Dinner Without Meat: What Vegetarians Order at 5350

Not every table ordering a vegetarian dinner on Anna Maria Island wants a side salad standing in for a meal. The Evening & Dinner Menu at 5350 The Pour House doesn’t have a separate “vegetarian section” — it doesn’t need one, because real options are already built into the starters, the greens, and the flatbreads. Here’s what’s actually meat-free on the card, and what to order depending on how hungry you are.

What “Vegetarian” Actually Means on This Menu

Vegetarian is a narrower word than people sometimes use it for. Per Wikipedia’s entry on vegetarianism, it means avoiding meat, poultry, and seafood — eggs and dairy are usually fine, which is why a cheese-heavy dish still counts. That distinction matters here: the dinner menu’s Greens & Things section also carries a Tuna Poke Bowl, and Notables has a Grouper Sandwich on Signature — both great orders, neither one vegetarian. Everything below is dairy-and-produce only, no seafood or meat anywhere in the dish.

Starters and Salads

The Burrata opens the Starters section at $12 — fresh burrata cheese over mixed marinated tomatoes, finished with a balsamic glaze and toasted lavash. It’s rich enough to work as a light meal on its own if you’re pacing the night slowly.

Two of the four salads in Greens & Things are vegetarian as served: the Wasabi Caesar Salad ($15) tosses romaine and Napa cabbage in the house dressing, topped with shaved Parmesan, hemp hearts, and a crostini. The Roots and Grains bowl, also $15, is the more filling of the two — quinoa, roasted butternut squash, roasted beets, spinach, dried figs, cranberries, and candied walnuts, drizzled with a tahini dressing. Both can take an add-on of salmon, chicken, or shrimp if someone at the table wants one, but neither needs it to be a full plate.

Flatbreads Without the Meatballs

Three of the five flatbreads skip meat entirely: the Margherita ($14, tomato sauce, fresh basil, fresh mozzarella, and a basil olive oil drizzle), the Funghi ($15, tomato sauce, an oven-roasted mushroom medley, mozzarella and Romano), and the Mushroom Galette ($14), which isn’t really a flatbread at all — it’s the same roasted mushroom medley baked into a tart with Crème Fraîche and herbs instead of going on dough. The word itself comes from the Norman term for “flat cake”; Wikipedia’s entry on the galette describes it as a free-form, open pastry that’s less fussy than a traditional tart, with a crisper crust — which tracks with how this one comes out of the kitchen, more rustic than the flatbreads sitting next to it on the same section. Every flatbread on the menu can also go on a gluten free sweet potato crust for $5 more, meat or no meat.

The Signature Order

If one dish on this menu is built specifically for a vegetarian table, it’s the Caprese Stuffed Portabello Mushroom in the Signature section — $14 for a portabello cap filled with mozzarella, mixed grape tomatoes, and house seasoning, then baked. It sits on the same list as the Seafood Dynamite Bake, the Grouper Sandwich, and the Filet Mignon, and it holds its own next to all three instead of reading like the one concession on an otherwise meat-heavy section.

Putting Together a Meatless Dinner

A table that wants to go fully vegetarian without feeling like it’s settling has a real path through this menu: Burrata or the Roots and Grains bowl to start, the Mushroom Galette or Margherita if flatbreads are in play, and the Caprese Stuffed Portabello Mushroom to close it out. That’s five dishes without a single repeat, and none of them is a side dish wearing an entrée’s price tag.

Dinner service runs from 5 p.m. daily at 5350 Gulf Drive in Holmes Beach. Call 941-251-3681 if you want to check what’s on the specials board before you head over, or take a look at the full dinner menu first to plan the rest of the table’s order.