MARTIN'S BAR-B-QUE JOINT

Time to make the donuts!

2011-03-28T05:51:00.000-04:00

It's 4:47am....headed to the Joint to start prep for lunch - beans, potato salad, slaw, pies, chickens, ribs. Then my weekly admin work for my P&L. Welcome to the restaurant business.

whole hog

2011-03-17T12:59:00.000-04:00

this past winter we quit cooking whole hogs on our pit (which is smack dab in the middle of the Joint) because it was too cold. Actually the temp wasnt really the reason, we had to winterize our patio and in doing so if we cooked hogs the smoke had nowhere to go. So its 78* today with a low of 52* tonight and that means the pit is coming out of hibernation. Got a 197# hog going on tomorrow and it will be done about 3-4 on saturday afternoon. Ill try to get some pics posted. Its good to be back writing on the ol' blog again!

-pat

So let's get the content going again......

2011-02-20T09:44:00.000-05:00

Again I'll remind you that I'll pull no punches.....read the following link carefully and ask yourself why do so many successful restauranteurs answer this one question the same way? There has to be a reason right? -oh there is, trust me!!! We'll discuss further in weeks/months to come.
Chris Schlesinger may be the 2nd biggest influence for me in regards to food because it was his book on live fire cookery (Thrill of the Grill) that I bought as a sophomore in high school 20+ years ago that really took my interests to new heights! It was the 1st (of many more to come!) cookbook I ever bought. Saved my $ from two weeks of allowances to buy it.

Anybody out there?

2011-02-01T11:04:00.000-05:00

if not im the only one to blame....but a lot has changed over the past year and im wanting to write about it - call it "stage 2" in the evolution of a bbq joint. feedback welcomed!

New blog......

2009-11-17T19:54:00.003-05:00

Thanks Mike Causey (Skyscraper Media) for the new look to the blog......now if I would/could just start posting a little more often.

3yr Anni!

2009-10-17T01:45:00.002-04:00

Cant believe 3yrs ago today we opened the Joint! what a night.......me/bo yelling at each other, dad washing dishes, mom apologizing to customers for the wait, then for us running out of food, Bryan Chandler busting tablesl, Eric Lamb doing whatever he was doing......it was a forgettable day, but one that I never want to forget! As many of you know Bo is no longer with us on a day/day basis...........but we're still tight........we met tonight at City House to have a few beers and think about where we've been and where we are.......its been a heck of a ride, and Martin's has a long ride to go...(trust me) .........but that being said.........I could never have built Martins without my friends and family helping me, BUT i could never have built Martin's without that asshole redneck rastafari Bo Collier.............wouldnt have happened! what a great friend he is to me.........foxhole!!!

Ain't Stalled no more!

2009-10-09T02:29:00.005-04:00

Had a window yesterday/today of no rain......so the boys were able to get out there today and pour. this is the hardest part, everything derives from this so its a big deal......steel here tomorrow, they start framing on Monday. This is great, we're moving forward. some pics to follow. ill have a biz blog in the next day or so......

still stalled

2009-09-27T21:13:00.003-04:00

rain has passed, should have a slab poured by the end of the week. even still it will be another two weeks before the steel gets here. have a job site review meeting tomorrow at 12:00. been designing the smoke stack for the pit furnace. wed. night i drove to Murphysboro, IL to spend some time with mike mills and his genius daughter amy tunnicliffe. been trying to get up there since late last year but something has always come up.....ice storm, inland hurricane, all kinds of stuff. very quick trip (only 3hr drive though) went up wed. came back thursday. we just hung out and had dinner.......also it was nice to see tommy houston (checkered pig) as well.....great guy! very nice operation they have going up there......and what tremendous people they are! they were getting set up for their competition this weekend and with amy in town from boston i decided to run up there and see em'. my buddy kirk duggan went with me and we worked on my books (quickbooks) while we drove. kirk has been helping get caught up on my books, ive gotten behind on reconciling my transactions on a daily basis and now feel like im behind Mt. Everest. i would drive and kirk would ask me what each transaction was for and what account it needed to be placed under. just data entry but dadgum it was very helpful - really made a lot of progress.
last week ended up pretty well, especially as rainy as it was. as you've read on here in the past the month of September is an enigma. i have learned that its an enigma for everyone, not just martins bbq. very tough to predict/anticipate. but as its done the past 3yrs the last week of september starts to heat up again and october is or at least has been strong relative to the season. added to the front of the house over the past couple of weeks......very encouraged by them! the back of the house is still trucking....stronger - and leaner - than ever. still avg under 10min ticket times on our peak service (saturday night), under 4min on weekday lunch (unless you order a burger). putting that second line in back in july was the best decision ive made since opening up, its just been like night/day. now the line to place your order is still and/or can be still pretty long, but once your order is placed you ain't there long. the new joint wont have that worry of waiting long to order, its set up to get you in and get you out if you so please......really looking forward to that kitchen!

Stalled

2009-09-21T09:37:00.002-04:00

So I went out the other day to check on the site, to see if the footers had been poured for the slab yet. wasnt anyone around except an old man in a huge wooden boat. I went over and introduced myself to him. He told me his name was Noah and that he'd keep an eye out for any contractors and let me know but that in the mean time he was very busy loading two of every beast on to his boat. Actually he did look pretty busy so I told him I'd see him around. He told me that it was supposed to keep raining for a while, but that he would keep me posted as to when it might dry up a little - then we could see some guys out working concrete. He said he would release a dove, and that when it came back with a masonry trowel we'd be pretty close to getting back to work. he told me to hang in there.

The site

2009-09-14T23:06:00.003-04:00

So i missed getting a pick of the actual breaking ground......but it wasnt nothin more than a track tearing the parking lot up. here is where it stands now.....they dug footings today, pouring 'crete on thursday. meeting with my construction manager & architect on thursday. ill take better pics in a day or two.......got a lot to blog/update on - A LOT! permits, equipment auctions, lease agreements, construction plans, rumor-mongering, nations toppled, orgys started, pills popped, mountains climbed......ohh just stay tuned.

Go eat at Jimmy Carl's Lunchbox!

2009-09-12T23:17:00.004-04:00

You know whenever I get a chance I love eating at Nashville BBQ spots. Its not everytime but quite (if I've got some Martin's BBQ stuff on ) often I get the look like, "what are you doing here"......as if BBQ guys ain't supposed to go eat at other BBQ guys restaurants......like there is some unwritten rule.......I dont know, whatever......I really enjoy it and Nashville has some really good BBQ....so when I have time I support everyone I can! So here recently I got behind on my books a tad bit, and let me tell you that will compound in a hurry! So thursday i hunkered down in my office/shoebox at home and dove off into a big ole' pool of Quickbooks.......which let me tell you was riveting! Anyway......broke for lunch around 11:00 or so and went with my buddy Kirk Duggan down to Jimmy Carl's Lunchbox in the Gulch. Didnt get that look from these guys.......instead I got a "glad you are here what can I get you" look. Listen, flat out dang good BBQ! Those guys opened up for lunch in the legendary Station Inn....perfect spot. Had the pork sandwich, slaw, mac cheese salad, beans, ribs! Really great BBQ At any rate......go spend some freakin' money with these guys, the food is well worth it and they are trying really hard.......if you have followed this blog for very long you'll know that, uh, I can relate!!!

Dog Doo

2009-09-12T08:40:00.002-04:00

A stray dog came around the Joint yesterday.....wouldnt come to you......real scared & skiddish. Went back in the Joint and grabbed the bills to head to the Post Office. When I came back out that poor little skiddish mutt was nowhere to be found, but his little skiddish ass was nice enough to leave a big pile of dog shit right on the sidewalk. thats how my day started yesterday.

3 blogs in 3 days?

2009-09-08T09:56:00.003-04:00

yep.......if you are that shocked then maybe its a sign of the times, so maybe you need to "get your house in order" as the ol' C.O.C. preachers used to say.......anyway, headed to a restaurant auction before lunch @11:00. worked on back of the house checklists all day yesterday (holding those knuckleheads accountable) and was up till 12:30 last night working on other stuff for the Joint. hopefully the contractors will be back out there working on that pad today!

on a side note, the pic is a good pictorial description of what the Martin household is like every morning.

Brick & Rough cut lumber

2009-09-07T21:44:00.002-04:00

Picked out brick the other day......really awesome, OLD weathered brick.......a lot of character! its about $30.00 (per thousand) more expensive than what we budgeted, but its worth it - plus we are saving quite a bit in other areas so it will all work out. the interior of the new Joint will look EXACTLY, like the current one......down to the interior roof, red trim, exposed HVAC, etc.......my father-in-law and i will be hauling Poplar to his sawmill to cut in the next week or so....the trees were blown down in the Tornado a few years back so they ought to be well seasoned.

Changes are a comin'

2009-09-06T09:27:00.002-04:00

Broke ground on the new "Joint" this week........we are staying in Nolensville, we just need a larger kitchen and better facilities. Ill post plans/renderings/elevations soon for you to see.......one thing is very important though, we will NOT lose our atmosphere, as a matter of fact we'll be adding to it. Having a larger kitchen is going to be such a huge help. Our current kitchen is 330sq feet.....we've milked it for as much as it will give. The overall product will be much more consistent in a larger space, we'll have the equipment we need etc..
Also, having the blog re-designed in line with the new website.......and the new joint. the new Joint will make the blog informative again. new codes, draft beer, restaurant auctions, staff will double.......putting all the chips on the table one more time.........so follow along

More Snapshots......

2009-06-17T21:13:00.013-04:00

1st pic of Big Apple BBQ Block Party

2009-06-17T19:27:00.002-04:00

More pics/commentary to come.......the event surpassed even my best expectations, it was great! This is Friday night around 8:30, 24th & Madison Ave.

Interview with Pat on WNYC

2009-06-12T15:53:00.003-04:00

Pat and Kenny Callaghan were guests on the Leonard Laporte show. Here is the interview.

Video of the new Rig

2009-06-09T20:19:00.002-04:00

Hello everyone, Mike here, I will be helping Pat update the blog here. First update, here is a video of the new Whole Hog Rig to add to the pics in the last post. The rig is currently on it's way today to the Big Apple to do some serious Whole Hog cooking. The trip so far has been an adventure, with traffic and hailstorms but all is going well.

New Catering Trailer

2009-06-08T21:00:00.003-04:00

Leaving for NYC in 8 hours at 4:00am with Robbie Lunday. Here we go........2009 Big Apple Block Party.

Trailer

2009-04-29T00:18:00.003-04:00

Getting the trailer going for the hog-pit. Paint came in today, 1300 degree flat black. we'll put 3 coats on it. I now have a slight delta (change) in my plans..........thinking of going fwd with the 32ft gooseneck i was originally thinking about and just getting the whole dad-gum thing done now. Ill post tomorrow with the update.

New website is/should be up......its a great step....we'll make changes (deltas) as we go be Mike Causey is great! I'm about to touch base with my old friend Katie Walker, been missing her a lot.......she & John had a baby and I've been trying to leave her alone, but I saw on Facebook the other day that she was sharpening her pencils...........sounds like Katie "All-Star" Walker is coming out of hibernation

FINALLY.......

