Restaurant Business

This year, for my annual review, I'm going to focus on service. A smile and a little attention go a long way in the restaurant business, making even the most casual meal out seem like a treat. While reviewing inexpensive restaurants in 2007, I've been privileged to dine at many establishments that made me feel welcomed, even pampered. Sometimes the most casual restaurants -- the ones where the owners are also the chefs and the wait staff -- shine at delivering excellent service where fancier restaurants falter.

The Canton bistro and martini bar Neon Moon (2522 Fait Ave.), which closed earlier this summer, is reopening next week as Doc's Eastside. The new owner is Steve Cochran, a former WQSR-radio disc jockey who was known as "the rock-n-roll doctor." (As a part-owner of Bohager's, he does have experience in the restaurant business.)Cochran's nickname is "Doc," but why "Eastside"?"I grew up in the east side of Baltimore," he says, "And I want [the restaurant] to have a nostalgic feel." The new decor will feature old photos of the neighborhood and screen paintings; the menu will include some traditional items like crab cakes, a Pigtown dog with kraut and wiener schnitzel.

Owners of nine of the 11 restaurants along Ellicott City's Main Street say county policy has led to too many restaurants, too few parking spaces and a drop in their profits. But others -- including owners of two new Main Street restaurants -- say the problems are simply the free market at work.The nine restaurant owners sent a letter Aug. 10 to County Executive Charles I. Ecker asking him to look into the number of liquor licenses the county is granting to new restaurants and parking problems along Main Street.

Jason Bulkeley sees himself as the James Cameron of the restaurant business -- at least on April 14, when he'll be re-creating the last dinner served on the Titanic. His restaurant, the Orchard Market and Cafe (8815 Orchard Tree Lane, Towson), will abandon its Persian cuisine for one night and duplicate selections from the original 11-course first-class menu of the ship. (The kitchen will limit itself to a mere eight courses of French-Edwardian cuisine.) April 14, of course, is the anniversary of the Titanic's sinking.

Giving thanks, celebrating family and seeing friends all are part of Thanksgiving, but the main point, even the Pilgrims would agree, is eating. And more people across the Baltimore region are getting right to that point -- shunning hours of kitchen preparation and party small talk for quiet restaurants where the wine is already uncorked, the bird is waiting on the table and somebody else washes the dishes.Restaurant reservation lists are almost 10 times longer in some restaurants than they were 10 years ago, and dozens of other restaurants are opening their kitchens for the first time this year, trying to cash in on Thanksgiving.

PURCHASE, N.Y. -- PepsiCo Inc. said yesterday that it raised $5.5 billion by spinning off KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell into Tricon Global Restaurants Inc. and exiting its restaurant business, to gain cash to pay off most of its short-term debt and boost its stock buyback.The maker of Pepsi soft drinks and Frito-Lay snacks said it received $4.5 billion from the Tricon spinoff, which was completed yesterday.It also sold its PepsiCo Food Systems restaurant-supply unit in July to AmeriServe Food Distribution Inc. for about $830 million; sold five small restaurant chains; and completed an initial public offering of its New Zealand restaurant business.

NEW YORK -- In a move that had been anticipated, PepsiCo Inc. said yesterday that it will spin off its restaurants and possibly sell its restaurant supply company to focus on its more profitable and promising soft drinks and snacks.Pepsi will shed its biggest line of business -- KFC, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut -- which it has assembled over two decades, because it has dragged down earnings and chewed through much-needed capital. It didn't give the terms of the spinoff, though it expects to complete it by year-end.

THE RESTAURANT genus isn't the lowest taxonomic group in the business kingdom. That spot belongs to part-time home businesses and lemonade stands, the paramecia and amoebas of commerce.IBM and Chrysler are the primates.But restaurants are well down in the food chain, organizationally simple, requiring little capital. And they behave like it, breeding and dying in droves, proliferating and dwindling like damselflies in autumn.More than 60 percent of all restaurants fail within five years, according to researchers at Cornell and Michigan State.

Richard McClure got his start in the restaurant business 30 years ago as a busboy at a Howard Johnson in Annapolis. Next month the 46-year-old general manager of Carrol's Creek Restaurant will become the president of the Restaurant Association of Maryland, with more than 2,300 members.Mr. McClure has served in the association for seven years and held every elected office. He also was a representative to the Maryland Tourism Development Board, a delegate to the White House Conference on Travel and Tourism and a board member of the Annapolis & Anne Arundel County Conference and Visitors Bureau.

