I've dined at this restaurant many times and always enjoy its simple food and drinks. On this visit, I ordered the tri-tip tacos. They were good, but not great, as the meat wasn't as tender as I had hoped. This isn't a fancy restaurant, but the food is consistently decent, and the lively atmosphere makes it an enjoyable place to visit. The presentation is fairly basic, but the service is a highlight--the waitstaff were attentive and respectful throughout our meal. One thing I especially like is the variety of seating options. I've dined in all three areas over the years: the bar, the indoor dining room, and the patio, each offering a slightly different experience. The only downside was the payment policy. Our group wasn't allowed to split the check, so we had to settle the bill with cash. Since not everyone had cash on hand, it made paying much more inconvenient than it needed to be. read more

Crocodile Restaurant & Bar - Tri-Tip Tacos - Bars Near Me - Santa Barbara, California

At Crocodile, their culinary focus is centered around fresh, locally sourced ingredients and creating dishes that are both flavorful and nourishing. My family and I came for Mother's Day and overall had a nice experience. The restaurant is attached to the Lemon Tree Inn/Motel and was fairly quiet during our visit, which I actually appreciated because it made for a relaxing meal. The only downside was pit server as he forgot to bring cutlery with the food and when we mentioned it, he kind of just shrugged it off, which did not feel especially welcoming or hospitable. We ordered the: *Parmesan Crusted Salmon-parmesan crusted salmon on steamed vegetables, creamy lemon caper sauce *Lemon Chicken Salad- grilled chicken on mixed greens with feta, artichoke, tomato, lemon vinaigrette *Coconut French Toast-texas toast, cinnamon, vanilla, fresh coconut shreds, maple syrup, butter, banans and berries *Mud Pie-homemade oreo crust with cappaccino ice cream Everything we tried was enjoyable and the food itself is what would bring me back. Another plus is the parking situation. Since the restaurant shares the motel parking lot, parking was very easy and free, which is always a bonus. read more

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For dinner, the patio has a Beautiful evening ambience with soft lighting, fire pit vibes and greenery and palm trees that makes you feel like you're in Hawaii. Delicious food and wine selection as well. read more

Excellent food, homemade soups, the local crowd, and hotel guests hang out. Service is great, super friendly and helpful. read more

Crocodile Restaurant & Bar - Specialist cocktail, tangerine lemon drop, & a draft beer - Bars Near Me - Santa Barbara, California

We stayed at the Lemon Tree Inn for 2 nights in Santa Barbara and this restaurant is located at the hotel. I only took pictures of the breakfast/brunch but everything well exceeded my expectations. The previous night, we had dinner and the chicken alfredo was also really good. Because we had a large group, they also made us an outdoor table on the lawn that was beautiful. Good service and the best place we ate over the weekend. The brunch menu really stands out! Take a look at the pictures! read more

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One of my all time favorites. Nice to eat at a restaurant that is not filled with yelling! lol quite, peaceful, with a lovely atmosphere read more

Crocodile Restaurant & Bar - Ice tea under the umbrellas - Bars Near Me - Santa Barbara, California

Was staying in Santa Barbara and decided to try this place out. As we walked in I noticed this restaurant is a little tired and really needs some updating. Service was amazing it was a young man his name was Jack. He had awesome customer service he was very friendly and had a nice smile on his face! He suggested the clam chowder. So we ordered the Clam chowder and a burger. He wasn't wrong the clam chowder was a 8 out of 10. It had a lot of tasty clam in the soup. The burger was nice and juice. So if you're in the area ask for Jack and order the clam chowder! read more

We came here to celebrate my nephew's graduation. It was an early lunch, but it felt like we had the whole restaurant to ourselves. This probably helped the attentiveness of our server. Food and drinks were tasty, but pricey considering it was lunch not dinner. The must-have dish is their clam chowder. They claimed it was the best in Santa Barbara, and I couldn't argue with that. Overall, great place to enjoy a taste of SB without the noisy tourist crowds and plenty of free parking (since it's located adjacent to a hotel). read more