2009-04-22T22:27:00.003-04:00

New website with new blog is here........launching it officially on Monday. Lots to catch you up on:

1) possible new building
2) invitation as one of the Pit-Masters to the infamous "Big Apple BBQ Block Party" in June
3) yet another timely, unplanned child on the way - my lovely wife being irresponsible once again with the birth control pills. september 7th due date. oh yeah and its a boy.......may God help us!
4) new whole hog trailer being built - its a monster!!!
5) update on business - the Martin's BBQ "pirate ship" is actually getting serious!?!?!
6) update on a new douche bag vendor
7) update on a new sloth/moron customer - this one is a good story! some folks are just unreal!
8) i am now going to be updating via "twitter" (short 2-3 sentence updates)......this will enable me to actually update my damn blog.......look, the big ass paragraphs were just getting too tough for me to do on a regular basis - i have severe adult ADD - what do you expect? what a terrible excuse.

2009-02-09T18:55:00.002-05:00

Some recent articles about the Joint...

Southern Living - Tales from the Road

100 Southern Foods - Garden and Gun

Smokehouse

2009-02-02T14:19:00.011-05:00

A look at the smokehouse

O.K. so here is the deal......

2009-01-15T09:54:00.002-05:00

New website & blog and blog design is on the way. Hang in there with me! A lot to tell you about I just wanted to wait until the new blog rolls out to do it. It will be better than ever. A lot more pictures, video, audio.........and if you have A.D.D. as bad as "they" say I do then you'll appreciate that! The blog will be rejuvenated with fresh and more complex business posts. It will also incorporate more cooking as well -again, just to keep content fresh. Soon my good man, soon.

Post

2008-11-14T23:41:00.002-05:00

I'm in Correctionville Iowa........Pheasant hunting. As you may summize this post has not a dad-gum thing to do with BBQ, opening a restaurant, grilling, cooking, lude language, nudity, bootlegging or.........................uh...............grits. This is really just a post telling you that I have a lot to post about, but ain't gonna do it till first of the week sometime when I get time. Really I'm happy as a damn tornado in a trailer park to be doing this, because I'm a huge quail hunter.....but as any Southerner knows quail hunting ain't what it was 15 years ago, let alone in the 80's and before! We're hunting WILD Pheasant here........not some pen-raised birds let loose an hour before we put our boots on. We may not see any birds, and if we do they may take off way before we come on em'............30mph winds, scattered snow ain't helping us.......but surely that ain't why we're here is it? All I know is I'm not thinking about running a restaurant.

Whole Hog BBQ in Chester County, TN

2008-11-05T21:16:00.005-05:00

So I rode down to the symposium with my buddy Carey Bringle, who is an amputee. How did he lose his leg? Depending on which night you ask Carey, you'll get one of the following answers:

1) He got his leg cut off with a pocket knife in a bar fight at Joe's Village Inn

2) He was swimming his daily laps in the Mississippi river when a wandering Bull Shark from the Gulf bit his leg off. Carey killed the shark with his bare hands and wrestled his leg out of its stomach, but the the doctors at Baptist Hospital in Memphis were not savvy enough to re-attach his femur bone.

3) One of the Ford brothers shot him in his thigh when Carey was running for Shelby County Commissioner.

Why mention that Carey is an amputee? Because riding with someone who's got one of those big-ass blue handicap signs hanging from their rear view mirror is like manna from heaven! I've never been able to just pull up and park right in front of the front door. It literally took me a couple days to get accustomed to it. It was awesome! Anytime I'm going anywhere and his ass is going, you better bank on it he's driving!

On the way though I wanted to take him through Henderson to eat at 1-2 whole hog BBQ joints. The two places I used to cook at, and learned the art, have since closed. One was Thomas & Webb. I credit Mr. Harold Thomas for really teaching me what I know today. He closed down and a place called "Bill's BBQ" is in its place. They cook with an electric cooker, which Im not going to get started on right here but will say two things; that ain't real BBQ and a man deserves a good ole' country ass-whooping for calling it bbq if its cooked on one of those electric cookers. Makes me sick. At any rate, we only had time for one, so I took him to Siler's Ol' Time BBQ. The pic is of Chris Siler, who is a great guy, and the damn near one pound pork sandwich I had. See that light colored chunk hanging out right there, thats the middlin' meat.......folks thats as good as it gets!

More SFA Pics........

2008-11-05T20:56:00.007-05:00

my buddy Tyler Brown, executive chef at Capitol Grill at the Hermitage Hotel in Nashville.

That is Sean Brock (chef at McCready's in Charleston) in that lizard mask. All I was doing was having a nice relaxed conversation over a beer at the after party and Sean walked up next to me and growled.......I almost wet myself.

Me and legendary NASCAR driver/owner and Corn Likker' Legend Junior Johnson.

Southern Foodways Symposium

2008-11-05T20:28:00.004-05:00

Went to the SFA's annual symposium in Oxford (Ole Miss) a week or so ago. This is the first symposium I attended. I have intended to go for 4 years now and always bump into some reason for having to miss it. I really regret not going earlier, what a fantastic event! This years event was as its title reads, the "Liquid South". Everything from southern spring water to buttermilk to moonshine. The speakers were absolutely hilarious yet informative. I still remember my summers staying with my grandparents, specifically my dads parents, in Corinth. We would come in at lunch and Ma-Ma would have this big lunch made for us and my grandfather would fill up a big glass of cold buttermilk and dip his cornbread in it. He'd get me to try it every time just so he could laugh at how much I disliked it. I just had a large glass of whole buttermilk and cornbread yesterday for my lunch.........funny how things take a turn on a man in life.
One of the speakers was a White House correspondent covering Jimmy Carters campaign when he was running for President. The story of Jimmy was good, but the real story was his brother Billy. All of the networks had their guys down there, a lot of which are now seasoned veterans of major networks. Every afternoon at 4:00 the correspondents would meet at Billy's gas station and drink beer. Then they, along with Billy and friends would go across the road to play a game of softball. Jimmy never missed a game when he was in town. If any of you know anything about Billy Carter then you know what an amazing character he was. He could absolutely care less as to what folks thought of him......that was really the real beauty of him. One afternoon Billy missed the softball game, but showed up at the station with everyone after for a beer or two. Billy and his wife had a son born that morning. Ed Bradly was one of the correspondents there and asked Billy about the birth. It was a live interview on national T.V......this is a true story. It went something like this:

Ed Bradly: Billy, congratulations on the birth of your son you must be excited.......

Billy Carter: Well yeah Ed, hell I appreciate it, we are proud of him.....hes a big strappin' boy!

Ed Bradly: That's great Billy, what did he weigh?

Billy Carter: Ohh Ed he tipped the scales at seven pounds and eight ounces...........................6.5lbs of which ain't nuthin' but dick & balls!

That was on live television for ABC's nightly news. When that guy told that story I about puked on the old Lady's neck in front of me I was laughing so hard.

ROUX!!!

2008-10-22T22:09:00.002-04:00

Its that time of year again, for us at least, for Etouffee'......we cant keep it in! I took it off the menu to take pressure off of us producing it and we still cant keep it in stock. As with our "Q" we make it from scratch and take the hardest most authentic way possible. That basically means we dont cheat on our roux....because of that it takes a long time (1-2 days) to produce a small amount of it, maybe a couple of gallons. Its gone in 1 day! At any rate.....making roux has become for me a small vacation on Saturday nights. No inventory, invoices, writing checks, hearing complaints, bitching employees, emails.....NOTHING! Its just me, a six-pack of beer, my cast iron skillet and my thin whisk (dont start in on me with the wooden spoon.....i like the thin whisk better). Nothing to think about but stirring that dang roux........total peace!

Update

2008-10-22T07:09:00.002-04:00

Last week ended up well. We are very steady in light of current economic conditions. Our sales have yet to dip other than the first week or two of school starting back, but that was expected. Our seasonal dip should start here in the next 4-6 weeks as we head in to the holidays, and that too is to be expected. We have two different demographics at Martin's; The hourly wage, blue-collar guy who works construction and the young semi-wealthy to very wealthy professional and his family. The first one has already felt his economic shock, back in mid to late summer. World markets doing the cannonball off the high-dive mean very, very little to him. I mean seriously, think about it......where is his investment portfolio right now? He felt his shock with the price surge in fuel, groceries, cigarettes etc., he's already digested that and moved on. Yeah maybe he pulled the old lunch pale out and is packing his lunch a day or two a week now, but he ain't doing it everyday! The second one, their wealth is such that we are still very, very affordable because of our price point. There are 4 price point categories in restaurants.....from most expensive to the least: fine dining, full service dining, quick-casual, fast food. The second guy and his family have cut back their visits to places that are in the fine dining and full service dining price points, but not the other two. Quick casual concepts (Martin's) and fast food concepts will fair much better in the next 18 or so months, if not longer.

The Nashville Scene had their annual "Best Of" awards last week......as you guessed it Whitt's won again. This is where I take my hat off as owner of Martin's Bar-B-Que and Im just typing here as a fan of BBQ, a fan of good food. This is like Fazoli's winning best Italian, its that ridiculous. It shows the level of ignorance, not stupidity but ignorance - there is a HUGE difference, in the local market in regards to BBQ. People who are not "foodies" sit down to vote for that one article every year and just start writing stuff in. They write in what they know and/or are familiar with whether its good or not. There is a Whitt's on every other corner in Nashville and lets give them credit, they have brand recognition.....thats the only reason they win this event every year. I dont give a shit whether you like BBQ or not, thats not the point I'm making.......the point I'm making is to appreciate good food and the people who are out there trying to put it out every day....the fact is that 90% of the time food from non-chain establishments always tastes better because the owners really care about what your eating and the quality of it. Their heart is in it. If you are not from Nashville reading this I may sound like a sore loser....Im not. Jim Ridley (Scene writer) named Dee's Q his pick and it is MOST deserved! Jim also was kind enough to write a few very nice things about Martin's that I appreciated very much! I'm just pointing out that we as a market have a ways to go in regards to appreciation of really dang good food....and for that reason we'll probably see Whitt's win for years to come..........but the real food freaks, they know whats good and where to go.....Hog Heaven, Dee's, Jim-n-Nick's (they fall into the 10% that are large and care about what you are eating), Jack's on Trinity and hopefully Martin's. Want to see this trend change? Then its our job as food lovers as we sip a beer at Bosco's in Hillsboro Village or play golf with some guys you dont know to talk about, inform and educate these ignorant bastards as to what good food is........tell them why pasta from Savarinos is better than store bought, tell them the diffence in truly great food and average food, or in this case BBQ. Do your good deed and educate the masses and lift our society! Life is just too dad-gum short to eat average food......it really is!

Post

2008-10-18T09:16:00.004-04:00

Yeah I know I re-committed to my vows but alas I have fallen short, sounds like marriage huh? I actually have "blogged" a few times on Microsoft Word, saving the file to copy/paste it when I finished.....I just never finished. For those of you that dont know me personally, the term A.D.D. is an understatement when it comes to me. At any rate here's a quick update of the past month, in rapid-fire succession:

New menu went over well. Had to raise some of my prices a little, specifically beef/turkey products, but really the only change out of pocket to the customer is drinks are now a la carte. I thought and/or was afraid of negative feedback but really only had about 4-5 comments and those were respectful. Didnt have any assholes bitching about how expensive our food is.

Business continues to be strong. Last year September was our 2nd worst month in terms of gross sales. Think about it, a lot of changes happen around labor day for folks. Kids go back to school etc.. This September has been our highest grossing month of the year and we were up about 150% - 200% in gross sales compared to last September. Why is that? Well several things, two of which I think stand out. Last September we had only been open 11mths so time alone has increased our brand to the customer. I also would like to think we are staying consistent with our food which is creating revolving sales through loyal customers.

