The Grand Marlin — Restaurant in Santa Rosa Island

First things first, if you’re looking for a quality meal, this place has some of the best food I’ve ever eaten. The night we went was for our 11th Anniversary. Our reservation was at 7:30 and we requested to be seated outside if weather permitted to view the water, however, it was incredibly windy due to a storm coming in the next day so we opted to stay inside the restaurant to be seated. I was hoping they would seat us somewhere nice inside since they were aware of our anniversary based on the reservation and we specifically requested a nice view even if we weren’t able to be seated outside, but they gave us a choice of either sitting outside as we requested, exposed to the incredibly high wind, or a table seated inside. We obviously chose inside but the restaurant is incredibly loud. You have to raise your voice to hear over the noise of the place. Hoping to avoid the loudness of the main dining room, we chose to be seated in what we hoped was a quieter area near the gift shop. Nope. They literally sat us in the bar where we were looking at people’s backs as they watched the games on tv. Not exactly the most romantic seating. I thought they’d at least try to seat us at a window overlooking the water but no. We were literally in the noisiest, least scenic seats in the restaurant. It was fairly disappointing. So much so that we just wanted to get our food and eat as quickly as possible to get out of there. We’d planned on having a nice dinner with drinks and dessert, but we just ordered a salad and our entree’s so we could eat as quickly as possible to leave. Now, the meal was DELICIOUS. My husband ordered the filet and I had the lobster tails. They were both cooked and seasoned to perfection and it came out fairly quickly. I’ve eaten here in the past and gotten the grouper and wasn’t too thrilled with it several years ago, but whoever is in their kitchen these days is knocking it out of the park. The Boursin grits that my perfectly cooked, perfectly seasoned lobster tails sat atop complimented them beautifully! My husbands filet was also cooked to perfection and he said it was one of the best cooked steaks he’s ever had. Highest marks on the food. We would have stayed to try the dessert and after dinner drinks, but with the seating we had and as loud as it was we were just ready to leave, which is unfortunate because a nice meal should be enjoyed slowly and leisurely and should be an experience. This…was NOT an experience that I wanted to draw out, but again, the food was phenomenal! I would recommend this place if you’re out to drink and be seen, but not for a nice romantic dining experience. At least it wasn’t for us. Skip this place if you’re looking for an intimate or romantic vibe. If you want somewhere where you can talk, slowly enjoy your meal, and has the vibe where you want the meal to last and truly get to savor each course, this isn’t your place. This is more chaotic, hip bar vibes with a...

It was our first time coming to TGM and it was to celebrate my partners birthday. We had a reservation and the hostess was super nice and mentioned a happy birthday so we were off to good start. For drinks he ordered a bushwacker and i ordered the Strawberry Mango mojito. My mojito was missing the alcohol, it tasted like fruit juice with sprite.. The bushwacker was okay. Our server took the drink menu and never offered another drink to us. The server Alex, didn't check on us often, he would just walk up to the table and give thumbs up and walk off before we could mention anything and checked on us 3 times during the meal. We got our appetizer promptly - a half order of oysters rockefeller which were decently good. We waited for our food for 45 minutes (which was understandable since everyone around us kept sending their plates back). For the dinner he ordered the Halibut and I ordered the Ribeye. The Halibut was overcooked and lacked seasoning, overall the entire dish really needed help from the sauce to the rice that was slightly crunchy, my partner ended up squeezing lemon from his water over the dish to salvage it. The Ribeye was inedible due to how bad the cut was, im not sure this was really a ribeye either. Every bite I took I had to spit out gristle as this was probably the worst cut I've seen. My greenbeans were fantastic though at least. When the server came back I had my entire plate of food still since the steak was inedible. The server asked me if I wanted a to go box after seeing how full my plate was and when I said no, he took my plate away quickly without asking. So I didn't get to finish my sides and he didn't ask about how the meal was seemingly to avoid the topic that was obviously at hand. And to top off this terrible dinner service, the server forgot about my partners birthday and did not offer to bring him his birthday dessert. Overall 2/10 would...

This was my first time here. My daughter treated me for mother's Day. We Visited on a Saturday early afternoon and had to wait a bit but not too long. It's very nice inside and there is also a large seating area outside. Both have views of the Bay. My daughter ordered the oyster Rockefeller app and I ordered lettuce wedge with blue cheese. There was scallions and bacon on it according to the menu. I asked if I could have it with no bacon and the waitress assured that I could. When the wedge arrived it was covered with dressing that had bacon pieces in it. I pointed this out and the waitress was accommodating and said she would bring one back without bacon. I cannot eat bacon unless it is nitrate free as I get very bad migraines from nitrates. The waitress came back and apologized and said it could not be ordered without bacon as the bacon was in the blue cheese dressing. I asked if there was blue cheese dressing without bacon and she said that there wasn't but she brought back the wedge with Caesar dressing on the side and that worked out. There was a lot of blue cheese crumbles and it was very tasty. My daughters app of oysters was not as good as usual she said as she has ordered them on other occasions. She ordered the red snapper and I ordered fried shrimp that came with coleslaw and french fries for entrees. We we're both satisfied. The shrimp had a light coating on it and had a good flavor. I'm not sure if you can substitute another side for the fries but I definitely would if I could have as the fries were plentiful but limp with no flavor. The side of coleslaw made up for it as it was delicious. Possibly the best I've had. I was treated to dessert as well I ordered key lime pie and she ordered like a cake with fruit on it I don't remember the name. We split them both and they were definitely the highlight of the dinner....