Cooters Restaurant & Bar

Vacationing on the beach? Want to be treated like a local? Look no further than Cooters. Its definitely old style Florida from the décor to the great staff.
Locally owned and operated this establishment serves up some of the best dishes, drinks, and hospitality.
I love the Thursday Grouper specials and usually order the Po’ Boy sandwich which is always delicious and cooked a number of styles.

After bragging to my sister visiting from NY about Cooters. I drove her out from Pasco County to Clearwater for some Fresh seafood. Upon arrival we were asked if we were there to watch the Steelers game. We answered no, just for some food and drink. We were given a pager then stood by and watched as group after group came in and were seated. No names on the list. No reservations. Just the question are you there for the Steelers. They literally would not seat us. There was a table right next to the hostess stand open the whole time??? Now thats great customer service? Not serving us, so they could wait for possible Pittsburg football fans. We went to Frenchys and everything was great as usual. They didnt ask us why we were there. Sorry Cooters you embarresed me. After many visits I will not return and I will spread the word.

So Let me start off by saying go early and on a weekday before the dinner or weekend/​tourist crowds. This place doesn’t have a lot of parking, and doesn’t have a lot of tables compared to the huge bar space. They do have a little separate sports bar room off to the side with a small bar and a few high tops and a few small tables in it.
Now for the food. I originally went for the AYCE fish and chips, but something told me not to get it once I arrived. I’m glad I didn’t. Instead I ordered the fish and shrimp basket for around the same price, because I wanted to try the shrimp also. We got there before 6PM, so we both ordered the .65 cent wings (10 mild and 10 medium) during the happy hour, and my fiancé ordered calamari for dinner, and I got a side order of scallops for each of us. So once the food came we tried each others food, and ended up sharing everything.
Greg or server brought the wings out first, and both the mild and medium were lightly breaded, perfectly cooked, and juicy. The medium had a very smokey, overwhelming aroma to them at first, but it went away after a minute. I liked both wings, but the mild wings were excellent! My favorite wings have always been at Abe’s, but these give them a serious run for their money in the taste department. The wings are average size here, but big on flavor.
Next Greg brought out our dinner entrees, and they looked great! Unfortunately the calamari didn’t have much flavor, but they were crunchy and had both rings and tentacles, which most places don’t have. My fish (Pollack) was cooked perfectly, and tasted good, but were two tiny, thin wafers. I wouldn’t even classify them as filets, or even compare them to the pictures. The shrimp were pretty big, were fried perfectly, and tasted on point. I usually am not a cole slaw person, and usually just try a bite where ever I go, but this slaw was creamy and actually good. The fries were average, and the small load of dark bread with maple butter was room temp, hard, and not edible.
Now for the star of dinner, the SCALLOPS! The sea scallops were HUGE, plump, sweet, and melted in our mouthes. There were six large scallops per side order for $ 6.99 and both orders were the best thing we had all night. These scallops were some of the best I’ve had anywhere. They didn’t need and salt, lemon, or tartar sauce, they were perfect on their own.
Our server Greg was frequently checking on us, and bringing refills without asking. The manager stopped by and asked us how were doing after our first bite, and one of the other servers even came by to clear plates off of our table. So the service was good for a small dive bar/​restaurant. The crowd at the bar looked like a bunch of locals, and a few had their limit and were betting a bit loud, but soon left. This is the usual bar crowd, but nothing too crazy.
Overall, dinner was good, and way better then the Crab Shack on Gandy Blvd. We will definitely be back, especially for the wings and scallops. The menu prices were a bit steep for the apps and entrees, but it is expected in a tourist area such as Clearwater Beach. The drink prices seemed to comparable to most places for the alcoholic drinks, and they did have a lot of drink specials. Cooter’s is definitely a place to check out!