We officially had our 2 year birthday this past Thursday. I cant believe its been two years already. What I really cant believe is the stupid business decisions I made in the first 6 months and how under capitalized I was starting out..........its really a blessing from God that I'm still in business because of that! I get a bunch of emails from people wanting to do this very same thing in their town. Ill say it here like I say in my responses. 2 great pieces of wisdom I can give you after this 2 year rollercoaster ride: 1) get SUFFICIENT restaurant management experience before you do something like this -and- 2) however much you think you need to start up with, add 50%. Dont worry about whether your product, whether its BBQ or Pizza, is the best around and a lot better than any restaurant around. If you dont heed those two little tidbits of advice I just gave you then you are doomed. You will fail. "Oh Pat, you've survived two years and started with no experience and very little money"......I'm telling you its an anomaly! -But Im happy it is and look forward to many years to come in this business.

Really starting to build the catering business. Hired a girl to do sales for me that I'm really excited about. Lori Lockmiller is on board and we're just waiting for her cards. We've had some turnover at the joint thats caused some growing pains....good ones though. We've also had to hire a couple of extra folks. We now staff around 10 full time and part time.....a long way from when it was Bo on the line and me in the front.

The new menu added Baby-backs, cracklins, tamales, slugburgers. All are selling well except slugburgers, but we knew that going in. Slugburgers are homage to back home...Corinth, MS. They actually will start selling though once folks from Mississippi who live in Nashville find out we have them.

Updated my quickbooks and I'm now doing the books....this is a separate blog unto its own. This alone has been one of the most time consuming things/changes I've made in the past couple of months. Ill blog on this later.

Yeah so I gotta hit it.......Lord willing it should be a good day in sales. Weather is sunny & 65 degrees. Hopefully we'll knock it out today. Look, Im really trying to get back on this blog on a regular basis. Its hard though, working about 65+ hours a week.....then whats left I'm trying like hell to spend valuable time with my wife and two kids. The pics are random.....a couple of Porterhouses I grilled a few Sunday nights ago. What a 2.5" thick steak scares you? Not if you know what your doing! Alpha males dont screw with the 1" rib-eye from Kroger......find your inner "cave-man", you'll be happy you did.

Dilworths Hot Tamales, Corinth Mississippi.

2008-09-11T22:58:00.006-04:00

Hoping to post an update in the morning. In the mean time I thought I'd post some pics from one of my favorite dives. This is Dilworths Hot Tamales in our hometown of Corinth, MS. When I was in high school w'ed each buy 2 dozen and eat every damn one of em! Look at the price list!!!
Tamales are BIG in Mississippi.....really BIG! They are a little different than Mexican Tamales, but not much. If you want to learn more check out:
http://www.tamaletrail.com/

Renewing my vows.....

2008-09-04T09:40:00.003-04:00

God bless Jerry Reed, God bless Billy Carter.

Alright........put me back on your RSS feed, I'm renewing my "vows" to the blog. Its been an incredibly busy summer. Big things are on the horizon for Martin's Bar-B-Que that Ill get into in a few weeks when some of the dust settles.......but the point is I am going to start blogging on a regular basis again, a couple times a week at least. I didnt realize how well read the blog was until this summer, only blogging once every 3 weeks or so, getting emails from folks who are getting irritated at the lack of fresh content. I am going to give you a summary of whats been going on since my last post, not a lot of detail to it. Before I do that though I gotta tell you that my grandfather passed on to the good Lord this past Saturday morning. I wont take you through a bunch of stuff but we were close and he was a fine Christian man. His influence on me and my career as a restaurantuer was beyond what he knew. You see, my first entry and/or interest to cooking was watching my Dad grill. It was a process, it was methodical. Dad was almost annoyed at those who "grilled" on gas grills. The mention of lighter fluid was dang near sinful. At my household it is the same way. If I ever see my boy, Wyatt, with a can of lighter fluid......other than using it to light a fire to keep hypothermia setting in.....I will tear his ass up! We never had a drop of lighter fluid on our property. We always used a chimney starter with raw charcoal. I think the hook was set not by the taste of the steak, but by the process of getting there. There was a right way to do things and a wrong way and he was very serious about us grilling the right way. Well, my Daddy learned all that when he started dating Mom, from his future father in-law. Dad played basketball at Mississippi State and would come home on the weekends and Pa-King would grill. Dad grilled growing up with his Dad, but the "show".....the magnitude of the procedure......the "we're one of the few that adhere to doing it right"......the PRIDE, came from Pa-King. I dont know where or how Pa-King became that methodical about things, but I'm glad he did. I've had two loves in my life in regards to career, growing up in and working in the securites industry trading and selling bonds, and this restaurant. The first one I still miss greatly, and as I continue to pay down debt for this Joint will start trading some again from my own account. The second though I can trace where I am to Kit V. King teaching my ol' Man, who taught me, who took it even further.

We rolled out the new menu and new pricing. We've only had one comment on the price increase. The new menu items are Mississippi Hot Tamales, Baby-Backs, Slug Burgers, Brunswick Stew and Elgin Hot Guts (Texas style BBQ sausage). The sausage is not ready yet because of the producer dragging their feet, probably a couple of weeks away. The tamales have sold out, we're trying to make more today. The slugs have sold well and the Baby's are flying out. I'll be interested to see what my extended sales turn out to be.

Yesterday I wrecked the F-350 flatbed and the catering trailer. Some dick-head slammed on the brakes in front of me and gave me 3 options: hit him in the rear end and send his stupid ass through the windshield, keep sliding left and hit an on-coming car, or jerk the wheel right into a 6' deep ditch. I hit the ditch, tore out the whole dad-gum front end of my truck. Once I figured out I was alright, I jumped out to check the trailer.......it was fine. Then I got pissed and said some un-christian things about the bastard who caused the whole thing. I guess I'm gonna have to buy a used/new truck, which I dont want to have to do. I'll shop around over the next month or two and find a deal.

The website is coming in the next 3 months or so. It will be very interactive and sleek. A lot of audio/video content, retail store, this blog, etc..

In the process of having a 32-36' mobile kitchen built. I plan on putting the pit I have on the catering trailer on the back of the new mobile kitchen, and putting two custom whole hog pits on the catering trailer (one on each end).

So thats about it, Ill blog again in the next day or two. I also plan on using the audio blog quite a bit so keep an eye out for that.

Brew Masters Dinner

2008-08-04T21:55:00.007-04:00

Update

2008-07-15T07:48:00.005-04:00

Had to put a picture of my kids on this post. We went to Bobbie's Dairy Dip after Church for ice cream. It was a mess. Things still trucking along, biz is still great and with all due respect to my good buddy Carey Bringle - I've been busier than a one legged man in an ass kickin' contest. So heres the update:

MENU CHANGE
I've tried - for way too long - to hold my pricing, but its going to change. The only relief I can find today is a sepository laced with some of that menthol cooling gel. My wholesale pork prices have almost doubled since April! -kinda felt a "tinge" down there didnt ya? There ain't no getting around it and its something I hate to have to do, but its got to be done. So, we'll be charging a little more on some menu items just to make up the difference and we'll be introducing a few things too. We're bringing on baby back ribs in addition to our spares, Mississippi hot tamales, slug-burgers, pulled chicken sandwiches, brunswick stew, stewed cabbage, mac & cheese. Then we're bringing on a daily specials list that will have anything ranging from Mutton to shrimp po-boys. I'm also going to improve on some of the things that I have never been completely happy with but had to settle for. If you've been reading this thing since the beginning then you know that when I first opened up it was just Me & Bo. When there are just two of you, or three/four for that matter you are very limited on what you can prep & cook to keep up with demand. Baked beans is a good example. We needed baked beans that we prep up in a flash and have cooked in 45 minutes. We didnt have time to dice and sautee onions or green peppers, so they have not been where I want them to be but with the staffing we have now they are about to be. Actually not really going to change much of anything - the only things that I'm going to work on is Baked Beans, Green Beans - but we'll be able to keep up with other items we only have every so often, such as Etouffee' on a daily basis. The funny thing is we'll still have folks who for some reason must think we're just dying for their opinion. Its usually some tubby-fat-ass who thinks she's got the best recipe on the planet for this or that. What said tubby-fat-ass does not take time to consider is that recipes have nothing to do with it. Do you, tubby-fat-ass, really think that we're sitting back there in the kitchen making a 4 ingredient baked bean thinking its the best stuff on the planet? This is some of the pain you'll have to deal with opening your own place - people who cant fathom the difference between cooking for 4-8 in their home kitchen and cooking for 300 - DAILY - in a commercial kitchen. When its just you and one or two other people then recipes ain't got shit to do with it, getting it out as fast as you can with what you have does. Scan down this blog to about the first couple of months we were open and read about the crock-pot lady. I guess she's draining her back fat for lamp oil because I havent read about her crock-pot bbq joint opening up yet......but I digress. Sometime around middle of August we're going to start opening on Sundays. Not sure about the whole day yet but at least 10:00-2:00. The deck has been a huge payoff. I'm not seeing any increased business from it yet but it has greatly reduced waiting times for customers! I think its probably going to take a few months for word of mouth to circulate around that its open, at that point we might start seeing more business from it. Brew festival is coming up in two weeks. We had a pretty strong day there in sales last year so that should be fun. Sales are still very strong - up about 35% or more since this time last year. Im now realizing just how underfunded I was opening this place up. The good side to that is Im paying for a lot of stuff with cash as I go, not going further into debt. The bad side to that is any additional funds to pay down extra debt or go on vacation or whatever ain't there. When does it stop? How the heck do I know? We were recently named a top 5 BBQ Joint by Nashville Lifestyles Magazine. Thats a pretty dad-gum big honor to me. To even be in that conversation is flattering.

http://tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080630/NL04/306300010/1395

Yep....still crazy

2008-06-24T08:14:00.002-04:00

Before I get started do me a favor, go to the tennessean.com and give us a vote for best BBQ in the "Toast of Music City" poll. The link is:

http://data.tennessean.com/v2/bin/toast/category.php?cat=108

Still crazy.....in a good way. The past 3 weeks have been our highest grossing weeks ever. We just opened the deck up a week ago tomorrow night, was hard to gauge it on Saturday because of rain etc......but by the looks of Friday night, its going to help with seating and help as an attractant. We're up around 50% in sales since this time last year, but still have not been paying much debt down over the past couple of months because the business we are doing is demanding more things/equipment to keep up. I'm paying cash for all those things as we go. Decor for deck, tables/chairs, additional fryer, new prep tables, cold well..........I could go on but wont. I'm hoping to be at the end of the tunnel on that stuff here in the next few weeks. I bought a 1985 GMC S-15 pickup truck saturday for $1000.00 cash. I have no "image" problem, dont need a status symbol truck/car.........no what i need is 30+ miles to a gallon! My chevy Z-71 is getting a whopping 9-10 miles per gallon - it was time for a change. So ol' Z-71 is going to be parked unless needed. This little truck is a 4 cylinder, two seater with tires about the size of a go-cart. If I ever get hit in this thing its over! I'd have a better chance of living if I were on a Harley............BUT I wont be spending $200.00 a week on gas anymore! See just from my House to the Joint is 25 miles one way, not to mention the running around I do during the day. This is what you call a good business decision. My buddies might laugh but I'll......you know the rest! Here are some recent articles/press:

http://www.gourmet.com/travel/2008/05/hoecakes

http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080622/COUNTY090101/806220356

http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080605/FEATURES01/806050320

