Providenciales Part 1: Hemingway's

A few weeks ago, I went to Turks & Caicos for the second time for a little start-of-autumn getaway. Last time I was there, our hotel didn't have an attached restaurant and our room only had a kitchenette. However, this time around, we stayed at The Sands which has an attached restaurant, Hemingway's, and our room had a full kitchen. So, we dined a little differently this trip. We ate hot breakfasts and lunches and the occasional dinner in our room and we had planned on dining out just a handful of times. But, every place we went to was delicious and worth sharing, so I'm going to be doing little recaps and reviews of our meals. That was my warning to you that the next week and a half of posts is going to be all TCI related.

First up is Hemingway's. Last time we were on the island, we went to Hemingway's out of desperation. Our other dinner plans fell through so we just drove over and tried to get seats without reservations. During this recent trip, we were actually staying at the Sands so we decided that for our first meal, we'd make it really easy on ourselves and have an easy dinner at an eatery within walking distance of our room.

If you're planning on eating at Hemingway's, look for this sign for 'The Sands' to guide you to the right place. It's funny to me that there's a number on the sign because whenever you look up addresses of places in Provo, it's usually just the street name, e.g. The Sands, Grace Bay Road, Providenciales. I didn't even realize there were house numbers until I was editing these photos to share on my blog.

We arrived at our table just as the sun was starting to set. We were seated in the outdoor area where we could enjoy gorgeous views of the sand and surf while we ate.

The menu is pretty extensive with a varied selection of starters and entrees and it includes several surfy and turfy options.

One thing you'll notice about most of the restaurants on the island: there is a resident cat associated with each eatery. This little cutie pie was walking around, saying hello to everyone and freaking out a little girl. Apparently, she was terrified of cats.

For our starter, we had the coconut shrimp which came with a delicious mango sauce. I thought the breading could have been more coconutty but the sauce was beloved by everyone at the table. It was sweet and tangy with just a hint of spice.

In between our app and entrees, it was starting to get much darker so the staff started bringing lanterns to everyone's tables and they started lighting torches around the perimeter of the dining area. I think the torches might've been serving double duty: lighting up the place as well as staving off mosquitoes. Thank goodness, because I hate mosquitoes.

It took quite a while for our entrees to come out - I don't know if there was some sort of snafu or if the service was just lacking a bit that night - so we were incredibly overjoyed when they finally showed up with a tray full of food for our table.

I got the grilled lobster. Lobster season is from 1Aug to 31Mar and Caicos lobster is a real treat (it's less stringy than Maine lobster) so if you can make your trip during that time frame, I highly recommend it. The lobster was deliciously seasoned but just slightly overcooked (unfortunately). The peas and rice were a delicious accompaniment, and you can't see, but there were some buttery snap peas hiding behind the lobster tail.

My papa got the grilled mahi mahi, which was so delicious. It was really soft and mild and pretty perfect.

My sister got the seared tuna with jasmine rice. The tuna was delicious but the rice was really, really delicious. It was super buttery and fluffy.

We had planned on getting dessert (because they have an amazing fried ice cream at Hemingway's) but because our main course had taken such a long time to show up, we weren't super hungry for dessert. So, we just headed back to our room for a little Netflix and relaxation.

By the way, I'm sharing all of the fun, travel-y, non-food-related activities that we enjoyed in Provo over on my travels blog, you know, if you're interested.