Crocodile Restaurant & Bar - The famous chowder with a limoncello martini, delightful! - Bars Near Me - Santa Barbara, California

This restaurant is inside the lemon tree hotel Really great restaurant great service from Angelina we have had her two times great customer service good food read more

Stopped by Crocodile Restaurant for a quick dinner and it hit the spot. I had the Roma angel hair pasta, my husband ordered the Absolut pizza, and we finished with tiramisu for dessert. The cocktails were great as well. A solid option in Santa Barbara if you're looking for quality dining experience. Service was good and the atmosphere was nice. read more

Always a great place to dine! Prices are reasonable and food is great! Staff is always smiling and happy!

IF I COULD GIVE THIS 0 STARS, I WOULD! Our reservation was at 7:00 PM, but our waitress didn't put our order in until 8:15 PM and only came by our table a couple of times to check on drinks. The ambiance was meh at best, and the food was not cooked the way we requested at all. DO NOT EAT HERE. You WILL be disappointed. While they may have brought us the items we ordered from the menu, the food was prepared incorrectly, arrived cold, and was completely tasteless. Overall, it was nowhere near worth the price. read more

Hidden gem. Food is delicious and service is excellent. Full bar service. Locals favorite .

So we've stayed here multiple times and decided to eat at their tiki bar, bad service. No one came up to us we had to ask for menus and just decided to leave instead.. read more

My husband and I stumbled upon this place after making a last minute decision to stay the night in Santa Barbara at the hotel attached, the Lemon Tree Inn. We ditched our teens (one was tired, one was sick...I'm not that mean) and the two of us had a really lovely dinner. We split a BBQ chicken pizza and a lemon chicken salad. Both were delicious. We were so pleasantly surprised. Plus, we sat outside with a toasty heat lamp. Service was perfection. Couldn't have asked for a better evening!! read more

Not enough vegetarian items. Service is mediocre. There's certainly nothing special. read more

My friend & I went here for dinner. We were seated outside and waited 20 minutes for our waiter to come over. He was nearby the whole time fussing with umbrellas, & my friend said she made eye contact with him several times. When he finally came over, she said something about the wait and from then on, he was professional but our irritation lasted. Food was quite good, a little pricey though. read more

What a great find for happy hour. Great for just the two of us but also fabulous for a group of any size. Back area outside is huge, secluded and friends or family friendly. Plenty of outdoor seating with heating tables or lamps. Very comfortable and inviting. This ambiance comes with a varied happy hour menu and friendly staff. We had a table of seven and everything we ordered was tasty. Recommend the meatball sliders, delicious and filling. Highly recommend this area for a relaxing happy hour and I made a note that we will have to come back for lunch or dinner sometime. read more

Crocodile Restaurant & Bar - Meatball sliders - Bars Near Me - Santa Barbara, California

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Everything about this place is wonderful! The service is fabulous! The ambiance is great. And food delicious!!

It's so tempting to give this restaurant a 1-star review. I love it so much, I want it to stay a hidden local gem. I'm not going to offer much of a description here, so you'll just have to go and find out yourself. But I do want to comment on the service. Whoever is hiring and training the staff that was working outside at happy hour this week deserves a promotion and raise. The young servers were among the sweetest, most responsive, kindest, well-trained servers I have ever encountered in my life anywhere in the world. Top tier service. read more

drove by this place and bookmarked it because of the name we came at like 8:30 and it was completely empty. it's inside of a hotel also which we didn't realize initially waiter was super nice but the food is bad im so sorry. super bland and basic huevos rancheros ....no sazon no sabor shocked at the high reviews - maybe lunch is better? read more

The seating? Amazing, the service? Extremely polite and quick. The food? Very excusable. Crocodile restaurant and bar is very okay. The food is nothing to write home about, the burger was very average but the potatoes where so bad that I was shocked. The lasagna was very average and I think it could have used so much more meat. I love the lemon tree in , but they can do improvements revolving around the restaurant. Their drinks are a solid 10/10 though. read more

