The Sanibel Cafe

We followed the Unilocal reviews (and our noses) to Sanibel Café. I’m torn between and 3 and 4 on this one.
The piece that has me leaning towards three was that our waitress asked if I want bacon or sausage with my French Toast as if it comes with it automatically — not cool. After I asked if it was included she said «no» but I didn’t appreciate the sneaky added sales approach.
The good:
*Fresh squeezed OJ and grapefruit juice (a Florida necessity at every meal)
*French toast trio with almond, coconut and crunchy (corn flake crusted) — of the three, the coconut was the star of the show. If I were to revisit, I would opt to order all coconut (hoping to make these on my own at home in the meantime).
*old timey beach atmosphere — we were by far the youngest folks in the restaurant — the «regulars vibe» was strong :)
*the hashbrowns were tasty and not overly greasy (always great in my book)

A lot of diners are the same. Greasy spoon, coffee a’flowin’ with efficient service. Eggs and toast. You can’t really mess up breakfast. Sanibel Café is not your standard café — super friendly and quick service, actual good coffee and kitschy-​fun décor. Tucked away in the corner of a strip mall, I almost missed it.
The Sanibel omelette… I can remember the taste, even 6 weeks later. It was the best omelette of my life. The Best Omelette, let’s capitalize that to give this bit of heaven its due diligence. Little shrimps, creamy onion goodness oozing out of perfectly fluffy eggs. I ate the whole thing, then laid on the beach not regretting the food baby I had. Stop in on your way AND fro the beach, you won’t regret it.

Great find. Had the special omelet which was yummy. Fresh squeezed juice nice. Good service and not as crowded as some Sanibel breakfast spots. Will return!

This restaurant is quaint and very friendly. Good breakfasts all day and great wraps for lunch.

Our family vacations every year to Sanibel. We always look for new places to go and we are so pleased we found this Café. Not only was the staff super friendly but the atmosphere, food and service was excellent. We will be returning on our next visit to Sanibel.

Good food great service. The tables are cool too. Feels like a nice little mom and pop restaurant.

Had a great lunch here today we ordered the Patty Melt with fries and the BLT with homemade chips. Both were really good and very tasty. Service was good and so was the food. If you get a chance try this place.

DOG FRIENDLY! Their breakfast /​brunch is delicious! We had an omelette and a scramble and both were delicious. The potatoes were a little disappointing but only because we like crunchy and they were soft — but they were amazingly seasoned so I can overlook it. And they brought a treat for our puppy and some water. We felt like family. Definitely will come back!

My guest and I decided to eat at the Sanibel Café for breakfast after reading reviews on Unilocal.We were seated almost immediately and greeted by what seemed like a friendly manager. The environment was family-​oriented and comfortable. Our server was mostly attentive (although failed to refill my guest’s lemonade) and had our meals out quickly. I ordered the stuffed stack of pancakes with strawberries and coconut (.75 cent upcharge for a second fruit was worth it!); they were so delicious I didn’t need to add butter nor syrup. I wish they had more combinations available, as I would have loved this to be a complete breakfast with eggs and bacon. The side menu did not list what the cost would have been to add eggs nor bacon, but I imagined the two together would have turned my $ 8.50 pancakes into at least a $ 13 breakfast. The coffee was subpar and bitter; I would return, but would make sure to have coffee before leaving the hotel.

Went for breakfast, very glad we did. Very clean, loved the tables. Very friendly attentive service. Highly recommended.

Picked up an order to go. It took handing the phone off to three people to get it right. Said it would take about ten minutes and though I thought it was a little fast for what we ordered, I snagged it up anyway.
Chicken fried steak was inedibly undercooked and there were eggshells in the egg.
At minimum I’d say it was a little pricey for having to cook everything again at home in the microwave.

Extremely mediocre diner, even by «beach food «standards. Quiche was runny egg pie over a rock-​hard crust, with two pieces of processed American cheese half melted on top. Tasted as awful as it looked. Wife’s French toast was undercooked and tasteless. Coffee was bitter and weak. Otherwise okay.

Off the main road into Sanibel and Captiva, this little café is welcoming and feels homie. The décor is late 80’s with a seashell theme throughout.
They serve breakfast all day and the breakfast quasadilla was terrific! The portion is late and filling.

