An article to tide you over while I'm off-island

Leaving the island tonight to go to the mainland (Maineland? Anyone?) for the weekend. Boston tonight and home in Maine until Sunday. Here is one of my new articles for This Week on Martha's Vineyard. It's a restaurant profile. This issue will hit Vineyard streets tomorrow (Thursday). For next week, I've written an article about where to get ice cream on the island. Weee/yum!

Will update soon about newspapering on MV. I'm aware the font sizes and formatting in this post are loopy. No more time to try to fix them -- I to catch a ferry in 20 minutes to get off this rock for the first time in a month! Have a nice rest of the week.

Wining and dining with your toes in the sand
Oak Bluffs restaurant offers great seafood and one-of-a-kind harbor atmosphere
By Zach Dionne - 6/18/09

The harborside entrance to Sand Bar & Grille, the only on-island establishment with a sand floor.

Sand Bar & Grille is like being at the beach with a personal bar, chef and waitstaff at your service. It’s not only that it’s the one spot you can legally drink with your feet in the sand – the restaurant is the sole on-island establishment using grains of the beach as the dining room floor – but also the laid-back vibe and location. Sand Bar sits on Oak Bluffs Harbor, one of only a small handful of restaurants boasting such status. Dual surfboards hang coolly above the harbor-side entrance.

It’s the type of joint you can spend 30 minutes grabbing a quick Corona – or one of the other 10 draft brews or 10 bottled beers – or three hours with friends, indulging in several courses and soaking in the daily live music.

Appetizers like burger-sized snow crab cakes with Cajun aioli sauce and house-smoked salmon with crisp, herbed bread are delightful, well-presented and leave room for the main course – or for one appetizer truly worth a derivation from an evening of seafood: warm spinach and artichoke dip with an all-star addition of fresh, sweet red peppers, served in a soft bread bowl.

Sand Bar diversifies its menu by offering more than 75 selections of sushi in addition to seafood, prime steak and lobster, burgers and sandwiches. The restaurant has doubled for several years as a respectable sushi destination; Sand Bar’s new sushi chef has crafted delicious creations at his own off-island restaurant for 20 years.

Entrees of pan-seared scallops and grilled swordfish prove what gregarious and resourceful server Alex indicates; the fare is locally caught, never raised in hatcheries, and, most importantly, the chefs know exactly what to do with the finest seafood. The menu offers several methods of preparation for each fresh special and chef-inspired entree.

The scallops are tender and tasty; not surprisingly one of chef Dan Kelleher’s favorites.

“I like it just pan-seared with a nice medium cook on it so it’s still a little fleshy in the middle, with that flavor,” says Kelleher, a chef alongside manager-slash-chef Pete Bradford, a Vineyard native and culinary veteran.

The swordfish is also delicious and expertly prepared – fresh, juicy, hot; an explosion of rich taste in every bite. Smashed potatoes and a bright vegetable medley serve as perfect compliments, occasionally garnering their own attention away from the sensational swordfish.

“You can actually mix and match a little bit. If you want a pan-sear and you want the herb butter on it instead of the soy glaze, we can do that. I think it’s a little more customer friendly that telling them, ‘This is how it is and this is how it’s gonna be,’” Kelleher says.

An island-style bar juts out into the sandy patio, an area replete with guests whiling away sunny afternoons with ambient live acts like local strummer Mike Benjamin. The sandy outdoor seating – the largest portion of the seating area, which also includes an indoor bar and tables – is Kelleher’s favorite aspect of Sand Bar. “You’re out on the harbor. It’s a good atmosphere,” he says.

Indeed, Sand Bar has character. In a tourist Mecca where restaurants are a dime a dozen, it’s almost magic to dine at an unforgettable spot overlooking a serene harbor, your toes in the sand.