrees include scallops with wild mushroom risotto, chicken piccata with fresh veggies and a creamy lemon caper butter or surf & turf with an 8 ounce filet and 10 ounce lobster tail. Desserts are strawberry cobbler or chocolate pot de creme with banana ice cream. Robert McCoy and Eric Graham will be providing the music.
Guajillo’s will feature “Bacalao a la Vizcaina”which is a Basque region of Spain style codfish stew and a bottle of Belle Glow pinot noir wine for $60/couple. This dinner is served for special occasions in Spanish speaking countries.
Island Time will feature the surf and turf tenderloin and lobster and a couple of sushi specials with strawberries, going with the Valentine’s theme.
Island Italian, which is normally closed on Wednesdays, will be open on Valentine’s Day 5 – 9:30 pm. One of the Island favorites Ruben Limas will provide the love songs. They are not accepting reservations, walk-ins only.
Costa Sur will be doing a surf & turf with steak and lobster.
The Boathouse Bar & Grill dinner for two is redfish over rice with shrimp cream sauce or NY sirloin with mash potatoes, two salads and a bottle of house wine.
Doc’s Seafood & Steaks starters are clam chowder or spinach strawberry salad. Special entrees are red snapper piccata, parmesan crusted flounder with shrimp sauce, seafood tomato basil linguine with jumbo Gulf shrimp and scallops, NY strip with sautéed scallops and chicken marsala. Dessert is chocolate tres leches cheesecake.
Packery Bar & Grill will be serving a 14 oz ribeye with loaded baked potato and fried or blackened local fresh bay shrimp or drum for $35 starting at 6pm. The Migas Trio will provide the music. They serve this ribeye with potato every Monday for $17.99. On Saturdays starting around noon enjoy oysters on the half shell for $20/dozen and oysters Rockefeller for $24/dozen. The Rockefellers are made with vermouth and
fresh spinach. Last week, their first oyster day, they sold 360 oysters so get there early before they are gone. Every Thursday is Reggae Night with music starting at 7 pm. They also added a fish cleaning station this week.
Random Stuff
Pillsbury Cornbread Swirls are amazing and, of course, even better with butter. It has more of a texture of a dinner roll. Directions say to bake in a muffin pan but mine came out great in a pie pan. If you would like more of a bread texture they came out with Grands cornbread bisquits a few months ago but not available locally yet.
ClearClick 2.0 is a great way to get rid of those boxes of VHS tapes you have. You need a VCR, I borrowed one from a friend. but you do not need to hook it up to a TV. You can watch the video on the screen of the device, which you attach a flash drive to, and push record on the parts you want to save. You pop the flash drive in your computer and label the videos. I created a YouTube channel so I could upload any size movie there and share with my family in Chicago. You can even edit them on YouTube. You can make them public or specify certain emails. The Amazon cost is about $160.
Nutella B-ready is a light, flaky crispy wafer with creamy Nutella inside that is a snack that the kids would love in their lunch bag as a dessert treat. Throw some in your desk drawer or purse for a delicious 110 calorie, 15g carb sweet tooth snack. Interestingly, they are made in Italy where the hazelnut spread Nutella was created in 1964. I discovered it at CVS. My friends who have never had Nutella loved it.
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Peace out.
