From 'Scripts to Shrimp: Bonefish Grill

Middletown may have lost a steakhouse, but it's gaining a new seafood restaurant.

Bonefish Grill, which recently purchased the liquor license held by the long-shuttered Route 35 Steak and Ale, is expected to open a few miles south on Route 35 in the space last occupied by the Chapel Hill Pharmacy.

A building permit posted on the window of the closed drugstore does not indicate the name of the anticipated tenant; but renovations to the interior space are expected to move forward, according to Middletown Township Planner Jason Greenspan.

No opening date has been announced yet for the seafood eatery, Greenspan said.

Because a restaurant is an approved use in the retail center, known as Chapel Hill Shopping Center and anchored by Whole Foods, the new owner does not have to seek planning board approval for the new business.

"They just need a regular [certificate of occupancy]," Greenspan said. "It's a business-to-business transfer."

The more-than-35-year-old strip shopping center, fronting Route 35 north at Chapel Hill Road, also houses Dairy Queen and a stand-alone PNC Bank. Until Whole Foods came in a few years ago, an A&P supermarket anchored the strip mall that housed many vacant storefronts for a long period of time.

Bonefish Grill is part of an extensive chain of restaurants owned by OSI Restaurant Partners of Tampa, Florida.

A few miles up the highway, on the southbound side of Route 35, OSI sister restaurants Carrabba's Italian Grill and Outback Steakhouse are also on Middletown's menu of chain eateries.

Meanwhile, the still stagnant Steak and Ale sits a few miles north as it awaits a possible revival as a retail/office complex.

An application from River Birch, LLC, of Manalpan, to convert the once thriving steakhouse to a mixed commercial use, has been submitted to the township's Planning Department, according Planning/Zoning Board Secretary Debra Yuro.

River Birch now owns the steakhouse building, but has yet to submit architectural design renderings and other necessary information to make the application complete so that it can be scheduled for a Planning Board hearing, said both Greenspan and Yuro.

Steak and Ale closed in 2008 when its corporate owner, Bennigan's Franchising Company of Dallas, Texas, filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy as a casualty of the economic downturn. Bennigan's shut most of its New Jersey restaurants under the terms of the bankruptcy.

Faced with a declining real estate market and the need to liquidate its assets, Bennigan's struggled to find buyers for its properties, including the Middletown Steak and Ale. Fixtures from that restaurant were sold off; and, eventually Bennigan's had to navigate the financial and legal channels in bankruptcy court, Greenspan noted.

"It took them a while to get thorough bankruptcy," he said.

Bennigan's followed a corporate model in designing its chain restaurants, like Steak and Ale. That design might delay conversion to a retail/office center as far as building plans are concerned.

"It was tailor-made for a Steak and Ale," Greenspan said.

Company officials at River Birch were unavailable at press time, according to an office worker who answered the telephone at the company's headquarters.

Steak and Ale, along with the closed , just south of Old Country Road, are just two businesses in the township awaiting new uses.

The remains vacant after closing earlier this year. The Woodbridge-based chain was purchased by A&P supermarkets.