Legal Sea Foods claims the wine high road: motto of the cheers 2004 chain wine award winner

Cheers, Jan-Feb, 2004 by Aurora Gallagher

Not many contemporary chain restaurants can trace their history back to groceries and green stamps. But Legal Sea Foods, the 28-unit East Coast operation originated in a grocery store that helped pioneer savings stamps. Harry Berkowitz, grandfather of the current head honcho, opened the Legal Cash Market in Boston in 1904. "Legal" referred not to the relative shadiness of the operations, but to the savings stamps issued with each purchase. Stamps were pasted into booklets or folders and redeemed for merchandise.

"It's not the typical chain," David Alphonse, director of beverage operations, understates. "It is still family-owned and completely independent." That suited Alphonse, who grew up in the restaurant business in Boston. Legal Sea Foods operated four restaurants in that city and environs when Alphonse started as a bar manager, "with maybe four or five wines by the glass."

"I wanted to build a beverage program," he says, "and I was particularly interested in the depth of the wine list."

GROWING FROM GROCERIES

In 1950, the grocery store added its own fish market next door, and in 1968, son Harry and wife Harriet set out a few tables and began serving very fresh fish, simply prepared, as well as a seafood chowder that helped build Legal's reputation. Grandson Roger Berkowitz, a passionate spokesman for the fishing industry, and for the role of seafood in human health, oversees the empire today. Current plans include expansion beyond the 28-unit number, and there already exists a thriving mail- and internet-order business. All of the older restaurants have been extensively updated and renovated. Family history, ownership and vigilance culminate in the company motto: "If it isn't fresh, it isn't Legal!"

Although the flagship restaurant is no longer located next door to a seafood market, Legal's philosophy dictates that the company still buy fish fresh from the docks, and the company runs its own famously fastidious inspection and quality assurance program. Even Phyllis Richman, a famously finicky restaurant critic for the Washington Post, testifies, "I'm afraid to eat raw oysters most places, but I feel safe at Legal. I have no hesitation here to order my tuna rare or my clams on the half shell."

SOME WINE WITH THAT FISH?

Included among the great inventions of civilization are well-prepared fresh fish and good wine. Celebrated in Egyptian wall paintings and Roman mosaics, the combination is one of the focuses of Legal Sea Foods current beverage program.

The wine lists of Legal Sea Foods are tailored to each unit's locale. All imported wines do well in the Northeast, while Florida specifically favors Italian wines. As wine styles, varietals and regions become popular, have a particularly good year, or arrive with a buzz, Legal Sea Foods' Alphonse keeps an eye out for the trends. Pinot gris is particularly popular wine right now, according to Alphonse, and "red wine in general is big. We sell about 65 percent red to 35 percent white."

Even within a region, the list can change. For the 13 restaurants in Massachusetts, there are four lists; also getting their own lists are the two units in the District of Columbia, three in Virginia, two in Maryland, and one in Rhode Island. New York's two units have comparable lists, as do the New Jersey (two restaurants) and Florida (three restaurants) operations.

Of total sales in the restaurants of Legal Sea Foods, beverages make up 18 to 20 percent--$25 million a year--and about $18 million of that is wine. "Just this past year, spirits began to move up," Alphonse notes, looking at the figures, "partly because of markets such as Florida that like drinks, but we expect our wine program to remain strong as we open new restaurants in the New York area."

STRUCTURE AND BALANCE

What does the wine list need to be? Like wine, those which are structured, balanced and interesting become the most popular. Like that of a racehorse, the wine list's structure should have a purpose, and a very similar one--to move well, last the distance, make money for its owners, and send a frisson of excitement through the stands. In structuring his wine list, Alphonse chose "a nucleus of wines that I knew would work, about a hundred."

Having a solid core generates a kind of gravity that allows wines that become popular in a particular area, wines of particular interest and wines circulating with a buzz to come and go in a kind of orbit. Something good and satisfying that enhances the meal and the experience of dining out can be found in the solar system or its visiting comets.

Reading the tasting notes of a well-structured list tells the diner that care has been taken in selecting the wines offered. Legal Sea Foods gives additional evidence of taking care of the diner by canny pricing. Higher-end wines are not marked up as much as they perhaps could be. "My feeling," Alphonse explains, "is they should not be for display only or sold as trophies, but more as a special part of the evening, of the whole dining experience."