Toasted Mango brings sweetness to south Siesta

While Siesta Key Village remains the mecca of island nightlife and busy beach days, two sets of entrepreneurs are embracing the laid-back style of the south end of the Key, in hopes that their new breakfast offerings could kick up business on the oft-ignored area south of Stickney Point Road.

Toasted Mango joins A Taste of Germany as the latest addition to the southern Siesta commercial district.

"A lot of people — I think especially on this end of the island — are coming for a quiet vacation," said Kimberly Duffy, who with business partner Sandi Wagner this month expanded the Toasted Mango Café into Crescent Plaza, which is a few blocks south of the intersection of Midnight Pass Road and Stickney Point.The new restaurant seats 87 customers and offers the same menu and hours as its counterpart on North Tamiami Trail.

"We're going to bring some great food and friendly service," said Wagner, who hopes the new restaurant also helps transform the south side of the island a destination.

"We went in there the first morning it opened and the food was excellent," said Aaron Mobley, manager of the adjacent Big Water Fish Market. "Everyone around the plaza has been busy."

Nearby, Munchies on the Key has benefited from more potential customers as well, said co-owner Shirley Kersten.

"People walk by and see how much more there is to the area," Kersten said.

The new additions give businesses within the area hope for busier offseasons and more foot traffic in general.

"Everybody was saying that if you go to the south end you're not going to have any business," said A Taste of Germany co-owner Tanja Hofmann. But, a loyal crop of customers has followed the bakery to the south end when it opened this summer, even discovering the lesser known Turtle Beach in the process.

Duffy and Wagner, who opened the original Toasted Mango Cafe downtown in 2011, spent $510,000 to buy the space occupied by the Peruvian restaurant and wine bar Javier's for more than 25 years. Duffy said they invested about $25,000 into renovations and new kitchen equipment, while saving money by undertaking a do-it-yourself approach that required 12 to 15 hours of work per day sewing curtains and seat covers.

"It was a bonding experience," Duffy said.

Michael Saunders & Co. Realtor Lee DeLieto Jr., who is marketing a 35,700-square-foot abandoned building up the road from the new restaurants, said with many long-term leases already in place in the district, Toasted Mango may remain the newest addition to south Siesta for some time. But, he's hopeful about the investment in the area.

"Everything in real estate comes in cycles," DeLieto Jr. said. "We're riding a very nice cycle right now."