Not far from the Columbia Restaurant’s longtime Sarasota location, the Gonzmart Family of Restaurants aims to open its latest project in 2019. With the tagline “Local • Coastal • Social,” the new restaurant — dubbed The Buccaneer — is moving into the former home of Pattigeorge’s on Longboat Key, where the late fusion icon most recently operated at 4120 Gulf of Mexico Drive.
According to a statement from Tampa Bay restaurateur Richard Gonzmart, the fourth-generation “caretaker” of the family-owned restaurant group, The Buccaneer will pay homage to Longboat Key’s Buccaneer Inn, one of his parents’ favorite restaurants.
Owner Herb Field opened The Buccaneer Inn back in 1957. His award-winning fine-dining spot was sold in 1992, closed in 2001, and then demolished four years later in preparation for the Grand Mariner condo. Luckily, Gonzmart has big plans for his revival.
“My goal and my dream is to make this new restaurant an architectural gem and to pay homage to some of that restaurant’s beloved menu items, such as oysters and prime rib, as well as to add distinctive touches,” the restaurateur said.
Gonzmart purchased the 40-year-old Pattigeorge’s in June 2016, when word of the coming-soon venture first got out. He’s been working on design ideas for the interior and exterior with architects, as the waterfront Buccaneer building is in poor condition and will eventually be torn down. That being said, boat slips will remain a feature of the restaurant, and swashbuckling antiques and artifacts found during Gonzmart’s world travels are in store as well.
Executive chef Mark Boor is helping Gonzmart and Co. with menu development. Boor previously worked for Cincinnati-based Trio Bistro, as well as Fulton’s Crab House at Disney Springs. Restaurant Forum magazine also named him among the “Top 20 Chefs of Central Florida.”
“The Buccaneer is based on not just any pirate,” said Gonzmart. “In my mind — and I know this is a romantic view — he was well off, possibly a noble, who rebelled and went to sea. He’s more a privateer, someone commissioned by countries like France and England to wreak havoc on Spanish shipping and trade. Some of them eventually were knighted for their services.
“Even the word ‘buccaneer’ comes from the French ‘boucan,’ a wooden frame that was used to smoke meat over a fire.”
At the moment, there’s no project opening date. But, as he’s done in the past, Gonzmart put it like this: “We’ll open when we’re ready.”
This article appears in Dec 14-21, 2017.