Bern's Steakhouse--Tampa, FL
“Travel isn’t always pretty. It isn’t always comfortable. Sometimes it hurts, it even breaks your heart. But that’s okay. The journey changes you; it should change you. It leaves marks on your memory, on your consciousness, on your heart, and on your body. You take something with you. Hopefully, you leave something good behind.”
--Anthony Bourdain
I am here to dispel the myth that work-travel is paid vacation. I often hear from people how great it must be that I get to travel so much (it is, but bear with me). In their mind they have painted a luxurious picture of me lounging in spas getting massages, leisurely visiting museums, and dining at the best locales the city du jour has to offer.
Let me repaint that picture for you based on mymost recent work trip to Tampa. My flight was at 6:05am out of Monterey thispast Sunday. I woke up at 3:13am despite having set my alarm for 4:24am. Icouldn’t go back to sleep so I gave in and got up to cook all the leftover foodI had in the refrigerator to take with me. This actually turned out to be agreat inclination later on the plane. I left for the airport a little before5:00am, parked in long term parking, and rolled my bags to the airport check-incounter. I flew to Phoenix where I had a quick cup of coffee before boarding mynext flight. If you have ever flown through the Phoenix airport you’ll knowthat the terminals are quite far apart. While I always welcome a walk,especially when I have planned sitting all day long, what I’m trying to acknowledgeis if you have a tight connection, a long walk may increase your stresslevels…which may or may not be elevated due to a poor night’s sleep. I made itto Tampa and by the time I had collected my luggage, found a ride, and made itto the hotel, it was 5:00pm. I had intended to go for a walk but it was pouringrain and so settled in and prepared for my next day’s work. Monday we workedall day and, at the insistence of my colleague, we went to a late dinner—not mystyle—at the place to go in Tampa,Bern’s Steakhouse. We got to the restaurant at 8:00pm.
Bern’s is an institution Tampa, it has been inthe same location since 1953, growing with time. It was opened by Bern &Gert Laxer initially as a luncheonette. Today, it has eight dining rooms, isdim-lit—bad for taking photos, sorry—has red velvet walls and gaudy renaissancelooking artwork scattered around the place. In addition to the dining rooms,there’s a bar and lounge area, a separate dessert room upstairs (more on thatin a moment), a huge kitchen that offers tours, and a huge wine cellar. Wedidn’t have a reservation so we got in line to put our name down with thehostess. The people in front of us were doing the same thing and after theyfinished one said to the other, “Where’s Harry?” I couldn’t help myself so Iresponded, “He’s with Sally.” Harry and his friends got a kick out of it andinvited my colleague and I to join them in the lounge while we awaited ourtable.
Eventually we were seated and I was told toorder steak, “this is no time to think about dieting,” chided my colleague. Thesteak came with French onion soup, a house salad, grilled vegetables from thegarden, and a fully-loaded baked potato. The page on the menu for steak was afull sheet—legal-sized—arranged in a table with the rows telling you the cutsof steak and columns explaining the two thicknesses of cuts of each steak, itsweight, how many people it serves, and the price. On the following page wasanother table describing to you how you should order your steak depending onhow you like it cooked, according to its thickness, and the cut of meat. Iordered the 7 oz. châteaubriand, rare warm—as opposed to rare cold where themeat on the inside would still be cold. A châteaubriand is a thick cut oftenderloin. I couldn’t finish it or the baked potato. The soup and salad wouldhave made for a lovely meal all alone but not at Bern’s.
After our meal my colleague insisted we take atour of the kitchen and it was spectacular. We saw cuts of meats with specificinstructions on receipt paper tooth-picked to them, sprouted greens for saladgarnish, and the “onion ring” station where we were told that Bern’s goesthrough about 300-500 pounds of onions a night.
The wine cellar was unbelievable: cold, dark,damp, and expansive. We were told that it is the world’s largestprivately-owned collection of wine. At any one time there are 100,000 bottlesin the cellar…and another 500,000 bottles across the street at theirstorehouse. The oldest wine by the glass is a Madeira from 1900 and the oldestwine by the bottle is an 1845 vintage Bordeaux.
Next we hiked up the stairs to the dessert roomwhere all the booths are made out of the wood of whiskey casks. In each boothis a land-line telephone where you can direct dial the pianist to request asong. He’s playing somewhere in the dessert room—I never saw him. We ordered acouple desserts to share: a baked Alaska that they flambéed at our table andthe King Midas (carrot cake, chocolate ice cream, and fudge sauce). It was anexquisite and excellent experience and totally worth it.
By the time I got back to my hotel room it was after 11:00pm and I needed to pack for our 5:00am departure to the airport for the 6:15am flight to return home the following day, Tuesday. While work-travel is most certainly not a paid vacation it is thrilling if you love what you do, like I do. There is (usually) time to try a great restaurant at the expense of sleep and most of the time it’s worth it, like Bern’s was. As the late Anthony Bourdain said, travel isn’t always pretty or comfortable but in travel you are changed and hopefully leave something good behind. I’d like to think I left something good behind in Tampa or with you all, by sharing my experience and urging you to seek similar, positive experiences in any way you can.