Update

2008-06-11T08:12:00.011-04:00

Its been a long 4 weeks! Since Memphis in May, I've been running wide open. Things are going well, really well! Because of my schedule though its been really tough for me to take the time to keep this blog updated. I'm starting to get some borderline hate mail coming in on me for not posting in a while, so I figured I would try to bring everyone up to speed. First lets start with Memphis in May. Needless to say we had a great time. This year was just as much fun as last year and maybe better, with the exception of the fact that our team co-captain Dave Johnson had to leave early to be with his momma who was very ill. The food was unreal, thanks to Jason Mcconnell from Red Pony (smoked duck tamales!!!), Lobels (best dadgum meat on the planet), & Wood smoked provisions (best smoked fish on the planet). We placed 62nd.....horrid. That being said there was a very large rift inside Memphis in May this year. The folks who ran the actual competition had a falling out with the rest of the organization and left to start Memphis Barbecue Network. Memphis in May is month long event and the BBQ competition is just one week of the 4 week event. There is an awful lot of rumbling and discontent with how this years judging went. A lot of food sat in its boxes for over an hour before they were judged. The main newspaper for Memphis, the Commercial Appeal, has had 3 editorials since then bitching about the new organizing committee. No doubt they were in way over their heads, but you move on and Lord willing show back up next year ready to roll. We had to bring my rig down this year because fire marshall Carey Bringle burned the teams pit down and almost burned down all of Tyne blvd. in Nashville. The pit did well for its first cook, and we got really good scores from the judges. One we know was a perfect 10, another we think was a perfect 10 due to the comments (perfect, this is the best I've ever had, dont ever change a thing with this meat) and the other we dont know. The guy had a great poker face. His poker face made Chris Moneymaker's face look like Ed McMahon reacting to a Johnny Carson joke. At any rate, as usual we ate better and ate better than anyone down there. Next year.
I went home to get back to the Joint for a week and prepare for the 1st annual Franklin Food & Spirits Festival. This was a great event put on by the Southern Foodways Alliance, Jim-N-Nick's BBQ and the Franklin Heritage Foundation. I will tell you now that this event will become one of the largest and most well respected food festivals in our Country. The vision for this is massive, aggressive and extremely well funded. I'm excited to be a part of it. Friday night was a private event at Carnton Plantation in Franklin. The patrons paid $150.00 per head. They had me cook a whole hog in the tradition of West Tennessee (large hogs around 185# at a very low temp with nothing but wood coals, pulled) and they had legendary pit-master Ed Mitchell come in and do one in the tradition of Eastern North Carolina (smaller hogs, hotter temp, briquette charcoal, chopped with sauce). Then they had several well respected chefs from the South come in and cook. Jason McConnell, Sean Brock, John Fleer, Drew Robinson, Tandy Wilson, Martha Stamps. The event was unreal, we had a great time! I forgot to mention that Carey and Dave Story came out and sat up with me till 3 am the night before, which was much appreciated! Bo and Dave grabbed the morning shift so I could get some sleep. The next day was the festival in the square in Franklin. I had my rig serving our Redneck Taco's (pulled pork on a hoe-cake with slaw & sauce). Ed Mitchell cooked hogs, Chris Lilly from Big Bob Gibson cooked their famous chickens dipped in white sauce, Tony Stone from KCBS cooked brisket, Puckett's cooked ribs and Jim-N-Nicks cooked Brisket Quesidillas. There were documentary films shown by SFA, speakers such as John T. Edge and Jim Myers, Bourbon & Beer tastings and a whole lot more. Looking forward to next year!
Had a deck built, which will be finished by this Saturday. Ill post pics of it when its finished, they are painting it today. Ill be "redneckin" it up with decor on Friday. We have run out of space, I need more seating. This, Lord willing, will help a lot! Our business is up about 30% from this time last year, but Saturday nights are starting to slow a bit because we've developed the reputation that you wont find a seat after 6:30. I'm probably losing over $1000.00 in sales per week during that hour and a half. That has always been my peak time of the week! I hope this will capture it back!
During our time at Carnton, Ed Mitchell invited me to help him cook his hogs at the Big Apple Block Party. In a little over six years this event has become the largest BBQ related event in the world. It is not a competition. Much like Franklin it is a celebration. They invite the best of the best, or the most famous (thanks to folks like Food Network) - however you choose to look at it. I had already been planning on going to take Martha to the city and hang out with some guys at the event, so it was an easy decision for me. On thursday before I left the guy building the deck showed up. I flew in Friday afternoon , dropped Martha off at our hotel (the Jolly Madison) and went straight down to Madison Park (26th & Madison) to get the hogs on with Ed.
After we got the hogs on Martha & I met Nick, Drew & John Hare and their wives for dinner at Mario Batali's famous "Otto". It was some of the best Italian food I've had and the atmosphere was unreal. The next night Martha & met up with my old Merrill Lynch buddy Rob Jaffee. He and I, along with Dave Phillip, Brooks "Booger" Stevens and Chad Streiter terrorized the Chicago Board of Trade for a while back in the 90's. Man.....it was great to see Rob! Later Martha & I met again with Nick/Drew/John and John T. Edge at 11 Madison. This is one of legendary restaurateur Danny Meyer's places. The food, the experience.....I cant describe it to you on this blog. WOW! After dinner we all met John Currance from City Grocery at a bar. Great night. During Saturday & Sunday we cooked 24 hogs and served I dont know how many people. Ed, Aubrey, Reggie, Ryan, Craig....we worked our tails off! But it was fun! There were several hundred thousand people for the two day event. It was great! Sunday night I met up with Stevie at the Black Bear, a little dive bar a few blocks away. We met up with Kenny Callahan (Blue Smoke NYC), Chris Lilly & his brother and Michael Rodriguez (Salt Lick/Texas) for a late night. Yet another great time. Stevie G is hard on a man! This event was great, Ed was just awesome, as were the rest of the boys. Reggie (chef at Ed's place, pictured here with me) was one of the nicest guys I've ever met! Great guy! So this has been a long post, but I wanted to catch you up. Ill update this weekend with the deck.

Priorities

2008-05-07T23:49:00.002-04:00

The trailer may only be half finished (albeit functional), but never mistake that my priorities are not in order. This afternoon I tatooed the pit with this. Rest in peace Waylon Jennings, rest in peace.

Trailer. Memphis in May.

2008-05-07T09:37:00.006-04:00

Well the catering trailer I've been building is starting to take shape. The pics you see here have it about 50% from the finished product. Still have a little more welding to do for the sides, need to put the fridge in place, need to paint it (what you see here is just primer). Have it ready to cook though, and thank the good Lord. Last week Carey (Peg Leg Porker) burned down the teams pit and about 8 more houses on Tyne Blvd. Just kidding, but the teams cooker is done, R.I.P.! So now our only option is to use this one. Trying to get the competition switch put on it so the automatic fan will blow the coals to give a longer burn time. Leave for Memphis on Saturday for Memphis in May. Ill be doing a bunch of audio blogs from down there, you may not want to hit the play button on those if you are sitting in your office.

There is no title

2008-05-02T08:23:00.002-04:00

Well its almost been a month, again, since my last post. Without taking you through the line of been working a lot and all that, well I've been working a lot. Things are really going well. Business is still up considerably from this time last year. The economy is really starting to take a toll though. Two weeks ago my pork prices jumped almost $.30 in one week. Usually there is a $.2-$.3 variance from week to week. I had my rep try to find out what was going on in the market for such a huge jump but really got the insight from some research from some friends of my Dads at a well known commodities firm in Memphis. Russia, China, & Japan are buying up pork left & right........mostly due to the fact that our currency is so cheap relative to the rest of the World. They can buy it much cheaper here. Prices jumped to levels we saw last July 4th, which is always the peak season for proteins such as pork & beef. Soaring grain prices are forcing packers to slaughter at a much higher rate, especially in regards to beef. The good side to this though is that the higher rate of slaughter might force the prices of beef to go down some due to putting so much supply on the market, but then again they could just keep prices where they are because of the summer season. Who knows......all I know is that I'm bracing for another 15-20% jump in pork prices in the next month or two. I am trying to get my new menu done to get my prices up in line with my costs. As I've said before I hope it doesnt piss my customers off but I have no choice, my food costs are really starting to get away from my model. Another line guy is leaving at the end of next week so thats something else I've got to handle, and Emily is leaving at the end of the month to stay at home with her sick grandmother. She may come in and work in a pinch if we need her, and she may come back after that sad time for her comes around. I'm trying to alleviate pressure on my seating on Friday & Saturday nights, figuring on maybe some outdoor temporary seating. We've now developed the reputation of being "too packed" on weekend nights, especially Saturdays. Most of our weekend customers come from Nashville/Brentwood, I'd say 80%. Where as 7:00 used to be our peak time it now hits a 15-20 minute lull before one last push going into the close. With only 48 seats, I've got to figure out some temporary seating. Katie "All-Star" Walker has my new T-shirt designs finished. Robby Lunday from the Peg Leg team is going to print those for me. I'm also going to get more of my original shirts ordered from Nick Mathews. So if you want to buy a shirt, shoot me an email at:

patrick@martinsbbqjoint.com

Buy one........hell I've got kids to feed!

New Whole Hog Pit

2008-04-05T10:00:00.005-04:00

Here are some shots of the pit. I've had two seasoning fires in it so far. I've got two more to go. Today I plan on wiping the inside real good with pig grease and then lighting another fire in it to "bake" that grease in the block. Lord willing tomorrow after church I'll light the fourth and final seasoning fire in it. Terry Harmon should have my grate made this week and Tom & Kenny are finishing my Hog box in the next few weeks. The pictures are of the pit before the first seasoning fire and a couple during the first one.

Yes......it has been a while.

2008-04-04T09:23:00.002-04:00

I've been too busy to blog. This is the longest I've gone since starting this blog without a post. We brought the Aloha P.O.S. system in and things are going really well with it. The first week or so was a disaster but once we got used to it everything was o.k.......things at the Joint have been really hectic and that is the main reason I have not had any time for things such as the blog. Raul (Chocho), the main guy on the line in the kitchen left this week to go back home. We brought in a couple of new guys, one works lunch and the other works dinner. They have a lot of kitchen experience but like anything else its taking them a while to get used to our little nuances of doing things. Sergio is still there but heck he's still green since he's only been working in a kitchen now for about 6 weeks. So I've been pulling lunch and dinner at the Joint to make up for the slowdown. Sundays have been just for my family, but when you count my Mondays (thte other day we are closed) I've been clocking in about 70+ hours a week now for about 3 weeks to a month. Add that in with the fact that business is up over 50% from this time last year.....days and weeks are starting to run together.
Starting here in a few weeks we're about to start offering whole hog on Friday nights. I've had a pit built (finally!!) and now I'm just waiting on the grate and the holding box. We'll start off by just doing it every couple of weeks or so to see how it goes. I'll post pics later of the pit.

