FORT MYERS BEACH, Fla. — Pastel colors are hard to find on Estero Island after Hurricane Ian.
The near-Category 5 hurricane from September 2022 destroyed so many of the colorful cottages along Estero Boulevard, whether a bed-and-breakfast, a permanent home or the breakfast bistro at 110 Mango Street.
The storm wiped Heavenly Biscuits off the northeast corner of Mango and Estero, about 100 yards from the Gulf of Mexico.
The memories never got wiped away as 8,000 Facebook fans of Heavenly Biscuit filled the restaurant’s page with memories of biscuits or wraps from vacationers or Southwest Florida residents.
“I was excited but I started crying because it was the outreach, the support, the love,” said Kayla Lukesic, watching the posts and the response for the restaurant in the days and weeks after the unthinkable storm. “I don’t think I was expecting it as much as it was. It was almost overwhelming.”
It’s that spirit to try and rekindle the business for why Kayla and Tyler Lukesic, this couple, bought the business. Tyler worked, for more than a decade, at Heavenly Biscuit as the kitchen manager. That meant plenty of mornings of getting to work at 5 a.m. to start prepping and cooking.
“I couldn’t get it die down,” said Tyler Lukesic. “I was the one who was willing to take the risk of everything and just try to make it happen. It’s such a phenomenal spot.”
A few days after Ian hit, Tyler and others with the restaurant were allowed back onto Estero Island to see the damage. The extensive damage prevented them from driving to the business so they had to walk across the Matanzas Pass Bridge, at least two miles until reaching Mango Street.
“We had an 18-foot trailer in the back and it was completely gone,” said Tyler. “Who knows where it went?”
This after he walked past the first days of Ian recovery in an unforgettable island of rubble.
“It reminded me of what you see in war zone movies, like a bomb went off.”
A “for sale” sign sits on the lot at 110 Mango Street. No sign of Heavenly Biscuits.
Yet the signage is coming.
The Lukesics have a food truck, freshly wrapped with Heavenly Biscuit signage, in their driveway ten miles in Fort Myers. Add in six refrigerators, deep fryers and more space than Tyler Lukesic said he ever had back at the building on Mango.
“We scrapped together our savings and tried to make it happen,” said Tyler, who added he wants to be back at 110 Mango but also envisions a future where the business will park at events on top of a permanent location.
In the months after Hurricane Ian hit, economic leaders at Fort Myers Beach held out a hope for half of the impacted businesses on Estero Island to come back. We’re seeing some of that, in certain spots, with Yo! Taco! and La Ola serving customers again. Liki Tiki BBQ, a well-known restaurant and bar just blocks from where Heavenly Biscuits stood for years, opened three miles north on San Carlos Boulevard.
The time frame for Lukesic would be for the next month to obtain all of the proper permits for the food trucks and find a place where the customers will be.
“Especially events like some more local spots,” said Tyler. “We’re really hoping to bring some light back to the beach in that way.”
One note for the eagle-eyed reader: The name is now "Heavenly Biscuit". Tyler told FOX 4 this was the original name of the restaurant and that the most recent owner made it plural as, "Heavenly Biscuits".
