Randy’s Fish Market, Naples, FL

En route to dinner at Bern’s to celebrate the birthday of a friend, we stopped at Randy’s Fish Market for lunch. More on Bern’s next week. Today, it is all about lunch. I had looked up some places to go, and much to my delight, Randy’s is just across the street from Trader Joe’s. This was pretty enticing to me, as we are sorely lacking TJ’s in southeastern Florida. 

We walked into the small retail area and through to the dining room, where we were greeted with a smile. Randy’s is extremely casual,

so I was expecting the menu to be rather limited. Not so. They have a full retail fish market, so everything available by the pound is also available on the menu, and we were provided a list when we sat down. The regular menu is huge. Salads, sandwiches, entrees… it seemed to go on forever.

I must also mention that their wine list was great. Not “great” with amazing, hard to find wines, but rather interesting wines at crazy good prices. La Crema Pinot Noir for $25 a bottle? Yup. Martin Codax Albarino for $18.99? You betcha. We did not partake as we were going to the wine wonderland for dinner.

Apparently Happy Hour lasts all day Saturday and Sunday with loads of food and drink specials. The smoked fish dip, in a choice of lobster or grouper was a mere $4.99 on the happy hour menu. (It is $6.99 in the retail shop). They serve an 8 ounce portion in the original container, complete with lid, so it was easy to take half of it to go. The second half made for a wonderful snack at the more traditional happy hour time.

We followed the dip with an appetizer of seared tuna (a mere $6.99 at happy hour) which was outstanding. It is really difficult to get the tuna to be red inside and not ice cold. This was delicious. I would go back just for the tuna (and the dip, and the sandwich…). We also had the black and blue grouper sandwich, which was a perfect combination of blackened, flavorful fish topped with a delicious blue cheese sauce. Somehow, they put a perfect amount of sauce on the fish so it was not overwhelming. ($16.99, no happy hour on the sandwich!)

Just as I was indulging in the last bite of sandwich, I commented to FKGuy how great the meal was and I just didn’t see how it could get any better. We had great food, great service and reasonable prices. Then it got better. Our server brought over a piece of key lime pie. For no reason other than she thought we would enjoy it. The pie was tangy, delicious and topped with real whipped cream. Halfway through the pie, I again commented that I didn’t see how it was going to get any better, in the hopes that a winning lottery ticket would somehow appear in my life. It didn’t, but the meal was wonderful. If you are in Naples, or anywhere in the vicinity, I highly

recommend Randy’s.

Randy’s Fish Market is located at 10395 Tamiami Trail North, in Naples and is open every day for lunch and dinner.