Times they are a changin'

2008-03-13T15:33:00.003-04:00

Well this week we brought in the Aloha P.O.S. (Point of Sale) system to the joint. I purchased it through a re-seller called the Bodnar Group. My buddy Dave Story, who runs the kitchen at the Jim-n-Nick's Smyrna location put me in touch with his Dad, who runs the re-seller. I've known for some time now that this was inevitable. When you run a restaurant by yourself and/or with limited help, you would be wise to invest in one of these systems. I have asked Dave to guest blog to further explain things, but in short it enables you to manage every little thing, from labor to food costs to about 100 other things that I wont list here. I am really excited about it, I'm excited about what its going to do to help me manage everything. It should really make a difference for me of about a 15% savings on my controllables (labor & food).
That being said we are all still learning the system and it is slowing us all down considerably. Last night felt like the first week we were open. We pissed a few folks off last night because our wait times were considerably higher than usual. Thankfully most of them were regulars and understood. I spent a good bit of time explaining our situation and giving away some free food, but its all good though......its to be expected.....and in the next week or so we'll have it down and it wont be a problem, but my oh my is it causing a headache right now. Today was a lot better than yesterday.....huge improvement on everyones part. I dont think it will take more than a week for us to get it down. That being said we may have to go back to the old cash register for this Saturday if we cant keep up. I'll post Daves blog here in the next day or so, its part one of a couple to come.
Oh yeah........2 guys on my kitchen crew is leaving in a week and a half, so I've got that fire to put out. That could be a pretty big fire to put out if I dont find some good guys real soon. We'll see what happens........the good Lord will take care of us.

The week/Atlantic Sun Tourn.

2008-03-07T09:06:00.002-05:00

The week has gone really well. Last year March was our second highest month in terms of gross sales. Last week was very, very strong and this week has started no different, mimicking last years sales and some. That being said I think Ma' Nature is about to slow our sales down. Today though we have snow moving in. Now if you are reading this and you dont live in Dixie.......the mere mention of the word snow is cause for panic. Even if its just a dusting folks stock up like they will be put out for days. And this snow forecast will be even worse, because its not gonna be a dusting.......they are predicting 2-6 inches. We have not had that kind of accumulation in several years. All we ever get around here really is usually a dusting that with the help of some rain will turn to "black ice" on the roads. So I'm bracing for a real slowdown!
Last night we catered the VIP room for the Atlantic Sun Mens/Womens Basketball Tournament. Dave Story helped out......he was a big help! My Lipscomb Bison's fell to East Tennessee State though. They need some help inside! I'll be looking to do an audio blog sometime in the next day or two.

More Whole Hog.

2008-03-04T18:48:00.008-05:00

Some other pics I have from B.E. Scott's in Lexington. The Pit-Master is Ricky Parkers (the owner) son Zach. I have a few more coming from about 17-18 years ago at Thomas & Webb Bar-B-Que in Henderson (where I learned to cook). Hopefully I can get them loaded up. I have more of L & L Bar-B-Que (now Ole' Time BBQ) which is another place I hung around quite a bit back when I was at FHU. When I get my hands on those Ill try to get them on disc and loaded into my Mac for the blog.

Hickey.

2008-03-02T21:01:00.002-05:00

This post has absolutely NO relevance. Hickey & I cooked some Osso Bucco, had a little wine and decided to give you a worthless blog.

Mobile post sent by MartinsBBQ using Utterz. Replies. mp3

Newspaper article in "Brentwood Life"

2008-03-01T09:17:00.002-05:00

Here is the link to the article in Brentwood Life

http://www.c-dh.net/articles/2008/02/29/affiliate/brentwoodlife/business/01bbq.txt

Martin's Bar-B-Que and the Tennessee Department of Tourism

2008-03-01T09:03:00.005-05:00

The week has been really strong! Yesterday we had an article on us in Brentwood Life (which I'll post a link to in the next post) which really helped yesterdays sales, particularly last night. But Tuesday and Wednesday were strong and I cant figure out why. Rain, snow, mud.......misery. Usually on days like that its slow, not this week. Dont know what the good Lord has in store for us today/tonight in regards to sales, but so far we've had a week comparable to late April/May. Could not come at a better time considering the bludgeoning I'm taking in regards to city/state/federal taxes. Yesterday Matt Burton came by to show me his new "attitude adjuster".......a 1974 Ford Ranchero with 351 V-8 in it. It is a very "proving" vehicle. We got our veal knuckles in on Tuesday and roasted them yesterday afternoon. I plan on making a stock with them today to be the base of the sauces I plan to make with some of the wines from Arrington Vineyards (Kix Brooks' winery). I neglected to mention here on the blog that the Tennessee Department of Tourism has elected to add Martin's Bar-B-Que & Arrington Vineyards to the their list of destination locations, much like they market a place like Loveless Cafe. The director of the Williamson County board of Tourism would like for the two of us to have a celebratory party for the occasion. I went over to Arrington Vineyards and Chris gave me a few bottles to play with. When I get this stock made I'll reduce the reds and see what I can make of it. Hopefully we'll be able to put a party together for the occasion!

Biz Blog #2-A; "Recession proof" foods

2008-03-01T08:56:00.001-05:00

This article says it all.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23415510/

Country Hams

2008-02-23T17:26:00.004-05:00

This morning my father-in-law (Buzzy Neil) and I hung our country hams in our smokehouse here at the house. Thought I might include some pics right quick. These ain't the best pics and Lord willing I'll have some better ones later on. These hams will be ready to eat next christmas. We're cold smoking them right now for a month. They've been curing for the past month in the smokehouse.

Biz Blog #2: Food Costs

2008-02-22T12:15:00.003-05:00

As I keep blogging about the business side to this thing, one constant you will notice is having to be disciplined about your % costs. There is a window for everything and you have to stay within that window or you are about to screw up. Food and Labor are your two biggest costs. those two should make up around 55-60% of your costs. Assuming you are planning on opening up a BBQ joint, one that is quick-casual like we are set up, you are looking for food costs to be around 23%-28%. Full service dining is always going to be higher, so if you are going to have servers and such you will probably add a basis point or two to that, but not always. Full service in general is higher because generally speaking the product is higher in quality. For example, I've got a buddy that is executive chef at one of the big steak houses here in town. Their percentage is around 39%. High right? It is, but dadgum they are clearing over $20.00 on average per steak, not counting the sides on the plate. The higher the average ticket generally the higher the food cost. As I sit here right now I cant tell you exactly what my food cost is. I could take a pretty good stab at it, but what I do know is its high! Now in two weeks I'll be able to tell you within the hour what % cost I am running for that particular day........all thanks to technology. That is why I just dropped a whole bunch of money on a Point of Sale system. I opened up operating with a cash register which gives you no real way to manage things. That was a mistake, a big mistake. Dave Story is going to guest blog about this in a few days so I wont go into it much more here. The point is you have to manage that percentage really well. Theft, waste, inventory mis-management, not paying attention to portion control (which is what I think my largest problem is) are all things that will "F" it all up. By the way, your food cost does not include your paper goods such as napkins etc.. Thats another blog for another time. We've done really well here at this location, but I would hate to see how much more money I'd have in my pocket if I had managed my food costs back then like I am starting to do now. Dont make the same mistake I did.

2008-02-21T18:40:00.003-05:00

Tonight I went down to see my buddies at Eastland Cafe to shoot the bull and grab a couple of their UNREAL pizzas to take home to the family. Hal Holden-Bache and Nathan Wells run the kitchen over there for Chef/Restauranteur Willy Thomas. While I was there I was back in the kitchen shooting the bull with Nathan and Hal and thought we might do a small audio blog. So here it is.

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Tornado Victims

2008-02-20T21:18:00.003-05:00

Catered an event at Stogie's in Cool Springs last night for the victims of last weeks deadly Tornadoes. They raised a fair amount of change last night for the victims........it was a great thing.

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Changes

2008-02-19T10:21:00.002-05:00

For the past month or two I've been trying to get a handle on my two biggest costs; Labor & Food. Not knowing or thinking that I would need anything different, I started my restaurant with just a simple cash register. You have no real way of managing your food costs. I am going to blog about this later, but if you ever do something like this, spend the money on a good Point of Sale system. I just pulled the trigger on an Aloha P.O.S. system. It will be a few weeks before we are using it because of programming in the menu, pricing, portions etc.. But I am hoping to save myself some real money over time by using this. Again, this will be in another blog in the next few days/weeks.
I have also trimmed my labor back. Gonzalo is now gone. Bo and I are going to rotate in and out on the line with Chocho. I hired a new guy yesterday named Alfredo who is going to work part time 35 hours a week. He is going to work 4:30 to close and all day Saturdays. Chocho is leaving on May 1st. When he leaves I will hire another guy to work the same hours as Alfredo to close nights. That should save me $600.00 a week in labor. I'll post on the benefits of a POS system in the next few days. I might even have a guest blogger on the subject, if I can talk him into it.

The week

2008-02-18T09:42:00.003-05:00

By now you might have listened to the new audio blog in the previous post. It was just a trial run and has no content, just wanted to see what it was like. Its a cool new feature that Mike Causey has turned me on to. I will only audio blog only a couple of times a week for general content. The business blogs concerning my experiences opening a BBQ restaurant will still be in type form. I'm looking forward to the audio blog, it enables me to blog on the fly. In the next few weeks we're going start adding some video content as well.
This past week ended up being a really good week. Again, sales are all over the place and have no rhyme or reason to them. Wednesday night was a very, very slow day. I started to anticipate us having a really bad week. Thursday picked up, Friday was o.k., and then Saturday hit. Saturday, thanks to a couple of small catering orders that added about $500.00 to the day, we set a new record day in sales. To set both gross sales records in the month of February, which is the absolute slowest month in the restaurant industry, is a very encouraging sign for the year to come. I am going to revisit extending the porch on the front of the Joint to make it a deck for this spring. I'll submit an application for that this week with the city. The picture is of singer/songwriter Kaci Allen. She played a few weeks ago.

2008-02-17T20:44:00.002-05:00

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Biz Blog#1-A: Inflationary Pricing

2008-02-16T08:39:00.002-05:00

My last post was about location and what you need to make per square foot (as a general rule of thumb) to succeed. Towards the end I discussed my own place and how I need to capture more money per order this calender year to sustain and hopefully increase my 2007 price per square foot level. To increase it I plan on going after off-premise sales pretty hard, which should add about 30% give or take. But to just sustain it I will have to increase some menu pricing to reflect my suppliers price increases on to the consumer. I have added an article below that came out a month or so ago in the New York Times discussing the surge in prices, which is affecting all of us as consumers and business owners. Its affecting you at the pump, the restaurant, etc. Some things you notice immediately such as rising fuel prices. Some are more subtle, such as a restaurant like mine raising some of the menu prices. Some restaurants wont raise their prices right away, especially those that lie in the "Full service" category. They will make other little subtle changes. Remember that free bread they used to bring to the table, notice you have to ask for it now? Wheat is up 270%+ this year....a year ago bread was so cheap they could afford to give you some for free, now its relatively expensive.....why give you free bread if they dont have to? Remember all that butter that used to lay next to the salt & pepper shakers? Where is that now? Milk has also seen a HUGE % increase and is expected to rise another 40% in the coming months, milk based products are included in that figure. Why would they leave a pile of cube butters on the table for you dump 4 of them on your baked potato to stuff your head-hole with? How about creamer for your coffee? Why would they leave creamer on the table for you now.........so you can dump 5 of them in your venti coffee? Not to mention the parents of that little bastard kid at the table next to you whose opening the creamers up and drinking them straight, or that good ol' sweet "christian" grandma who never leaves the restaurant without stuffing her purse full of your complimentary creamers. Thieving wench.
Why this is happening is another blog that I dont have time to explain, but a lot of it is due to the high demand for ethanol. You'll notice these things now and if you are going to open a place up you cant just sit idle and pay attention to whats going on in the world markets. They affect you directly, and if you are not paying attention they will sting your ass. If you dont your sales per square foot will start dropping, and the next thing you know you'll be in trouble. Read the Wall Street Journal and/or Business Day in the New York Times. Every weekend pick up a copy of Barron's and read it. Keep up with whats going on......you'll be glad you did........trust me.

