Ray's Boathouse rises from the ashes

Nation's Restaurant News, May 22, 1989 by Alan Liddle

Ray's Boathouse rises from the ashes

SHILSHOLE BAY, Wash. -- You can burn it down, but you can't slow it down.

Ray's Boathouse, a 16-year-old Seattle-area restaurant known for fresh seafood and a stunning view of Puget Sound, generated annual sales of $4.5 million before a fire reduced it to ashes in May 1987.

"From a philosophical point of view," Wayne Ludvigsen, the executive chef, says, "the goal was, and is, to serve the best piece of fish."

That statement of intentions was apparently not forgotten by the public during the 10 months it took to rebuild the restaurant and the pier it rests on.

First-year sales for Ray's Boathouse II were "just under $5 million," managing partner Russ Wohlers reports. He projected 1989-90 sales of $5 million for the 250-seat restaurant, cafe, and bar, which adds to its capacity several months out of the year by serving on a 120-seat deck.

The biggest draws at Ray's Boathouse are several varieties of salmon, which collectively garner up to 33 percent of total food sales depending on the season, and North-west-produced oysters.

"It's almost scary," Ludvigsen quips, after calculating that the restaurant serves more than 20 tons of fresh and frozen salmon and 150,000 oysters annually.

Among the salmon dishes recently offered: Nova Smoked Copper River King Salmon with capers, onions, and horseradish-dill sauce ($7.95); Grilled S.E. Alaskan Red King Salmon with roasted red pepper and rosemary beurre blanc ($18.95); and Grilled S.E. Alaskan Coho Salmon Fillet basted with herbed-garlic butter ($14.95).

Recent oyster offerings included a dozen Olympias ($7.95) and a half-dozen European Flats ($7.50) -- both varieties from the Totten Inlet -- and a half-dozen Pacifics from Hamma Hamma ($4.95).

Ludvigsen, executive chef for eight years, believes "people come here for quality fish," so he keeps preparation and presentation "unpretentious."

Few foods are cooked in sauces, though some are served on sauce, and marinades are rarely used, the chef claims. Most of the seafood served, he adds, is grilled, pan-fried, poached, baked, or steamed and accompanied by relishes or salsas that customers can eat or brush aside.

Ludvigsen said the addition of in-house smoked fish, poultry, and vegetables was the only major menu change made since the restaurant reopened. The smoked items, he said, are "popular" and "exceptionally profitable" since smoking is inexpensive, results in very little product shrinkage, and infuses foods with a "value-added feeling" that entices customers to spend more.

Though the new Ray's, Boathouse retains the basic look and feel of the old Ray's, Wohlers said it was made larger to provide better access to the handicapped. He said he and his partners -- Elizabeth Gingrich, Earl Lasher, and professional basketball player Jack Sikma -- also opted to build "a more powerful kitchen" and additional banquet facilities.

The dining room features four-tops and blond-wood chairs in front of the large picture windows facing the water and rows of booths down the center of the room and along the back wall. Separating the booths are high wooden arches that also anchor banners adorned with salmon prints.

Diners at Ray's Boathouse have, and probably always will, let their attention wander out onto Puget Sound: The criss-crossing wakes of passing boats, bobbing buoys, antics of piling-parked sea birds, and slow, but steady progress of distant ferries provide a soothing form of entertainment.

According to managing partner Wohlers, on returning for the first time since the fire, many long-time Ray's Boathouse customers, remark, "Gee, you made it [the new restaurant] the same as the old one."

That was the plan, he confided, explaining, "Sometimes there's no such thing as `new and improved.'"

PHOTO : Executive chef Wayne Ludvigsen under Ray's sign.