It all began in May when Jim Lash was planning a surprise birthday party for his wife at Rewster's restaurant in Taylorsville.Mr. Lash was going over the details of the party with restaurant owner Doug Henley. But by the time the conversation ended, Mr. Lash was more surprised than anyone."One thing led to another, and here we are," said Mr. Lash, who became the new owner of Rewster's last month and has renamed it Ridge Roadhouse. It opened for business Oct. 20.For the past three weeks, Mr. Lash and his wife, Sandy, have been settling in at the Roadhouse, near the intersection ofRoutes 26 and 27.Mr.

SALARY: $13,300 AGE: 43 YEARS ON JOB: 2 1/2 How she got started: : Carla Lucente grew up in the restaurant business, helping her parents run their Italian restaurant. After high school she went to work as a loan officer for six years and then worked for her family's home construction business. At the age of 36 she quit work and began culinary school at the Baltimore International College. After graduating, she opened her own catering business and worked part-time at Trader Joe's in Annapolis.

Ask your friends how this economic mess is affecting them, and I bet the first thing they say is that they are eating out less often - or maybe not at all. At a time when you can't cut back on your mortgage payment or your car payment or just about any other payment, dining out is one expense you can reduce. That, and shopping for clothes. While it makes me feel sensible and thrifty and virtuous to give up clothes shopping, putting an end to dinner out with my husband or my daughter or my friend Betsy just makes me feel sad. It isn't the food and wine I am giving up. It's the people.

There's a special on restaurant stocks, with many down 50 percent or more in price because of the weak economy. The restaurant industry certainly is never going away. But the question is whether it is too early to invest now, because many of these companies are struggling. Industry concerns were dramatized by the closing of many Bennigan's and Steak & Ale restaurants after their owner, S&A Restaurant Corp., filed for bankruptcy last month. Vicorp Restaurants Inc., operator of Village Inn and Bakers Square, filed for Chapter 11 in April, which lets it reorganize and remain open.

benjaminchristie.com Want to learn how to cook kangaroo meat or make Shortbread Cookies With Wattleseed? This redesigned Web site from an Australian celebrity chef will show you how. And there's information for those in the restaurant business.

This year, for my annual review, I'm going to focus on service. A smile and a little attention go a long way in the restaurant business, making even the most casual meal out seem like a treat. While reviewing inexpensive restaurants in 2007, I've been privileged to dine at many establishments that made me feel welcomed, even pampered. Sometimes the most casual restaurants -- the ones where the owners are also the chefs and the wait staff -- shine at delivering excellent service where fancier restaurants falter.

IF MONDAYS ARE SUPPOSED TO BE THE quietest restaurant night of the week, Baltimore's stylish Pazo eatery certainly wasn't following convention. The place popped with pizazz -- thanks to a couple hundred foodies. Welcome to Fiesta on the Terraza -- an evening of food and wine, with the night's proceeds going to Share Our Strength, a national nonprofit dedicated to fighting childhood hunger. This was the final stop on a 12-city tour of similar dinners staged at restaurants across the country in an SOS program called "A Tasteful Pursuit."

Alfred L. Davis, a pharmacist-turned-restaurateur who co-owned the Pimlico Hotel, died of cardiac arrest July 14 at Sinai Hospital. The longtime resident of Old Court Road was 78. Mr. Davis was born in Baltimore and raised in Forest Park and Ferndale. He was a 1945 graduate of Glen Burnie High School and earned a pharmacy degree from the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy in 1949. He had worked as a pharmacist for Whelan's Drugstores in Silver Spring and later Edmondson Village.

Wayne Brokke, retired restaurateur, self-described micro-manager, cookbook author and now budding actor, no longer dreams of purveyors or errant wait staff. "I used to wake up shaking at midnight, wondering if I had ordered the next day's chicken or if one of my waiters would call in sick, but no longer," said Brokke, 58. He first started dishing up soup in 1978 at the The Soup Kitchen Ltd., his Federal Hill restaurant, and became one of Harborplace's original tenants when he relocated there in 1980.

Charles "Tony" Talucci Director of culinary instruction Baltimore International College Salary --$70,000 Age --49 Years on the job --One How he got started --Growing up in Italy and watching his mother's love for cooking. After working in the restaurant business as a chef for 30 years, most recently as the general manager for Truffles at the Belvedere, he decided to make the switch to education. Typical day --Talucci is in charge of all culinary classes and chef instructors at the Baltimore International College's School of Culinary Arts.

No, it's not a rumor. It's Rumor Mill (8069 Tiber Alley, 410-461-0041), a new restaurant that's opened in Ellicott City where Sidestreets used to be. The space has been redesigned and spruced up, says Matthew Milani, who with his two partners also owns Cacao Lane across the street. (The bartender, he says, painted the Japanese-inspired murals.) Milani describes Rumor Mill's food as "American-Japanese fusion" and "seafood forward." That means entrees like the signature wasabi-crusted snapper with plum sauce served with haricots verts ($25)