Lighthouse Cafe

We’ve eaten at the Lighthouse in previous years and found it delicious. However, we were disappointed with this trip. Our starter cinnamon roll was burnt (an obvious dark brown color with black bottom). Then some of our entrees were subpar, including the cinnamon raisin french toast, listed as the special but looked like store bought thin bread with little added cinnamon flavor. The blueberry pancakes were still a winner!

Great casual restaurant. I went here for lunch and ordered the Smothered Fish Sandwich. The fish was perfectly cooked and tasted amazing blackened. The service was fast and friendly. It can get loud sometimes due to its smaller size. However, being a minute away from the lighthouse was nice along with being right next door to Pinocchio’s delicious ice cream. Great little restaurant!

Ehh… I thought that maybe people were being too picky they weren’t. Server was nice and the Jam was good. But I rather would have went back to the island Cow. Definantly not worth the hype. Save yourself the 30 minutes wait and go somewhere else.

Had breakfast here. There is a wait for it. The fresh squeezed juice is excellent but not cold needed to add ice. I had the seafood Benedict with the sauce on the side. Glad I did the Alfredo tasted out of a jar and it did not need it. A squeeze of lemon and it was perfect. Overloaded with seafood! My spouse had the chorizo with red peppers omelet. Very good but not better than my meal. Service is amazing. They said we had a 40 min wait — not. More like 15 and once we ordered our meal arrived hot at our table in literally 10 minutes. The place is very small. You will likely have to wait.

Good breakfast. Standard fare. Nothing really special. Gruff servers want to turn tables quickly.

Great breakfast! Had the bacon and cheddar omelette with the Lighthouse potatoes and white toast. Everything was cooked properly and tasted great.

The wait was about 45 minutes for 4 of us but well worth it! The service and food was fantastic. Enjoyed all the lighthouse pictures from around the world!

Excellent service. Friendly staff. Food is nothing out of this world. I had an orange muffin and a bowl of grits. My husband had scrambled eggs, ham with house potatoes. All tasted average. Not on my list of memorable dining experiences. Next time I’m around this neck of the woods I will give another breakfast restaurant a try but we won’t be back to this one only because of the average food. The service and staff on the other hand gets 5 stars.

My husband and I came here for breakfast after our sunrise wedding. Everything was great! The service was good, food came out fast and was very fresh. I had the Greek omelet and my husband had a breakfast sandwich, I would deff recommend!

Found this highly rated brunch place on Unilocal and decided to follow my fellow Unilocalers advice but wasn’t overly impressed. This is small, family owned place with great service but the food leaves a bit to be desired. Got the turkey Benedict and thought that the meat was dry and the hollandaise sauce itself was average. Overalls, great service and great people but only your average, regular food.

Coffee was terrible, food was terrible… everybody was disappointed. Good serving staff, everybody was polite and welcoming.

Went for late lunch one afternoon. The grouper sandwich was tasty. Service was friendly.

One of the best breakfast seafood meals I’ve ever had. Picked up to go. Very fast, friendly staff. It was just a great meal!

Seafood Omelets? Yes please! Aside from the great food and friendly servers, you can call ahead during the busy season. Bonus: no wait! We scheduled for 10AM, drove up and 10:02AM and walked right in! Definitely come!

I ordered the eggs benedict with key lime hollandaise sauce, it was delicious! Key lime wasn’t overpowering it was just hinted in the sauce. I washed this down with mimosa which paired perfectly! This was one of the best Breakfasts I’ve had. They make their own cubed potatoes which were very tasty… I will be going back if I ever find myself in the area again… very small inside so if your robust this isn’t for you. :)

