Archived Article By Tom Fitzmorris Originally published December 16, 2005 Click here for the current edition Brennan's Outlook After keeping utterly quiet about its plans since the storm, the Brennan brothers who own Brennan's on Royal Street let loose a story about the demise of their wine cellar late last week. (It even made the national news.) The story, if you missed it, is that the insurance company paid off a million dollars for the cellar, which it then carted away to sell to who knows who. In the days following the hurricane, the temperature in the cellar allegedly got up to 120 degrees. This strikes me as unlikely, although temps in the more believable 90s would have ruined the wines easily enough.  I got a call from Ted Brennan with some more facts. First, he told me that his brother Jimmy, whose baby the wine cellar is, has already purchased a great deal of wine for the new wine list. Then he set out the situation which is keeping them closed for another three months at least, about which there have been many rumors. "Our building was not built to be a restaurant, but a home. So we had to a lot of things in funny ways," he said. "One of those is that our big refrigerators and freezers were on the second and third floors. When they defrosted and the stuff started running out of them, especially the freezers. . . well, it was nasty. We have to rebuild a lot of that part of the building, and the kitchen. We can't do it and stay open at the same time." The freezers in question were in the rear of the restaurant, but that's still an area that gets a lot of use on the first floor. "We're hoping to be open in March," he said. "Maybe April first." © 2005 Tom Fitzmorris. All rights reserved. news@nomenu.com