BROTHER, CAN YOU SPARE $300,000?

Now, I've been told on numerous occasions and by many different people that the absolute worst job in the world is to be a restauranteur. Heard it, understand it, granted it. Don't know whether the sewer inspectors in Mumbai would concur, but whatever: having spent the better part of the last three years in the restaurant scene I've come to understand the sentiment. Still, there's an insistent little voice in my head that enjoys nothing better, alas, than to devise plans for new restaurants.

Take, for instance, the phenomenon of the wine bar. For some reason that I've not fully worked out, wine bars are much more numerous back east than they are here in Chicago. This imbalance is nowhere more striking than in New York. You literally have multiple wine bars on any given block in the Lower East Side. Granted, New York is larger and more concentrated than any other American city, but neither of these facts accounts for why wine bars practically outnumber fast food restaurants there. To my mind income and the prevailing culture account for much of the disparity; wine is a relatively expensive diversion, and while the overall cost of living is higher in New York, so too (significantly) are median wages. Also, Chicago's proximity to the major beer brewing centers of the country predispose the city towards a thirst for beer. But there's another reason for the relative scarcity of wine bars, and it's more a matter of style than of substance. Wine bars, by and large, suck.

Sure, there are the occasional gems: Terroir and The Slanted Door in San Francisco; Terroir (no relation), Gottino, and the overwhelming Cru in New York, and Webster's and Avec in our fair city; but by and large, I'm underwhelmed by these places. Many are pretentious, but it's not the pretense that bothers me most; it's the lack of substance, of a workmanlike attitude towards serving customers. A wine bar should be as accessible as the neighborhood tap, or at least nearly so. Ambience is nice, but that should be the last of a restauranteur's concerns. The prevailing philosophy at my wine bar (oh boy, there it is) would be this: the beginning, middle, and end of the business is quality in the wine, the food, and the pairings.

A word about small plates: they're finished. In a culinary reverse spin on Kant's categorical imperative of moral judgment, I wouldn't serve anything to share that couldn't reasonably stand alone as a complete meal, or at least a light entree. Pizzas? Fine. Frisee salad with ventresca tuna? Absolutely. But no fritters. No carved-fruit decorative elements. No emu mini-burgers. No gels, foams, powders, or syringes. And no bacon "lures" dangling from hand-crafted Vanadium-steel "fishing rods," pace Grant Achatz.

(The one exception I would happily make to this rule is for brandade. God, I love brandade. Put good brandade on a roofing shingle - nevermind decent bread - and I'll wolf it down, no questions asked.)

Speaking of which, the bread at this conceptual wine bar would absolutely punish. You remember when you were small, and your grandmother would bake bread, and when you went to visit her the smells were so vivid and alluring you couldn't concentrate until you'd been given a slice still warm from the oven, porous and feathery, toothsome and crusty all at once, butter percolating through the fissures and onto your hand as you ate? Neither do I, but doesn't that sound just rockstar-good? That's the kind of bread this place would have. "Atkins" would be a forbidden word under my roof.

Oh, and the wine. Look, it's the 21st century. We are blessed with relatively unfettered access to the best wine from more regions of the world than any other society in history. At the same time, the cost of good "fighting varietal" (Chardonnay, Cabernet, Pinot Noir, Merlot) wines from blue chip appellations has far outstripped the rate of inflation. You want good, I mean good Pinot Noir? Expect to pay $60 per bottle, $15 per glass and up if it's from a familiar appellation. Ditto quality Cabernet Sauvignon. If you insist on both quality Cab and a Napa Valley designation, make it more like $120. Chardonnay will hurt less, but don't expect to be blown away by a bottle that's $40 or under.

So, what to do? Go global. Go family-owned and artisanal. As a priority, go organic or biodynamically-grown grapes and wines made with minimal intervention. Go with varieties that might be less familiar, but are affordable and delicious. I can't pour a good Pinot Noir for $9 a glass, but I can pour a $9 glass of Beaujolais that simply rocks from one of the appellation's greatest producers. Likewise, no Chardonnay worth a dime can be had for $7 per glass. Damn good regional French whites, though, made from grapes like Ugni Blanc and Colombard, certainly can. Never heard of them? There was a time when we'd never heard of Viognier, either.

This is not to say that a modest country white is interchangeable with great Chardonnay. But at $7 you won't get great or even good Chardonnay. You'll get mass-produced, highly manipulated, soulless Chardonnay - the Coca Cola of the Chardonnay world. It probably spent most of its life in a tanker truck and got its oaky flavor from an additive made by Monsanto. That no-name French white at least might have some raciness, some zest, some personality. Might even have been picked by human hands and taste of the stony hillsides where it grew. Now, wine can't compete with beer in a race for the bottom: no $4.50 glass of wine is worth drinking. But if that's a market I can't have, that's OK; there are enough people who find wine sufficiently rewarding to pay a few more shillings than they would for PBR. Plus, steak frites just doesn't taste right with PBR.

The fulcrum of a winebar is always the waitstaff. For me this would be especially important as Aglianico and Romorantin don't exactly make most customers' eyes light up with recognition. The front of the house would have to be both glib and whip-smart when it comes to wine. Budding Master-Sommelier smart. This would absolutely take primacy over previous serving experience. I'd give anyone aged 24 or older with a serious love and knowledge of wine and the right attitude a three-month training stint, then if the fit was right I'd offer them a full-time position and generous healthcare coverage to encourage them to stick around for at least a few years. In my experience, most restaurants treat their servers like chattel, offer them no benefits and then wonder why they flake out and fall off the map without so much as a phone call. I never believed in karma until I'd spent a few weeks as a wine sales rep. Now, it's become my operative philosophy.

Yes, health care is hella expensive. No, I don't know how I'd afford it the first few months of operation. My location would perforce be low on the rental scale and essentially a turnkey enterprise, no major renovations or interior design until we'd achieved solvency. Oh, and both parking and proximity to public transit would be essential. Surely, though, there are many locations that would fit the bill in a city the size of Chicago.

To me this scheme sounds so intuitive that it must be flawed. Maybe there's some overhead or prohibitive start-up expense that I'm ignoring? I realize I would work 20-hour days for months before I could relax. I'd have to vet employees with extraordinary care; for every solid worker in the restaurant business there are five coked-out, social-climbing, borderline Napoleon-types. But even given these caveats and more... doesn't it sound like it just might work?

Shit, there's that little voice again.