Beloved Cortez Village restaurant reopens four months after Hurricanes Helene, Milton

A beloved Cortez Village restaurant reopened on Tuesday, four months after back-to-back storms. Slicker's Eatery has seen a lot since opening during the COVID-19 pandemic. From red tide seasons to, more recently, Hurricanes Helene and Milton. 

"The first one, we had three feet of water in here," said Bob Slicker, the owner of Slicker's Eatery. "Luckily for us, the structure of the building is brick. Unfortunately, everything inside of the building was ruined. The tables, the chairs, these are all new. We made the tables ourselves. The barstools, every piece of equipment in the restaurant had water in it."

READ: Manatee County family hoping to save Cortez Village bait shop from demolition after hurricane damage

Dig deeper:

Slicker said despite being closed, he and his 10 staff members were busy giving back to the community. 

"I'm blessed and fortunate that I'm a Rotarian, and we all got up and running, and we've been working to keep Cortez, Cortez," he explained. "We spearheaded giving away over $70,000 worth of appliances to Cortez residents that lost it, helped working on a couple of homes, and refrigerators." 

Staff donated 67 bikes to kids in the community and served free meals.

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"When we first opened this joint, we pretty much opened with the idea not to look the other way, not to turn our head, our shoulder, and to step up to the plate and help people," he said. 

Local perspective:

Monday afternoon, Flay and Linda Crosswell waited at the doors for the restaurant's soft reopening. 

"It's just unbelievable how the troops rallied to come to help people and they helped Bob and Bob helped a ton of people," Flay said. "You kind of feel like Christmastime. It's pretty warm."

What's next:

Slicker will emcee the upcoming Cortez Fishing Festival on February 17-18.

"People really want to see Cortez Village, see the damage, see how important it is to have them come out," he said.

The Source: The information in this story was provided through an interview with Slicker's Eatery's owner. 

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