William’s Town,
Exuma, Bahamas
(242)345 4102 ~ E-mail: tannadee@hotmail.com
A bazillion years ago, my dad bought a bit of beach on Little Exuma (connected to Great Exuma by a long, weather-worn, rickety bridge). We don't make it down there every year, but we try.
Once there, we are reminded that only idiots would neglect coming to this amazing little spot. The water is tranquil, the flies don't even know where we are, and we can float along a small reef, watching the rarely-disturbed fish flit about.
It is a distance however, so when D.J. recommended Cassandra's Conch Fritters as the best on the island, continuing on from our property seemed like the best plan.
About fifteen minutes down the road from Mr. Clark Beach, is William's town. It was easy to spot Santanna's, where I had been told that Cassandra's sister cooked some astoundingly good food. There she was, closed up for the day and having a beer with another sister. She hollered brightly that her sister Cassandra was "off the island," but that she did, in fact make the best damn fritters in Exuma.
She then told us modestly, that she makes the best damn everything else. "Like what?" we asked, hanging out of our car window. "Conch, Lobster and Grouper" she told us. I brightened up, thinking of my Great Conch Search and asked if she made fritters. No, they are the only food that she won't touch because her sister makes them so well.
"Are you Santanna?" I asked. No, this was Denise (who shortly would request that, as all people do, we call her "Dee.") Santanna is her daughter.
She half-bullied us into agreeing to come back the next day when she would stay open especially. My mind ran the length of the Queen's Highway as I considered the hour-plus ride that we'd have to make again.
Someone in the car announced that we'd just been swimming (as a reason for missing the arbitrary closing time). Dee responded with "Nooo Sh*&!" A quick exchange about the next day, the impending hurricane, and we were off.
Little Exuma is pretty little, so about ten minutes later, we had reached the end and were turning around. You know you've reached the end because the "highway" simply stops at the water. Dad turned to us and asked, "When we told her we went swimming, did she say 'no sh*%'?" At our nods, he started laughing that huge, Mr. Clark laugh and trundled back by Santanna's (one road. Remember). He leaned out with a grin and said, "can I get your number for tomorrow?" She started to give it and then said, "If you wanted to sit, I could cook for you right now." We literally turned the car off where it sat, blocking a few people in, and piled out in our sticky, salty suits and cover-ups.
Dee took one look at my dad, in a pink polo with a towel wrapped around his waist and asked, "what the hell are you wearing?!" He pulled back his towel to reveal his Speedo-clad self. (he remembers it differently; showing just a few inches) She howled and instructed Jack, who is tall, to start pinning up the windows to the restaurant...but only a few. She was closed and did not want the entire neighborhood dropping by when they saw the open windows.
The oil was still hot and Dee's husband, Edgar is a fisherman so the protein is always fresh.
She mixed up some of the strongest drinks I've ever had in a solo-cup and bustled around her octagonal kitchen, fixing one of everything to choruses of "NO SH^%!" Without the open windows, Dee's kitchen is lit by a single, shade-less reading lamp.
Like everywhere in Exuma, the view outside her dock was astounding and we quickly fell into the amazing evening. Dee was or hero.
There were a few copies of this graphic around her busy place. Perhaps someone drew or painted it for her and she's since had it copied? The huge, great smile on her face captures it all.
It wasn't long before men, women and children started arriving by land and sea. Most just came into the kitchen, opened the fridge and frowned as if hoping cold beers would simply appear. She was out of Guinness and Kalik; no one wanted Heineken.
Far faster than any Bahamian food we've had on the island, the food arrived. The sides were all identical and thank goodness or the war of foods might have been worse. Lobster for Mom and Jack, Grouper for Dad, and I had the Conch.
Dee had been right. She made the best version of everything. My Conch was sweet and tender without even the slightest hint of tire-rubberiness.
The lobster was also great. Ultra-fresh meat, slightly pulled from the shell and fried in a feather-light batter. It took some commitment to get the meat out of the shell, but was well-worth 
it.
The big surprise, after all the other ones that evening, was the Grouper. We tend to order grouper to be polite or to get a full depth-of-understanding when we try a place. After enough fried grouper and grouper-fingers...also fried of course, we have come to expect a toughness and lack of flavor that I was beginning to assume was the fault of the fish if every cook gave it to us in such a way. Nope. Dee turned out a flaky-soft, white (not grey) meated, delicate fleshed fish that made us all wonder where we'd been all our lives.
Dad was sitting two people down from me and when Mom scooped a forkfull of grouper and was passing it along, the bite fell over Jack's zone where, just like an anxious seagull, he scooped the morsel off his plate and ate it. Once it had fallen on his plate, this bite of fish was no longer mine. Not to worry, Dad was off making friends with everyone so I just switched seats and shoveled what I could into my mouth.
When we were all digesting the sweet yellow rice & onions, coleslaw, and seafood, I asked Dee "Did you only feed us because Dad flashed you?!" She laughed and said something about how he looks good for his age (Mom started to turn pink) and how everything looked well in order. She then said, "It doesn't do any harm to window shop!"
When Dad came bopping back from washing has hands in the ocean a few minutes later, Mom greeted him "Hi Window.." which he totally missed despite the whooping peels of laughter from the rest of us.
If you go, bring a spare hat that you can sign and donate to the ceiling decor.
Santanna's asks for reservations if you want dinner (so that she'll stay open. I'd feel terrible if you went all the way down there and she was not sitting, having a beer in a good mood). They also do catering. The night we returned, she had catered a wedding the night before. The entire party showed up at the restaurant for dinner. Half of them hopped behind the bar to take orders and hand out plasticware.
Dee will make you feel at home with an easy "No Sh%^" and you'll never want to eat anywhere else again. Unless you want conch fritters in which case, you go across the road to Cassandra's. If Cassandra is off the island, then the search will have to go on. Fritters, while ubiquitous and a no-big-deal kind of food are impossible to find.
We went back. And we'll go as soon as possible when we return to Exuma. She was mentioned in the NY Times 36-Hours in Exuma and her Trip Adviser reviews are a point of pride. Check her out, email her, but for heaven's sake, rent a car and try the grouper!
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