Outback Crab Shack

What a cool place. Recently moved here from the northeast and was looking for a local hole in the wall that serves bbq and seafood. This place is it! Big portions of seafood done right! Down and dirty with a great view of the water. Can’t wait to go back for the Bbq.

By family was in town and my brother picked out this place. We arrived via boat and parked at their private pier. Sign says you’re supposed to check in or something but when we asked about it, they said we didn’t have to. Their was a pretty decent amnt of ppl but there was no wait for our big group — party of 10, which was nice.
It was a beautiful day and we were seated in an enclosed area so we weren’t directly in the sun. Even though they had the fans on, it was slightly uncomfortable.
We ordered calamari app and an app trio with smoked fish, gator tails and conch fritter. The trio app portion were a bit small for the price. We ordered a full platter of the seafood boil AND the fried seafood platter. Prices for the platter was high, however serving size is for 4 ppl. It’s more like 7 ppl bc the platters were Ginormous!!! The fried platter portion was larger than the boil platter. In highsight, we should have forego the apps or kept apps and ordered ½ fried platter bc we ended up with 4 boxes of leftovers. Boil seafood platter — wasn’t the freshest I’ve had and the potatoes were under seasoned. Fried platter — everything was seasoned very well. The fish fillets were cooked perfectly. There were some calamari in the assortment as well however it was overcooked compared to the indiv calamari app.
They use a lot of Styrofoam, wished they more eco friendly.
Service was pretty good; our waitress was friendly.

Lots of ok fried seafood that is fairly expensive. No free refills on softdrinks. Nice location. Service was just ok. Not very well climate controlled in the large seating area so be prepared to be hot or cold under those conditions.

When I hear the words «fish camp», I don’t expect anything fancy. And Outback Crab Shack lives up to that with the used office chairs, simple concrete patio, multiple styles of flooring, etc. I love it! The location is on a river with good indoor and outdoor seating. The food has never disappointed! We’ve enjoyed fried and steamed platters. Someday I’ll do the delicious looking low country boil. Beers are what you’d expect. We always bring visitors here. Good stuff!

Tilts a busy place and I can see why. The fish and snrimp was awesome and the service was great! Best place for seafood!

Food was plentiful for the most part although I would have loved more fish on my fish tacos. Service was prompt and friendly. Glad we found this place– worth the extra driving we did. Would recommend it.

We got turned off of this place 10 years ago because value was just not there. No complaints about the food or service, just not good enough to be a reason to return. Today was our first time back since then. Had fried oyster platter and conch fritters. Both were very well cooked and delicious. Our waitress very attentive, polite, and engaging. Facility and value are just as I remember. I am ok with rustic but not when it is just run down. Bathrooms are nasty and needing a rehab. Chairs ripped up and unmatced, dead bugs in spider webs. Dust crusted fans. You don’t pay for AC. At least clean your fans and not blow dust and big remnants all over your customer’s meals. Are you a business or throw back on kids summer camp? Maybe I will return in 10 years to see if the place is still standing.

Update: This is still a wonderful hidden gem! We came here for my mom’s birthday party this year and I reserved seating one day prior to arriving. The staff totally accommodated our entire group from 11am to around 9pm and gave us friendly, attentive service.
The food was fantastic and the new additions for dining since my last visit earned them another star for me. Absolutely a terrific place to bring family and friends for a special occasion or just to spend the afternoon/​evening and make lasting memories. Love this place!
4.0 star rating 5÷20÷2012
Another great experience! Great place to bring visitors (i.e. the out-​of-​town boyfriend from CA) at least once – I brought Jeff. It was his first time. Like Whitey’s Fish Camp, it’s just a great place to enjoy food and drinks with friends and family. We sat outside under the covered gazebo near the one man band and stayed until they closed. Definitely no complaints… just great food & service. Loved the floating dock, live music, outdoor seating, relaxed atmosphere and eating by the water among Florida’s indigenous critters. What fun! The bill was very reasonable ($ 118 + tip) which included several pitchers of beer, drinks, a hamburger plate with fries, an order of hush puppies, 1 order of conch fritters (some for the baby gator… ooops!), 1 full slab of BBQ ribs & a plate of boiled crawfish (plenty for all 8 of us!)…oh and FREE UNLIMITED ICE WATER! Yay! Take that — — JAX BEACH!

