Restaurateur behind Parm and Sadelle’s expanding its alcohol-focused offerings with Pool Lounge and Polynesian
By Charles Passy - March 10, 2018 8:00 a.m. ET - The Wall Street Journal
Jeff Zalaznick, left, and Mario Carbone of the Major Food Group toasted at the Heineken House at Arthur Ashe Stadium in Flushing, N.Y., in 2014. Mr. Zalaznick is looking to tap a mixology-crazed market with his latest establishments. PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES FOR HEINEKEN
True to its name, the Major Food Group has built its reputation as one of New York City’s pre-eminent restaurateurs. Most notably, in the past year the company opened the high-end dining spots the Grill and the Pool in the East Midtown space formerly home to the Four Seasons.
Now, Major Food Group is turning its attention to the boozy side of the business.
In the coming weeks it will open the Polynesian, a 100-seat contemporary-themed tiki bar in the Pod Times Square hotel. The idea, say company officials, is to update the island-minded concept of generations ago for the mixology-crazed market of today that demands better-crafted drinks.
The bar also will offer what Major Food Group managing partner Jeff Zalaznick said will be the largest selection of rum in the city, with hundreds of choices.
The Polynesian will join another new Major Food Group drinking spot, the Pool Lounge, which is connected to the Pool restaurant. Opened in the second half of 2017, the bar focuses on cocktails built around a single flavor, as evidenced by drinks with such straightforward names as “Cinnamon” and “Sour Apple.”
Major Food Group officials declined to say how much they have spent developing their recent bar projects, but it is clear the company isn’t cutting corners. At the Polynesian, architectural details include hand-carved woodwork in the tiki tradition, Mr. Zalaznick added.
And at the Pool Lounge, the glassware is from the Japanese brand Sugahara, said director of bar operations Thomas Waugh. A single glass can retail for up to $100, he said.
“These are like collection pieces,” he added.
Major Food Group’s move comes as other big names in fine dining also have branched out into the bar world. Union Square Hospitality Group, the New York-based restaurant company headed by Danny Meyer, opened Porchlight, a craft cocktail bar, in west Chelsea three years ago.
Hospitality-industry insiders and experts say such moves shouldn’t come as a surprise because the bar business can be lucrative, with product and labor costs typically much lower than in restaurants. And, in the era of craft cocktails, bars have become a forum for the kind of creativity and showmanship once exclusively associated with dining spots.
“Now, mixologists are rock stars,” said bar and nightlife entrepreneur James Morrissey, whose New York venues include the VNYL and the Late Late.
Major Food Group officials don’t see themselves as jumping on the bar bandwagon, so to speak. They say they their latest forays into the nightlife scene are reflective of the seven-year-old company’s longstanding commitments and interests. In particular, they note that they opened ZZ’s Clam Bar, a Michelin-starred craft cocktail bar in Greenwich Village that also offers raw fish, in 2013.
Moreover, the group sees the Polynesian, which also will offer outdoor seating, as exemplifying the company’s approach of taking classic concepts and tweaking them for modern times. So, much as Major Food Group put a new spin on Italian-American cuisine with its Parm restaurants or Jewish food with Sadelle’s, now it plans to take tiki into the 21st Century.
The Polynesian “falls into the Major Food Group mold,” Mr. Zalaznick said.
The challenge that Major Food Group could face is that the bar and restaurant worlds ultimately are very different, said Stephen Zagor, a dean at the Institute of Culinary Education, which has a campus in New York.
In restaurants, patrons tend to spend a fairly consistent amount, making it easier to gauge revenue, he explained. By contrast, in bars, some guests pop in for a quick drink, while others make a night of it.
The bar business “is a lot more unpredictable,” Mr. Zagor said.
Write to Charles Passy at cpassy@wsj.com