Genuine Bistro

Genuine Bistro anchors the southern end of Charles Richard Beall Boulevard, DeBary’s main commercial strip, at number 2 South. It is set up as a full service restaurant with a wide ranging menu rather than a single cuisine focus, which means a table of people with different tastes can usually find something that works. The kitchen moves across seafood, American classics, barbecue, Italian dishes, and a few Mediterranean and vegetarian options, so a lunch crowd can order anything from a simple sandwich to a heavier plate without feeling like they walked into the wrong restaurant.

What sets Genuine Bistro apart from a lot of the other casual dining rooms in DeBary is the addition of live music, which turns certain nights into more of an event than a quick meal out. Paired with a bar program built around drink specials, the restaurant works as well for a group looking to make an evening of it as it does for a family stopping in for dinner on a Tuesday. The dining room itself is set up for that range of use, with enough space to handle both a quiet weeknight table and a busier weekend crowd drawn in by the music.

The restaurant is open six days a week, closing only on Mondays. Tuesday through Thursday it runs from 11:30 in the morning until 9 at night, stretching an extra hour on Friday and Saturday to 10 PM, and closing a bit earlier on Sunday at 8 PM. That schedule covers lunch through a full dinner service most days, with the later Friday and Saturday hours lining up with when the live music tends to draw the bigger crowds.

For DeBary residents who want a sit down dinner without driving into Sanford or DeLand, Genuine Bistro offers one of the more complete restaurant experiences right on the city’s own main road. The varied menu means it can double as the answer to almost any craving on a given night, and the bar and live music side of the business gives it a reason to come back beyond just the food. Between the broad menu, the drink specials, and the entertainment on select nights, it functions as one of the more versatile dining rooms in DeBary, capable of covering a quiet family dinner just as easily as a livelier night out with friends.

DeBary itself is a quiet, largely residential city along the St. Johns River, without the kind of dense downtown restaurant row found in nearby Sanford or DeLand, which makes a full service option like Genuine Bistro stand out a bit more than it might in a bigger city. Residents do not have many choices for a proper sit down dinner without crossing a bridge or driving several miles, so having a restaurant on Charles Richard Beall Boulevard that covers seafood, Italian, and American food together, with live music and a real bar program on top of it, gives the city a genuine anchor for evenings out close to home.