Ticket Editor: Beach Bistro founder cancels Sarasota restaurant, expands on Anna Maria Island

Sean Murphy and wife Susan Timmins surprised Sarasota and Bradenton area restaurant-goers last January when they sold Beach Bistro, the Anna Maria Island waterfront landmark they opened in 1985.

When Murphy announced the sale, resulting in one of the biggest restaurant news stories of 2022, he noted that they were focusing on their cocktail bar, The Doctor's Office, which is by popular Irish pub Freckled Fin less than a mile away from Beach Bistro. Both businesses are in the tiny Anna Maria Island city of Holmes Beach.

About a month later, though, Murphy updated me about another restaurant that he planned to open in the downtown Sarasota area.

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BLVD restaurant in Sarasota 'project is dead'

Tentatively named BLVD Bistro, the restaurant would have replicated the Beach Bistro's popular menu, which focuses on creatively prepared local seafood. Murphy intended to open the restaurant on the first floor of the 18-story BLVD Sarasota condominium tower, located at 540 N. Tamiami Trail in the Rosemary District, offering panoramic waterfront and city views.

Developer Kevin Daves, known for projects such as the nearby Ritz-Carlton Sarasota hotel and condos as well as the private Concession golf club community in east Bradenton, recently completed the 18-story BLVD Sarasota condominium tower, where Murphy planned to open his new restaurant. Daves and Murphy have previously collaborated on an upscale dining destination located in the private Concession community. They aimed to open BLVD Bistro in November 2022.

"The project is dead as of a couple of weeks ago," Murphy said via email March 2. "It takes great commitment and drive to create a great restaurant. The BLVD ownership ran out of gas."

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Doctor's Office on Anna Maria Island now a full-scale restaurant with garden dining

Murphy has also moved on from the Eat Here restaurant brand that he launched about 12 years ago as the more casual sister restaurant to Beach Bistro. Eat Here previously included two Sarasota locations in addition to the now-closed one that operated in Holmes Beach. Today, Murphy is focused on The Doctor's Office.

Tucked away behind the Island Shopping Center and occupying a building from the 1950s that actually served as the island's actual doctor's office, The Doctor's Office opened about six years ago as a place Murphy described as serving "crafted cocktails, great bar fare from the Bistro team of chefs, and artisanal beer and wine." Now, it's a full-scale restaurant that rivals Beach Bistro.

Murphy has assembled a trio of top chefs from Beach Bistro and Eat Here including Joey Egan, who was the head chef at Beach Bistro after serving as executive chef at the old Louies Modern in downtown Sarasota and being responsible for the local TableSeide Restaurant Group’s catering department.

In addition, Murphy recently secured permission to allow service in the charming outdoor space adjacent to the cocktail bar. Dubbed The Doctor's Garden, it's a romantic getaway filled with tropical plants and trees adorned by twinkling white lights that are set off by a matching chandelier.

"I was haunted by how beautiful that garden was, so I spent over two years in permitting," Murphy said during a recent phone interview. "This is the best place on the island to have a dinner. Last night, under the trees and lights and birds and flowers, it was like 'A Midsummer Night's Dream.'"

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Doctor's Office for fresh grouper dishes, bouillabaisse and Lobstercargots

In addition to the garden seating that accommodates around 50-60 people, there are indoor tables for about 35, as well as bar stools. The Doctor's Office opens daily at 5 p.m., and reservations, which are recommended, can be made for either outdoor or indoor seating by calling the restaurant during the day at 941-213–9926.

While the cocktails served at The Doctor's Office remain among the most sophisticated and satisfying in the region, the main attraction these days is probably the food. Essential dishes include the fresh grouper sandwich and the Anna Marribbean Grouper entree encrusted with coconut and cashew and "prettied with red pepper papaya jam."

Most famous, though, are a pair of Beach Bistro's greatest hits: Murphy's rendition of the classic French fish stew bouillabaisse as well as Lobstercargots, which are chunks of lobster "baked in a crock with garlic butter." Murphy recalls coming up with the dish nearly 40 years ago alongside Timmins.

"It was invented by my wife and I at table six at the Bistro," Murphy said. "We were offering escargot from two different cans, trying all these different kinds. I finally said, 'This dish would be great if it wasn't for all the chewy little slugs.' And we switched to lobster."

Yeah, following BLVD restaurant's cancellation, Eat Here's closing, and the sale of one of the best beachfront and romantic restaurants in Florida, Murphy seems determined to make The Doctor's Office the place folks go not only for top-shelf cocktails, but the kind of elevated cuisine he oversaw for decades at Beach Bistro.

For more information on The Doctor's Office, which is at 5312 Holmes Blvd., visit doctorsofficeami.com.

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Wade Tatangelo is Ticket Editor for the Sarasota Herald-Tribune, and Florida-Georgia Regional Dining and Entertainment Editor for the USA TODAY Network. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. He can be reached by email at [email protected]. Support local journalism by subscribing.??????

This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: Beach Bistro founder cancels Sarasota restaurant expands on Anna Maria