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Talk of the Bay
A better fish taco ... and a big banana
By MARK ALBRIGHT
Published August 7, 2006
For those who think the regional dish of the Tampa Bay area is the grouper sandwich, behold the grouper taco. Some of the brains behind the Cody's Original Roadhouse chain made it a signature item of Banana Burritos - their new entry in the jammed quick-serve, taqueria business. "Fish tacos are the hottest thing in the restaurant industry and they're finally coming to the East Coast, so we figured 1-ounce fried grouper chunks were a natural," said John Lee, the Clearwater restaurateur who created Tucson's at the height of the 1980s Southwest food boom. "We test-marketed our tacos at the Taste of Pinellas and sold 3,000 of them." Other local taqueria chains are carrying fish tacos, but they're typically cod. Lee and partner Rich Franklin's first Bananas Burritos opened last week astride U.S. 19, southwest of Westfield Countryside mall in a renovated Hungry Howie's. They hope to sell franchises once they work out the kinks of a no-table-service restaurant priced at $8 a customer. The look is, uh, different. Tiger-striped booths. And a huge fiberglass banana stands in the middle of the 62-seat dining room cooled by a 12-foot-diameter ceiling fan.
[Last modified August 7, 2006, 06:04:01]
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