Margaritaville USA

¡Viva la Margarita! is the title of a recent Houston Press article on "the drink that changed the way we eat."

Latino food and cocktails dominate the casual dining market in Houston. The food may be Tex-Mex or modern Mexican, but the format is always the same -- a dining room that's laid out around a prominent central bar area. Call it the contemporary cantina, if you like. . . .

Does [David] Garrido consider the concept a major restaurant trend in the making? "I think this is the next evolution of Texas food -- a bar with Mexican snacks; you don't even call it a restaurant anymore," he says. . . .

But in the end, he admits, the food will be whatever sells the most margaritas. "You are really making money on the drinks -- more than on the food. So the higher the percentage of drinks, the higher the profit. They're getting $15 for premium margaritas in Dallas."

Stop for a second and consider the profit margin on a frozen margarita. At $11 a bottle for regular tequila, a restaurant owner can figure on around a 15-percent liquor cost on a six-dollar margarita -- that's $5 in profit. And while using premium tequila might raise the liquor cost as high as 25 or 30 percent, the restaurant would still make $10 on each $15 cocktail.

At these kinds of margins, it's no wonder restaurant owners are willing to adapt their menus to suit the tastes of drinkers. What's really evolving is a "margarita cuisine." . . .

The snowball that set off the margarita avalanche got rolling in 1970 when the Texas Legislature passed the "liquor by the drink" amendment. Ever since the end of prohibition, the draconian Texas alcoholic beverage code has attempted to "maintain the public temperance" by limiting the availability of liquor. Half of the state's counties remain dry to this day.

Beer and wine were available at restaurants in "wet" counties -- or you could bring your own bottle and buy "setups" to mix your own drinks. But the new law gave each wet community the right to vote on whether local restaurants could sell cocktails. . . .

The sweet frozen margaritas at Mariano's Mexican Cuisine became an instant sensation. The Dallas Cowboys drank them; Trini Lopez and Lee Trevino drank them. But it was coeds from nearby Southern Methodist University who really spread the drink's fame.

"The margarita made tequila an acceptable drink for women," explains Marc N. Scheinman, marketing professor at Pace University's Lubin School of Business. Scheinman is the author of a study called "The Global Market for Tequila." Demographics played a huge role in the popularity of the frozen margarita. "The spread of the frozen margarita coincided with large numbers of young women coming into the workforce," says Scheinman. "It also coincided with a rise in immigration and the Mexicanization of American cuisine." . . .

The drink changed the way we ordered. Cocktail-friendly chips and salsa were more likely to be upgraded with accompaniments like chile con queso and guacamole. Easily shared bar snacks like a big pile of nachos or fajita meat with a stack of tortillas replaced individual entrées like combination plates as happy hour stretched into dinner.

The lobster ceviche at Sabor and the tuna tacos at Chuy's are the latest in a long line of snacks designed to sell more margaritas. But the frozen margarita not only changed the way we eat in Texas, it transformed the liquor business. . . .

"The margarita is the No 1. cocktail in America," Scheinman says. "Sixty-five percent of the tequila sold in the United States goes into margaritas." The continuing popularity of the cocktail is having unimaginable repercussions. "The rise of the margarita meant that for the first time the major market for tequila was the U.S., not Mexico."

The United States surpassed Mexico in tequila consumption in 2000, and the market continues to grow, fueled by the nation's insatiable demand for margaritas. In Mexico, where tequila is a macho drink taken neat with a chaser, the American frozen cocktail is beginning to make headway among women. The drink is also gaining ground in Europe as part of the Tex-Mex restaurant phenomenon.

Just beware - the likelihood of what's labeled as "Tex-Mex" actually resembling it decrease sharply with distance from the region.


The Cactus Club in Boston usually has good 'ritas.