Check this article out........

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/15/business/worldbusiness/15commodities.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=commodities%27+relentless+surge&st=nyt&oref=slogin

Biz Blog #1: Your Location

2008-02-15T09:57:00.003-05:00

Dude I'm not really concerned about your location. The old marketing adage "location, location, location" is true dont get me wrong, but I think its like everything else......its all relative. Assuming we are talking about somewhere within a reasonable distance of the masses, whether that be a city of 1,000,000+ or a town of 10,000. To me it all depends on what you are serving, what genre of food your place is. I think that most restaurant genres fall directly under that old marketing rule, but I believe that a few do not. I also would like to mention that those "few" are indicative of the area of the country you are in. Here in the South If there are two types of food that people will drive way out of their way for its BBQ and Cajun food. I have a conservative estimate that (marketing info) 35% of my customers drive from Nashville to eat at my place. Thats a 1 hour round trip in the car for BBQ. That is very flattering to me but it goes to show that in this day and time, with all the choices consumers have, they want value and quality in the money they spend. In other areas of the country it may be a great Pizza place, a burger joint, whatever. If your food is extremely good, they will find you. There might be some that disagree with me on this, and I may be wrong......but I doubt it. If you are reading this thinking about opening up a BBQ joint, and you live in say Hartford, CT then your location MUST be very important, has to be! But if you are in say, Columbus, MS it is not. In Columbus, MS you can afford to lie on the outskirts of town or even farther than that and be successful.......if your BBQ is really and truly great! This is not to say that there are not some exceptions to the rule. As we all know nothing is a guarantee, there are a few places that had good food but for whatever reason just did not make it. Maybe the service was bad, Parking sucked........there are all kinds of reasons but thats for another post on down the road. Right now I'm talking in very general terms. When shopping for a location you do have to weigh them against each other. In Macroeconomics one of the first terms a student will learn is "Opportunity Cost". What does it cost me to choose to do business at location A instead of Location B? Considering all the demographic figures, traffic counts, sales tax returns from other restaurants in the area you are considering and all that other crap.....if location A should yield $17,000.00 a week in gross sales and location B should yield $10,000.00 per week, then your opportunity cost is $7,000.00 per week. In other words its costing you a potential $7,000.00 a week to choose B over A. That doesnt mean option B is not a better choice though.......lease rates, certain clientel, all weigh in on it.
Try if you can to NOT open a BBQ joint in a strip mall. You limit yourself so much in terms of creating an atmosphere. If you must then at least get one of the "book-end" locations so you have options for a patio or deck. If you can find a stand alone building you are far better off!!! If you are buying the location then your annual sales to start-up costs should be 1 to 1. If you are leasing then it should be 1.5 to 1. To help you decided on the space you should consider this rule of thumb for profitability (limited service restaurants......full service would obviously be higher I would think, but my place is a limited service so that is all I can comment on):

1) $200.00 or less you are losing money like an open siv
2) $200.00 to $300.00 and you are breaking even
3) $300 to $400 means you are making a moderate profit
4) $400.00+ means you are flat out skinnin' it back!

Last year my place did $380.00 per square foot. We have a lot of room to grow. We do very, very little catering/off premise sales, which should add 30-40% to that square footage number. Also, my menu prices are very low compared to my competition. Add to that what has happened over the past year with commodity prices and I have lost potential income. I have not reflected those price increases on my menu yet and it is really hurting me. I plan to change that in the next few weeks. Commodities have really hurt some restaurants. Especially anything made with milk (cheese, slaw mix, potato salad, etc.), certain vegtables like potatos, or beef product (brisket). I will never structure my menu prices to be on the higher side of the scale, because I want to provide my customers a premium product at a real value to them, especially the folks of Nolensville! But to be profitable you have to reflect inflationary price increases on to your consumer. So to keep up with my square foot average last year I will have to do that. To grow it past he $400.00 per square foot mark we'll have to grow our catering.

Still shots

2008-02-14T22:49:00.004-05:00

A few months back Channel 4 did a little spot on us for their newscast. A few weeks ago I received some still shots from that telecast.

Sales.....

2008-02-14T08:42:00.003-05:00

February is notoriously the weakest month in the restaurant business. I dont care what category your food is under, February sucks! I say that to say that last week ended up being really strong and consistent. All winter has been a lot better than I expected. This week however, is looking rough. Snow hit yesterday morning and we all know what that means as southerners. Business was as slow as its been in well over a year yesterday. Its sunny and 54 today (supposed to be) so I'm looking for and/or hoping for a bounce. We'll see what happens. I'm supposed to be headed to Austin this coming Wednesday for the NBBQA convention but now have to figure out how to squeeze in Louisville also. Dont know how yet I'm going to do that but we'll see.

Action Shots.......

2008-02-12T10:24:00.000-05:00

A few action shots of the kitchen on a Saturday night. Bo at the register. Our most requested/sought after side item: the hand-cut fries. Ernesto bringing in more potatos to be cut for fries.

Memphis in May meeting

2008-02-11T15:08:00.001-05:00

Well its that time of year again. Yesterday we had the first meeting of 2008 for this years Memphis in May. It was a great time and dang good to see some of the guys on the team. As you know I'm not really into the competition thing..........nothing at all wrong with it I just dont really have the time to do it. But this is a lot of good clean fun, and I'm really looking forward to it. I brought some "prospects" to the meeting that I'm hoping will join. Lamb, Michael, Nathan Wells (sous chef from Eastland Cafe), Jason McConnel (chef/owner Red Pony & Sol in Franklin) and Dave Story (Jim-n-Nick's).............Yazoo is coming on board to sponsor and supply beer. We eat better than any team down there and this year should be no different.

The Business of it all........

2008-02-07T20:47:00.000-05:00

All right.......I get emails all the time from folks all over the lower 48......literally. I'm talking about in areas of the country that you (a southerner) wouldnt dream of caring about BBQ. They (emails) have progressively gotten more and more frequent. I really like answering them and being of any help when I can. Its people in the same shoes I was a couple of years ago just looking for simple answers.
When I first started this blog almost two years ago I didnt know a dadgum thing about running and/or managing a restaurant. I mean nothing. I invited my buddies to come along for the ride to either watch it succeed or watch me financially set my life back to the stone age. I had no idea that anyone other than friends would care to read about what was going on. That being said I quickly discovered another reason that pushed me to keep it going. When I started it I really could not find any information "out there" as to how to do it. Oh there are a butt-load of "how to start your own restaurant" books out there, but most of them are useless. I wanted to talk to somebody who did it. I wanted to find out what worked and what didnt. I had so many questions that I could not get or find answers to. It was tough knowing where to go and/or who to talk to. So I figured I would document my own experiences to maybe help somebody else out someday looking to do the same thing.....whether I made it or not, and I can tell you that I am far from being out of the woods!
So one thing I am going to start doing is mixing in some posts about what I've learned about the actual business side of things....numbers, percentages, etc.. Using this info can save someone a lot of wasted money and misery. I only plan to discuss what I have experienced. For example, I dont sell liquor.......the "devils nectar" as we call it in the Church of Christ......so I cant really blog about that. Beer on the other hand........we sell over 20 different kinds so I have insight as to what mark-up works for me, what sells, etc.. In case that last statement sounds like an oxymoron to you let me just say that yes it is and at the same time no it isn't.....but thats for another blog somewhere else. My goal is for the info on this blog to be useful and helpful to someone. Does that sound "cheesy" to you? Well if it does go crank your car, wrap your lips around the tail pipe and breath in for a while........let me know how that works out for you.

Wings.

2008-02-07T20:39:00.001-05:00

Some of our smoked wings.

Sick.

2008-02-05T18:51:00.000-05:00

Well today is the first day of work I've missed since being open due to illness. I really cant even muster the strenght to type this post...........I'm so weak right now that I could'nt pull a greased string out of a sick cats ass. I dont know what I've got. The last time I missed work because I was sick was about 10 years ago working for Dain Rauscher in Memphis when I was selling bonds. I got home yesterday afternoon and "it" hit like me a like a truck. About 9:00 the throwing up started and didnt end till early this morning. Been in bed all day. Hope to get back to it tomorrow Lord willing.

Random post.

2008-02-04T17:08:00.000-05:00

This is about hour #16-18 or so in the process of cooking a Hog. The fat starts to liquidate and pool up in the rib cavity, in effect poaching the ribs and loin.......which is some of the most decadent meat you have ever put in your mouth! For a 185-200lb Hog cooking at 185*, you've still got another 6 or so hours, give or take a little. Once it goes to drippin' through the skin on to the coals back by the spine, you know your getting pretty close to being done. You can start shutting your chimney down cause you wont need many more coals.

Record Day

2008-02-03T10:02:00.000-05:00

Its amazing what a little sunshine and 60 degree weather will do for you. Yesterday we had the best one day of gross sales ever......in February! It was steady all day and then we got slapped last night. It really helped our week because Tuesday & Wednesday were a little slow. I included a picture of my little girl Daisy smiling about the news. In the following weeks I am going to start blogging a lot on the business side of the restaurant business. Rules of thumb, calculations, and all kinds of wonderful stuff I've learned the hard way over the past year and a half. Hopefully, if you are thinking of doing something asinine......like opening up your own bbq joint or restaurant......this info will save you some time and money!

Marketing......what works and doesnt work (for me at least).

2008-02-02T16:16:00.000-05:00

Well after playing the role of the "new restauranteur"........a.k.a. "ignorant sucker" for the past year and a half, I think I've found some marketing that actually works. When you open up every Tom, Dick & Hare comes by selling you on every marketing/advertising scheme known to mankind. You've got a certain amount set aside in your budget for it, and most of them make it tough for you to make a decision. The truth is most of it, in theory, sounds like a home-run. Now I'm not going to set here and speak as if I am now the authority on what works and what doesnt.............but I will tell you what worked for me, which was not much. I've done coupons on the back of Kroger receipts, Newspaper advertising, Sudden Values, coupon magazines.............all of which have been about as worthless as tits on a boar hog. BUT.........my radio campaign on 104.5 the zone (local sports/Titans radio show) added to the bottom line......and I just did a direct mail campaign for several local zip codes that looks to be working very well. We are consistently getting probably on average of 10+ per day coming in the Joint and I would say that 75% of them are new customers. I am going to start an email list here in the next month or so.....which is what Sudden Values is/was but I dont think they really ever sent anything out. I am pretty happy with the direct mail campaign.....we'll see how it goes over the next few weeks before I'm completely sold.

Free Sauce & T-shirts

2008-02-01T22:32:00.000-05:00

Hey if you have a minute go check out www.homeofbbq.com.........you could win some free sauce, a free shirt or maybe both!