Food is excellent here. Side dishes are where you could slack off but — Not here. The fries, side salad (complete with whole cherry tomatoes, raw onion and cukes) and beans and rice (topped with cheddar & sour cream dollop) were very good. The manager was the most present and helpful I’ve ever seen. He was assisting the servers, hostess, bar staff… It wasn’t busy at all and yet there he was making small talk with everyone. He made up for the rude hostess. She rolled her eyes when she sat us (I didn’t know the policy about the whole party had to be there before being seated– we were on a tight schedule so I asked to be seated so we could get our order in and to «forget the third person» she rolled her eyes and took off with the menus to seat us-​bad behavior). Highly recommend the Mon/​Tues night all u can eat snow crab.

They have all you can eat Crab legs for like $ 30 on Mondays and Tuesdays can’t beat the price on the beach. The wings there are awesome too, try the Daytona Lime wings… The best! The service can be spotty and there is sometimes a wait, but we will be back!

Loved the blackened gator bites.
Ruben mahi mahi sandwhich and grouper tacos, you cannot go wrong. Highly rate this place. Glad we came.

I never miss coming here when I am on vacation and now that I live here I am there more frequently. I love their oysters on the half shell and the kids never complain about coming here.
It is relaxed and I never wait to be seated.

It wasn’t as easy to find a place with king crab legs as I thought it would be, but we found this little dive bar with great crab legs and you can watch football to boot. It feels a little tight– our daughter actually hit the guy at the next table with crab juice, but the food was really good and the prices were fair. I had the snow crab and it was more than enough food. The service was prompt but not especially friendly. No sunset views but there is plenty to look at with the bay on one side and a busy street in the other.

All you can eat crab legs. Fresh and tasty. 29.00. Not a bad price. Server was Great :-) Nicole! Free parking a plus. I will be back

My company decided to have a Christmas Party on 12/​15/​2015 at Cooters, the reviews were great so we decided to have it this year at Cooters, instead of Shepherds.
Everything was wonderful, the food was excellent, the only issue I had was our Waiter confronted one of my employees in the parking lot, and complained about his «TIP» he received.
Apparently $ 35.00 was too low of a TIP
The kitchen staff was seen more than our waiter, who wasn’t rude, but was very off putting, didn’t engage in conversation, it was almost as if he was invisible.
My employee feels embarrassed as he was approached by the waiter in front of his Fiancée expecting him to shell out money.
my corporate comes down 5 times a year and usually picks Shepherds as their choice of venue. I really wanted to let them know about you guys, but I am reluctant to do so.
I was contacted by management 2 days ago with this response.
Thank you for your email to let us know about this. I am absolutely beside myself that one of our staff members would do this, and you have my guarantee that this will be addressed immediately! I am so sorry that this happened. As soon as I get to the restaurant today, I will pull out the checks and find out who the server was. I also apologize for the poor service on top of that.
This is not how acceptable behavior by a staff member. I will get back with you soon.
Sincerely,
Carol.
Haven’t heard nothing back yet it’s been 2 days.

Love the crab fest that they have, but hate that you can’t get stone or dungeness any other time. They do have all you can eat now crab though. Great happy hour specials.

About what you would expect for a touristy beach restaurant. The food was pretty good, nothing to write home about, but the service was great. Very friendly server, I think his name was Gary or Greg. I don’t think we’ll rush back.

Decent. The happy hour oyster special is pretty good at .75 cents a pop. It’s a very locals relaxed kind of place. I like the outside mural and the Cooter. turtle theme on the coasters. They do an all you can eat crab legs. deal $ 28 or so. Not on the beach but a decent place to throw back some drinks with the yokels.

