Caneel Bay has turned the sedate, refined, gourmet Turtle Bay Estate House into an house of beef. “Even the most renowned restaurants can’t stand still,” said Anthony Dawodu, the executive chef, who joined the resort from two Boston restaurants, Bamboa and 33.
“Managing Director Nikolay Hotze and I realized there was no place to enjoy top-end steaks on St. John or St. Thomas," he added. "So we jumped on transforming the menu at Turtle Bay to reflect a modern steakhouse inspiration, with contemporary flair, by using the freshest ingredients to provide an array of unique dishes. Even though the new menu is quite modern, Turtle Bay remains true to its fine-dining roots.”
While the beef is not local, Chef Dawodu is looking to the land for vegetables, relying on Coral Bay’s Josephine’s Greens for some supplies. Look for heirloom tomatoes, ginger, lemongrass, micro herbs, arugula, baby mixed greens and pumpkin. Lobsters and mahi mahi are also locally sourced.
Caneel's opening a steak house suggests an attempt to please what may be a younger clientele at the traditional, reserved resort.
But only if it’s along the lines of an Arnie Morton’s or Ruth’s Chris.
Not an Outback
When we travel, we like to find food and restaurants that are unique to where we’re visiting. For us that means when we’re in the Caribbean, we don’t eat Italian or Chinese or Mediterranean or Mexican. Or steak.
“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”! Turtle Bay is the most upscale restaurant on St. John, in a beautiful setting, offering excellent food and service in the Caneel tradition. Why the switch to steak? Caneel’s own Sugarmill restaurant has been offering many excellent steak dishes for quite a few years – the Lime Inn has long been serving great filet mignon – and Chloe and Bernard’s tried the steakhouse approach several years ago, and then abandoned it. With several places already offering good steaks, ther’s certainly no need for still another one.
This may indeed appeal to the young(and the tasteless), but count us out. Turtle Bay is exactly what Mr.Rini described- an island of dining serenity on an island fast losing its unique character. The island (and the world) do not need one more purveyor of beef.
Show me the BEEF, I cant wait to come down on January 25 and make my reservation.
I suspect it is more of an attempt to attract patron of all ages looking for a “safe” meal.
We are with jmm, we seek out what we can’t get at home.
In fact, it is a fun challenge in our group to refuse to eat or drink anything on STJ that we could get at home.
That means no pizza, no burgers, no steak, no soda or Bud, etc.
If we can readily find the same thing at home, we don’t eat it on vacation.
When I’m in paradise I prefer to enjoy local cuisine. I get enough great steak at home in Chicago.
It might be interesting to redo this survey, limiting it to those who have actually dined at Turtle Bay. Willing to wager that people who have been there before would not want to see it changed into a steakhouse.