Ugh, run by the loveliest ppl, so I want to give it four stars, but tbh, my omelette was really only a three and Stevo’s pancakes lacked a certain fluffiness I had been expecting, so here we are at a solid A-​OK.
Apparently LC is kind of a big deal in Southwest FL, as per the menu the blueberry pancakes had ranked well on Bön Appetit’s list of «best comfort food» in the States — as a result, the wait can get nasty. That said, bless their hearts, they let you call in when you’re en route and put your name in — thus, when we rolled up not so fresh after sitting in Christmas-​in-​a-​beach-​town traffic, our name was just being called — G-​d was smiling down on this gustatory field trip.
Menu is fairly standard fare — eggs w sausage/​corned beef hash, breakfast sanwiches, bennies (regular, seafood, turkey), hot cakes (bluebs, granola nut, malted), waffles, French toast, omelettes/​frittatas — and for lunch, you can hit a salad w local seafood/​chicken/​steak, soups, and sandos (burgers, fish, chicken).
Muam went for the win with the «ocean frittata», skip the creamy alfredo (b/c…why…) — eggs a shrimp, scallops, krab, broc, shrooms, artichoke hearts — and I have to say, I’m not one to ever eat krab, but as she was done and I feel compelled not to waste food, I dove in and was pleasantly surprised — subtle flavor, eggs were creamy without being too wet, even the krab managed not to be offensive — hers was the best choice of our three items. The hotcakes were decent but unremarkable — though the homemade compote accompanying them was fairly tasty — and as mentioned, my eggs were okay, but nothing I couldn’t do just as well at home.
We arrived around 2p, so our neighbors had mostly burgers/​salads — the blackened grouper seemed to be a hot choice, as did iterations of caesar/​house salads (heavy on the romaine, cucs, tomatoes, light on the microgreens and farro). Everyone seemed happy, though no one was exclaiming «this is the best seafood salad I’ve ever put down my gullet», which is clearly what the bar for communicating excellence should be.
The vibe is muy casual — you wouldn’t be out of place there in swim trunks and a T — given the name, you might expect it to be on the water — false — it’s the lighthouse café b/​c every inch of wall space is decorated in photos of lighthouses from around the world. Tables are a little sticky, nothing fancy abt it — waitresses have clearly been working there for years — friendly without being oppressively so.
Most breakie items run from $ 7.5−12, sides in the $ 3 – 5 range, lunch is a little steeper ($ 11 – 15), though still very reasonable. Portions ample but not overwhelming, unless you have a bird appetite. Was it worth the 90min drive from Naples? For the food alone, no — but for the adventure, sure. If you’re on Sanibel, not a bad place to end up — and the owners are so lovely, go just to support the community.

s’all right…
i don’t get the hype. it’s small and they overestimate the wait. it’s breakfast (albeit greasy), it’s fast, it’s friendly. not the ‘best breakfast in the world’ as it boasts but it’s fine.
probably popular because they offer true breakfast food/​omelettes which stands out amongst all the seafood heavy restaurants.
quick drive or bike ride to/​from the famous lighthouse/​beach. everything i read made it seem like the restaurant was along the beach and i had envisioned shelling while we waited for our table but the beach is a 5 second drive down the road. don’t need to go back.

I was prepared to experience something similar to what I had already experienced along the Periwinkle stretch on Sanibel Island but was sadly disappointed.
Spent almost $ 17 on a grouper sandwich which was more like a $ 2 TV dinner. cheap, white bread hamburger bun with an 8^th inch slice of fish, some lettuce and a tomato. If There were no fries it would’ve been a total loss.
I had spent less at several locations on the island and had a far superior meal.

There are few things I enjoy as much on Sanibel as a nice, lazy brunch out – and there is no better place in my opinion than the Lighthouse Café. It’s cute, quaint, friendly, tasty, and affordable. I’m pretty sure they haven’t raised their prices in the 15 years since we moved to the island! What they’re not is fast, or modern, or gastro-​gourmet fanciness.
Down home, home-​style cooking is the name of the game, in a place that looks like it’s out of a 40s magazine, surrounded by pictures of lighthouses. My family’s go-​to favorites are the Eggs Benedict (served «lighthouse style» on a croissant) and the Belgian Waffles – and be sure to order the potatoes with those eggs! But really, it’s hard to go wrong here, and over the years we’ve tried most of the menu – and never left unhappy.
While it might be busy and noisy at times, Lighthouse Café is a Sanibel institution that is worth the wait – plus if there’s a line, you can just shop next door!

I love it when recommendations turn out to be better than expected. Lighthouse Café was scrumptious!
The BF & I each had the 2 egg combo with sirloin, house potatoes & toast with strawberry jam. We also ordered bacon and sausage on the side. The orange juice was fresh and the coffee was continuously poured through out our dining experience.
Overall my favorite thing was the sausage links. They had a great taste and kick to it. The strawberry jam was fire too. I would definitely buy a jar to take home.
The service was on point, the servers came by several times to check up on the guest and promptly brought us anything else we wanted.
I would definitely come back to Lighthouse Café.

Ein angesagtes Lokal, gerade zur Frühstückszeit, da die meissten Apartmentanlagen auf Sanibel kein Frühstück anbieten. Ich kanns definitiv empfehlen!