I came here one evening on our vacation because I was in the mood for unlimited snow crab legs which they only have on Monday and Tuesday nights for $ 29.00 per person which is not too bad of a deal. We came on a Monday night and it isn’t their super busy season so we got a table outside pretty quickly. I mean what can be better than breathing fresh air and stuffing your face with unlimited crab. I can’t think of too many things to tell you the truth. Our server was super nice, originally from Chicago so he was a great conversation starter.
We waited about five minutes at most and out came warm, juicy snow crabs. We started out crabbing them with their little tools that they give you and they were amazing. The crab was super moist and sweet and you can tell it was super fresh and not like we have in some of our all you can eat crab legs from here. Fresh from the gulf is where it’s at. And the best part is they keep on coming. You also get a nice little side of cripsy fries which I drizzled all over with ketchup since yes, I am a ketchup kind of gal and that was nice that they included those. I think we did about 3 or 4 servings (plate fulls of crab) before my tummy couldn’t handle anymore. I was stuffed for the next three days I would have to say. So yes, this is definitely the place to go to if you want to stuff your face with unlimited crab and I think I definitely ate my moneys worth which is always a bonus. Some beefy men probably do a lot more damage than we did, but that’s okay. It’s all about the experience. Don’t know about any of their other seafood specials, so I’m only speaking for the crab. Prices are what they are pretty much everywhere except the quality is better here. The service is also top knotch, the manager made sure we had a nice table for our kiddos and our server kept coming by to refill our waters, asking us if we are ready for more crab. So that is what I’m talking about for an overall good dinner experience.
Yay, for snow crab with no actual snow like we have to deal with in Chicago :)

Came here bc I wanted to check out their Stone Crab fest. There was a band, a bunch of tents, some memorabilia to buy from the restaurant and some seafood specials.
First, I ordered a mango colada and it was so so good. My stone crab came out. I admit, I had some earlier in the week, but these were better. My hubby had a burger and thoroughly enjoyed it. We had at least 3 or 4 people check on us. They were very nice.
They are dog friendly here as well, so that makes all of us happy. Check this out for good seafood, burgers, and drinks.

Great pound and a half of snow crabs. You’ll definitely fill up with this and its two sides.
Don’t get a rum and coke during happy hour. It will end up being a cup of water with a splash of rum and coke. Sent it back twice and still got mostly water.
Nice island atmosphere. Limited parking.

Stopped by after a rainy day at the beach for the chance to sample more of the places right on the beach. The name of the place didn’t entice me, but the outdoor seating was something that I wanted to experience so we dropped in.
I ordered the chicken quesadilla and it was actually HUGE and delicious. For 10, you really can’t go wrong with this beach eat. My companions had the BLT salad and she-​crab soup and an order of king crab legs. I tried the crab legs and they were excellent.
The one snafu of our time at Cooter’s was a visit from «Rufus» and a few of his friends (i.e., a large Florida roach). I get that it’s outside, in Florida, after a rainstorm, but when one of these guys starts crawling up your leg it makes for a it of creepy crawly feeling for the rest of the evening. The wait staff was kind enough to help us shoo them away from our table so I am assuming that this experience is commonplace.
After dinner we retreated to the sports bar area to have a happy hour drink. 3 drinks for under 7 dollars was perfect for us. Highly recommend the happy hour in what is surely the Pittsburgh Steelers bar of Clearwater, FL.

Smoke free! Great laid back atmosphere and decent bar seating.
Great happy hour specials including food and drinks. The wings are pretty good and with a wide menu selection you should be able to find something to like.

Excellent seafood! Generous helpings of everything from drinks to your meal. I am here with 17 people and the service is friendly and accommodating. Couldn’t ask for more for a beach casual eatery.

My sister and her boyfriend drove from Atlanta to spend the day with us before we left to go back to Texas. We have an uncle whose nickname is Cooter, so we thought it was neat that there was a restaurant called Cooters here.
Cooters is a restaurant located near Clearwater Beach. I got the naked punch which was a 22 oz alchy drink. I don’t remember what was in it, but sure was good. Oh and $ 22. I just wanted the glass. Because of the drink, I don’t remember what everyone else had. Lol.
Cooters has the potential of being 4 stars maybe even 5 stars, but they forgot to put my food in. My food didn’t come out with the rest. I had to wait 20 more minutes for my food and everyone was done by the time I got mine. It was the signature stuffed Mahi Mahi and was so good. They took it off the bill though. I wish I would have gotten mine when everyone else did so I would have enjoyed it instead being felt like I was rushed to eat. Here’s your food and here’s your check.
I would give Cooter’s a try again. Hopefully next time they won’t forget my food.