The Fish Company — Restaurant in Atlantic Beach

If I could give no stars, I would. We tried "The Fish Company" last night for the first time. I have been from terrible restaurants in the middle of nowhere on Texas and all the way up to Pennsylvania. I've had amazing food in Hawaii, and I've had amazing food right down from my house here in Jax. But out of everywhere I've been to, I've NEVER EVER had as terrible of service and food as we did last night at The Fish Company. I made reservations for 7pm for 2 adults and 2 kids. It was for our anniversary. The server was not super friendly but not rude. She just seemed annoyed that she had to be there. I ordered the 4oz grilled Mahi daily special with fries and slaw. The Mahi was so tiny. I know I said 4oz, but it was ridiculously small less than what i'd expect a kid to be served, and for $26, I expected more. I could've gone to Singletons and gotten more than twice the amount for that price. The fries were horrible. They were cold and not even salted or anything, no flavor at all. Even ketchup didn't help. I didn't think fries could be that bad. They tasted freezer burnt and then cooked. The coleslaw also lacked flavor somehow. It tasted exactly like the store bought coleslaw that went bad a week ago. My husband got some kind of soup thing with lobster tail, scallops a few other things, and came with a roll. It literally tasted like dirty toilet water. The roll was the only edible thing. Before we got home, he said his stomach hurt from the dirty toilet water soup. His was $29. Mine was $26. $26 for the smallest piece of Mahi I've ever gotten is baffling. His tasted bad, but he literally had a lobster tail in his. We were sat at the only round table towards the front it smelled horrible like throw up there wasn't even a SINGLE air vent our way so we were burning up it was cooler outside then where we had to sit. They had a rolling cart with cups and stuff right next to us. We even had a couple of servers squeeze between our table and the cart to reach up to get stuff. I had to move my daughter closer to me. On top of that, we had to wait 45 minutes for our food. The service for us was so bad I would never go back there, not even to give another chance. We almost left before the food arrived, and I really wished we had. I'm not one to complain ever. But that was insanely terrible. Never again...

First SERVICE / ATOMSPHERE-

Our server was Elizabeth. She did a fantastic job. Was warm and welcoming. She consistently checked in on us. She didn't hesitate to make a recommendation when we ordered the shrimp dip (detailed later) and proactively handled a mishap from the bar.

Second FOOD-

We started out with SHRIMP DIP. It was tasty; the dip that is! It was served with fried saltine cracker- not a good pairing AT ALL. Mainly because who fries saltines? You literally were able to taste this grease which completely overpowers the light taste of the dip. Which is why I was happy for the recommendation of plain cracker. Kudos to our waitress (wink). I suggest skip the middleman and serve it with plain or maybe a captain wafer.

We also ordered the CRAB CAKES. Really good. Light and not a lot of filler. Outside was crisply fried and the inside had great texture showing it was cooked perfectly. Remoulade sauce was good too. I've had a few that were too good.

Kids had the CHICKEN TENDERS and FRIES. They said they were pretty good but unfortunately they had just ran out of honey mustard and didn't offer bbq sauce. They were lightly breaded and looked really good.

Wife have the FRIED SHIRMP and the GREEN BEAN melody. They were lightly breaded and fired correctly. She was happy so naturally I was happy.

The star of the meal was the CAJUN LINGUINI PASTA. I don't eat pork so I opted to have it with no sausage add shirmp. They have something with this cajun sauce. Not cream based, loose, and a balance on the the heat. They hit a homerun with this one fresh dices tomatoes, mushrooms and fresh herbs. Really balanced. It's served with a quality piece of crusty bread to soak up the remaining cajun pasta sauce. This dish was as close to a perfect pasta. If I had to say anything critical about it it would be to use a granted parmesan cheese rather than shredded- that's a stretch but as you can tell I really liked the pasta.

Overall this was a great little spot. We don't visit Jacksonville often but I would happy to come back to this spot. Good atomsphere. Awesome service and really good food. Cheers to Elizabeth for being a great...

To the best of my knowledge shrimp and grits are supposed to have Andouille sausage in them, not Kielbasa. As a chef and connoisseur of Cajun cooking, this is by far my least favorite here at the beaches. Especially when the price was over $20 for the single menu item, containing only 8 medium shrimp. I will say the flavoring was delicious. In addition the staff is amazing always polite, helpful and a tentative. You can’t raise your prices and then take shortcuts and use less expensive ingredients. If you’re losing business, as a business owner, with over 30 years experience this will be the reason why. In addition the last time I came in I had the fish spread and it didn’t taste the same… Someone told me the chef had changed the recipe. Change should be for the better not for the worse in addition they no longer carry Captain wafers which I prefer with my oysters. I came here because they had the best pricing and now they too, have pricing comparably to The Beaches town center. I understand the overhead closer to the beach is quite expensive. I’ve always felt the fish company was able to have lower prices because of their lower overhead.… So I frequent them and supported them for the last eight years.… to be more realistic they should increase their pricing symbol from $$ to $$$$. I find myself cooking at home more now, not eating out. I used to come to the Fish Company at least once a week and now it’s about once every six months. Mostly because of disappearing Happy Hour, they’re closed on Mondays and I’m off on Mondays. in addition to the oysters were $6.99 a dozen when I was first coming here during happy hour, and now they’re no longer available and they’re over $15 a dozen. I’ve been coming to the Fish Company and referring people, because my clientele consists of long-term residence and newcomers. If you’re looking for amazing shrimp and grits my two favorites it’s Metro Diner and Beach Haus in...