What better way to start the day than with breakfast? We found a number of tasty options nearby and barely scratched the surface of the local offerings.
In all our prior years visiting Destin, we'd never succeeding in playing with food at the Destin Diner - it was a cool looking old railcar style place, but always seemed to be between owners during our February visits. The current operators of the space (now called
Mary's Kitchen) have remedied this. They also operate a second Mary's Kitchen at Uptown in Fort Walton Beach, which is open until 8pm for dinner. The Destin version is open from 7:30am until 2:30pm, and offers daily "Blue Plate" specials beginning at 11:30am for lunch in addition to the generous breakfast and lunch menus. Due to the number of meals we ate there, Mary's will get it's own post. However, our first breakfast at Mary's, on our first morning in Destin, warrants a preview here.
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| Bob's Pancakes |
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| Half Order of Biscuits & Sausage Gravy |
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| My side of cheese grits |
Bob's pancakes were light and dreamy. I honestly didn't love the sausage tossed into the gravy, but the white gravy itself was delicious and the biscuits were light and airy. They told me their biscuit maker makes them from scratch daily and they certainly tasted like it! People tend to love grits or hate them; I am in the former category and found these creamy, cheesy and serviceable. A lovely start!
Our next breakfast adventure took us back to a place that didn't really impress in years past, but has upped their game quite nicely.
The Donut Hole now has three locations; on this trip, we dined at two of them. The original, in Destin, impressed us both times we visited.
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| Bob's: The Everything. 2 eggs, sausage, cheese grits (subbed in for homefries), 2 pancakes. |
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| Mine: Texas Sweet Potato Pancakes with Praline Sauce |
The quantity of food provided two full meals for each of us, and then some. But more important was the quality, which was very good and delivered at very reasonable price points. More of Donut Hole will appear in a later post.
We enjoyed two breakfasts at
The Pancakery, just up the street from us. While they do use liquid egg product for their omelets, the fillings I sampled tasted of freshness and quality.
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| Mine: Crabcake Omelet |
They get the crab cakes already made from their vendor, which they said was a local product. They also source local shrimp for omelet making, but we didn't sample it. This mammoth plate gave me two meals, with some to spare! The quality of the filling and presentation of this dish almost made up for the use of liquid egg product. And to accompany this savoriness:
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| Sand Dollar Pancakes |
What a treat! Why get a side of food service bread toast when there are freshly made pancakes in the house?
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| Bob's: Strawberry Fields, pancakes filled with strawberries and topped with strawberry compote. |
This was a little too sweet for my palate, but Bob loved it.
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| Gone Bananas: Filled with fresh bananas and served with bananas foster sauce. |
We both ordered this on our second visit, and didn't love it as much as our first visit. The Bananas Foster Sauce had a strong margarine/butter substitute flavor that wrecked the dish for us. So the trick to enjoying the Pancakery is to order carefully - they do a fabulous job with the pancakes themselves and some of the toppings are worthy. We will definitely return.
Crackings was recommended by our realtor, who is a food guy and is married to another food lover. Originally part of the still-existing “Another Broken Egg” chain, but recently taken independent by its owners, Crackings still felt (and tasted) way too chain like. It wasn’t bad but wasn’t especially good either, and more costly than other local options. The menu bragged about serving Hormel meats – that sort of sums it up. There are better choices. And to be fair, my realtor and his wife had lunch items not breakfast; perhaps they do better with that.
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| Mine: Praline Pecan Pancakes - two sweet cream pancakes, filled with sweet crunchy praline pecans, drizzled with scratch made cinnamon cream cheese icing |
This looks like a bit of a mess and that was how it ate. Way too sweet, and the parts that weren't covered with icing were quite dry.
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| Bob's: Banana Foster's it Up - a scratch made brown sugar, banana liquor, and butter cream sauce with fresh bananas with pancakes |
Crackings actually did a better job with this dish than the Pancakery had, probably because they used real butter rather than substitutes. Bob clearly chose better than I! Having lots of sauce to drizzle where needed helped.
The final two places are almost polar opposites, but each delivered deliciousness!
Mama Clemenza's is owned by the couple that are part owners in
Fat Clemenzas in Miramar Beach and Clemenzas at Uptown Station, Fort Walton Beach. The Miramar Beach location, 12273 Emerald Coast Parkway, Miramar Beach, Phone: 850-424-3157 is open Wednesday – Sunday 8am – 1pm. The Fort Walton Beach location is open 8am- 1pm Sunday in the premises of Clemenzas at Uptown Station, 75 Eglin Parkway | Suite 126 | Fort Walton Beach, FL 32591. Both locations offer an upscale, hand crafted breakfast and lunch experience. Though our second experience was marred by some technical difficulties, the house responded well and we'll certainly be back.
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| Sliced Oranges in olive oil with black pepper |
So tasty that I tried to recreate it for our Snowbird group's Happy Hour. How'd I do?
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| Plant City Truck Farmer Honeybells with EVOO & Black Pepper |
Back to Mama Clemenza's.
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| Bob's: Italian Breakfast Panini "Special" House-made Italian Sausage, sunnyside eggs and Gruyere cheese, served with side of Hollandaise and "side of the day" which was Raspberry Steel Cut Oats |
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| Mine: "Special" Seafood Quiche topped with Hollandaise, served with Croissant and "side of the day", Raspberry Steel Cut Oats (it ate like pudding!). |
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| Bob's Banana's Foster French Toast: maple glazed sliced bananas and warm caramel sauce. |
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| Mine: Croque Madame. An open faced egg sandwich with Prosciutto, and Gruyere cheese. Served with Side of the Day (Blackberry Steel Cut Oats) and an addition of Hollandaise sauce on the side. |
The menu changes frequently and every day brings one off specials. Mama Clemenza's is not a cheap date, but the quality of the food is a notch above most local offerings and well worth it. Despite the hiccups on our last visit, we'll be back!
Blue Collar Cafe in Fort Walton Beach is the only place in the area making real NY style bagels from scratch. And doing it quite well. But go early if you want a bagel, because they will sell out (by 10:30ish)! We didn't get there in time the first time we visited. But the made-in-house biscuits almost made up for it! And that Maple Bacon - divine! The grits - nothing special. But there remains plenty of special to go around at Blue Collar Cafe! And at very friendly prices.
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| Mine: 2 Eggs Over Easy, Biscuit, Cheese Grits, Maple Bacon |
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| Bob's: 2 eggs over easy, toast, sausage patty. |
The bagels were worth the price of admission and a second trip. New Yorker approved. And though that cream cheese probably started life in a food service loaf, it had been whipped with a perfect touch of white pepper by the time it hit my bagel. Outstanding! As was the service, a real treat.
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| Mine: Plain bagel, not toasted, cream cheese, fruit. |
No New Yorker would ever toast a fresh bagel.
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| Bob's: Poppyseed Bagel Toasted, Cream Cheese, Fruit |
Another lovely touch - that fruit garnish isn't just a garnish - it's fresh, substantive fruit, which cut nicely through the richness of the bagel and cream cheese. And the sausage and bacon at our first visit.
Finally, a rare made from scratch breakfast in the condo, featuring
Black Bear Bread Company Bread made into French Toast with Blue Eggs we got at the Sandestin/Grand Boulevard Farmers' Market, topped with Strawberry Syrup I made with Plant City Farmers' Fresh Strawberries.
And so we have breakfast in Destin and environs. Some lovely places to play with food, and a few others we didn't get to try. There will be more Fun Playing With Food from this trip, coming up shortly!
