St. Augustine Eats
I’ve been living in Florida for a while now but I still had not had the chance to explore St Augustine. I finally got the chance during a friend’s wedding weekend. This small historic town has so many cool places to explore and plenty of restaurants to try. We were there for about 36 hours but we wanted to get a feel for the area in that time.
We started our culinary experience in St. Augustine at Maple Street Biscuit Company. This counter service restaurant was so cute and homey. They of course serve biscuits in all sorts of varieties in addition to some other southern side dishes. This place strives to be a part of the community and shows it in the cutest ways. Instead of calling your name when your order is ready the counter, they ask each customer a question and call out the answer, like “what’s your favorite animal?” And then you wait to hear your answer to grab your order. There was quite a line when we got there but it moved fast and the food did not take long to receive either.
Most of the menu is different variations of chicken on a biscuit, but there are other options as well. When I saw the Squawking Goat, I knew that’s what I wanted. On top of the chicken was fried goat cheese and pepper jelly. The combination of toppings on the dish was heavenly. There was the nice crunchy chicken, the savory cheese, and then a little sweet and spicy from the jelly. I am not even a big fan of biscuits but I found this one to be the perfect texture.
Andrew also got chicken on a biscuit, but he ordered the Sticky Maple. This dish topped the chicken with bacon and maple syrup. He loves maple bacon so this was a delicious brunch for him. There is a ton of syrup on it, but it is a local family made maple syrup that he could not get enough of. We also got a hash brown cake on the side. It says the cake is made of potatoes, chives and gouda, but we did not taste any cheese. It was a bit on the bland side, so I would try the mac and cheese or a different side next time.
If you like fried chicken on a biscuit, this is a great place to stop. It beats Chik-fil-a by a long shot and the service is unbeatable. It was much faster than we expected, but parking might take a while since it is right in the middle of town. I would recommend eating here when you plan to be walking around for a while since it was annoying to pay $10 to park on the street nearby and then leave right after our meal.
We of course had dinner at the wedding along with lots of dancing and celebrating. The next day we wanted to go somewhere for breakfast by the beach since that’s where our hotel was. We found Margie’s FA Cafe nearby and decided to try it. It had a cute beach diner theme and we were pleased there wasn’t a wait. The food is pretty basic here and I would stick to the classics. I got huevos rancheros and I was happy to have a nice cheesy egg meal with some potatoes.
Andrew opted for the special pork belly benedict and was very disappointed. The pork belly was not the usual tenderness we were used to and instead was extremely hard to cut. That made his meal super hard to eat. This place is good if you want a simple breakfast, but there are more foodie options in town if you have the time.
It was a surprising cold weekend in Florida and after walking around the fort for a bit after breakfast, we needed to warm up. We decided to stop at Kookaburras for coffee. There were a couple locations of this Australian coffee bar in St. Augustine and we went to the one downtown. I got the Honey Badger Latte which had honey, cinnamon and vanilla flavors. It was very sweet, in a good way where you could still taste the rich coffee flavors as well. Andrew just got a basic black coffee and he found the blend to be bold and flavorful.
We had a late lunch before heading home at The Floridian. This is a well known St. Augustine restaurant that had an eclectic, tropical theme and lots of great food options. We did not have a reservation so we had to sit at the bar. They had a great craft beer selection that we had to indulge in. We each got a smooth Pale Ale from Wicked Barley brewing company called Drink Me, which was very refreshing.
I was in the mood for a burger so I got the Dixie Burger with Pimento cheese. It was very flavorful but super messy. The fries were especially good as they were the right amount of crispy. It was a basic lunch, but just what I needed.
Andrew got the Fried Green Tomato BLT which has a mouthwatering bacon jam in addition to the usual BLT toppings. He also added the Little Moo cheese which added a more savory flavor to the sweet jam. This cheese had a flavor somewhere in between Boursin cheese and goat cheese. It was a very enjoyable sandwich, and much more unique than my choice.
I would love to go back and try the dinner options here as there is so much variety! It was a very fun place to dine and really showed the essence of St. Augustine. We left shortly after this meal to hear back to Melbourne, but we will definitely be back again.
Let me know if you have any restaurant recommendations for the next time we are in St. Augustine!