Winter grinds on. I escaped to Florida, and came back to snow. I longed for the feeling of sand between my toes and a cold beer in my hand. I wanted conch fritters and a grouper sandwich. And that's when I heard about the Sanibel Cottage in Webster, which co-owner and manager Kevin Gerstner describes as a "family" place with the "laid back, feel-good attitude" of one of Sanibel's many beach bars. In this he was partially successful. The tavern side of the restaurant has the feel of an upscale resort-hotel bar accented with bits of Florida bric-a-brac, and a stylized map of Florida pinpointing the location of Sanibel and Captiva islands. Although there was some initial seating confusion - the hostess refused to offer us seats in the dining room, and the bartender asked us to shift several stools down to make room for regulars who had yet to arrive at the bar - things started off promisingly with a couple of icy cold Red Stripe beers ($4) and the menus.

Gerstner's menu offers an eclectic mix of north and south, ranging from artichokes French and beans and greens to gator bites and conch fritters, taking in much in between. There are chophouse favorites: prime rib, pork chops, and a New York Strip steak served with a shallot and gorgonzola butter. There are also Floridian dishes, including grouper and key lime pie. There is also a whole section of shrimp and pasta in various combinations (including the unfortunately named "red-tide linguine" - named after a red algae bloom that sucks the oxygen from the water, kills off thousands of fish, and closes beaches up and down the Florida coast several times a year).

We started our first meal with the gator bites and the conch fritters. Both were fried to an appealing mahogany brown and served on a romaine lettuce leaf. The gator bites ($8.95), tiny pieces of marinated alligator meat with a spicy coating, were crunchy and flavorful, although the meat itself was chewy (but not offensively so) and nearly as flavorless as chicken breast. The honey-mustard dipping sauce added a pleasant kick to the bland meat. The conch fritters ($6.95), on the other hand, were not so successful. Neither my companion nor I could find any conch in what were essentially spicy hush-puppies. This would make a fair seafood stuffing, but on its own this dish was disappointing, gummy, and dull.

More Red Stripes preceded the salads - iceberg lettuce, shredded carrot, two grape tomatoes, one slice of cucumber, and a single piece of oak leaf lettuce on each plate - and the entrees, a 12oz. prime rib served with au jus and a dish called "Cottage Grouper" ($17.95). The prime rib ($18.95) was a very generous cut of meat, at least an inch and a half thick with what seemed to be a nice, even caramelized edge that promised good things within. Unfortunately, the meat itself was fattier than prime rib usually is, and much of that fat was still snow-white and hard (fat that has started to render into meat is a translucent ivory color). It had also been under a heat lamp for entirely too long; the stippled, pale pink face of the meat looked seared and was dry to the touch.

The fish, too, had died underneath the heat lamps. Apparently broiled and then finished with the same mango salad dressing that had accompanied my house salad, the fish was dry and tasteless, although the dressing did give it a bit of a fruity lift. The worst offense on our plates, though, was the "steamed asparagus." Badly prepped and uniformly overcooked, each of the spears was limp, nearly brown, and both stringy and woody at the base.

Thinking that the kitchen may have been having a bad night or been overwhelmed by the Friday night dinner rush, my companion and I returned at the beginning of service the following night. The restaurant and bar were nearly empty, and we were immediately shown to a pleasant table near the fireplace in the dining room. Our waitress was friendly and attentive, and we quickly ordered the artichokes French ($6.95) and one of the Cottage's signature "mondoritas" ($16.50) The artichokes were generously portioned and the familiar butter, lemon, and white wine sauce had the right flavor, but the artichokes themselves were more or less flavorless, and two out of the eight halves were full of furry, inedible "choke." We reached for the mondorita - a basin-sized chalice full of very strong margarita - and started thinking about entrees.

We ordered the "pirate" pork chops ($14.95) and the gritty shrimp ($14.95). The first indication that something was wrong was that the same asparagus from the previous night was still the vegetable of the day. Still limp, still brown, four out of the six spears on my plate were lacking their tips. The pork chops themselves had very attractive grill marks on them, but they were so overcooked that even with a steak knife my companion and I had a difficult time cutting them. The apple cider emulsion that went with the chops was separating even as it came to the table, deep fissures appearing in the tan sauce as it sat on the too-hot plate. To be fair, the sweet potato fries that went with the chops were quite good - crispy, sweet, and slightly earthy. The gritty shrimp, despite the name, was the most appealing dish we ordered, a generous portion of shrimp surrounded a small island of cream-cheese infused grits in a pool of tasty garlic cream sauce. The shrimp were well-cooked, the sauce had a very pleasant bite of garlic and fresh pepper to it, and the grits - while not at all what I was expecting from that Southern staple - resembled polenta and were tasty in their own right. The leftover sauce was a nice dip for my companion's sweet potato fries.

All of this said, Sanibel Cottage is indisputably popular. At just more than a year old, it is packed every weekend, and on most nights the bar is full and the wait for tables can be long. It could well be that we caught the kitchen on a couple of "off" nights. But I find it difficult to escape the conclusion that I would have been better off saving my money on a trip to the real Sanibel rather than spending it here. 

Sanibel Cottage

1517 Empire Boulevard, Webster | 671-9340

Mondays-Fridays 11:30 a.m.-4 p.m. (lunch) & 4-10 p.m. (dinner); Saturdays 4-10 p.m.; Sundays 10:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m. (brunch) & 3:30-9 p.m. (dinner)