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Friday, February 4, 2000
Grilled tiger shrimp is popular at Virginia's
Port Aransas restaurant has mastered the art of serving a blooming onion
Virginia's On the Bay, one of Port Aransas' newest eateries, capitalizes on the best Port Aransas has to offer with quality seafood and a stunning coastal view.
Nestled among the watercraft docked at the Port Aransas marina, Virginia's On the Bay is an open-air restaurant right on the water. Glass garage door-type walls can be pulled down when the weather is chilly. But most days, they are open, providing diners an up-close look at the Intracoastal Waterway with its cargo ships, pleasure boats and dolphins.
The decor is simple and clean - wooden tables and chairs on a hardwood floor, with the dining tables surrounding a large bar. Ceiling fans hang overhead with a few beer signs hanging from wooden rafters and a surfboard over the entryway.
The menu is generous in its choices with a number of shrimp and crab dishes, steak, lobster, chicken and even some Italian selections. One of our favorite starters is the blooming onion, a standard appetizer in a number of restaurants these days.
But Virginia's has mastered this deep-fried creation with a peppery batter that proved popular at our table. Served as an unfolding flower, diners pull off bits of the onion, which were delicious eaten alone but had a bit more flavor when dipped in a spicy remoulade sauce.
For a more unusual appetizer, try the smoked marlin pat‚, served on a bed of lettuce and with crackers. This has a rich, smoky flavor and a hint of what tasted like sweet relish, and was particularly good on a saltine cracker.
If you're in the mood for a light meal, try the campechana cocktail, a traditional Mexican seafood cocktail of shrimp, scallops, calamari and crab. Served in a chilled parfait glass, this spicy mixture also has serrano peppers, onions, tomatoes, cilantro and avocado.
Our entrees came with a fairly standard dinner salad, although we appreciated the use of green leaf lettuce instead of iceberg.
Popular among diners here is the grilled tiger shrimp, which are huge, almost mini-lobster-sized crustaceans served on a bed of rice. We particularly liked the cilantro and garlic butter sauce with which the shrimp were grilled. The squash casserole served as a side dish also was tasty with flavorful onions and green chiles mixed with the yellow vegetable.
The 8-ounce, bacon-wrapped filet mignon also pleased us, with the mushroom-topped steak proving to be carefully grilled and tender with the squash and side order of new potatoes completing the meal.
If you feel like cooking at home, check out the Sportsplex seafood center, which is part of the same building. Customers frequently pass through the seafood shop on their way in or out of Virginia's, catching a look at a colorful aquarium or checking out the fresh fish in the display case.
We enjoyed one of the most beautiful sunsets we'd seen in a while, with brilliant shades of orange and red filling the evening sky. The combination of good food and great atmosphere will definitely bring us back to Virginia's.
Virginia's on the Bay
815 Trout St., Port Aransas
(361) 749-4088
Entrees: $8.95-$26.95
Hours: 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. (sometimes 10 p.m., pending on weather), Wednesday-Monday, closed Tuesday.
Checks: No
Credit Cards: All major
Wheelchair accessible
Alcohol: Full bar
Food: ** 1/2
Atmosphere: ***
Service: **
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