Past the condo towers and beach hotels, Cortez slows the pace with docks that smell of salt and bait. Boats sway lazily, gulls squabble, and then Star Fish Company comes into view, a seafood shack with no pretense.
There are no tablecloths, no glossy menus. You order at the counter, take a number, and carry a box to a weathered picnic table. The grouper sandwich is the prize: fried crisp or blackened smoky, always paired with hushpuppies that vanish too fast.
With salt air clinging to every bite, it tastes like Florida stripped to its honest core.
Dockside Bite With A View
The shack itself is modest, but the stage around it is grand. Picnic tables stretch along the water, and boats clink against pilings while you eat from cardboard boxes…