Centro Ybor boasts another corporate success story, Cafe Mezzanotte, which first made Miami Beach waves in 1988, when owner Piero Filpi started playing loud Latino music late at night, impelling patrons to dance on the tables. Great fun! The Italian food was good, but the spirit and rhythm were sensational. Crowds flocked to South Beach -- as they did to spinoffs of the same name in Coconut Grove, Boca Raton, Fort Lauderdale, Mexico City and Acapulco.
The crowds have also been flocking to the hugely successful Outback Steakhouse and its first spinoff, Carrabba's Italian Grill. Last July, Outback opened the 44,000-sq.-ft. A La Carte Event Pavilion in Tampa with Tampa Bay's premier catering company and in following months opened a triumphant trio of other joint-venture winners, near neighbors on Tampa's Boy Scout Boulevard across from the new International Plaza with Lord & Taylor, Nordstrom's, Macy's and Neiman Marcus: Fleming's Prime Steakhouse & Wine Bar, Lee Roy Selmon's and Roy's, each of them well-established before joining forces with Outback.
Fleming's was founded by Bill Allen and Paul Fleming, the latter starting P.F. Chang's China Bistro and operating several Ruth's Chris restaurants before coming up with his own upscale steakhouse, with a stunning selection of 100 wines by the glass.
Lee Roy Selmon's specializes in barbecue and Southern comfort foods, and if you don't know the name, check the wall of fame in the Trophy Room devoted to this former star of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Roy's stands for Japanese-American chef Roy Yamaguchi, a Hawaiian trailblazer whose East-meets-West cuisine blends magically the best of many.
But there's more. Outback also joined the Cajun-Creole bunch by partnering last summer with noted New Orleans chef Anne Kearney to produce a southern Louisiana outpost of back bayou good taste in south Tampa. Zazarac has been successful enough to earn one of my Top Newcomer awards this year and encourage a second venture in Orlando.
In south Florida, the Vietnamese also have expansion fever -- on a more humble scale. Minh Lee, who started with the modest Saigon-Tokyo in the Palm Beach boonies of Greenacres, then spun off to West Palm Beach with an all-you-can-eat sushi shop called Saito's, rolled out again with Saito II's in Lake Worth.
Then there are far more ambitious and expansive family-run operations by some of the giants. In south Florida, there's the Brooks-Benvenuto bunch in Deerfield Beach and Boynton Beach with perfectionist patriarch Bernard Perron, wife Cathy and the second generation of Lisa Perron Howe, Jon and Marc Howe and Jean Philippe Gaudree working around the clock to keep ahead of the herd.
In the north, there's the McGuire Martin marvel with wife Molly and their three overachieving offspring -- son Jim, certified executive chef from the Culinary Institute in Hyde Park, putting to good use his bachelor's in business as general manager of McGuire's Irish Pub; son Bill who's done such an outstanding job at the McGuire's Irish Pub spinoff in Destin that they're buying the entire 15-unit shopping center; and daughter Amy, who's the manager of catering.
But the first Florida restaurant family has to be the Gonzmarts of the Columbia Restaurant Group. The blocklong happening in Ybor City is the state's oldest restaurant, looking forward to celebrating its centennial in four years. It is also the largest Spanish restaurant in the country.
At the head of this family enterprise is Adela Gonzmart, daughter of Cuban immigrant founders Casimiro and Carmen Hernandez, born a couple of blocks from the restaurant. An alum of the Julliard, she was an accomplished concert pianist but is now better known as CEO, author of the Columbia Restaurant Spanish Cookbook and mother of Richard, president of the company, and Casey, chairman of the board.
Richard's two daughters, Lauren Gonzmart-Laurato and Andrea, are the fifth generation of the family in the business. Lauren is in charge of retail and merchandise sales, and Andrea, who made her Colombia Flamenco dance debut at the ripe old age of 10, runs the cigar store.
Columbia has offshoots in Sarasota's St. Armand's Circle (1959), St. Augustine (1983), The Pier in St. Petersburg (1988), Clearwater/Sand Key (1996) and Celebration (1997). In addition, there's the Columbia-owned Cha Cha Coconuts quartet, a lively and casual Caribbean style bar and grill, located at The Pier, in Sarasota, Oviedo and Fort Myers.
There is another overachieving first family of restaurateurs in Sarasota: The Klaubers. Their Florida origins go back to 1969, when a Buffalo orthodontist, M.J. "Murf" Klauber, purchased a ramble of weathered Longboat Key cottages with a single tennis court and started transforming the 18-acre gulf-front spread into what Tennis magazine praises as the No. 1 tennis resort in the U.S., The Colony Beach & Tennis Resort.
Murf is blessed with offspring who make it all work. Daughter Katie has been president and general manager since 1988. Her husband, Michael Moulton, is the executive vice president. Son Tom turned Longboat Key's Pattigeorge's into a dining destination of note, after tours at the Culinary Institute and Paris' La Varenne, apprenticing at restaurants in France, Florence and Amsterdam, then opening something as wonderful as its name, Gieusseppi Wong in Aspen. His return to the Colony last summer coincided with yet another general upgrading of the property and the opening of the Bongo Bar, Monkey Bar and Monkey Room. Tommy's new menu is marvelous. His newly renovated kitchen must be the envy of every other restaurateur in town, except for maybe another Klauber son, Michael.
Michael's got his own modern kitchens and his own super chefs in his repeat Golden Spoon winner Michael's on East and Michael's Mediterranean Grille, one of this year's Top Newcomers. In addition, he went back into the retail wine business last December with Michael's Wine Cellar in Midtown Plaza, and he continues to run the best catering service in the area.
Restaurants Around The State
SOUTHEAST: Miami Beach
Fish Joynt
2570 N.E. Miami Gardens Drive, 305/936-8333
From the display kitchen and dessert table to the blackboard listing of what's fresh from the sea, from calves liver to cowboy steaks, this is a real discovery -- thanks to owner David Bianco. Lunch, $6 to $15, and dinner, $18 to $50.
SOUTHWEST/TAMPA BAY: Tampa
Zazarac
3702 W. McKay Ave., 813/350-0481
An offshoot from famed New Orleans chef Anne Kearney with local chef-partner Jayson Polansky producing such southern Louisiana lusciousness as genuine gumbo, Creole crab cakes, cornmeal-fried oysters and redfish court bouillon.
Dinner, $20 to $35.
CENTRAL: Winter Park
Sage
358 N. Park Ave., 407/647-4556
This remake of a corner landmark features innovative fare starting with southwest crab cakes on corn-crusted green tomato and baby spinach blue cheese salads. Follow that up with sweet onion-crusted snapper and black sesame seed wasabi tuna on Asian vegetable slaw. Lunch, $5 to $20, and dinner, $9 to $23.
NORTHEAST: Jacksonville Beach
Lighthouse Grille
2600 Beach Blvd., 904/242-8899
Waterway wonder with great value. Non-stop menu bursting with steaks and Danish baby-back ribs, seafood Po Boys, mouth-stretching sandwiches and burgers, fresh fish of the day. Lunch and dinner, $6 to $18.
NORTHWEST: Tallahassee
Albert's Provence
1415 Timberline Road, 850/894-9003
French-born chef Albert Ughetto provides the Provence with a strong, knowledgeable and loving emphasis on seafood, and David Ferguson supplies the moxie, the managerial skills, to make this one of the capital's best. Lunch, $4 to $10, and dinner, $14 to $28.