The Crabby Cafe — Restaurant in Elizabethton

🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 If Poseidon opened a restaurant, it would be The Crabby Cafe.

Tucked away by the lake where Shirley’s used to serve family style meals, this hidden gem is now the holy grail for seafood lovers. I’m a self-proclaimed seafood snob—East Coast, Caribbean, you name it—and The Crabby Cafe still managed to blow me out of the (salt)water.

Let’s talk menu magic: 🦀 Crab Rangoon Mozzarella Sticks — These are not your average bar snack. Imagine a jumbo corn dog married a crab rangoon and had delicious, cheesy triplets. Real blue crab, cream cheese, and melty mozzarella packed inside a golden shell of crispy perfection. You get THREE, and yes, they’re enormous. Eat one, share one, and take one home to air fry later. (Trust me, future-you will weep with joy.)

🌊 Scallops — These are the filet mignon of the sea, and The Crabby Cafe treats them with the respect they deserve. Get them sautéed in butter—not fried, unless you’re trying to upset the seafood gods.

🥣 Crab Bisque — Creamy, dreamy, and packing a gentle spice kick, this soup is swimming in tender crab meat. The kind of bowl that makes you pause mid-slurp just to appreciate life.

🦐🦀 All You Can Eat Snow Crab Legs & Broiled Shrimp — The crown jewel. For just $55, you get endless refills of expertly seasoned crab and shrimp (hello, Old Bay!), two sides, and all the drawn butter your soul can handle. Don’t overthink the sides—just get the coleslaw and focus on the feast. These portions are not shy; they’re huge, messy, and glorious.

Other highlights? House-made seafood pastas, legit lobster rolls, chicken dishes, and plenty of fried goodies for the deep-fried devotees. But honestly, if you’re not going broiled or pan-seared here, you’re doing it wrong.

The staff? Friendly, fast, and clearly trained to keep seafood snobs (like me) coming back for more.

Final verdict: 20 out of 10. Bring your appetite, wear stretchy pants, and prepare to slip into a sweet, buttery crab coma. Make sure you make reservations because this place fills up fast, and for good reason!

You’ll leave The Crabby Cafe full, happy, and wondering why you ever bothered eating seafood...

I don't even know where to start. As soon as we walked in there was a group of diners who were getting a partial meal refund. That should've been my first clue. -Server who greeted us was visibly exhausted and frustrated. -The appetizer: didn't come so we asked for it and eventually got it, then when we were almost done eating another duplicate was brought to our table. -My meal: I got the wrong meal. Instead of taking the whole thing back she left my sides so I ate my side dishes because I didn't want them to get cold then ate my salmon by itself when it came. Salmon was dry and tough but saved by a decent crab au grautin topping. -Sister's meal: seafood pasta. Tons of dry, tasteless noodles but you had to dig to find any seafood. She hesitantly asked for some extra sauce that never came until everyone was finished eating. She didn't eat her meal and it was comped. -Hubby's meal of cajon seafood pasta, it was ok but he didn't get his salad. Not wanting to"bother" the server to ask, the server said toward the end of the meal that the salads were almost ready. Hubby said to not bother, it was ok, then she proceeded to tell us they had run out of lettuce and they had to go to the HOUSE to get it so we had better eat it. (Do you run at this point) Salads came with brown lettuce. -Brother had ribeye and his meal was good. Throughout the meal they brought several plates past asking if they were ours, then did the same to surrounding tables. It was like a Chinese fire drill. I read a lot of positive reviews so maybe we hit them on a bad day but when you're paying between $28-$40 per meal, you want a quality product. Even with one meal comped off our check and no charge for our beverages, our bill was well over $100 for 3 meals. I still tipped but only at 15% , our server was super nice and smiled through the chaos. (They work hard. We typically tip 20%) There were so many problems with this experience, honestly it was chaos and you could tell it started in the kitchen. Tables around us were struggling too, and we tried not to complain. The bus was flying downhill with the...

After seeing this place posting all over facebook we decided to make the trip to see what this was all about. AWFUL experience and we will NOT be back. Service was poor, server was rude and left multiple times. Drinks took forever to get, the tea tasted old. We attempted ordering multiple different items of which they were out of. One of us ordered a steak and it was so charred on outside but raw on inside and definitely nothing like photos in facebook post. Another ordered a pasta and there was little to no seafood in it and sauce, i'm not even sure you can call that pasta sauce. One had an all you can eat, waited over an hour to get served our food and only one other table. The crab legs were still cold and had ice so clearly frozen. Shrimp was over cooked and cole slaw was so sour and rotten tasting made my husband too ill to even finish. When we told the server we were disappointed in food and pricing for what it was she said "so don't come back, don't care for people like you here anyway". There was a strong sewer like smell that made it almost unbearable to breathe in there. This was probably the worst dining experience we have ever had and I'm 58 years old. We went to check out and older man was at register and server had told us he was the owner, we let him know our frustration and he said oh well the kitchen must just be having a bad day, come back and try us again another time and try the crab cakes or something different. Then he proceeded to charge 5% for using a debit card. If looking for fresh seafood or friendly service I do NOT recommend...