Crocodile Restaurant & Bar - Bars Near Me - Santa Barbara, California

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Stuck in bed not feeling well. Ordered mud pie to the room. Quick with friendly service. Just what I was craving. read more

Everything was perfect. From happy hour cocktails at the bar, to the best seat in the house for dinner. Abi, our server was attentive and stood out as a top notch gentleman. Delicious!!! Everything was delicious read more

The staff was great! The food was very good. We had a Steak salad that was served with some grilled peppers, zucchini and it didn't even need dressing. We followed this with the Mud Pie dessert which was a wonderful blend of Oreo cookie crust, cappuccino ice cream and vanilla cream. The restaurant was clean and its seating was spacious. Easy place to have a good meal and conversation. Also, we tried the La Cubana which included habanero Tequilla and passion fruit amongst other things. Pretty cool! read more

This is the place to be! The ambience is amazing, the food delicious, and the service is great. Shoutout to Abner for being so helpful and quick with the service. Had some great tips as well! L Food: Potato steak cut fries. literal wedges hahah if you don't like super chunky fries, stick to the mashed potato Chicken Marsala: absolutely delicious. We did add a bit of pepper and pepper flakes for some extra spice but the dish itself was great! Pomegranate margarita and Rose: they speak for themselves. Super yummy and the margarita was well mixed and not watered down. Two desserts to go: Banana Malibu and Trip Chocolate Mousse stay tuned to see how yummy it is read more

The experience was a plus. Servers Abner and Jerry were awesome! Thanks for going out of your way to make our stay at the hotel a memorable one!! The ambiance is nice. We went this past weekend, it's June so the weather was amazing and sitting patio side or even by the fire pit and ordering a late night snack was the best. Very neat and clean. The burgers we had the first night were outstanding!! We loved them seriously the best. The "French fries" were a unique experience so good I wanted to order more!! We had a white vegetable pizza by the fire pit for a late night snack, best pizza ever! The crust was light and slightly chewy but still soft! Coffee was great. I love a good coffee. The Bloody Mary I had (a virgin I don't drink) was so refreshing. Shockingly enough the downside was the dessert. There were 4 of us one had tiramisu said the alcohol flavor was too strong for her my husband had a triple chocolate mousse and the middle layer was a bit gritty for a mousse and I had the coconut cake. I didn't understand the strawberry sauce w it. I prefer it alone, for me it was too sweet. Other than that everything from drinks to snacks were great, shrimp cocktail, chips and salsa everything was delicious!!! Thanks for the great service we will be back!! read more

Crocodile Restaurant & Bar - Churro French toast....i think that's what it was called. - Bars Near Me - Santa Barbara, California

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I was quite surprised when I joined some friends for a Friday evening Happy Hour that went until 6 pm! Outside in a gorgeous patio with the sunset punk clouds overhead there was a tasty happy hour menu with drinks and food. We enjoyed the caprese, calamari, chowder, and French friends. Oh and added in some meat ball sliders! Plus, a few glasses of heavily poured wine. The staff were quick to take orders and although busy, the drinks and food all came out in order and timed well. Plus, free parking at hotel while you eat. Definitely will be back! read more

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I'm taking away a star because we dined here yesterday evening and the service was amazing. They really went above and beyond. However we came back for breakfast because we were staying at the hotel and the service was terriblem. We were probably the only customers there at 930 am today and the server clearly didn't want to be there. I would give him 1 star but didn't want to run n it for the other guy read more

This restaurant makes one of the best gazpacho soups I've tasted. It is usually there only during the summer months.