If you want good fried seafood this is the place to come if you get the platter for two it will easily feed four normal people. Do not come here if you were expecting a gourmet grilled piece of fish or fried chicken it ain’t gonna happen. And by the way the bathrooms could use a little upgrading and deodorizing. No air conditioning so don’t come on a hot day. The degree of service depends on the waitress summer good somebody to go back to mcdonalds.

I just left there with a group of friends. We got there at 9pm and they close at 10pm. Fish dip was really odd and there wasn’t very many people there. There was a family who had a boat there so it was cool to walk on the dock and see that and be by the water. Also, our waitress brought me a drink with a fly in… not her fault though. Overall, it was an ok experience. I probably wouldn’t go there again if I was the one to choose.

Our waitress was really nice, but that’s the only positive about my experience. I ordered the chicken tenders. They were extremely small and hard to chew. Definitely not worth $ 9 (appetizer). My friend got the crab cakes and she said that they were really good.
I won’t be back. The quality of food does not justify the price. It was extremely hot in there; they only have fans.

Was very disappointed. My husband went here with his fellow military buds and really enjoyed himself. Food and atmosphere. Our family came here tonight and it was very disappoimting. Food was okay but I’ve had better. My biggest complaint was my service. no basket of place settings no napkins, no crayons for the kids. Had to ask a couple of times. Got up and got the utensil basket ourselves after we received our food. I’ll stick to Trents Seafood

Our meals were not good… at all. We ordered the single seafood platter and it had no taste to it whatsoever. Seemed like cajun seasoning was sprinkled on top. We will not be returning. Usually hole in the walls are good but this will be our one and only time we will visit.

The food was very good and fun to eat! We got the low country boil platter for 1 and my husband and I split it. We added a few appetizers: fried pickles, hush puppies and sweet potato fries. The sweet potato fries were excellent! It was more food then we could eat with our two kids. It was affordable prices for the amount of food we received.
The restaurant is called «Outback Crab Shack» –and didn’t lie on the «shack» part of the name. The place itself was a little shabby and there was no air conditioning inside– there were several high powered fans that kept the temperature bearable. But with 2 little kids in the hot weather– it wasn’t exactly ideal.
The service was fine but not great– the people working there were really hot-​sweating through they’re clothes!
It was fun for my kids to walk down the dock looking for gators and watching the fish jumping out of the river –presumably to eat bugs? Overall, it was a fun experience– but would have been helpful in setting our expectations had we know about no A/​C. Certainly kid friendly, as it was a relaxed and very casual atmosphere.

The food here was so fresh and seasoned to taste we drove all the way from Gainesville to enjoy and it was well worth it!

They used to have Datil pepper sauce on every table, now you have to beg for it… I used to buy bottles of it here, now they sell only coozies?
Did the Datil pepper guy die? It was a local at Augustine company …
I hope my fish is fresh…

Don’t make the same mistake I made, don’t go out of your way to check this place out. There’s far better fish camps and crab shacks in Jacksonville. The portion for price is literally half the food and double the money. On top of that it was a hot day and we only saw our server once. I was so parched, thank god I brought a bottle of water with me.

Met up with friends in Saint Augustine, and their resort recommended Outback Crab Shack. Our server was attentive; however, I did have to ask for napkins & plates when our appetizer & drinks were served. That should be an automatic task for the servers. We each ordered the single platter of fried seafood. Their platters were indeed generous. And, it was delicious. No way was it frozen seafood – it was fresh! This place is indeed a must if you’re a seafood lover. Oh, their Bloody Mary’s are good!

Absolutely great. Great choices in various seafood. Sit outside. Saturday night we had a 30 minute wait, which we did in the bar.
Dinner we order ½ boiled platter. Also know to many as a low country boil. Two other groups saw ours, then also ordered the same.
Great place to ride to by motorcycle or boat.

One of my favorite hometown seafood joints. Expect to get messy, use your hands. To me the only menu item worth getting is the steamed seafood platter (2-​person and 4-​person, both accurate for hungry men). It comes with crayfish, snow crab legs, shrimp, potatoes, broccoli, and mushrooms. I’ve tried many of the other things on the menu, but most of the fried items are always too salty and heavy for my taste (the sweet potato fries are okay, though). They put Old Bay seasoning on everything.
Noticed that they recently replaced the benches indoors with nice, new leather/​pleather swivel chairs.
If you have a boat in the area, come by boat — they have a dock in the back.
Don’t be seated outside in the summer unless you like getting eaten by mosquitoes.