Restaurant Review: Bonefish Grill

Bonefish Grill, Ft Lauderdale, FL - dinner on September 25, 2013

My boss took his direct reports out for a team dinner during my first of two back to back trips to Florida a couple of weeks ago. It was the second time we'd gone to Bonefish Grill on one of my visits but prior to that, I had never heard of it before.  According to their website, they have locations across the United States so they're quite the chain but they're not in California, hence my unfamiliarity.

We went on a Wednesday night and that turned out to be a good night to go as the appetizers were all $5 each. Most appetizers at full price are almost $10 so it was like a 50% off deal.  Being finance people, we couldn't not take advantage of that, right?  We ended up getting a couple of the Bang Bang Shrimp appetizers to start off with.  I'm normally a little leery of appetizers in a creamy sauce because many of them have mayonnaise (which I hate) but the Bang Bang Shrimp was pretty good.  The breading was light and retained its crispiness even coated in the sauce.  If the sauce did have mayo in it, it wasn't enough for me to taste it and I'm happy to remain in blissful ignorance as to whether it did or not.

Corn Chowder with Lump Crab

This time, since I was in South Florida and again there was "fish" in the title of the restaurant, unlike the Blue Moon Fish burger, I did opt to go with seafood for dinner, starting with a corn chowder with lump crab.  It was good although the soup was, well, soupy.  I think of chowder as something with thicker, more creamy soup like you typically find in baked potato soup.  Still, it was tasty.

Jumbo Sea Scallops and Shrimp in lemon butter sauce with cheddar mashed potatoes

And it's hard to go wrong with scallops and shrimp which is what I ordered for an entree. At Bonefish Grill, you can choose from a variety of sauces and pick your own side.  I liked the combination I got.  Sometimes scallops can be hit or miss - if you undercook it, the texture is too mushy and it smells fishy.  If you overcook it (which is easy to do, ask me how I know), it's pretty rubbery.  Mine were perfectly done.  And I love shrimp so that's never a bad choice for me.  Unless you burn it to charcoal, I will like any and all shrimp dishes I'm served.

Flourless Macadamia Brownie

But really, again, it's all about dessert.  My team knows me well enough that no matter how full any of us are, I'm going to order dessert. We can all have a spoonful (or three) if that's all we have room for but dessert is a must.  The nice thing about going with a group is, if everyone is full, we can still get a dessert or two just for tasting and there's enough of us that it doesn't go to waste. The Flourless Macadamia Brownie was good although I'm never wild about raspberry sauce with my chocolate.  I know it's the common pairing but to me, chocolate should just be left alone.  Or paired with caramel.  But not any rendition of berries.  That's just my personal prejudice.

But the winning dessert of the evening was the Coconut Pie.  I forgot the official name and the website doesn't list its desserts (what?!?) but it's a wedge of coconut pie with a scoop of ice cream or whipped cream (I can't remember anymore, I was too focused on the pie) in a caramel rum sauce.  Now you know I love all things coconut and despite not liking rum, I forgave the sauce to get to the pie.  Serious goodness.