Coke sucks (part two)

2008-01-28T20:17:00.000-05:00

So Pepsi came this past Tuesday, hooked up the machine and all the syrup and we were in business by lunch. Meanwhile I still have not heard from Coke as to when they are going to schedule the pick-up of their equipment. Well a couple of days pass by and I finally get a call from the balding, hitler-mustache, mullet wearing sales consultant who for the past 18 months has done such a wonderful job of covering us. He says he can only pick it up on Monday, as in Today, at 8:30 - 9:00 in the morning. As you might know this is the day we are closed......funny how that all works out huh? So I say fine, see you Monday morning. Now....I live about 25 minutes from the joint.....thats 50 minutes round trip.......ah heck lets call it an hour. I leave this morning a little before 8:00 to get there. THE - BASTARDS - DID - NOT - SHOW - UP!!!!! Ticked off is not the word! I know some Coke guys read this blog, and I know they share my disdain for "bald with a mullet". I wouldnt be surprised if they switched some things around to screw his day up or what. I dont know what my retaliation will be, but I will keep you posted. I can tell you this..........they cant get their machine without me...........and it may be a few weeks before Captain Mullet Man gets it back. Stay Tuned.

The week

2008-01-28T08:57:00.000-05:00

Tuesday and Wednesday started off really slow. I was like, "oh here it is.......its finally shown its ugly head........the doldruns!". But then we had a strong day Thursday, real strong day Friday and a really strong Saturday. Those three days made up for the first two and some, we finished above our "winter time" average. This week nothing looks to change weather wise; two days of rain, partly sunny all week. Those good ol' muddy Tennessee winters. I am building an excel spreadsheet with all of last years daily sales and the weather for each day we were open. I am going to lay those two out in a graph on top of each other to see the correlation. Ill post it here when i finish it, it should be interesting. Martha took a picture of my boy Wyatt sitting in my truck. He wanted to put Daddy's sun glasses on and drive.

MEAT

2008-01-24T20:19:00.000-05:00

Shot of some meat on the pit.

Sales off a little this week.

2008-01-24T08:12:00.000-05:00

Sales are off to a slow start this week. Rain+snow+mud=contractors not working. Supposed to get sunny & in the mid 50's in the next few days, which means first of next week. Looks like this week could be off by about $1,500.00 or so. We'll see.........

Coke sucks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2008-01-23T21:48:00.000-05:00

Coke & Pepsi. There is no in between. Its like Chevy & Ford, Tennessee & Alabama, Celtics & Lakers..........there is no in between.......its one or the other. I grew up a Coke man.....we didnt drink Pepsi products in our house growin' up. So I'm sad to say that I'm no longer with Coke. I'm also glad to say Coke (Corporate) SUCKS ASS! You wanna' talk about being treated like shit? This really hurts me......I'm not kidding.....but I had to do it. I was the biggest Coke fan anti-Pepsi person you ever met. It hurts me now to even think of not serving Coke, but I've had enough! Coke has a true monopoly in the soft drink market. They have so much of the market that they truly dont give a rats ass whether or not you want to do business with them or not, let alone being happy. Those bastards have been prison raping me to the tune of $80.00 per 5 gallon box of syrup ($290.00 per week average) for over a year. To top it off the C-suckers charge me an additional $13.00 per delivery for surcharges and delivery fees. Pepsi offered me $50.00 per box and no fees. Even with those numbers it still took me a night to think about it! Thats a savings of around $6,000.00 per year.
Oh and I dont have the room here to discuss my wonderful sales rep, Terry.....who is NOT on commision I might add. If Terry were on commision, his balding, mullet wearing, Hitler-esque mustache ass would look like a combo crack/meth addict because he'd be starving and homeless! He is THE most worthless "salesmen" on the face of this planet! There are COKE people who read this, maybe even Terry himself. Terry, we here at Martin's Bar-B-Que hope you are reading this. Please follow our directions closely:

1) Print this diatribe
2) Crumple it in your hands
3) Go take a dump
4) Wipe your ass with said crumpled diatribe as hard as you can, several times over.
5) Smear Turpentine on your butt-lips

Now........its said.........I'm not angry anymore and looking forward to my new relationship with Pepsi-Cola.

New Bookkeeper, Menu Design

2008-01-16T08:30:00.000-05:00

Monday Martha & I met with a bookkeeper. Folks I should have done this a long time ago! Its really tough for me to describe it because I could type here forever. I have a finance background, so I think I was a little bull-headed on letting someone else do what I felt I could. You finally get to a point and realize that you can't wear every hat............you have to wear a lot of em', but a few you let somebody else put on. We got all of our payroll squared away, set everyone up on direct deposit, set up our quarterly payroll taxes to monthly so it wont strap our cash flow 4 times a year.........I really could go on and on but I wont. If you ever do something like this, get a bookkeeper right out of the gates. Trust me.
I have been doing a lot of research on "menu engineering". In layman's terms it basically uses item placement, shapes and colors to tell your subconscious to buy what I want you to buy (usually those with lower food cost or those with a very high dollar return). When you have an itemized price list like we have set up now, the customer focuses on the price first, the menu item and/or what they want second. Next time you are at one of the major casual chains, Applebees, Chili's, etc....take a minute and just look at their menu. You have to almost look for the price, and most of the time its listed without a dollar sign right after the item description. Katie is re-designing the menu and I am adjusting my food costs. We should have a new menu in the next few weeks. Its not really about charging more, its about steering your mind towards certain things. Now their are some items that I am going to raise the prices on because commodity prices have soared (if you are not "in the business", read yesterdays article in the New York Times business section....very good!). Peace out.

Arlie Bragg

2008-01-09T20:53:00.000-05:00

I remember like it was yesterday. A rainy day in June 2006. I had just verbally agreed to rent the space in Nolensville from Vern. I was in the process of finding a pit. Knowing that I could not build a brick pit to cook hogs on (because of codes), I was trying to find a pit that replicated that of the brick pits I knew and know so well. I called what seemded like everyone in the country, one of which was Ole Hickory Pits. Next thing I know I'm "up on top" of Mt. Juliet in the driveway of Arlie Bragg; Competition Cook, Organizer, Caterer. Arlie sold me on the pits and the rest is history. He and I were talking the other day and I had realized that I had never given ol' Arlie his rightful "props" here on the blog.......so here it is. Arlie is a great guy, friend, and a helluva cook.......if you ever need a pit, call Arlie or look up his website @http://www.arlieque.com

Update

2008-01-09T09:02:00.000-05:00

Yesterday fell right in line with every other Tuesday for since October. I guess we've finally hit our stride. Our daily sales through the week are becoming very predictable. Hopefully in the next few weeks I can start concentrating on catering for the spring. Relatively speaking, in relation to other bbq restaurants, we did not do much catering in 2007 because I didnt want to lose focus of the Joint. I wanted all I could get but was careful to go get what I asked for because we could have overextended ourselves and hurt our reputation by not being able to adequately service the demand. This year we are better suited and more comfortable from an operations standpoint to take that on. In the next few weeks I'll outline a sales plan here on the blog.

Sales still strong

2008-01-05T09:04:00.000-05:00

The past two weeks we've only been open 6 days combined because of the holidays. Those 6 days have been very strong. It has really been a very pleasant surprise! Because of the 4 days we've been closed we've probably lost about $5,000.00 in sales (opportunity costs), but then again my operating expenses were almost nil. I hope the past few weeks are a sign of whats to come; that the "slow" months of Jan. & Feb. wont be as slow as I was/am anticipating.
2008 is really looking exciting.........I've got some big plans in the works, a lot of irons in the fire. Some of it I'll get into over the next few weeks and some of it I wont/cant until they come into fruition. Its hard to believe that mid June will be the two year mark of when I leased the location from Vern and started this Train on the tracks.

Nathan Wells......STUD.

2007-12-28T23:55:00.000-05:00

So tonight I was able to get away from the Joint, which is rare.....especially for a weekend night. Bo held down the fort and Martha and I went for our Christmas date night. We went to Eastland Cafe in East Nashville. My buddy Nathan Wells is the Sous Chef there. I gave him a call this afternoon to let him know we were going to try to make it out. He told me we would not be ordering off the menu, that he would cook for us. Was it good? Let me put it to you this way......in classic redneck terminology. You ever picked a grey tick off your dogs ass? You know, those big disgusting bastards about the size of a grape whose bodies are literally 40 times larger than their head? Like the one here in the picture. Well, put my face on that body.......and thats what I fell like right now. I have sinned...........committed gluttony! The food I ate tonight was nothing short of phenomenal! Absolutely stunning! I highly suggest you get over there!
We had a really strong day yesterday. Today at lunch was pretty slow because of the rain. I thought Noah might stop in for lunch when the dadgum boat went by but he didnt. I was feeling pretty depressed about what today might end up looking like.........and then tonight came along. Emily called with the sales and we posted July/August type numbers (peak season). When I got that call I ordered a second bottle of wine.

Back at it......

2007-12-27T08:32:00.000-05:00

Cant believe I'm saying this but I cant wait to get to work this morning to do some inventory! We've been closed since Saturday night for Christmas. Its been real nice but dadgum I'm itching to get to work. We had a great week last week. Saturday night was an absolute morgue. I dont think 20 people came in. Of course we were expecting that because of everyone traveling for Christmas. Even still we did over 250 orders at lunch, so that carried us. We ended up having a very, very good week. I went back on the blog and read posts from last year around this time......pretty dang funny. The good Lord really blessed us this year!!! We've seen a lot of growth. I remember last year, 45-50 orders at lunch was a good lunch. Well a year later if we dont do 100+ orders something is wrong. Its hard to believe that its been a year but it has. 2008 should be real interesting. I've got some things in the pipeline I'm planning on and I'm interested to see what happens. In the mean time......I've got to get in to do some inventory.

Peg Leg Meeting; Sol

2007-12-21T08:27:00.000-05:00

This week has been very, very strong! Numbers, like the last two weeks are in line with our October/November sales. The slow down I expected has not really hit like I thought it would, which is a great thing. Because of when X-mas & new years fall (on a Tuesday) we'll only have 6 days of operation over the next two weeks. We'll be open Thursday-Saturday next week and new years week. After that I see us being fairly slow for the two weeks following that for folks to get back in to their routine. Last night I met up with some of my fellow Peg Leggers. Carey got a few of us together to talk about a few things. It was good to see those guys. I wasnt able to stay long because I had to get back out to Franklin to eat at Chef Jason McConnells new place, Sol. I cant encourage you enough to get your ass out there to eat......it was amazing! I cant think of one thing we had that was not incredible.....it really was awesome! Im about to head into the Joint, get things squared away and then I'm gonna head down to Bucksnort with my buddy Tracey "Mini-Don" Jarrell to shoot some quail. The picture is a shot of our Brisket Tacos.

2007-12-19T10:32:00.001-05:00

Top of the chimney where we burn wood down to coals for the pit.

Ribs

2007-12-17T09:44:00.000-05:00

A shot of our ribs..........

The week

2007-12-16T09:46:00.000-05:00

This week finished really strong.......as in normal pre-holiday time numbers. We had a big day overall yesterday and that is with us having the slowest Saturday night I think we've ever had! Snow was mentioned in the forecast for last night.......if you mention that word in Tennessee you'd better get to the store and get your milk cause its gonna be gone by the afternoon. People around here act like the ice age is coming back through. I thought we'd see a little bit of a slowdown (over and above the normal holiday time slowdown) because of an article that was in the papers this week. This past Wednesday the Brentwood Journal did an article that didnt paint the town of Nolensville in a very good light. We were quoted in there a few times, it was basically what I have stated here.........business being affected by weather, peoples schedules, etc.. The article was basically saying that anyone who lives in Nolensville eats outside of Nolensville. Of course if that were totally true I'd be out of business right now. Needless to say, judging from customer comments, there were a lot of local residents come in and a few city officials who were VERY unhappy with it. We are to a point now that it wont really affect us. We have an established brand so to speak........our name and reputation for good BBQ has gotten around and it reaches outside the Nolensville city limits. Now if this article had come out a year ago, when we had been open for only 6-7 weeks, I'd be a little worried. I dont know the writer but he was just doing his job. The fact is Nolensville is a few years away from having enough dining options to keep folks in town all week. We are on the front end of the growth curve. But the writer could have made the point he made and still followed it up by listing the positives that residents have as of right now. Rio Verde serves very, very good Mexican food. Two Way next door has awesome breakfast and lunch. Martin's BBQ was listed as one of the favorite 13 restaurants (of any genre, not just bbq) in the entire metro-Nashville area by the Tennessean. There could have been a few positives listed is all I'm saying. When you invest time and emotions in to an area you want to concentrate on the positives. Its like family, yeah my uncle might have some short comings, but you dont like hearing it from someone else.

