Philadelphia's BYO Revolution

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PHILADELPHIA It was the guy with the shiny metal case. He's the one who drove home how much the bring-your-own-bottle aesthetic has profoundly changed this city's dining scene.

We were at Pumpkin, a 28-seat restaurant owned by a young couple in a neighborhood that, depending on your outlook, could be called emerging, marginal or flat-out dicey. The candlelit former deli has a single storefront window and an open kitchen. Gauzy orange curtains hang from exposed fixtures, and the secondhand tables, pushed tight together, are covered in butcher paper. The short, frequently changing menu is printed on a single sheet of paper. The food, such as braised veal cheeks, pan-seared sea scallops or a pork chop served over spaetzle, is admirable and at times approaches outstanding.

In other words, Pumpkin follows the pattern of cool BYOBs all over Philadelphia, where crowds of people with brown paper bags of wine and beer in tow wait patiently for tables. . . .

. . . Over the past decade, Philadelphia has experienced an astounding boom in BYOB dining. When Audrey Claire opened in 1996, it was one of only two fine-dining BYOBs in the city, along with longtime favorite Dmitri's. Now, in the metropolitan region, there are more than 240.

According to a recent survey by the online reservation service OpenTable.com, 63 percent of Philadelphia diners said they had taken their own wine to a fine-dining restaurant within their last 10 meals. That's compared to a national average of 27 percent and more than double the percentages in New York and wine-crazy San Francisco.