New Cape Coral restaurant opens with old Florida flavor, look and feel

• Florida Boy Burger Co. is committed to using local ingredients, with plans to offer an all-Florida beef option in the future.
• The owners are looking to expand to other locations in Florida, including Orlando, Jacksonville, Naples, and North Port.

Stuffed squirrels, gators and a wild boar’s head are mounted on the walls. Taxidermied gator heads with mouths wide open and rattlesnakes in striking position are scattered about on tables and shelves. Four live baby gators swim around an 8-by-2-foot tank in the middle of the dining room. Oh, then there is the skin of a python stretching from floor to ceiling.

“That was caught a year ago in the Everglades,” Roger Lolly says matter-of-factly. “It’s about 10 feet, one of the larger ones I caught that day.”

Welcome to Florida Boy Burger Co.’s newest Cape Coral location, where old Florida is everywhere.

It’s expected to open at 11 a.m. Friday, Feb. 21, in FK Your Diet’s old spot off Del Prado Boulevard.

“We wanted to expand at some point, but this happened so quickly,” said Louis Cioffi, a co-owner along with Lolly. “This spot was too good to pass up.”

“We’re going to get this one going, chill out a bit and keep going,” added Lolly (Floridaboyinc on Instagram) as he put the finishing touches on one of the mounted gators. “We have investors reaching out to us from all over.”

An old Florida and Pine Island feel

For now, though, the focus is on this new Cape location, basically a carbon copy of the original location that opened last July near the intersection of Fowler Street and Colonial Boulevard in Fort Myers.

Look closely and you’ll see references to Pine Island in the photos of Lolly’s father mullet fishing, his grandfather and uncle, and of Summer Dooley whose fishing family is “legendary to the island.”

“There’s a little more Pine Island at this one,” said Lolly, who grew up there. “It’s important to us.”

The two have spent the last three months getting ready for Friday’s opening.

“It’s been a project,” Cioffi said. “There are no shortcuts here. Everything we do is meaningful.”

Especially when it comes to the menu.

Some changes made to the original menu

“That’s the same for now, but we’re making some changes,” Cioffi said. “We got rid of the steaks and the tacos. And we’re adding gator bites.”

Other changes include making the Bangor Bash “less Louisiana” by replacing the boudin and andouille with venison sausage and wild boar cheddar and jalapeno sausage, and gator too.

“We’re making it more Florida,” Cioffi said.

“We listened to our customers,” Lolly said. “They asked, we listened and made some changes.”

All about the burgers

The biggest changes can be found in their signature burgers, some of which will be renamed when the new menu comes out.

“Our burgers are seasoned now,” Cioffi said. “They have great flavor now. Everyone seems to like it.”

Watch: A 10-foot long python skin adorns a wall at Florida Boy Burger

Roger Lolly mounted the skin from a 10-foot Burmese python he caught in the Everglades at his Florida Boy Burger Co. in Cape Coral.

The signature burgers are works of art at Florida Boy Burger.

One is topped with alligator sausage, blackened crabmeat, spicy pimento, pickled red onions and arugula, while another features bacon BBQ pork, cheddar and onion straws. Some come with bacon onion jam, a sunny-side-up egg or beer-battered lobster.

If it all seems too much, no worries.

“We have an original Florida burger,” Cioffi said. “It’s plain with cheese, lettuce, tomato. It’s not on the menu right now but just ask for it. It comes with fries for $12. We don’t want anyone to be overwhelmed. Keep it simple.”

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Appetizers (think frog legs, blue crab fritters, house-made pickles and more), salads, handhelds, specialty fries and milkshakes (extraordinary ones mixed with Fruity Pebbles, Key lime pie, banana pudding and cookies and cream!) round out the menu.

Burger-esque alligator patties are in the works, along with an all-Florida beef option.

“That will be a 100 percent Florida-raised and processed beef option,” Cioffi said. “We want to support local farmers. All the greens, vegetables and fruits are local. We want to do the same with our beef.”

What’s next?

Florida Boy Burger will open Feb. 21 with little fanfare.

“There’s no soft opening, no test run,” Lolly said. “We’re going to hit the ground running. Once it’s going, we will look for another location. Orlando, Jacksonville. We want to go to Naples, North Port. We want to be part of communities. Like Louis says, ‘Come in as a customer and leave as family.’”

Here’s to a growing family.

Florida Boy Burger Co., 1402 Del Prado Blvd S., Suite 4, Cape Coral and 4480 Fowler St., Suite 110, Fort Myers; (239) 245-7145; burgers.inc or follow on Facebook

Robyn George is a food and dining reporter for The News-Press. Connect at rhgeorge@fortmyer.gannett.com