In my heart, I knew it would never be the same. And not for any of the reasons people were writing about the day after the (probably) World Famous Red Bar and Piccolo Restaurant was destroyed by a fire. February 2019. The end of an era? I certainly thought so.
Days later, I was told of the announcement in the wake of the fire. The Red Bar would be rebuilt to the exact specifications it had been before. Every window, every inch of seating. Every millimeter of adorned wall or ceiling space. “We will rebuild it,” owner Oli Petit said at the time.
“Except for the bathrooms,” he continued. Boom. Point made.
You see, it’s important to keep in mind that the original Red Bar would give any dive bar in America a run for it’s money. Yes, it is a very popular restaurant. A very good restaurant, but if you’ve been visiting for as long as I have, which is almost half of my life, then you know that The Red Bar has been so much more than a place to eat.
Since about, well, feels like forever.
The charms of a true dive are not up for debate. The staples are usually cheap drinks, eclectic decor, a couple of local fixtures at the bar with stories to last for days and of course tiny, cramped bathrooms. The kind of rest rooms where anyone over 6 feet tall has trouble moving around in. And I did. Every single time. Staring at that James Bond poster right in my face.
Once they had to be re-built, that part of the story was gone forever. Life rolls on, right?
Over the last few years and certainly before the fire, I’d seen the growth in Grayton Beach push across Highway 30A into the area now being called “Upper Grayton.” Fair enough. There’s limited space beachfront in Grayton Beach and a State Park to the immediate East wouldn’t allow growth there. Development had to go somewhere.
I’d seen the parking lot built in Upper Grayton. I’d seen the parked full-sized tourist trolley in the middle of the lot. I’d seen the signs for a free shuttle service down to the beach and The Red Bar. All of it a turnoff really, and a reminder that they were beginning to pave paradise and put up parking lots. Thankfully this was about a mile away from where we really wanted to be.
I was introduced to Grayton Beach by my wife and her mom. Mama grew up in the area and was about as colorful as the decor in The Red Bar. She even lived in Grayton Beach for a time. The stories were legendary. I can try to say that I heard them all, but I’m very certain there were more. Like the time she had a handy man doing some work on her house until he disappeared. She found him surfing a few hundred yards away.
Clearly the real tragedy was wasting those waves.
Or the time Michael McDonald (yes, that one) had been spotted on a bike several times riding around Grayton. It was believed he was living there at the time. That led to a drunken band of 30 somethings with a guitar on a front porch during 4th of July weekend singing Michael McDonald songs in hopes he’d appear out of a tree and join in.
Thankfully, I wasn’t there that weekend. I would have probably tried to sing lead to get him out of hiding. What fools will believe, I’ll tell ya.
Mama knew all of the stories. All of the personalities. She probably knew where all of the bodies were buried as well, with the only guarantee being that if they were locals? They were more than likely buried barefoot.
That’s Grayton Beach. One of the quirkiest nooks in the Florida Panhandle.
Add to that an impeccable “Euro quirky” style restaurant with a Restaurateur who never met a stranger and you had a perfect match. The menu stayed small and largely stayed the same. Deliver it via chalkboard and you have something pretty damn near heavenly a hop skip and a jump from one of the most beautiful stretches of beach in the United States.
If you know then you know.
My initial reaction to the Red Bar’s re-opening day was “It’s going to be a mad house. I will wait.” But as we got closer to that day and realizing I had a free morning, I decided I’d take a ride over to Grayton alone. If there was a mob scene and a 2 hour wait, I’d keep driving. If I could sneak in right at lunch time, I’d do it.
I got lucky.
By now you’ve heard and probably seen all of the images you’ve needed to see to believe that The Red Bar was rebuilt to an almost exact replica of what it was. This is all true. She’s as beautiful as she ever was. The new extra deck space in the back to accommodate more seating having no real bearing on the original spaces up front. In the Summer, I’m sure those decks will fill up. My lunch was exceptional. The Seafood Gumbo? Clearly made with care. I could eat it every day.
The walls and ceiling? Same as they ever were. “Nothing goes up on the walls or ceiling without Oli in attendance,” my server told me.
Which brings us to owner Oli Petit. Belgian? Yes. Celebrity chef? Nope. Politician? Nope. More popular than most politicians in the area? Certainly. What restaurant owner do you see stopped for selfies as he walks through his dining room? Not many unless they are the chef as well. You see it with Oli and he handles it all with grace and appreciation for the customers he’s been welcoming since 1995.
After lunch, a visit to the bar introduced me to a couple from Memphis who’d been very excited to return and see if The Red Bar was back to normal again. “Oh, it’s perfect.” I said “This is amazing. Except for the men’s room.”
He agreed. “Yeah, I used to have to hunch over in there to fit too.” Tragedy, I tell you.
One $6 vodka/soda and a couple of stories from ‘back in the day’ with this couple and she was beginning to feel like her old self again. “How long have you been coming here?” he asked.
“Oh man, almost 25 years.” I said.
“Oh wow, you’ve been coming here since way before it was cool.” he said.
“No, it’s always been cool. It’s just the last whatever number of years everyone has begun to notice.”
On my way out, souvenir t-shirt of support in hand, I wandered over to the shuttle stop that was the holding area for people waiting to return to the parking lot up the road. It was pretty clear to me that I was very likely going to be aboard golf cart number 7 or 8 for departure. A wait that could easily top 30 minutes. Just to get back to my car. No thanks. Another reminder of what The Red Bar has become. In so many ways it has always been more than a restaurant. Now, in season, you can add Disney World to that list. Personally, during the Summer, my threshold for that pain will depend on my mood.
I chose to walk the 1.2 miles to my car right through the heart of Grayton Beach rather than wait for a golf cart to shuttle me back. Promising myself I’d return once the Summer was over and the masses had gone back to Birmingham or Nashville or Louisiana.
The beauty about The South’s beach is that it is open year round. Though I’m not entirely sure you’d catch me outside during the Winter, The Red Bar will be a perfect spot to hang. How about that? I’m very much looking forward to it.
Welcome back old friend.
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