We visited Sanibel for a long weekend, and came to the Sanibel Café every single day of our trip, on one occasion multiple times! Extremely impressed by the food, atmosphere and friendly staff.
Don’t let the shopping center location fool you — this is THE place to go for breakfast or lunch on the island. Especially since I will eat breakfast food at any time of the day, and my husband would prefer a burger even at 8 am, this was perfect for us. Great pancakes, sausage gravy, and you HAVE to get the gator bites! I’m still craving them days later. Tried the key lime pie at other places that claimed to have the «best key lime pie on the island,» but this definitely gets my vote.
While you’re there, be sure to check out the amazing shell tables and grab a jar of jam. Can’t wait to go back!

The Over Easy Café nearby had a long line so we drove up the street to come here– and are very glad we did. Food was great. Service was fast and courteous. We had both breakfast and lunch fare — super tasty club sandwich; great pancakes. Really just perfect little spot. I’m sure they are quite busy at peak breakfast time, so plan accordingly!

We rode our bikes 6 miles to get to Sanibel Café! Bike rack available for our bikes… extremely cute shopping center as well!
Immediate seating for breakfast. Our server was friendly… the Canadian bacon eggs Benedict with grilled Parmesan tomatoes was AMAZING. My son had the country breakfast which included scrambled eggs, hash browns and biscuits and sausage gravy.
My coffee never ran low and the restaurant was quaint and clean… no complaints.

This place was a really pleasant discovery in Sanibel island!
We came here for breakfast, and I fell in love with the decoration of the place (take a look at the tables) and atmosphere, it‘s not the typical touristic place unlike most of restaurants in the area.
Food was very good, you have a lot of breakfast choices, for sweet lovers and for salty breakfast lovers, I decided to try both and I was not disappointed by any of them. One of the options has alligator, and it‘s not the usual fried one, so you can really appreciate the true taste of gator, which is great!
On the other hand, I had an unpleasant experience with one of the waitresses, she took my order wrongly, she didn‘t listen to me when I explained what I wanted, and she was not so kind after that, but she might had just a bad day. Be sure to be very clear about what you order because it might be confusing (there are several things included in each menu).
A highly recommended place if you stop by Sanibel island!

My wife and I had a late breakfast here while vacationing in Sanibel. I ordered the coconut French Toast while my wife preferred the Almond French Toast. We ended up sharing so wet each ate ½ of both and they were both delicious.
We also ordered a side of sausage which was perfectly done.
I like my breakfast with maple syrup but my wife requested a side of the «Orange sauce» she had read about on Unilocal.The sauce we got was more pineapple than Orange and was hot (temperature) so I did not like it at all. My wife was disappointed but not as much as I was.
The meal itself was awesome and our waitress was amazing too — an EMT currently studying to be a Paramedic and also looking to go to fire school. As someone who lives in an area where the fire and ambulance crews are mostly volunteer I couldn’t help but appreciate this young woman working too devote her life to saving others.

Pancakes, Waffles, Omeletten, French Toast, alles was das Herz begehrt. Super Service, sehr schnell und zu einem vernünftigen Preis. Das Interieur könnte bequemer sein, hat aber seinen eigenen Charme.
Sehr empfehlenswert für’s Frühstück!

We hit the Sanibel Café for breakfast on our way out of town after a lovely week in Sanibel. We thought it was much better than another local breakfast joint we started our week with and wished we’d tried it sooner!
Our server, Bonnie I think her name was, was so sweet and energetic, and gave great food recommendations. I had the breakfast quesadilla, which was delish, nice and crispy and loaded with eggs, bacon, salsa, cheese and hash browns. I love breakfast quesadillas and this was one of the best I’ve had. The kids loved the pancakes and fruit cups, and others enjoyed the french toast trio which looked really good.
It’s a tiny place so it’d be hard to fit in a party larger than six. The atmosphere is kind of old fashioned, like your grandma decorated it.

Wonderful breakfast at Sanibel Café. Asked the waitress what to order — she suggested the coconut French toast. She didn’t steer me wrong … it was a huge portion of delicious French toast encrusted in coconut. I spread some of their homemade raspberry jam on it and that was fantastic, too!
Service was friendly, coffee was good and our food was great. I’ll be back next time I’m in Sanibel!