We stayed at The Lemon Tree Hotel and walked on over to check out crocodile bar! It was pretty neat, small but drinks and food was good. We caught Happy Hour still which was cool. read more

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Charged 9.00 extra for cream (or milk) with 5 cups of hot tea. Who charges for cream with tea or coffee. They charged us for two glasses of milk servers in the tiny creamers that are served with coffee. We were told by the waitress/manager that she was told by her manager to charge us and she had no answer for whether they charge for cream or milk with coffee. We have been going there for over 40 years and have never had a problem. We were a party of 6 so they automatically charged us a 20%tip and this charge was pointed out to us when we got the bill . It will be interesting to see how Crocodile holds up without its backbone, Alfredo. He was the best. RIP. read more

I was hoping to enjoy a good experience dining at this restaurant during my brief stay in Santa Barbara in October, 2024. I guess it wasn't meant to be. During my first visit, I treated my son to dinner. That's when a server spilled iced tea on his just-cleaned slacks. "Sorry about that," the server said. The very next morning, I wanted to sample the restaurant's breakfast choices. The plate looked pretty, until I pulled a strand of hair from my mouth. Although I was disgusted, I shrugged it off. I lost my appetite after I pulled a second strand of hair from my mouth. That strand was long. Thankfully, the server comped my entire meal. I chose to stay at the Lemon Tree Inn because it also has a restaurant on its premises. However, I don't think I'll be returning to this location. My stay at Lemon Tree Inn, mind you, exceeded my expectations. The Crocodile Restaurant, unfortunately, took a huge chunk out of what could have been a 5-STAR review. In my opinion, all employees at this restaurant need a refresher course on cleanliness, hygiene and safety. To management: Please work harder on doing a better job in areas of your kitchen your diners can't see. read more

Terrific new bartender,Dryea,nice attentiveness and personal able. Food is always on point

We came here to celebrate our friend Carole's birthday (she sings here). My wife and I had a great experience, loved the food, loved the singing, loved the ambiance, and enjoyed the intimate outdoor setting when we went to sit outside later. I had the Tagliatelle Alfredo (first time having tagliatelle) and it was delicious. Highly recommended. read more

Crocodile Restaurant & Bar - Bars Near Me - Santa Barbara, California

This is a hidden gem (that honestly I never would've considered visiting had my in-laws not been going for years). First of all...parking galore! Never an issue. Also, ambiance...if you're outside, you might be by the pool, but they've done so much outdoors since COVID! An abundance of tables, fun lights, heaters and umbrellas, a huge yard chess set. So much space for large parties and room for kids to explore. The food is delicious. We normally come for lunch or dinner, and I typically get the parmesan crusted salmon with veggies. It is SO GOOD. Such a full plate, huge serving, and so so delicious. They also have generously portioned breakfast and brunch entrees, pizzas, a nice sized burger/steak fries/salad. They've got options for everyone. My mother in law is from Sweden and lusts after the Swedish pancakes. So they get her stamp of approval. Service is always top notch. They've got kids meals and crayons for the kiddos, are always quick, courteous, and friendly! We come here often and highly recommend. read more

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Always delicious. Pretty outdoor dining space. Decent prices. Easy parking. Clean ambiance. read more

Crocodile Restaurant & Bar - Iced latte - Bars Near Me - Santa Barbara, California

was sat for over half an hour without anyone taking out order. no one even came to take our drink order. huge bummer

Nice space. Great indoor seating, fantastic outdoor seating in a garden setting. The service was good and our server was attentive. Nothing spectacular but nothing to complain about either. The food was above average and everyone in our party enjoyed the dishes ordered. The absolu pizza was tasty and fresh ingredients. The salmon piccata was delicious and perfectly prepared. The star of the evening was clam chowder. It was smooth velvety thick with a large number of clams and chunks of potatoes. It was a real surprise and unexpected treat. The attached hotel is the Lemon Tree Inn and is a decent place to stay. We tried the restaurant because we were guest of the hotel. read more

The food and the vibe here was amazing without a doubt. The price is pretty on point, they serve in really big portion and keep you full really long. The service was iffy. Like the server gave attitude and didn't really help much, that's like a 3/5 stars for me. But overall it's good! read more