Update

2007-12-10T21:02:00.000-05:00

Well Saturday night ended up being a lot better than I anticipated. We're still going in to the slowest time but it was a pleasant night. I'm 35 years old and I am eating Pepcid Complete like a 5th grader eating a box of grape/strawberry nerds. Every other freakin' day I've got heartburn. There could be an oil spot in your garage from your car.......dont go to Home Depot to and waste money to buy Muratic Acid. You can get it up for free by just giving me a call. I'll come over and spit on it, wait 15 minutes for it to bubble and just wipe it away. I guess its just the price you pay for eating your own product too much............2-3 Pabst Blue Ribbons on top of it dont help the matter either.

Here come the doldrums

2007-12-08T17:15:00.000-05:00

Well its that time of year again. It happened last year and I've been wondering when it would hit this year. I think its hit. Biz always slides off this time of year (not including off premise catering for year end parties, etc..). Yesterday was the slowest friday since, well, last year about this time. It slides off for several reasons......depending on who you ask. Holidays, dark earlier, rain, mud, cold.....whatever. I think its a combination of them all, especially in a town like Nolensville. We need to survive the next 2-4 months. Oh we'll have a spike here and there, and after the holidays when folks have digested all the money they've spent on christmas presents they will get back in a routine and be back out. Its not like the world stops until spring but you see where I'm going. Its a cash flow issue.........as it always seems to be. I'm about to head out to the Joint

Update

2007-12-03T20:33:00.000-05:00

Ladies and Gentlemen.........................Miss Reagan Boone!

Update.

2007-12-01T13:46:00.000-05:00

Biz still going really well. We're really, really doing well during the lunch hours and weekends. Weeknights still a little slower. I'm contemplating several different options to combat that.......closing early during the weeknights until spring, kids eat free nights, rib night, frequent customer cards.....and/or a combination of it all. I feel today will be a little slower than we've seen in a while. There are a few xmas parades going on and the conference football championships are this afternoon and tonight, which means everyone will be at home or at a sports bar watching. I've added a pic of some coals........to a BBQ guy looking at those is like ol' man limpness taking Viagra.

Cooking Whole Hog.

2007-11-30T09:45:00.001-05:00

Well it had been almost two years since I had cooked a hog and the rust showed! That is the longest by far and away I've gone without cooking at least one since I started this craft in 1990. Last year my time was consumed with opening the Joint that we did not have a BBQ back home in Mississippi and this spring and fall were the same. At any rate I freed up some time to go down with Dave Story to cook one. It felt really, really good to get back around the pit all night.....much like some wack-job artist I needed to get back to the basics of it all, and in the world of BBQ there is nothing more basic than this. It was pretty cold that night (low 30's) with a really good wind all day & all night. That has a huge effect on cooking because it becomes a fight to keep your coals/pit temp consistent. When you cook a hog you cook in the 185* - 200* range because you dont want your middlin' & loin to over cook waiting on your hams & shoulders. My pit is built really, really well. Cinder block filled with mason sand and brick lining the outside of the block. We never could get the dadgum temp consistently below 200 all night. Oh I guess we could have if we sat there for 3-4 hours removing coals here and adding them back there....but we were doing this for fun so we didnt fret over it too much. I'd say we cooked at about 225* on average for 27 hours and sure enough it was a little overcooked! I was pissed for about 2 minutes till I asked myself, "self - what did you expect....you let it roll all night @225* thinking it would back off but it didnt....so its your own dumb-ass fault". It still tasted really good but it wasnt perfect. I'll probably start cooking one every 3-4 months now just to stay on my toes.

Its coming.....

2007-11-29T21:49:00.000-05:00

Well.......when Strieter was in town we went out to take a pic of the trailer and I left my digital camera on the back end of the trailer. About 6 inches of rain later my digital is, needless to say, dead. So I've been slow on updating the blog with no pics. At any rate.....got the pics off the camera, some more from family and a few more from Dave Story. I'll be updating a few times over the next few days on the Hog we did in Mississippi and other things going on. Some really good pics to come! This post I posted a pic of me and my boy, Wyatt on Cape Cod a few weeks ago just so I could put one up.

busy

2007-11-21T06:55:00.001-05:00

been busier than a one legged man in an ass kickin' contest........I've got some new posts to come, specifically on cooking the hog in Mississippi, but I'm crazy with Thanksgiving Turkeys & Prime Ribs. We're getting the the busted oak barrels from Arrington Vineyards to smoke our Prime Ribs with. The barrels held the Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. I wish I could put a scratch and sniff here for you to smell them......I cant wait to smell them in smoke form from the Pit. Anyway....got to get out of here to put everything on. Folks are picking their meat up after 3:00 (we close at 3:00 today). I've posted a pic of our "Redneck Taco".

Tennessee Crossroads Television Show tomorrow night

2007-11-14T15:06:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow night the show "Tennessee Crossroads" will be airing a show they filmed on us. It starts at 7:00pm. I'll be missing the show because I'll be heading to Mississippi to cook this Hog on Friday with Dave Story, but hopefully I'll catch it on the re-run on Sunday night. If you can remember try to catch the show tomorrow night.

Pig Roast

2007-11-13T15:36:00.000-05:00

Going to God's country this weekend, Mississippi, to cook a Hog on our old pit with my buddy Dave Story. Dave has been put in charge of planning a pretty large festival of BBQ & Bourbon and I may play a role in cooking a Hog for that event as part of a class on how it is done. More on that to follow in a few months. Dave has quickly become a pretty good friend of mine and I'm really looking forward to doing this with him because he has a real, big time passion for old school BBQ...... I mean the process, the history of it, everything. He's never cooked one before so we're going home to do it. Dave works for Jim -N- Nick's BBQ and he might have a buddy or two come down that work at the Memphis location and possibly some guys from another organization to sit up with us all night. Folks from the community are coming by Saturday at lunch to eat and take meat home. I'll have pics. I included a few pics of our pit that I already have on file.

Chaddy boy

2007-11-13T15:28:00.000-05:00

This past weekend my old buddy Chad Strieter came in town to hang out........we had a blast. We worked together at Merrill Lynch in Chicago at the Chicago Board of Trade, back in the 90's. Chad is still there. We went to the Joint on Saturday night and finished the night up at the house with our wives, some wine and a fire. Sunday we saw the Titans screw up a potential win to the Jags. Had dinner here that night......filets with more wine. Had a great time!

Rafters on & primed

2007-11-03T09:19:00.000-04:00

Rafters are on. We primed them yesterday and today. Lord willing we should have the roof on by Tuesday. That will at least get us up and rolling. Dresch and I will do the custom work (hinge platform on back and off of firebox, limited 4ft siding, etc..) over the holidays. Things look a little "junkie" out around the old barn huh? We'll clean it up when we're all done. Biz was really good yesterday and the week has been very good, and we closed Wed. at 5:00 for Halloween. Looking forward to today.

Trailer update

2007-11-02T10:36:00.000-04:00

I havent posted a blog with pics for a while because my camera has been on the outs.......but I got it all taken care of and here are some pics of the the catering trailer. This trailer used to be a bob-cat trailer with wood decking. As you can see we've replaced the decking with expanded iron (to reduce weight), mounted the new cooker and Dresch has put up the uprights/corners. Yesterday Dresch got the joists put on. Today after the rush I'll prime all the new iron to prevent rust. Lord willing Tuesday Greg Locke will be putting on the roof (red tin). We'll have a ways to go because there are several more custom things Dresch and I plan on doing to it, but it is now officially in operation

Skin Cancer

2007-10-25T20:32:00.000-04:00

Had a wad of scar tissue on my right shoulder that never would go away.......been on there for like 3 or so years. I thought it was scar tissue from some hard work (building a retainer wall and hauling the cross ties on my shoulder........not tryin' to sound like an Alpha male but I'm just sayin'). It just never would go away so I finally went to the Doc at Belle Meade Dermatology. They shaved a dadgum sample off my shoulder with a razor blade that looked like Johnny Paycheck had just got through snorting a line of coke with (may the good Lord rest his soul). At any rate it was "hot"......or malignant. They scheduled me in to take the rest of it out.......5.75" by 2.5" by 1.25" deep!!! I was like doc......should I bring the ice cream scoop from home or will you take care of that? I mean it was a freakin' hunk. Anyway it put me out of work for the day and that is not rest............but I gave in. Back to it tomorrow and looking forward to it. I'll have a bum shoulder for 3 weeks but I'll manage. Besides......Wiley "Bo" Collier is at the helm.....can you say "atten-hut"?

Rectum-fied!

2007-10-25T09:48:00.000-04:00

Certain battle has been diverted......Apology and financial aid given for the fence gate debacle from the culprit.......everything has been rectum....ah, rectified. There will be no henge's stuffed up any ones butt by the folks at Martin's Bar-B-Que Joint.......but we still have an issue with them dropping product, i.e. meat that needs constant refrigeration in the the middle of lunch while we are at our busiest so there could be additional "colorful" stories to follow. We'll wait and see..........off to work.

Last week

2007-10-24T11:18:00.000-04:00

Last week ended up being a really good week. The week before was slow and I think that can be attributed to the fall break. This week I see being a little slower because of all the rain we are finally getting. Its getting tiring being at the mercy of school and weather. That is the price I'm paying for being in Nolensville. Lord willing when the opportunity arises for a second location it will be somewhere close to and/or more convenient to the metro Nashville area. Dresch got the uprights on the trailer this past week, its starting to really look good. Still got a ways to go but you can really see it coming together. I found my camera over the weekend so I'll get some pics of it posted in the next day or so. The IWC rep keeps showing up for deliveries in the middle of lunch rush which makes it impossible to check in inventory. Needless to say there have been some screw ups! Last Friday night we go out to put meat on and there was no brisket. Had to drive to Murfreesboro to pick some up from Jim-n-Nick's. Thanks Z for the meat and thanks Dave getting me hooked up with Z to get out of the jam. Then the IWC rep broke the gate to the fence yesterday and promptly left without letting us know anything. I mean the whole damn gate was laying on the ground off the henge's......I guess he thought to himself:
"Oh shit, I ripped the gate off the fence......ah no worries, they got a rush going on, by the time they find out they'll never know it was me"

Like Bo & I were going to come out and say:

"Gee Bo.....the gate......it musta just fell down"

I love my customers but Friday (we get deliveries on Tuesday & Friday) when I see that dadgum IWC truck pull in I dont care if its high noon and there are 400 people in line, I'm gonna walk out there and he can either pay me for the new henge's or there could be a fight. I've saved the old henge's in case he starts hemmin' & hawin' - I'll jam those damn things up his fat ass. I'm getting mad typing about it right now....I've got to quit.